Duochrome madness - MAC Mean and Green

This one's a beauty - my first MAC polish is a glittery duochrome which shifts from bronze to purple and gold with tiny flecks of blue. By itself this polish is pretty hideous - a slightly sparkly swamp green polish and the color shift does not show up like it does in the bottle. Instead, to achieve the full effect, I have opted to layer it over black. 

*faints* It's so pretty! i'm surprised at how nice the formula was (layered, of course) and the brush was pretty good. I liked the rubber cap, as well. Overall, I probably wouldn't pay this much for a normal polish from MAC, but this is worth it just for the color shift. 

Do you own any MAC polishes?

Delicious duochrome - layering with Nfu-oh 51 and Revlon Royal

Coming back to kickass duochromes - Nfu-oh 51. A purple jelly base with iridescent purple to green to gold flakies and a scattered pigment of the same nature. This polish colorshifts like nobody's business and it's great! I've shown it here before, but this time... I can show you the full range!

It's layered over Revlon Royal. 

Let's start with this:

Looks purple, right?

Wait a minute

You can see the gold in this

Oooh there it goes!

Nothing better than wearing a few colors at once, eh?

Nubar - Indigo Illusion

Oh my god... this is the strangest polish

Today is an especially picture-heavy update. Click read more to see the rest of the post/photos.

Essence - Chic Reloaded

I gotta admit - Essence has to be one of my favorite new polish brands I've started to find about drugstores. Not only do they start their short lineup with glitters, a pink and peachy nude, basic cremes and nice glitter, but also two duochromes!

I've had the pleasure of wearing Where's The Party? before and it's awesome! Since it did not disappoint, I went and got Chic Reloaded.

It's a much darker duochrome with a charcoal base, turqoise to purple duochrome shift and some scattered green glitters. The formula is a bit watery, but it works well with the big brush Essence uses. Dried nice and fast, wore strong for 3 days with no chipping and major tipwear. I'm extremely happy with this polish, especially since it only cost two dollars!

The color shift was notoriously difficult to capture - it is more evident in the bottle, but is still strong on the nail.

Where's the purple? Apparently doesn't show up with flash, but I hope this shows the texture of the polish well.

Essence - Where's the Party?

Now here's a surprise - a 2$ polish I picked up at the drugstore and it's a duochrome!

It's a smooth metallic polish that doesn't show streaks, dries fast and is a dark grey base with a prominent purple flash and a little bit of green. The effect in this is comparable to OPI Not Like The Movies, but less gritty and darker. I was pretty surprised at this find, since it applies nicer and looks better than OPI. The main difference is that it doesn't have any particles/glitter and it is much more purple, rather than green when it flashes. I loved the look of Where's The Party?, it reminded me of really soft graphite. 

I would recommend it to anyone who likes a good duochrome - cheap and very pretty!

Has anyone else tried out this polish? 

Holographic and Duochrome mish-mash experiment

*drool* Rainbows!

I saw the Ozotic mish-mash polished swatched at Nailderella and I was inspired to try something similar on my own. For the base, I used OPI Just Spotted the Lizard from the Spiderman collection and HITS Hefesto holographic topcoat.It didn't turn out as holographic as I hoped, but I could have always done more coats of Hefesto. I want to keep experimenting with this and different duochromes to see which will have the strongest effect! 

Duochromes are probably my favourite finish of them all... I love them more than any polishes. What is your favourite duochrome polish of all time?

Wet 'n Wild - Speak When Spoken To and Jewels for your Highness

Speak When Spoken To indoors

These babies actually came to Canada! Found them in superstore, they apply like a dream, solid in 2 coats and dry nicely. They aren't as gritty as many other glitters are and much to my surprise... the removal was less painful than normal. These are dupes for the China Glaze Prismatic polishes, I saw swatches online where they are indistinguishable from each other. This is awesome! I like the tiny bottles because I will never use the whole China Glaze-sized bottle of glitter. The best part about these glitters, as you can see from the bottle shots very clearly, is that they are slightly duochrome! They also contain tiny multicoloured glitter besides the base color, making it a joy to watch, especially in the sun. 

Here's Jewels for your Highness over black (and by itself on the thumb for comparison)

These photos were taking in the sunlight.

This photo shows the prominent pink flash that comes through at this angle

The coloured glitter  comes through more indoors, but when the sun hits the polish, it lights up like a diamond!  All glitters begin reflecting light and it's a joy to watch.

In conclusion, I really love these polishes! They're easy to work with and look absolutely fantastic. I might even grab the green one sometime, since I love duochromes and duochrome glitters is an awesome combination. 

Abstract butterfly - holographic and duochrome

This was an experiment do sort of dupe the Ozotic mish-mash type of polish - a duochrome with a holographic effect.

I used Sparitual - It's Raining Men and HITS Hefesto on top. Then, I used a black nail art brush to do the lines. This was supposed to be an abstract look, but eventually, some of them turned into a butterfly wing pattern. I want to try this with a stronger duochrome next time, but I do love how airy and delicate this combination looks. I must do more holographic layering!

OPI - Just Spotted the Lizard! Spiderman 2012 Collection

Check dat color shift!

**I am giving away a brand new bottle of this polish for my 400 follower giveaway!**

OPI Just Spotted the Lizard is a lovely green-gold duochrome with flashes of teal and blue. I'd say this is the crown jewel of the Spiderman 2012 collection, as other fail to impress me (maybe except Number One Nemesis). I'm so happy OPI is doing more duochromes and I hope they keep at it.

