Nail Art: Art Club Technicolor Doll

Art Club is known for making some of the best nail art polishes on the market. They're what you call 'striper' (not stripper, that's another post for another time) polishes. They're called that because they have a very long skinny brush instead of a normal polish brush and it's perfect for making stripes and other nail art.

Art Club just released the Technicolor Doll nail art kit to coincide with the release of Color Club's Electro Candy collection for summer. The kit includes:

5 Neon Stripers: Technicolor Doll, Psychedelic Dream, Paisley Paradise, Electric Universe, Cosmic Creature
2 jars of sprinkles: Aqua Charms, Fuchsia Charms
3 Self-Stick Decal Sheets: Floral Decal, Heart Decal and Swirl Decal.

They paid so much attention to detail on the packaging on this kit, it's absolutely beautiful. They even made a really pretty handle for it!



The model for the advertisement has such amazing makeup, too. I never remember to take a picture of the advertisement. She has neon yellow and green eyeshadow with black double-winged liquid liner. Gorgeous, I'm going to steal that look this week.


Anyway, there's the whole kit. Let's move on to the nail art.

Anyone can do this nail art, it's not difficult. The only extra equipment required will be black polish and a dotting tool if you want to do the dots.


Let's start off with something extra simple:




I love the combination of neon and black, it reminds me of the 90's. The 90's rocked.


If that design isn't interesting enough, you can spice it up a little bit with your dotting tool:



But if you're like me and want something a little more over the top, break out the sprinkles! I used Fuchsia Charms:



One interesting thing about the charms- if you peel one of them off after your polish has dried, it will leave a flower-shaped hole in your polish. It almost looks intentional, pretty cool actually.


Let's try another design with dots!



A simple, bright look with a base of Color Club Volt of Light.

Not colorful enough? Try adding more colors.



And one more very simple design:

This is neon pink and green, but it came out looking more like Christmas with snowflakes! So, hey, why not sport a Christmas manicure in April? This one used the Aqua Charms.


Now here's something a little more involved.

Marbling. It's really not difficult at all, you just need to work quickly because these neon colors dry very fast. Start with a base of a color you like and then add as many colors as you want to the nail. Take a toothpick or needle (I just used my small dotting tool) and swirl the colors around.

And now that we've seen abstract, let's go back to something more geometric.



In 1995 I had a coat that looked like this.

I also had one that looked like this.

Of course, those designs weren't awesome enough for me so I had to take it one step further...

I added one of the 'swirl' decals (looks more like a butterfly to me) to make it more interesting.

I took these pictures while the polish was still wet, so please excuse the weird thickness of the polish. It goes away when it dries, I promise.


I really love nail art. I wish I was able to do it more often!


The Art Club striper polishes are perfect. The polish is opaque, it dries quickly and the brushes are just the right firmness. Since this kit contains neon polishes, you will need a topcoat if you want them to look shiny. I used Seche Vite, but I bet the Color Club Vivid Color Intensifying topcoat would work well on these too.

Happy Easter!

Hey everyone, Happy Easter!

This isn't actually my Easter mani, but I'm not near a camera to take a picture of the real thing, and this looks pretty Easter-y to me!

It's actually a little preview of an upcoming series of posts I'm going to do about nail art.

I also wanted to let you know that I will be responding to emails and comments as soon as possible, I've been spending time with family over the holiday and haven't been able to respond.

Konad sale: 20% off and free shipping over $20

I know a couple other people are doing this right now, but in case you've missed out or haven't heard about it, you can get 20% off of Konad products at OCNailArt.com!

Just use the code 'scrangie' at checkout and you'll receive 20% off your order.

Another perk is free shipping over $20, and that includes INTERNATIONAL SHIPPING!!

I'll add this info in my sidebar so it's visible in case this post gets buried.

Use code scrangie at ocnailart.com for 20% off and free shipping over $20.


Here's a little inspiration, and I am making an effort to do more Konad posts. I have been working on doing a tutorial, but I just haven't gotten a chance to finish it!

