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Monday, 23 April 2012

Monkey See Monkey Do Monday - Laser Tape Mani

Hi Goddesses  



Wow, what an exciting week!  Lots of people loved the MSMD idea and have joined us in our weekly challenge to convert our pinterest pins into reality.  If you want to join us, just click here.   And just become some of us use pinterest doesn't mean you have to - it's just an excuse to recreate any of the cool manis you've always fancied trying for yourself.



A word before we start, we are not here to steal anyone's thunder.  Our goal is to say "Kristen did an awesome mani, I loved it so much I tried it myself".   We want to source and credit every MSMD post we do, and if we don't know where it came from, we'll ask you to help us so that we can give credit where credit's due.



First - we have a cool logo - look!  Thanks to Emma at Manicurity for making him.  

So today, I'm going to show a laser mani I did a couple of weeks ago.  I've always loved this type of mani, and it's the main reason I got into its creator, Jane from Nailside (you may remember she was my 2nd favourite blogger of last year).  Here's a couple of examples of her brilliant versions - 



Now, mine isn't so accomplished, but there is ALWAYS something striking about these manis.   This is also a great one to try before you take your polish off.  I'm a big believer that you should experiment before you take your mani off - if it goes wrong, you were gonna take it off anyway!   Taping is something I've practiced quite a bit, and now I'm getting much better with it.  




This was a base of Dollish Polish We're Gonna Need A Bigger Boat, a gorgeous blue with copper flecks.  This made the PERFECT base for the taping - you want to make sure that what peeks out is either worth seeing (eg a holo) or provides a great contrast.




I would show you a photo of the tape I used, but it's "lost in the nail room".  What I would say, is that it's cheap, and it came from ebay - and we're talking £1 cheap.   Another VERY important thing - I ended up buying a couple of different width tapes.  I found the standard tape too thin for my huge claws, so I went up a size.  It's cheap enough that you can play around to find what you want.




When you paint over it, you need to make sure the polish you use is a 1 coater, because you have to take the tape off whilst the polish is still wet.  Matte polishes are excellent for this - they are thick, and you can tell when they are drying.  I used Zoya Savita, a gorgeous dark purple.  In the photos, you can see some shots of her au naturel, and then some with added top coat.  She's so pretty :)




There are lots of tutorials on how to do this, especially on Nailside's blog (you can read her tutorial here), and I would recommend you read them before you start, as you have to take the tape off in reverse order, so that the last strip on is the first strip off.  Also, only do them 1 nail at a time.




So there you go - I love it.  It's an especially cool look to create just before you take any holo polish off AND it will totally cover any tip wear.  Rejoice!



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