Sweet Baby Octopolish!

 Last weekend, the man and I went on a lovely road trip - New Jersey is beautiful and peaceful in the off-season, y'all - and when we got back I decided I was done with Star Trek nails and ready to ponder a new theme.  In the meantime, one good Baroness X polish deserved another, so I pulled this beauty out of mount untried. indoor, bright CF lighting YASSSSSSSSSS! outdoor, cloudy daylight Baroness X released Event Horizon as part of a LE outer-space themed collection in 2017 that was all-around gorgeous, all dark inky stellar beauties.  This one is a smoky black jelly base filled with a gold-to-green "sister UP" shimmer and a light scattering of iridescent flakies. indoor, CF lighting The formula was smooth and of a flawless consistency that was very easy to work with.  It's sheer enough to let the shimmer sparkle forth without being masked, so I'm showing 3 coats here. outdoor, cloudy daylight Most of my pics show emerald green over charcoal, and while that look...

Closing out my Star Trek series, I have to make a nod to all the boys wearing command red.  Q is of course my fave, especially in his completely over-the-top judge's robes from the very first episode, so this design has as much black in it as red. indoor, bright CF lighting Baroness X has been releasing some amazingly pretty fluid art polishes - instead of simple crème finishes, she's adding shimmer or flakies, and for X Marks the Spot she's added a handful of holo dust. outdoor, overcast daylight To get this look, I started with a layer of Julep Karmen, a fiery red foil that's been used several times in nail art experiments, painted thickly across a silicone mat.  I then added drips of OPI Glamour Game, a somewhat sheer champagne gold shimmer, and drips of X Marks the Spot.  When I had a big enough pool to work with, I folded the mat in half a couple of times, and tilted the mat on it's side to get the paint to flow and spread out. outdoor, overcast/shady daylight ...

And we're back to the final frontier! indoor, bright CF lighting My younger sib, every bit as nerdy as me, has been totally geeking out over my Star Trek The Next Generation nails, and gets all credit for this design.  Wesley Crusher is far from universally loved by the fan community, and people tend to either think he's a Gary Stu or that he's an entry point for younger fans.  Either way, his science brains and dedication in the face of being told to "shut up" (most certainly not the high point of dialogue) earned him a position as acting ensign, and that uniform design is pretty sweet.  outdoor, shady/overcast daylight For the wool blend of the jumpsuit, I've started with two smooth and easy coats of Different Dimension Twisted Fantasy.  The scattered holo sparkle makes this look heathered in low light, and the pale orchid microflakie shimmer (below) is just an added bonus. outdoor, shady daylight What I loved about this uniform is a nod to...

Suzy came to stay for a delightful long weekend quarantine bubble-merge of board games & comedy TV, so two things happened right away.  1) Star Trek was on hold in favor of treasured human interaction and 2) I was pretty instantly smitten with her neon green sparkle polish. indoor CF lighting Neons are most certainly not my jam, and I own vanishingly few greens that lean prominently yellow, so the super bright one she had on wasn't replicatable with my stash.  The closest I could come up with was Vapid La Fae Verte, about 3 notches darker but with the same fiery aurora shimmer. outdoor, bright direct sunlight La Fae Verte is an apple/spring green jelly sheer enough to let the sparkle of the aurora pigment show through easily.  This also means it needs many coats to get there, and unfortunately there is no cheat for that.  In an effort to brighten the base color and cut down on coats needed for the right look, I started with a layer of white crème...

Star Trek The Next Generation is a goldmine of nail inspo, and I'm just loving the ongoing theme on my nails (and we're still loving the re-watch of the show at my house).  Next up is the endlessly determined Geordi La Forge. indoor, bright CF lighting I've started with a base of Heather's Hues Latte Love, a richly saturated chocolate brown with autumn-colored microflakes and a light touch of scattered holo dust.  This polish was an easy one-coater, with a thick formula that stayed exactly where I put it, no running or pooling in cuticles.  indoor, CF lighting Though we'd just watched an episode where he turns into a blacklit-glowing alien, and he has plenty of retrofuture off-duty outfits, the character is defined in many ways by his visor which of course had to be the inspo here.  The gold stripes of the visor are the short hashmarks from Lina Feeling Shapely 10, while the medium weight straight silver bars come from Maniology M053, both using metallic...