Harry Potter (Slytherin) Themed Franken Collection

Left to Right: Emerald Encrusted Assets, Avada Kedavra, Malfoiled

Left to Right: Crabbe & Goyle's Death Burger Deluxe with Cheese, Nagini, Dead As A Dumble-Dorenail

I made all six of these in one evening. I had been gearing up for frankening and my manglaze franken juggs package arrived on Saturday. My favorite is Emerald Encrusted Assets, though Dead As A Dumble-Dorenail looks better in person (and it's my favorite OPI-esque name). I split the Malfoiled franken between two jugs (because it was super thick. You see, it was perfect until I went and added Green Sparks! mineral pigment from TKB and the franken immediately turned into a gel/paste. DO NOT RECOMMEND these for frankens) and added more clear to the Malfoiled and black to make the Avada Kadavra. I made Nagini by splitting the Dumble-Dore Nail between two jugs and adding NYS Amaranth. Some of these turned out great texture wise, but Malfoiled and the two Vintage Leaf Glitter heavy ones (Dumble-Dore Nail and Nagini) where a gooey bear to work with. All of the following swatches are three coats and topped with Seche Vite. These photos were taken indoors with an artificial light source. Now I have to decide which of these to wear with my Draco Malfoy halloween costume...


Avada Kedavra

1/2 bottle of Wet n Wild Wild Shine Toast
1/6 bottle of Wet n Wild Wild Shine Clear
1/4 bottle of Wet n Wild Wild Shine Black Creme
1/4 tsp Apple Green Pop Pigment from TKB
1/8 tsp MAC pigment in Green Brown
+ some Green Sparks! mineral pigment from TKB
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Crabbe & Goyle's Death Burger Deluxe with Cheese

1 bottle of Wet n Wild Wild Shine Clear
1/2 tsp Martha Stewart Nephrite Glitter
1/2 tsp Martha Stewart Peridot Glitter
1/2 tsp Martha Stewart Sterling Glitter
2/3 bottle of Wet n Wild Wild Shine Confetti
Special Note:
The amount of clear polish I put in this franken means the glitter won't stay suspended and the nephrite glitter bled into the base and turned it black after I took these pictures. I don't know if the glitter would have bled if I had only used Confetti base, but the glitter would probably not sink to the bottom. The glitter did not appear to bleed into the silver foil based polishes I made.
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Dead As A Dumble-Dorenail

1/2 bottle Hard Candy Trailer Trash
1/2 bottle of Wet n Wild Wild Shine Clear
1/4 tsp Martha Stewart Olivine Vintage Leaf Glitter
3/4 tsp Martha Stewart Verdalite Vintage Leaf Glitter
1/4 tsp Martha Stewart Nephrite Glitter
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Emerald Encrusted Assets

1 bottle of Wet n Wild Wild Shine Confetti
1/3 bottle of Wet n Wild Wild Shine Clear
1/4 bottle Wet n Wild Craze Morbid
1 tsp Martha Stewart Sterling Glitter
1 tsp Martha Stewart Sterling Vintage Leaf Glitter
1/4 tsp MAC pigment in Emerald Green
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Malfoiled

1/2 bottle of Wet n Wild Wild Shine Toast
1/6 bottle of Wet n Wild Wild Shine Clear
1/4 tsp Apple Green Pop Pigment from TKB
1/8 tsp MAC pigment in Green Brown
+ some Green Sparks! mineral pigment from TKB
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Nagini

1/2 bottle Hard Candy Trailer Trash
1 bottle of Wet n Wild Wild Shine Clear
1/4 bottle New York Summer Amaranth
1/4 tsp Martha Stewart Olivine Vintage Leaf Glitter
3/4 tsp Martha Stewart Verdalite Vintage Leaf Glitter
1/4 tsp Martha Stewart Nephrite Glitter

The A-pa-calypse Continues!

