Jafar

***sorry this post is late, my wordpress just broke! I wasn’t able to post this at all on either of my two browsers…apparently only chrome will work. Go figure. Hopefully chrome keeps working so I can keep posting, but it has been a painful day!***

So Jafar? Coolest villain outfit. It’s dark and creepy with lots of gold and red. Also his facial hair is EPIC. That said, it was darn difficult to paint!

Most versions of Jafar that I could find used in nail art were either too simple, too complex (I cannot paint faces) or just boring. So, I mostly made this up!

My pinky is supposed to be Jafar’s body, but since he is super freaky skinny, it mostly just looks like a weird hourglass? My ring finger has his hat, and the beginning of his awesome red feather. The middle finger is supposed to be his snake staff, but my snake-skin stamp was misbehaving. Pointer is the top of Jafar’s outfit and his awesome beard. The thumbs it intended to be a VERY stylized Iago, the obnoxious parrot.

Here, again, I did not write down which polishes I was using as I painted! I can guess at most of them, but I don’t know if it matters. Let me know if there are any ones you are curious about.

Out of all the Disney manis I have geared up and planned, only this one and the 101 Dalmatians one had better heroes/princesses than villains! All the other manis, the villains look a lot better. You can tell where my loyalty lies! Hope you enjoyed!

Princess Jasmine

This mani was painted just after I bought my newest brown (aka back in May), which I decided was perfect for Jasmine’s skin. I think this was the first complete villains + heroes mani I did, the ones I did before this were either villains only or heroes only (and I completed the set later on).

As last time, this time, with 101 Dalmatians and Cruella daVille I am starting with the “heroes” mani for the movie Aladdin. Obviously, the focus is on Princess Jasmine: her outfit (pointer and pinky) and her hair (ring finger). I got to use one of my favorite techniques again (stamping over an awesome metallic pattern) on my middle finger to make Raja the tiger, and my thumb is the Sultan’s feathered hat.

Some of the colors aren’t 100% accurate to the movie, for example Raja in the movie is just orange, but I figured artistic liberties would be acceptable 😀 Unfortunately, I did not write down which colors I used! I know the magnetic polish and the brown, but I can only guess at the others. I own just a few too many similarly-toned blue/teal polishes! Oops.

In retrospect, it might have been fun to include Aladdin’s fez or outfit, but I think I am sticking to mostly princesses and their side-kicks, rather than including the male heroes in these manicures. It just seems more feminist (and they tend to wear clothing that translates to nail art better).

Hope you enjoyed! Stay tuned for Jafar!

Subtle Patina

This ended up looking like a pretty pattern with a patina over it! Like, copper underneath (hence the flecks of gold) and then rusted. I don’t know, maybe thats too poetic?

Although this was painted for and worn to the hospital, I think it is pretty enough (and not pink!) to count as just a regular mani. Despite how subtle it is, I actually really like it! For once, adding dots was actually the right move :-p

I need to remember to use the random full-design square plates I have more often when I am low on time, enjoy the randomness of the pattern that ends up on my nails.

I also need to keep reminding myself that pastel of just about any color should be acceptable in the hospital, no need to limit myself to pink! Or purple. Mint is a current favorite nail color of mine so I’ll keep trying to work it in 😀

Colors
~ Grey: Cadillacquer – Memory Palace
~ Teal: Zoya – Tiana
~ Gold: Essie – Good as Gold
~ Stamp: BM – S101

That’s all for today…but the later part of this week is another Disney heroes and villains set-up!

Starswirl

So, I painted my nails with yet ANOTHER new multichrome (I need to stop buying them!!) from ILNP…and then I was stumped. Do I do something bold and shocking? Something subtle? Freehand? Stamping? Decision paralysis!

Then I realized that my nails are JUST short enough to use only half of one of my stamping plates. Now, this plate has a lot of cool designs that are meant to be centered, but I honestly like thinks that start at the edges of my nails better. So voila!

After that it was easy: tone-on-tone (as much as possible for a crazy multichrome) and maybe a little 3D bit? Sure!

