Showing posts with label piCture pOlish Honeydew. Show all posts
Showing posts with label piCture pOlish Honeydew. Show all posts

Tuesday, 13 August 2013

Digit-al Dozen DOES Fashion .... Neon Camouflage

Hi Goddesses



Today I have some neon camouflage for you.  Apparently it's the new "thing", very trendy.  Even SJP is wearing it, so it must be lol.




Camo is such an easy design to do, and it's also one of my favourite types - there is no right or wrong, there just IS.   



For mine, we have OPI My Vampire Is Buff on base, and then for the greens I used piCture pOlish Honeydew, ILNP Green Goblin and China Glaze I'm With The Lifeguard.



I use a narrow dotting tool when I am doing this type of design.  I find them really good for dragging a puddle of polish into random shapes.




The only caution with this design is doing your colours in the right order, as the colour you do last is going to carry more weight.  You'll see that I finished with Green Goblin as it was the more traditional camo colour, and also because I wanted the neon to blend a little.



Finally, I added OPI Matte Top Coat, and instantly it looked like material!  Enjoy xx



Saturday, 3 August 2013

How To ... Freehand Roses - Tutorial for International Nail Art Day

Hi Goddesses



Today is International Nail Art Day - how cool is that?  Loads of bloggers are taking part, and you can join in too.  Second thought - there's a nail art day but there's still no Crumpet Day?  How wrong is that!



Lol.  This last week on the blog has been dominated by my entry for this year's piCture pOlish BlogFest.    And what did almost all of those posts have in common?  Roses.  And that's what today's How To is all about.



Now, before we start, can I just say - these are mega easy!  I was intimidated for months, but seriously, there is no need to be.  They may look difficult, but they really are not, and trust me, once you start, you will not be able to stop lol!


Things You Will Need
* a base polish
* a colour for your roses, and a colour for your petals.  The petal colour should be a couple of tones lighter or darker than your rose colour.  In this tutorial, I mixed my colours for my petals, but usually, I don't do that, so please don't feel it has to be that complicated
* a colour for your petals.  Again, I have mixed my colours, but that's only because I have used what I used for the piCture pOlish roses.  Usually I use a dark green acrylic paint.  Polishwise, any dark or medium green will work.
* a large dotting tool
* a small nail art brush or thin dotting tool
* a blobbing mat
* top coat
* clean up materials


Ready?

Step 1



Paint your nail with your base colour.  I have used a white.


Step 2


With your large dotting tool, create the outline of your rose.  The dotting tool really helps you here.  You are trying to create a lumpy circle, so take advantage of the irregular edges the dotter will give you.  NOTE - you are not dotting your rose on, you are using the tool to draw an outline, the way you would with a brush.  The trick is to really get a good blob on that dotting tool!


Step 3


Colour in your rose.


Step 4



Add your petals.  Because the piCture pOlish challenge was about only using 3 colours, I mixed Beige and Wisteria to create my petal colour.


With a thin nail art brush or thin dotting tool, create your first 2 strokes.  I create a shape that's a bit like an apostrophe and a comma - they sit side by side, sort of interlock, but don't touch.


Step 5



Create the rest of your petals.   Just go round, adding extra loops.  Irregularity works well.  As you move out from the centre of the rose, try to create your petal out of line with the previous row of petals, so that they don't all stack up in neat rows.


Step 6


Add your leaves, first with a triangle shape.


Usually, you would just use a green paint or polish here.  Again, to comply with the pp rules, I mixed Wisteria and Honeydew.


Step 7




Colour in your leaves.


Step 8


Add top coat.


See, not difficult at all, is it ?  Create random blob shaped things?  We can do that!  Draw commas and apostrophes?  We can do that too!   It's the petals that intimidated me, but really, easy as peasy :)


Quick recap - and enjoy!  xx


Friday, 2 August 2013

piCture pOlish - There Was A Number 5 ??!!! Skittle ...

Hi Goddesses



Yay it's the weekend!!!  And it can't come soon enough.  I have a lot of nail polish planned for the next 2 days, as well as preparing some of the posts that take a bit more writing.




Today sees the final mani that I did for BlogFest and I thought it was a winner .... until I didn't lol.   I like the elements of this mani, but I think I was too aware of how short my nails were!




