piCture pOlish - Hope

piCture pOlish Hope! This is another collaboration shade for piCture pOlish, this time with french blog Vernis en Folie.
It's a dark blue jelly with scattered holo and a few pieces of blue hex glitter mixed in which I love as it sets the polish apart from other scattered holos. Opacity is great as with all piCture pOlishes I've tried. This is two coats. For the accent nail, I used some regular blue rhinestones and round gold studs from the Born Pretty Store.

Isn't it so pretty? It's got amazing dimension to it.

piCture pOlish can be purchased directly from their website - picturepolish.com.au. They do international shipping. You can also purchase it at various etailers throughout the world. Check out their Network page for more info. You can keep updated on any piCture pOlish news via their Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

*The product featured  in this post was sent to me for review.

 

Holo Day: Speciallita HITS Dionisio

Today I have swatches of the lovely Dionisio from the Speciallita Hits No Olimpo collection. It's a gorgeous grape purple linear holo. Although I don't find the holo effect of these No Olimpo polishes as evident and strong as the newer Jade Holographics, the holo effect is still very good considering both these pictures are indoors and not in direct sunlight!
The formula is really good as well although since this collection was launched, various companies have ensured that their holo formulas have become better and better. Too bad these polishes have every chemical known in the book and aren't 3-free.

 These Speciallita Hits polishes are available through Llarowe for $8 I believe but I got this one in a swap.

My Fall Polishes: A-England St.George

My autumn/ winter polish picks wouldn't be complete without an A-England beauty. This is St. George, my favourite from "The Legend" collection which has often been called "teal perfection"! The smallest scattered holographic particles are mesmerising and it's smooth, buttery formula make this polish a dream to work with.

The consistency is so perfect, I didn't even have to do any clean-up. It's pretty much a one-coater if applied carefully and thickly enough. I can easily run out of positive adjectives to describe this polish, those of you who have tried Adina's holos know what I'm talking about.

Layla - Ocean Rush

For as much as I love them, I hardly ever use my holos, even in the summer because it's so hard to actually get a sunny day to coincide with me having the time to paint my nails. As strange as that sounds, it's painfully true. So I was quite impressed when a friend from Instagram told me she swatches her holos at night, under her lamp as she does with any other polish and the holo effect still shows as vividly.

I can't say if this is the case for every brand (I will most definitely put it to the test) but it's definitely true of this Layla Hologram Effect. I was so impressed the linear holo effect shows indoors under my lamp, hmmm, why didn't I think of that before? It makes sense!

I wore Ocean Rush with no base coat as I don't own any holo-compatible base coats and it was quite tricky to apply. Nothing too bad that a second coat didn't fix. I was also afraid a top coat would kill the linear holo effect but it didn't seem to make a difference (at least with the top coat I used, CND Speedy).

I tried adding some sort of nail art over it but gave up after a while and just added some silver chevron french tips. I didn't like the overall look as the chevrons blend in too much with the blue polish so I removed the whole mani this morning. Sometimes a pretty polish really does need to be left alone.

Island Girl - Pink & Micro Holo Glitter

I only found out about Island Girl polishes around five months ago via the girls on Instagram. As far as I'm aware, these polishes are only available in Hawaii and they are also sold in ABC stores in Las Vegas. The brand has such cool and vivid colours and they are quite cheap as well (under $3), the bottles are shaped exactly like the China Glaze ones and the brushes are identical too.

Here I'm wearing two coats of Island Girl - Island Girl (self titled polish, lol!), a fuchsia creme packed with micro holographic glitter. It's still a bit gritty after the top coat which doesn't bother me at all but for those of you who like your nails smooth, a thicker top coat will do the trick! The accent finger is Rimmel London Misty Jade stamped with BM221. I think pink goes with green so much!

Here are the colours I've collected so far:

I'm Not Lion - China Glaze On Safari Collection

I'm Not Lion is the second polish I purchased from the "On Safari" 2012 collection.

This is a cool gold toned holographic glitter and as with all holos, it really comes alive in the sun. The holo effect is very scattered but when the sun hits it, it's like tiny fairy lights sparkling away.

The glitter is densely packed and it reminds me somewhat of the glitters in the Prismatic collection. Two coats provide full opacity. It has a slight gritty finish but I quite like gritty finishes on glitter, plus it's nothing that a thick layer of top coat can't fix.

Looking at the bottle shots, I'm Not Lion is very similar to the other glitter in this collection, I Herd That. However, I Herd That is much more golden and darker than this one. Not sure if I need them both but I'm glad I got this one.

Dragon & The Shield

This polish needs no introduction. Dragon from A England's The Legends collection is a stunning scattered holo masterpiece. If you love greens, you need to go and get yourself this polish! If you have tried A England polishes before, you'll know that they apply like butter and are mostly one coaters. The holo effect of this green is subtly packed with tones of gold! I love it!