Rihanna Smiley Face Nails!!!

OMG!

Look at this awesome picture of Rihanna I just saw on BellaSugar:



Smiley face nails! You may already know that Rihanna is one of the few celebrities I like because of her unique sense of style and complete creativity and fearlessness when it comes to her nails and makeup... Now I think I love her even more! (Even though I've never heard any of her music...)

She's one of us! How awesome!

Konad and Everything Zen Day

Enough bitching for now, how about something happy?

Here's a Konad design I did a couple days ago!




Nicole Black To The Future and Blues In The Night (I forget which hand is which) with two amazing Viva La Diva polishes which were a gift from the ever-lovely Sanna of MakeupMyLack and a Konad plate that I can't remember the number for. My memory seems to be failing me a lot lately!

If it looks beat up, smudged, chipped and ruined, that's because it is! I didn't think to take a picture of my mani until after I had gutted and carved pumpkins, which could be one of the ultimate manicure destroyers I've ever encountered.

Also, on a totally unrelated note, it was Gavin Rossdale's birrthday last week! You may be thinking, "Scrangie, why would care about it being Gavin Rossdale's birthday? " and the answer is, you don't! But I wanted an excuse to tell a story about some of the happier times in my life.

You see, I used to be the #1 crazed psychotic obsessed Bush fan, and every year I would celebrate each of the band members' birthdays.

One year, when I was in Junior High, my best friend and I skipped school on Gavin's birthday. We were walking around in a grocery store when we ran into one of our teachers- Mrs. Ammons- who was known for being a bit strict. Why she was shopping and not at school teaching, I have no idea. She saw us and we had to come up with a quick excuse for why we weren't in school. We told her that it was a religious holiday, so we took the day off school. What religious holiday falls on October 30th? Why, Everything Zen day, of course. Ah, those were the days.

While I'm not a crazed fan like I used to be, Gavin will still always have a special place in my heart. And I can still recite unlimited amounts of useless Bush trivia that no one but me thinks is interesting.

Ten Little Gavins feeling fine
One got too high and then there were nine

Nine little Gavins messing with fate
One fell off the stage and then there were eight

Eight little Gavins on their way to heaven
One got lost and then there were seven

Seven little Gavins in those Rolling Stone pix
I accidentally cut ones head off and then there were six

Six little Gavins trying to stage dive
One got attacked by mad chicks and then there were five

Five little Gavins repeating the line "I am a whore"
One got taken literally and then there were four

Four little Gavins playing with me
I must have been dreaming cause there were actually three

Three little Gavins playing a kazoo
One got sucked in and then there were two

Two little Gavins, what could be more fun?
One fell off the bed and then there was one

One little Gavin laying on my bed
When I entered the room, I dropped dead

Konad Of The Day

I have been feeling a little under the weather lately, and you've probably noticed that I've been neglecting my poor blog! I'm sort of taking a mini-break, I'm not spending much time online but I am checking my email periodically throughout the day. I'm still alive!

Anyway, I went to the doctor today, so I decided to do a really interesting manicure to cheer myself up. I wasn't able to get a good shot of it, but I did manage to get three crappy pictures of it to make up for that.


Flash, to show the holo.


More flash, not as washed out, but also not very clear. You can still see the holo!


Very dim natural light, but a clear picture. Can you believe it's snowing already?!

This is one coat of Wet N Wild Fantasy Makers Black Pearl with China Glaze OMG and Konad plate M63. It looks kinda marbled, doesn't it? I really love this! I think I'll use my Konad more, I feel bad for neglecting it.

So, that was my manicure of the day. See you soon!

More Nail Art with Art Club polishes.

First things first, I want to apologize for being so slow in responding to your comments. I'm not ignoring you and I will respond to each and every comment! I have been trying to spend less time on the internet... I love reading blogs and commenting and posting about nail polish and reading all your comments, but I can easily spend the ENTIRE DAY doing it... Addictive!


Now it's time for pics!