The base color is Greatness by ILNP. Greatness is primarily a red-leaning pink, that shifts strongly to orange-gold and then green-gold at sharp angles. The bottle also shows hints of blue, but that does not carry through onto the nail. It is not the shiftiest polish that I own, but it it still quite stunning! A little more subtle than some of the others, but that might just be because pink-gold is less ridiculous than teal-purple.

I actually ended up wearing this polish for A WHOLE DAY without any art over it. That never happens! Shifty goodness. I do like the art though :-D. The 3D bit is actually a rhinestone that I covered with another multichrome polish just for a tiny bit of contrast (and because the original gold of the rhinestone stood out too much for my tastes).

Colors:
~ Pink-gold multichrome: ILNP – Greatness
~ Magenta creme: Zoya – Veronica
~ Red-gold multichrome: Born Pretty – 212
~ Stamp: BP – L050

I should take all my similarly-colored multichromes and paint one on each nail for comparison at some point. Maybe then I can convince myself I have enough? Unlikely! Hope you enjoyed!

Glittering Turtle

I painted my nails blue…and then got stuck. What to do with blue nails? There were SO MANY OPTIONS. So, I turned to one of the queens of nail art, and tried to loosely duplicate a mani 😀

I started off trying to re-create the sea turtle mani by yagala, but got sidetracked. I used stamps instead of free handing…and then decided that if I was going to be wearing gloves over this mani (which I will be, yay for lab work!), that I should probably steer clear of lots of 3D bits. So I added a glittery topper. And then some silver. And I kinda just had fun with it!

The base color is Over the Moon by Color Club, one of the famed halo hues polishes. I bought it to replace Nfu Oh 065, which has dried to an unusable glop despite being over half full. I have to say though, I am not disappointed in Over the Moon! I used two thin coats here, but I probably could have gotten away with one. The polish is ever so slightly thick, but not hard to work with. And it is holo-y as ANYTHING. Oh my god.

I need to convince myself not to go hunting for the rest of the halo hues polishes…so far I only own this blue one and the silver (Harp On It). And they are both amazing! Gah.

Colors
~ Blue: Color Club – Over the Moon
~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White
~ White/silver glitter: whim – Frosted Cupcake
~ Silver: Revlon – Metallic
~ Stamp: hehe – 012

Hope you enjoyed the jaunt under the sea! Even if my poor turtle is a tiny bit disproportionate. Whoops!

Roses on Red

Not infrequently, I get my inspiration for my manicure from the name of the polish I decide to wear. This is one of those times!

I knew I wanted to wear red, so I grabbed an elegant looking shimmery red from my collection, and went with it. The polish just happened to be called Rosebower, so when I was stumped as to what to do with the mani, I just went ahead and added golden roses!

Of course, random blobs of gold polish do not much resemble roses, so I added black borders, and then some black background pattern (leaves? brambles? who knows!). The end result was a bit elegant and a bit wonky, but I like it!

Colors:

~ Red: A England – Rosebower

~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black

~ Gold: Essie – Good as Gold

I have so many fun glittery polishes that I’ve only worn once or twice…I wish I could make myself stop buying polish and just have fun wearing the ones I already own! Hope you enjoyed.

Lit Up Neon

COLOR. Oh my gosh you guys I AM SO EXCITED. I wore these when I went to San Francisco for my first vacation after hospital time! Also for my birthday :-p

I was trying to recreate a gradient from ilaeti but I think I need more blue! I love how the colors came out though, so I imagine I will be trying again…and this time showing a gradient-only photo, it was so pretty! Don’t get me wrong, I like the stamping, but that gradient.

I wish my nails were longer, the hint of neon green you can see at the tip of my thumb made me happy.

Colors:

~ White: Sinful Colors – Snow me White

~ Blue: Zoya – Rocky

~ Purple: Sephora X – Ignition

~ Pink: WOW – #371

~ Yellow: Love & Beauty – Yellow

~ Black: Sinful Colors – Black on Black

~ Stamp: B Loves Plates – 03 Mind Blown

That’s all! More colors and fun designs next week. I am so happy I had a least a month to wear whatever I wanted on my nails! Residency is going to be painful if I need to keep my nails ‘tame’. Although I have a sneaking suspicion that I won’t have time for nail art, just color and a stamp if I’m lucky. I don’t know whats going to happen to the blog next year. Yikes…