I added a "shield" to the accent finger using Barry M Gold Foil. I would usually call this a "checkered mani" but it does remind me of a medieval shield and it fits the theme of the polish, so let's go with shield :)

 

I love all types of holo polishes, I know I'm not the only one! But the biggest pet peeve of mine is when I so badly want to wear a holo and there isn't a single ray of sunlight! However, I also took a picture of this polish indoors and I was surprised that some of the subtle holo effect was still there! It's amazing how it doesn't look completely flat like a lot of other holos.

Nude on Nude

Today's mani was inspired by one of my IG friends, Nicole. If you have an IG account, check out her amazing manicures, she is super talented and her nails are gorgeous (@nic_tchelly). Nicole also sent me a bunch of amazing goodies from Hawaii which I can't wait to share with you, Color Club Love'Em/ Leave'Em being one of them.

Love'Em/Leave'Em is such an unexpected holo because it's a nude! I don't have any other nude holo in my stash so this is a perfect addition! The holo effect is subtle which adds to how delicate and classy the polish looks. The pictures below are only one coat so I think this polish has very good coverage. It also applied like butter, no aqua base coat needed!

I took the "nude" theme all the way through to the mani as well and decided on a nude half moon mani with copper coloured loose pieces of hex glitter which I stuck along the half moon line.

Thanks for reading and commenting!

Nfu Oh 62

The weather here is horrible today! Cloudy and dull as anything, the sun came out for literally a matter of minutes! So I need a holo to liven up my mood a little! It's a nightmare trying to swatch holos here because the sun disappears just as quickly as it appears and it's always hit and miss! :(

This is Nfu Oh 62. The neutral beige/ pinkish one of the Nfu Oh holo bunch. Nfu 64 is still my favourite because the pinkish/ purple tone is much brighter and more prominent but 62 is a very special polish in my stash! I still want to get my hands on the other holos from this collection but haven't yet been able to find them at "reasonable" prices.

I have to admit, application was tricky and in fact unpleasant! It could have been because I was trying to rush so I could capture pictures of it in the sun but also because I was applying it without Aqua Base coat. That usually makes no difference whatsoever with my other holos which apply like butter but this formula caused me some patchiness problems on a couple of the nails. I guess it was worth it because I love this linear holo effect.

Speciallita - Hits No Olimpo Skittles

I've recently done a mini Brazilian swap with Bia from Nails by Bia and I am now the proud owner of some of my favourite shades from the Speciallita Hits No Olimpo collection. We had a bit of trouble with the post as my order got held up and inspected but they managed to get here in the end! Thank you Bia for all your help and concern :)

Bia sent me 5 bottles from Hits No Olimpo, a pink and silver micro-glitter Impala and a burgundy shimmer from Colorama. As the last two don't need sun to show their full effect, I will show you them in the days to come!

Today is the first time there is sun whilst I am at home and it was still really hard to take shots of these because it's so cloudy and the sun kept hiding! Here are some of the pictures I managed to capture whilst the sun was peeking through the clouds (thumb-Zeus, index-Atena, middle-Hera, ring-Dionisio, pinky-Apolo, two coats on all fingers).

I also took this picture under my lamp and I have to say I was pretty impressed that the holo effect was still present, even with no direct sunlight!

I really liked the formula on these! So easy to control, they go on like normal nail polish and don't drag or leave any bald patches like my Nfu Oh's do. They have an unnecessary wide brush for such a small bottle but I don't mind the wide brushes at all, I actually like them.
Next time I use these for a full mani, I will probably layer them over a coat of creme polish. The bottles are so small and they are so pretty, I don't want to use them up right away!

Dotted Tristam

I'm eagerly awaiting the arrival of St George and Dragon which should be here tomorrow (hurry up Royal Mail!), so in the meantime as we had an inkling of sunshine today, what better way to welcome the 2 new pretties into my collection that to adorn my hands with Tristam!

Tristam, from The Mythicals collection is a deep blue packed with a ton of holo micro-glitter! There isn't really anything I can say about this polish that hasn't been said all over the blogosphere! For many of us it was THE polish of 2011 and a must have!


Here is Tristam dotted with Zoya Trixie and on it's own! And check out the " A la Glitta Gloves" hand positions on the pics! It was the only way my hand didn't look weird in direct sunlight!

And a somewhat blurry picture showing all that holo goodness:

Blurple Scattered Holo

You know when you want a polish so bad that you need to have it straight away but then when it arrives, it sits on your untrieds stash for months? That's what happened to this little guy - Kleancolor Holo Chrome.

Holo Chrome is a light purple, in fact, it shifts between blue and purple depending on lighting. You can really see a rainbow in it! I was quite amazed that the scattered holo in this polish shows even under my artificial light, at night and indoors. Most holos I have look completely flat if the sun isn't shinning (granted most of them are linear holos like Nfu Oh's).

