Polished Perfectionist Giveaway

If I had to name a manicure hero (that makes little sense, but let's go with it) one person immediately comes to mind: AmyGrace of Polished Perfectionist. Thanks to her excellent, nail care post, my nails have never looked better.  Well right now she is having a giveaway to celebrate the new year. Go over there right now to win the entire Hits No Olimpo collection.

New York Summer - Hot Purple and Wet N Wild - Believe Me, It's Real

Is today the greatest day ever or what? I just found a photo app of my dreams. Here's a shot taken and processed with Photo Toaster:

I generally have difficulty capturing complex, glitter polishes like this one. You can actually see the purple, accent glitter in there (or at least I can... I kind of have Spidey senses when it comes to photos). I was also able to adjust the white balance while fiddling with the tint/contrast and so much more... it's really worth a look and it's only a buck! I also like Diptic but it needs to be used in conjunction with a more powerful app like Photo Toaster:

As for the polish, I wanted to give this manicure more depth which is why I used Hot Purple as a base; it's a wonderful purple, jelly on its own. But I topped it with one coat of Believe Me, It's Real and it looks amazing and has a pseudo-duochrome thing going on.

Orly Nite Owl

This dry weather is not doing my skin any favors. Here's Orly Nite Owl. It's a great nude for my skin tone although it looks more brown in the bottle. It gives the same effect as nude pumps - it makes my fingers look long.

Wet N Wild - Night Glow

Halloween is right around the corner so I felt like I had precious little time to bust out this glow-in-the-dark nailpolish. I also have yet to try a herringbone manicure and I imagined this wonderful pattern full of contrast. Instead I got this:

Ugh - look at how dry my skin/cuticles are. This reminds me why I never break out the good camera for these things! In any case, the glow in the dark polish is very sheer. I should have laid down a white base before putting it on but I actually kind of like it this way. What really failed me is the mediocre black pattern (Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear in Black Out along with plate m63). This watery mess is a far cry from the sharp, opaque pattern I had in mind.

And here is the best shot I could take of the glow-in-the-dark action (and the reason why I broke out the good camera in the first place). It's crazy bright ya'll! I can't wait to go trick-or-treating - no one will notice how terrible this mani is in the dark!

Wet N Wild - I Heart Matte

The wait is finally over! Wet N Wild's much anticipated matte 8-pan palette has landed! I'm not sure whether this will eventually join the three, permanent 8-pan palettes but there was only one at my local Walgreens and it was cracked:

It was still sealed though so I got it anyway. There was no room to consider - there was a girl eyeing the display in front of me and I basically reached around her to snatch the last matte palette. I will try to fix it later with alcohol. Hype aside though, this palette could be better. As suspected, most of the shades exist in other palettes:

The white and green are from the Pride palette. I thought the blue would be similar to the one in Fly Me to the Moon, but FMttM was a bit darker and has a slight sheen. The browbone and crease shades on the right side are from the Vanity palette. The right eyelid shade looks similar to the one in Vanity but it's more peachy and a bit less brown. I can't find the purple in any of the palettes I own but it looks like the one in Dancing in the Clouds - from the Dreamweavers collection which I failed to track down.

So it's not super fantastic. On top of the dupes, I wish they didn't waste two of the pans for a matte white and a matte black.

Wet N Wild - Diamond in the Rough

From Wet N Wild's "Ice Baby" collection: Diamond in the Rough over two coats of Pure Ice Kiss Me Here.

The shimmer in this one is so dynamic, it kept confusing my camera phone and going in and out of focus. This one is packed with tiny, silver glitter as well as big, prismatic (holographic?) glitter. In an attempt to show you the rainbow goodness, here's a bokeh shot:

When Nouveau Cheap started an interactive map on this collection, I stalked it until a local Walgreens popped up. I feel lucky to have found the untouched display. They only stocked two of each color and I had to have one of each.

Don't you love awesome, drugstore brands? They make it easy to splurge without breaking the bank. I'm not looking forward to the day I have to take this off though. I know it'll take a good, acetone soaking to get all this glitter off.

Orly Fowl Play and Color Club Perfect Molten

Sorry for the tiny hiatus. I did a lot of cooking this week and it's more sanitary to go bare nails. I also gave my medium-length nails the chop. Rolling dumplings goes a lot more smoothly with short nails.

But I wrapped up my cooking endeavors just in time as my latest haul from Head2Toe Beauty arrived today.

When I first saw swatches of Orly Fowl Play, I knew I had to have it. It's what I wanted Nfu Oh 51 to be - smokier and more "glow from within" if that makes any sense. This is another one that is so difficult to capture. Here's a bad picture but it somewhat conveys the depth, sparkle and flakies:

Too beautiful. I really didn't want to stamp over it but I was anxious to try my new foils from Color Club. Perfect Molten is excellent for stamping - so crisp, clear and pigmented. The best  I have tried yet. I think I'll have to get the rest of the foils from this collection. I should take out my real camera because my phone isn't doing these colors justice. Perfect Molten is actually green and not silver.

For now, I am too lazy and can only maintain any semblance of a blog if I do it all on my phone.