Yay! My first nail tutorial! The lighting is a bit off because the photos were taken indoors ... at night. (for shame!) but in all honesty, the day light here has been pretty crummy and I've had three beautiful unposted manicures because I didn't have a sunny opportunity to take any photos. I'm getting kind of sick of letting my nice work go to waste! So I sucked it up and tried to make due with what I had. I did however post those three manis to my
instagram because I feel I can get away with a slightly lower quality of photos on a tiny screen. (Read : Indoors + at night.) Anyway, that was a really long drawn out apology for the lighting in these photos, it's my first try so here's to improving with each step! :)
♥Click the picture to enlarge it!♥
1. Paint your fingers with the base color of your choice. I chose "L'Oreal Walk in the Sand." Use the lighter color or the polish that is more sheer to paint the base if you don't want to sponge on layer after later. Let dry.
2. On a make up sponge paint a thin line of the darker color and next to it, a thin line of the base color. This will help the colors create an even gradient. I used Zoya "Louise" for my dark color. Talk about a dreamy brown.
3. Begin sponging the colors onto your nail with a side to side dabbing motion but dab slightly up and down too in order to blend the line between the light and dark polishes. Let dry and add a second coat, this time evening out the blending between the colors and to build up opacity if needed.
4. Grab a dotting tool and dip it in the base color.
5. Begin adding evenly spaced dots on the nail and put dots even where the base color is the same as the dot color, this helps to create the effect of the dots fading into the background.
6. Add a quick dry top coat to seal in your design and smooth out the sponge marks.
7. Clean up around your skin and cuticles with an eyeliner brush dipped in pure acetone, and now you're done!
Nail Tips: I use a latex sponge because it absorbs less polish creating less waste, but a non latex makeup sponge works well, too.
You can also easily reverse the gradient and have the tips be dark and fade into light closer to your cuticle. Just paint the same colors on a new sponge with your base color at the tip of the sponge and your accent color above it.
My fiancé told me it looked like dinosaur skin, which I guess is a compliment, dinosaurs are pretty freaking sweet. However, if you don't want dino fingers, try different colors! A blue and white would be beautiful for winter and would be reminiscent of falling snow or fun party colors could look like confetti! Be creative!
What do you think of this kind of picture tutorial? Is it helpful? Would you like to see more posts like this? Tell me in the comments! :)
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