I really like Kleancolor polishes and have always had positive experiences when using them. They have some pretty cool polishes at very affordable prices! I know a lot of people don't like their strong smell but I can't really say it bothers me. Anyway, Holo Chrome doesn't smell like the other Kleancolor's I've tried. I've never had a problem with their formulas either. Application is always smooth and consistent. Holo Chrome is no exception. The formula is thick but in a nice way, it actually makes application easier to control.

This is 1 coat of Holo Chrome over an unnamed lilac polish I had lying around. It's by a brand called "Yes Love"  which I usually buy in €1 stores when I go on holidays to Spain or Portugal.

Multichrome Purple Glitter

Here is a little update to yesterday's mani. I wasn't ready to take off Perfect Plum. Well, to be honest I'm trying to wear my manis for longer than 24 hours, let's see how that goes :)

This is one coat of Kleancolor Chunky Holo Purple over Rimmel London Perfect Plum. I had to make the most of the tiniest bit of sun we had today!

Chunky Holo Purple is a multichrome glitter polish in a sheer purple jelly base. It is way too sheer to wear on it's own so I think it looks best layered over other polishes. If I move my hand, the multichrome"ness" of this polish really shows - from green to yellow, orange and red. I tried to capture some of the blue/ turquoise you can see in the bottle but couldn't. It is really pretty! Much more than my crappy little camera could capture.

I'm also using larger pictures than before. I like the look of large pictures on blogs but my camera isn't very good at capturing detail which is the main reason I like large pictures. I also feel that my fingers/ nails look weird in larger pics! Hmm dunno! My cousin and my mum said they prefer the smaller sized pictures. Let's see how I get on, if not, I'll have to revert back to smaller pictures.

Milani Hi-Res

I had heard many good things about the Milani holos so when I placed my Beauty Joint Kleancolor order a couple of months ago and saw that they also sold Milani, I thought this would be my chance to try it (we don't get Milani here in the UK).

I used 1 coat of Milani Hi Res over 1 coat of Rimmel London Perfect Plum. I wanted it to be completely opaque and also use less of the Milani to achieve this.

Hi Res is such a soft and dreamy purple. The rainbow of colours (red, green, gold and blue) in all their holo goodness add to that fairytale feel it has. I love it! This one is definitely a keeper for me and the price is amazing ($3.99) considering how good the formula and the overall polish is.

Nfu Oh 64 - On the fence!!!

I was waiting for some sun to use this Nfu Oh holo because there wouldn't be much point taking pictures under a cloudy sky or an artificial light! For the past couple of days, we have had a heatwave in the UK so I jumped at the chance. It's quite weird it's been so hot, even the plants are confused! They were getting ready for autumn and now they are blooming again! Lol!

I don't think there are any bloggers out there who don't own or have tried the Nfu Oh holos, especially #61 which seems to be the most coveted and I know different people have had different experiences with these holos, but here is what I thought:

The good:
- The holo finish in direct sunlight is really impressive and beautiful
- My top coat didn't dull out the holo effect (CND Speedey)

The bad:
- Application was a bit patchy. I don't have the Aqua Base and wouldn't buy it just for these holos but found that using a base coat (CND Stickey) made it even worse so I used no base coat at all on my left hand
- Colour is very dull and disappointing in indoor lighting. Actually, one of the flattest polishes I've seen in a while
- Didn't get much wear out of it. Major tip wear and chipped on the 2nd day even with a top coat!

My bottom Line:
I absolutely love the concentrated linear effect and the colour but can't get past how dull it looks when there is no sun (which is most of the time in the UK), to the point where I actually get disappointed when I look at my nails. The crappy wear does it no favours either... BUT... did I mention I love the holo effect?! So...as you can tell, I'm on the fence with this one!

Layering Of The Day - Kleancolor Chunky Holo Black over Risque Turmalina

The first polish I tried from my August haul was Kleancolor Chunky Holo Black. I was really curious to see what it would look like on me, and layered over something other than black.

I bought this polish (and a few others) from Beautyjoint and it only cost $1.75! Although the shipping did brake the bank a little! I wish we could get stuff like this here in the UK so as to avoid all the ridiculous shipping charges.

I'm afraid the pictures don't do this polish justice. They were taken at night and this chunky holo glitter is at it's best in direct sunlight but here it is, 2 coats Chunky Holo Black layered over 2 coats of Risque Turmalina.

Oh!You've probably noticed that I've changed my page as well. I just wanted my pics to look a little bigger and I was tired of the old background and wanted to go for something much simpler!
I've also recently got photoshop back so I've been playing around with my watermarks and picture sizes. So bear with me as I try to get all pictures/ posts to look uniform :)

Which do you prefer, old or new?