The formula starts a bit thin but builds nicely in 3 coats. The finish is metallic, but it's very forgiving with brushstrokes. It dries relatively well, doesn't feel chunky or runny and wear great! I wore this for 3 days before removing it, it was still good as new!

As always, the bottle looks so much more amazing due to the thick glass, but I still love this polish. I saw a few comparisons before and it looks like an exact dupe for Chanel Peridot! That makes me feel even better.

What's your favorite duochrome? 

Sparitual - it's raining men and black roses

Sparitual - it's raining men is a beautiful dusty blue duochrome to pale gold and light pink - very pretty! In the photos it looks more gray than blue and in real life this is also true. The yellow evens out the blue into a greyish tone and it ends up looking very interesting...It's not as bright as I would've liked but it's very subtle.
 I was disappointed with the formula...it was runny, the the worst part was the bubbles and chunks! I rolled it in my hands for a while, didn't see any bubbles in the bottle, put it on...chunky bubbletime. For 12 dollars? No thanks!

blue shows up better with a flash!

I was a little upset at that but once I put the roses on I had a very different opinion...they came out beautifully and the color grew on me. I'd give this a thumbs up, especially as a base for nail art.Maybe my bottle was old...I'm not willing to dismiss such a pretty color on its formula alone.

BTW: what do you think of my photos lately? I'm working on a laptop so the colors don't look right to me and I have to guess...do they look too pink or too dark to you? Please let me know, I really need feedback!

Thanks <3

OPI - Not Like The Movies over black

Sorry about the photo quality, it turned out a little bit red...

When I moved, I took the most office safe color with me and turns out it's a casual dresscode! I was also stuck on a no-buy (until December! Whoo hoo!) so I had to get creative with what I brought with me.

I finally tried NTLM over black and I'm not sure if I love it as much as I love NTLM by itself. 2 coats over black. I do like how the duochrome is a lot stronger, but the fine glitter in the polish no longer gives it depth. It does look very interesting though, like a really dark gunmetal shade.

Missha HGR01 and Konad

Missha HGR01 is one of my favourite duochromes, even if I don't  really like green. This polish is cool toned green to blue, with hints of gold. This polish hits close to home, since it reminds me of my favourite insect - the green beetle (Cetonia Aurata). It's a two-coater and smells like roses! The topcoat diminishes the smell or it goes away after a day or so, but I find it super nice and girly. Formula is great. Not thick but still opaque, its extremely finely milled metallic shimmer is beautiful. It does not show streaks and doesn't chip very easily. The brush is HUGE but it helps cover the entire nail, which is useful for longer nails. The big cap is a little hard to hold but I didn't mind too much. HGR01 is somewhat similar to Chanel Peridot, but it's more green-blue as opposed to green-yellow duochrome Peridot has.

Absolutely beautiful color, it's even better in person...My most favourite green!

Nicole by OPI - Coral denominator

check out that color shift!

I don't usually buy NOPIs due to their price and the weird shaped bottle, but I just HAD to have this crazy looking coral duochrome foil! Coral Denominator is a Canadian exclusive, which makes me happy because we never get anything crazy up north. CD is very pretty, as it shifts from golden to coral, almost like a sunset.

I love this polish, but it's a little bit too cool for me and I wanted it to be more warm toned (the pink is more like mauve). Applies okay, but a little sheer, took me 3 coats to get it to show. Very metallic, pain in the butt to remove like a true foil. All in all, another duochrome to add to my collection!

Nfu-oh 51

Nfu-oh 51 is a BEAUTIFUL flakie suspended in purple jelly, with some glass flecks. The multichrome effect reminds me of opal actually. In the bottle, it looks like fire (bottle pic here) and on the nail, it turns a bit more blue/purple. I swatched this over black and the flakies turned red! The formula is smooth, the brush picks up enough flakies to how with one swipe.

 I did two coats over SH xtreme deep purple (which turned out a little sheer) and the effect is wonderful!

This lasted three days on me and didn't chip (with top coat) and then I just got tired of purple. This one is definitely a great polish to layer with, as well as fine on its own. It's like a pre-made jelly sandwich!

OPI It's My Year

It's My Year is a part of the new Miss Universe collection, something that just hit the stores recently here in Canada! I was REALLY excited for IMY, as I missed my chance to get Rally Pretty Pink and this seems to be the same thing, just with a purple base instead of pink.

On the first glance, it's a shimmery dusty purple in the bottle with a bit of gold duocrome.

On the nail, it's got shiny, almost a mirror-like finish. IMY is a gold foil in a purple base, the gold REALLY shows in the light, but it looks more brown in the shadow. Indoors, the purple base comes through strongly and shimmer is visible. Applies VERY smooth, shows well in 2 coats, but I usually do 3 for full color payoff. I'm also wearing Seche Vite on top.

Outdoors, IMY is very reflective in the sun (I had issues photographing it, since it was reflecting my blue shirt too much) and every shimmer particle just glows from within.

Here is a close-up:

This is probably my favorite foil I picked up this fall and I find it to be very fall-appropriate since it combines a subdued purple and a whole lotta bling to spice it up. It's a very fun color! I expected it to be more muted, but the color is more than enough. Love it!