Today I thought I would take a look back and share with you the reason I decided to start a blog instead of just my facebook page. As some of you may know I started my page in March of 2011. I was just looking for someplace to share my nail art creations. Up until then I was sharing pictures on my personal page and people were starting to make comments about it, and not in a good way. So Lustrous Lacquer was born. At that time I had no intentions of doing a full-blown blog, I just wanted to share my pretty pictures.
But as time went on I found myself struggling with how to create certain looks. I would watch video after video on YouTube trying to gain some insight or a miracle trick to get my nail art just right. One stroke flowers, dry marbling, needle dragging. you name it I was watching videos on it.
One of the techniques that I struggled with for quite some time was gradients. I was never happy with the way the polishes blended together. The line was too harsh and looked off. So I started watching videos on how to do them. I discovered there were several ways to get this look. Now I just needed to figure out which way worked best for me. And I thought maybe someone else could benefit from my experimenting so I made my first "tutorial".
After posting it to my page, I realized that it was an awful lot of information for just one picture. I also liked the thought that maybe I was helping someone else who had struggled with the same thing.
So in November of 2012, I jumped in and started my blog. Ironically I never posted my gradient experiment on my blog. And I've been struggling lately with ideas about fun, creative ideas for a post. I figured going back to the reasons I started this blog was a good way to get myself back on track. Now please bear with me on this, my '"tutorial" has a lot of growing up to do.
"There are a few ways to do a gradient nail design. I decided to see which one worked best for me. My pointer finger is done in the manner that I usually try and am never happy with. I start with a base coat. For this, I used CG Sea Spray. Then I add a drop of polish (for this I used CG Man Hunt) to my wax paper and tried to blend the color down the nail starting at the tip. The next step is to add a drop of my base color to the wax paper and work my way up the nail trying to blend the line where the colors meet.
For my middle finger I applied my polish to the sponge, dabbed a little off on my wax paper and then dabbed the sponge onto my nail.
And finally, on my pinkie finger, I painted the polish on the wax paper, leaving a small gap between the colors. I used a toothpick to blend the colors in the middle and, then dipped my sponge into the color. Then I placed the sponge onto my nail. All 3 fingers are finished off with a coat of Seche Vite."
I thought this was genius back then. Looking at it now it makes me cringe a little but the message it still good. Plus it did help me figure out what technique worked best for me. I do a variation of the middle finger technique and my gradients are better than ever. Basically, instead of dabbing the extra polish off on the wax paper I dab it onto my nail several times to blend the colors. So what do my gradients look like now? Take a look!
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| Photo was taken with my cell phone for IG. Please excuse the less than stellar quality |
I've recently noticed that I like to use blue for my gradients...might have to work on mixing that up a bit. Thanks for taking this walk down memory lane with me. I hope some of you found this little comparison helpful. I want to get back into doing posts like this so if you have a technique you've been struggling with let me know and I'll see if I can break it down and make it easier. Thanks for stopping by and Happy Polishing!
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