Shark Week!

It's Shark Week on Discovery this week and while I have meant to do a themed mani for years now, I never got around to it.  But when I sat down to do my nails a couple nights ago, I thought tonight is the night; I'm doing it (well, that was after I spent the night before looking through all the plates to find theme appropriate plates and images...that probably took longer than to do these nails!).  Here's what I came up with!

Started with a sponged gradient using Zoya Blu, China Glaze Bahamian Escape, LA Girl Disco Brites Funkadelic and LA Girl Disco Brites Dance Studio.  I think this is one of the first times that I was able to do a quad gradient and you can actually see all the colours in the gradient.  Yay me!  Even on my shorties!  As a side note, the LA Girl Disco Brites worked really well for the gradient and what was good about them is that they are highly pigmented but thin so worked well for the gradient and the cleanup was easy and clean with no dark blue ring at the cuticle, if you know what I mean.  Even though I did use latex barrier, rightttt up against the cuticle still usually has polish and it removed easy peasy on the thumb as it was thin.  I hope I remember this for future gradients!

Topped with KBShimmer Clearly on Top.

It might not look like it, but this mani was a lot of work! I made a stamper decal for the index finger with the the top half of an image from Creative 51 after shrinking image using a really squishy stamper head.  I did try to double stamp it onto another stamper to correct the way it places like the stamping plate but that was a no go. Applied it to index, then stamped the lower portion of the nail with the wave image from Creative Shop 28 using MdU 3.  Middle image is from Creative Shop 85 again using MdU 3.  Stamped thumb using Painted Polish Stamped in Clay but it was too faint, so stamped on top (not quite a mirror image but I'll call it that anyway; it wasn't intention, just necessity to see it!) using an image from Creative Shop 02 and MdU 2.  On ring, stamped image from Cheeky CH38 using Painted Polish Stamped in Clay, then mirror stamped using same image using MdU 2.  Lastly, on pinky, stamped waves from Creative Shop 28 using MdU 3, then singled out an image from BFF 17 using Painted Polish Stamped in Clay, then mirror stamped using MdU 2.  For added interest, stamped birds twice on pinky using Painted Polish Stamped in Stone using image from Infinity 58.  I'm sorry I didn't do my step by step pictures as I usually do but hopefully you can appreciate that this mani took a long time do do as well as plan out, pick out stamping colours, etc. and it was 1:30 amish when I finished so it was late and I just wanted to get it done so picture taking took a back seat, sorry.  Oh, and I also spent some time setting up new lighting and then I tried 3 different lighting areas each time I did take pictures so that took some time too, in my attempt to get better images and less lobstery looking hands!  I swear, my hands do not seem this red in real life lol!

BFF 17

Creative Shop 85.  There's also another shark image on this plate but it was too cartoonish for the look I was going for but maybe another time, I'll use it.

Creative Shop 51

Bundle Monster BM-503 (even though I didn't end up using it, it might be used for reference if someone is looking for shark images).

Topped with KBShimmer Clearly on Top to finish.

I haven't watched Shark Week every night this week but have seen some of the shows; notwithstanding this, I do have a great interest in general of shows involving sharks (and whales, orcas and marine life in general) and have watched my fair share of shows in the past.  One thing is for sure; I certainly do hope I never encounter one in the wild!

Thanks for looking...and enjoy the rest of Shark Week!

Digit-al Dozen Does Birthday's: April 2017

Today, we are celebrating Digit-al Dozen birthdays for April; this month, Uma at Uma's Nail Art and Katherine Marie at ProcrastiNails both celebrated birthdays; this is the mani I did based on the photo they picked for inspiration.  Happy Birthday, Uma an Katherine Marie!

Inspiration photo.

Started with a base of one coat of Enchanted Polish Opals & Cream.

I thought the iridescent glitters in the Enchanted Opals would give that oil slick kinda look in the bubbles so used them for a radial gradient.  Used Enchanted Opals & Cream, Opal Lagoon, Opal Nectar and Candied Opal.  In hindsight, I wish I had have  done the base a little darker but these polishes are fairly goopy and not that opaque so I had had enough with doing sponging even to get them to this opacity.

They didn't quite give enough of the iridescent look I was going for so added two coats of Colorama Blazes of Crystal.  I probably should have sponged on the flakies but didn't think of it at the time.

Added a coat of KBShimmer Clearly on Top before stamping. (Unfortunately, between my hands not being steady enough and so much going on in the polishes, my camera had a hard time focusing so I took a lot of pix and have quite a few to share in my attempt to show how cool this base really was.  It is sooooo much cooler than my pix portray!)

Stamped using an image from Creative Shop 02 using FunkyFingers Gesso.

Topped with KBShimmer to finish.

The next morning, I took these pix outside; they show the flakies a little better.

Then added a coat of OPI matte, again, hoping to show the magic of the flakies.

Topped it again with KBShimmer, then headed to work.

While I was sitting in the drive thru at Tim Hortons, I looked down at my nails and thought hmm, the flakies are looking good in this lighting, so grabbed a couple pix while I was waiting.  I think these were the best pix but excuse the awkward hand pose!

Flakiesssssssss!

Uma and Katherine Marie, hope your birthday's were fabulous!

Here's the other ladies mani's!

An InLinkz Link-up

Thanks for looking!