I've been playing around with some Art Club nail art polishes lately and trying to come up with interesting designs, but I keep coming back to the same type of design.




The past couple of month, I've been in the habit of wearing a different color or design on each hand. It gives me a chance to 'wear' more stuff. Is that weird? I have serious nail polish ADD.

In these two pictures, it's China Glaze Calypso Blue with Art Club Gold Hologram and Hologram Glitter. The thumbs have a little Pure Ice Heartbreaker. Heartbreaker is one of the best polishes in the entire world- it can make anything look better. It'd consider it a must-have for sure.



Here's the silver blurred a little to show you how cool the hologram glitter is. For some reason, only blurry pictures show the awesomeness of glitter. Hmm.


Here's a little closeup of Heartbreaker over Calypso Blue.




Here's me playing around with a bunch of Art Club polishes... Malmsy, Orchistra, Aquarius, Titania Gold. I'm not sure if I like any of these designs, but they were fun to do! I guess the stripes and polka dots are pretty cute...

And here's the mani I ruined to play with nail art:




I love this one. It's so cool, I think I'll do it again, but I can't remember the polishes I used! I know the orange is OPI Osaka To Me Orange, but I don't remember what the rest are. Oops!

I think I'm going to keep playing with nail art- Art Club polishes are perfect for creating designs and it makes it really fun and easy to experiment.

Some requests and some nail art.

I don't have a whole lot of time to post this morning, but I'm really behind on my requests and I wanted to make sure I got these posted!

Here are a couple reader requests:

(As always, click the images to view full size. These puppies are huge!)


Index to pinkie: OPI Parlez-Vous OPI?, China Glaze Who's Wearing What, China Glaze Channelesque, Pure Ice Taupe Drawer.

They all look really similar in the bottle, but they're much different than I expected when you apply them! And, in all my infinite wisdom (*snort*), I forgot to include OPI You Don't Know Jacques and Sephora By OPI Call Your Mother and Metro Chic in the comparison! D'oh.


Thumb: (left) OPI Tickle My France-y (right) Rescue Beauty Lounge Grunge
Index and middle: OPI Tickle My France-y
Ring and pinkie: Rescue Beauty Lounge Grunge

Another great request for a comparison I wouldn't have thought of myself! These look nearly identical in the bottles, but as you can see, they're quite different on the nail. Both are gorgeous, do I don't know if I'd ever be able to pick between the two!




Urban Decay Book Of Shadows.

The eyeshadows are excellent. Absinthe is the standout color, a very bright golden green with shimmer. No complaints there. The packaging, however, is really crappy. The eyeshadows are in a pull-out drawer that fits so tightly it's a struggle to open. You have to open it by a tiny little ribbon, and since you have to pull so hard to get the drawer open, I can imagine that delicate little ribbon getting torn off pretty easily.

The brushes are floppy and useless. Bah. And, my major irritation with this is the stupid "pop-up" top flap.... WTF are you supposed to do with that?? It doesn't stay open so you can't use it as a mirror.... It's just.... useless! They should have put the shadows up there instead of in the stupid drawer!

So, final verdict: Awesome shadows, crappy packaging.


Chanel Rouge Noir.

I tried taking the picture in a different part of the house, but I think the lighting turned out weird. Hm.


Chanel Tulipe Noire.

That's it as far as requests go- I'm working on a really big project right now, but I think it will help me respond to requests a lot quicker! I know a lot of you are still waiting on requests, but I didn't forget about you, I promise!


And, for fun, here's a little nail art.





China Glaze Gypsy Girl, China Glaze Fairy Dust, Art Club Black Hologram. This was a touch darker in real life, and it looked awesome. Sparkly and eye-catching!

For some reason I can never photograph reds. They always come out looking weird and too bright and glowy. Reds, oranges and neons. I don't know what it is! Argh.



China Glaze Blue Sparrow, China Glaze Emerald Sparkle and Art Club Black Hologram.

I really like this shape- it's not quite a french but it's not quite half-and-half either. I love the way this looks when the light catches it too- tons of sparkle.