This all started with the little finger.  Originally I painted my nails each of my 3 shades - Beige, Wisteria, Honeydew - and dotted flowers on 4 nails.  On the ring finger I did the "reed" design you still see.




There was something charming yet babyish about those dots, so off they came, and on went the roses again, this time with more effort on trying to retain the saran wrap texture.




For variety, and to break the beigeyness, I painted the index finger purple with Wisteria, and did another version of the reeds on it.




I loved this mani and yet I didn't, which seems to be the unique characteristic of ALL the BlogFest manis I did (with the exception of the one that broke the rules).   Looking back over this week, I still don't know if I posted the best one as my official mani.  What do you think?


Enjoy your weekend xx :)

Thursday, 1 August 2013

piCture pOlish Trauma - The War of The Roses

Hi Goddesses



How's your week going?  I am overjoyed it is Thursday.  That means only 1 more day til the weekend, 2 more days at work, and then 12 days off!  Yippeeee ... I wonder what I'll do with all the spare time?  Hmmmm ....



Today's post is at the heart of my trauma with the piCture pOlish BlogFest experience.   From the moment I received my colours - Beige, Honeydew (green) and Wisteria (purple) - all I could see in my head was roses.  I resisted as I thought it was a bit obvious, but caved in the end, and created a STUNNING mani, possibly my best ever.  And then realised I had used green acrylic paint for the leaves.  Which was verboten.  So I had to scrap it.  Traumatic times, especially as my green was too pale to mix with black, for a similar effect.




So, back to the drawing board it was, and these 2 manis are the result.  I liked them both, but in the end picked neither - probably because I just couldn't decide which I preferred.




Both are the same mani - it's just that one version has a couple of extra steps.




I stated with the Honeydew, and then did a saran wrap with Beige to create a paler green base, so that there would at least be *some* contrast when I used my green again.   I really loved the base, but for reasons I'll explain, it's only really visible in this version of the mani.




I then did my roses with a large dotting tool, and mixed Wisteria with the Beige to create the milkier purple you see for the petals.   This is the point I stopped at, and I did like this version, especially the texture (both of the saran wrap and the lack of top coat), but all I could see was the absence of leaves .....





So I added leaves.  This time I mixed Honeydew and Wisteria to create an off green colour that looked ok for a leaf lol.  And top coated.




And whilst I ALSO like this version, I mourn the fact that it doesn't contain the texture of the other version.  This ultimately, is why neither got used - I liked some aspects of one, and some aspects of the other, but didn't love either in its entirety :(




I've got a rose tutorial coming up at the weekend (and they are shockingly easy to do), and I leave you with this, the mani that could not be used ..... sniff .... (you'll get to see more of it for a guest post on an awesome blog soon).



Enjoy - tomorrow is the skittle I did!  xx  

Oh and Lisa N ??  Thanks for being such a loyal follower and commenter, my sweet xx

Wednesday, 31 July 2013

piCture pOlish - Take 3 - Polka Dots

Hi Goddesses



And welcome to another chapter in the saga of piCture pOlish BlogFest lol.  Today's post is some really unsuccessful polka dots I did :(





Polka dots, I think, are the most popular nail art style out there.  Post them on a blog, or pinterest, and everything goes ker-AY-zeeee.  They're cheerful, easy to do, and just look effortless, so where did this one go wrong?




Well, not in the colours.  The 3 colours provided the perfect colour scheme, and whilst the dots may have popped more with brighter colours, the odds WERE in their favour for this mani.




The struggle comes with the size of the biggest dot, and this is where these amazing polishes (possibly combined with the heat) failed.   I just couldn't get a big enough blob on my largest dotting tool, which then makes the pattern kind of .... well, puny.




The PP polishes are great, don't get me wrong, but they are rather thick.  Usually, when you pull the wand out of the bottle, a nice big juicy drip falls off the brush, but that was not my experience here.  This made it difficult to create a good sized blob on my blobbing mat, plus the heat and my fan dried said blob really quickly (would have REALLY helped if I were doing a sugar spun mani though lol).




So, disappointed.  Dots should have worked so well, but didn't.  Hey ho.   Tomorrow, we have The War of The Roses, and the nub of all my BlogFest pain.


Enjoy xx :)
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