swirled roses v 1.0

my first attempt at a new style of flowers. I scanned the tutorial out of the magazine but I haven't uploaded that. I'll get to it later. I've seen this done a few times in examples in the nail magazines I picked up but finally, one of the magazines had a simple photo tutorial to show how it's done. So here's my first attempt at it. I actually started out with the plain polish a few days before and then finally decided to add something fun ^_^

♥ duration: 15-20 mins (not including polish time.. while watching Apollo do qualification rounds on TV)

♥ colors/steps for polish:
▪ Orly Bonder
▪ base color: OPI's Italian Love Affair
▪ in addition, on one hand I did a second color coat using Winmax Pink Diamond polish to give it a bit of snowy glitter.

♥ colors/steps for flowers:
▪ 1 drop of white acrylic craft paint using a dotting tool where I want the roses to be.
▪ 2 smaller drop of magenta acrylic paint in the middle of each white drop. (purchased the magenta paint ages ago at Mitsuwa near the makeup section)
▪ Use a thin brush to gently swirl (not mix) the paint together. I went in both directions (CW and CCW) and if necessary, added a tiny amount extra of white or magenta paint depending on how the flower was looking.
▪ I'd recommend doing each nail one at a time so the paint won't dry out when you're trying to swirl the paint.
▪ paint green leaves with any green acrylic craft paint. (I use the green in one of this kiddie sets that's all stuck together. (something like the paint included in these things). I've probably had those sets for years and since I rarely open them, they're still usable.

silver and pink gradient

This one was so subtle in color that I was afraid it'd be impossible to see in photos. I think you can see the gradient, but I guess the naked eye view is much better, in my opinion.

The silver gradient was made using a nice translucent silver color (Out Of This World) I picked up from Walgreens :) (Sinful Colors polishes are around $2!). I found a gal who swatched it in her blog: laquerlaine - towards the end of the entry. I did read in laquerlaine's entry that Sinful Colors' formula isn't good. Well.. it's $2 so that's to be expected I guess.. But on the other hand, this polish was perfect for what I wanted to do. Granted, I didn't plan on making the polish to appear 100% opaque so it worked out just fine for what I had in mind. Another comment was that it chipped immediately. In total, there were 8 thin coats of polish on my tips by the time I finished.. and I kept the polish on for an entire week or more without chipping or barely even a worn corner. I'm just in the habit of changing my polish/pattern around once a week. This set did really well for me. (Can I get off my soapbox now?)

I hardly ever use bullion b/c to be honest, it's a pain in the arse to handle. It's tiny and you need to be patient enough to push them around to suit your desired shape. But it was cute for this and I figured 1 heart on each hand wasn't going to kill me :P

♥ duration: 40 mins

♥ colors/steps:
▪ Orly Bonder
▪ base color: OPI's Tutti Frutti Tonga + Winmax Diamond Nail Enamel #7 (pink diamond)
▪ tip gradient color: Sinful Colors' Out Of This World (4 thin, gradual coats) + Winmax Nail French #5 (french silver)
▪ Accessories: silver bullion from Vietnam. Don't ask me where I got those.. (about 5 yrs ago, my parents went back to VN and I asked them to just find some fun nail things and that's one of the items they returned with).
▪ Seche Vite on top

more photos:




below is a photo of the polishes I'd bought a few months ago. The pink on the far right is one of the base colors I used. And the silver (2nd from the right) is the last coat I used over the silver gradient.