Second Chance

Relationships with nail polish are much like relationships with people.  You admire one from afar and decide you want to get to know them better.  You go on first date and it is awkward.  Neither of you are at your best.  You decide to keep trying.  Then MAGIC!  It is like you were always meant for each other.  Sparks fly, your heart beats. You want to be at your best and you want to bring out the best in the other.
So that being said, my first date with Bow polish did not go as well as I would have liked. There were not the wonderful color changes I expected. There were coverage issues. And then there were bubbles.  Lots of bubbles.  From first application to top coat.  Bubbles.
Luckily on Instagram there are very helpful, experienced nail artists who for the most part want to see others succeed.  I met three such individuals.  Janne from Denmark has beautiful magnetic nails.  Her nails are pretty much straight forward.  She specializes in bringing out the best using magnets and some basic nail art.  Zlata does wonderful things with magnetic polishes (and others) and is fabulous in bringing out the best that magnetized polish can do and is an absolute color specialist.  Then there is Kombucha Witch.  She is a design artist.  Please take a moment to visit these ladies and see their fabulous work.
So after messaging back and forth and seeing a video from Zlata I was ready to take on Bow polishes again.  Let's start with Revel.

From the beginning I loved the color but really did not expect much change with the magnet.  And I was right.  The first time.  Then I tried again.  There are two styles of application of these polishes that seem to bring out the best.  This is an example of the first style. Each nail is worked start to finish individually before moving on to the next nail.  Each nail had a medium base coat (with the exception of the index finger which has no base).  The base should not be too thick and complete coverage is not necessary. Do not allow the base to dry.  Paint a fairly thin coat of Bow polish like normal.  You may notice some blending or swirling of the base with the Bow.  That is fine.  Then working left to right (or right to left, your preference) make diagonal strokes.  This should be medium thickness.  Again do not worry if your base comes through some.  Immediately place the magnet (on it's side) diagonally across the nail and then across the nail in the other direction.  Do this for no more than 3-5 seconds each time.  You will notice a color change.  The Bow will be brighter and the individual flecks of color will come out.
The index finger has no color base.  It has a wonderfully rust, coppery, pinkish color.  The ring finger is a white base.  Amazingly this really brings out the pink in this polish.  The basic color is a light reddish/pinkish red color and the flecks of pink are prominent.  It is my favorite.  The middle finger and pinky has vivid, fiery copper streaks made more beautiful with the contrast of the black that peaks through.
I topped this with INM Out the Door topcoat and loved the results. I passed the magnet again like I had the first time and it brought out more vivid colors. My prior attempt had used Sally Hansen Big Shiny Top Coat and these polishes do not respond well to it.  Major problems with bubbles.  My Seche Vite was thick (yuck) so I didn't really try that.
While we are talking about bubbles, on the first try I had small bubbles from the start.  I believe this is due to the fact I was not just making one diagonal pass with the color but rather a double cross hatch.  It was simply too much polish.
Now let's talk Sirens.

I had some success the first time with Sirens.  I was able to bring out a nice cat eye effect with the polish. But there were issues with bubbles.  As I addressed before, I think this was due to the cross hatching and wrong top coat.
The thumb uses a a white base.  It had a lovely pearl like effect.  I loved it.  The bottom picture shows it over black.  The contrast here is fabulous.  The blue is so vibrant and has so many individual shades over the black.
While I didn't do nail art on this round of Revel, I did use some nail decals on Sirens.

I really like the look of the silver over the blue/black nails.  I will be honest.  I kind of swooned over these nails.
Now let's talk Paranoia.

While the results of the second try on the first two polishes was pretty dramatic, the second try of Paranoia wasn't so much.  On my first picture I did the index finger and ring finger with white base and the middle finger and pinky with a black base.  There was a slightly more bluish green look and a lighter overall appearance to the ones with the white base than with the black base but that is all.  The blue, pink and copper flecks all show about equally. 
Remember when I told you there were two basic thoughts on how to apply the polish?  I did the diagonal strokes on the first two colors.  On these nails I did the same procedure until the last coat.  I went horizontally left to right with the polish and used the magnet vertically and horizontally (like a plus sign) for about 3-5 seconds each.
The thumb is done with no base and I used a diagonal brush/magnet stroke.  Again not much difference than in the first tries.  I did use my new INM Out the Door topcoat with great success.
Since I received my gift of charms from NailArt Elegance, I have enjoyed using them on several manis.  Here is another "under the sea" mani.

I promise my posts will not always be this long.  I strive to keep you interested while providing information I feel is important.  My next post will review Motivation, Divide & Conquer and Reboot.  You will want to see this post. It is my plan to post on Tuesday and Friday of each week.
I encourage you to try something new.  Find what you really like to do. While I will always enjoy using my normal polishes and trying new nail art, I can tell my true love will be magnetic polishes.  I hope to try a couple of others including Masura.  I want to try all the techniques I use with my normal polishes with these magnetic beauties.  I want to push my boundaries of nail design and see what I am capable of.  Please join me in this journey.
Now grab your polish and paint those nails!
Donna