More of the pa swatches. Same drill. Three, two, and one coats descending from top to bottom of each pic. Photos taken indoors with an artificial light source.

pa A109



pa A32



pa A86



pa A83



pa A81



pa A72

Hard Candy Walmart Halloween LE

I happened to run into the three new Hard Candy Walmart Halloween bottles - Wicked, Zombie, and Mischief, when I spotted a Walmart off the freeway in SGV and made a quick detour. These polishes are a little thick and goopy, but didn't really give too many application problems and they have pretty good coverage. All of these swatches are three coats.

Wicked

Mischief

Zombie


Comparisons:
Mischief is a pretty generic shade, I have more than five black loaded with silver glitter, so I picked the ones with denser glitter for comparison.


Wicked is a bright orange glitter loaded into a greenish sheer black base. It's pretty similar to China Glaze Ick-A-Bod-Y from their current halloween collection (Awakening 2010) but the glitter is a little brighter and more dense.


Zombie had two dupes right there at Walmart. Pure Ice Cheatin and Nicole by OPI Gone Wishin. I couldn't bring myself to buy three identical bottles, but i did get the cheaper Cheatin to do a comparison. Cheatin is pretty much the same, but much less dense. It would take several extra coats to build to the same opacity as the Hard Candy.


These pictures were all taken indoors with an artificial light source.

The A-pa-calypse Begins!

Let's pause for a commercial break...

Hyaku Retsu Harite!

So, my special experimental mission for the month of Rocktober: to swatch and photograph all of my pa nail polishes. I have 37, so in order to complete this in a timely manner, I have not done post polishing cleanup and have a horrifying glitter battlefield littering my fingers on some of these swatches. I apologize in advance. I swatched all of these polishes with three coats on the ring finger, two on the middle finger, and one on the pointer finger and with no base or top coats. Here is the first batch in no particular order:

pa A67



pa A45



pa A44



pa A34



pa A32



pa A9



I have purchased my pa collection from orangelighthouse.com - which I believe no longer exists, the lovely country of Japan (Yodobashi Camera in Osaka), Japanese markets in SoCal - Mitsuwa and Marukai, Palace bs in the Koreatown Galleria, and finally Cosmeland in Puente Hills Mall - which had the best selection I have seen stateside.
All of these photos were taken indoors with an artificial light source. The intro photos were taken during a Sumo Tournament at the Ryogoku Kokugikan in Tokyo this May (it was awesome and had way better food than a baseball game over here).
More pa to come!

A Tale of Two Purples

The first purple on the docket is Finger Paints Passionate Purple from the 2010 Love At First Bright collection at Sally Beauty Supply. This polish photographed way more blue than the polish actually appears. The last photo is the most color accurate, but this is an almost iridescent dusty purple shimmer. It's a one coater, but I did two.
This mani is one coat Nubar Nu Nails, two coats of polish, and one coat of Nubar Diamont.




This next one is technically two purples. I took two coats of the sheer jelly Lippmann Call Me Irresponsible, which is described on Lippmann's site as a vivacious violet creme. *shrug* I think it takes like 4 coats to build up to bottle color, so I decided instead to layer my new Butter London Jelly Stroppy that I bought on Revolve Clothing for less than retail with a code and free shipping.
This mani is one coat Nubar Nu Nails, two coats of Lippmann CMI, two coats of BL Stroppy, and one coat of Nubar Diamont.
+



All photos are taken indoors with an artifical light source.

China Glaze Glitter Skittles

All of these skittles are from the Specialty Collection of 50 glitters, shimmers, and cremes released a little more than a year ago (with the exception of 5 Golden Rings, which is from the ChG Holiday 2009 collection China Glaze Loves You Snow Much). They are all three coats over Nubar Nu Nails and topped with Nubar Diamont and a coat of Seche Vite (since glitters are bumpy more topcoat helps to smooth out the nail surface).


Thumb to Pinky:
Nova, Cleopatra, Medallion, Shooting Stars, Techno


Thumb to Pinky:
5 Golden Rings, Stellar, Ginger, Silver Lining, Goddess