copper | Vegan Claws

A vegan nail polish blog. A celebration of colour and light, as well as of justice for nonhuman animals.

Posts tagged ‘copper’

Nicole by OPI Just Busta Mauve

This amazing polish is Nicole by OPI Just Busta Mauve, which I haven’t seen for sale here in Canada (it’s supposed to be exclusive to Target stores and we don’t have those yet), but I was able to get with the help of someone having a blogsale! (Thanks again, Amy! :))

Shown are three coats plus a layer of topcoat; the polish is slightly sheer to allow the duochrome iridescent shimmer to show through.

I recommend waiting a minute between coats to avoid any balder spots near the cuticle, but other than that the formula was good!

These photos are in natural light, various degrees of shade/partial sun.

I love the finish on this polish! As you can see, there are a whole lot of colours in the flecked/foily particles: mauve, blue, copper, pink, plum, and a lovely warm golden orange colour shift at an angle. It’s the kind of polish that doesn’t really belong to just one colour family!

There are two other polishes in this release that have a similar finish, and I’ll be posting those at a later date. 😀

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Nicole by OPI

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China Glaze Fast Track

China Glaze Fast Track is a taupey-beige nude with heavy golden shimmer flakes. It was released last spring in the Hunger Games collection.

Shown are two thick coats. In the sun photos, there’s also a layer of topcoat. As evidenced by the sideways watermark, these pics were also taken using my phone, haha!

I found the formula a little thick but didn’t have any problems with application.

The sun photos didn’t quite catch all the tiny sparks of different colours, little flashes of orange and green, that are often reflected in the sparkle of this awesome polish!

Here it is in the shade:

As a bonus here is what I ended up doing to this mani after a couple of days, mainly because I didn’t want to take the time to remove Fast Track first, and then I just kept adding things, haha…

Over Fast Track is a coat of Orly Nite Owl, an opaque taupe with silver shimmer, then two layers of Glitter Gal Buckled Bronze, Nubar Petunia glitter on the tips, and Spoiled by Wet n Wild’s Trust Fund Baby over it all!

Category:

China Glaze, Glitter Gal, Nubar, Orly, Wet n Wild

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Misa Epiphany, Taking Chances, and a comparison

Today I have my two picks from Misa’s Wanderlust collection for fall 2012 to show you.

First is Misa Epiphany, a light beigey mustard shade with gold shimmer. The finish is kind of like a creme with shimmer flecks in it. I used two thick coats; I found the formula to be thick but not a problem to work with if you use thick coats and don’t manipulate it too much.

I love this shade! It makes me think of a shimmery version of China Glaze’s Kalahari Kiss. The large version of this next photo gives a good view of the finish.

The second polish I got from this collection is Taking Chances, which has the same finish as Epiphany but in a coppery, dusty light orange with gold shimmer. Very appropriate for fall!

Formula was also similar to Epiphany, maybe a bit less thick. This was also two thick coats.

I really like this shade as well, but when I opened the package, I thought, “this looks familiar!”

Here is Taking Chances next to Sephora by OPI’s That’s What Fringe is For, from their spring 2012 collection.

Misa Taking Chances and Sephora by OPI It's all About the Fringe (Misa, SOPI, Misa, SOPI)

Left to right: Misa, SOPI, Misa, SOPI

They aren’t *exact* dupes, but, well, for all intents and purposes they are dupes. It’s really hard to see the differences, so I’m including several photos of the comparison. From index to ring are the Misa, SOPI, Misa, SOPI, two coats of each.

Left to right: Misa, SOPI, Misa, SOPI

The biggest difference is in the formula, since the OPI is much thinner (not runny though). It also seems that the Misa has slightly bigger shimmer particles, making it appear a tiny bit lighter at times with the added reflectivity. Just barely.

Left to right: Misa, SOPI, Misa, SOPI

Great colour, but if you have one of these two you probably don’t need the other! Unless you have the mini bottle of the Sephora version, like I do, and want the Misa as a backup!

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Misa, Sephora by OPI

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China Glaze Deviantly Daring and No Plain Jane

I’ve got the first two of six new China Glaze polishes from their New Bohemian collection today! These shades have duochrome to varying degrees, and a metallic finish that’s slightly brushstrokey but not in a bad way, in my humble opinion – I wouldn’t quite call them frost, and I didn’t have trouble getting the brush stokes straight.

I’ll start with No Plain Jane, the purple shade; I was actually a little disappointed with this one since the duochrome didn’t seem as orange as I expected; more of a pinkish-goldenish-copper shade, and the purple can look paler and almost lavender in some lighting. This swatch is three coats, and I found the formula a bit thick and sticky for this kind of polish. First photos are in sunlight:

These next photos are under my Ott Lite:

Next I layered one coat of No Plain Jane over Kleancolor Black. Layered this way, it photographed bluer than it is – it’s definitely more of a red-leaning purple like the first photos showed. Sunlight:

This one is a bit more colour accurate:

In indirect natural light:

Next is Deviantly Daring; I love this rich teal-blue-green shade! Two coats shown here, and this one had a great formula. Sunlight:

In the shade, if you click to enlarge this photo you can kind of see the fine gold shimmer that gives this polish extra depth; it’s more visible in the bottle than on the nail but is really pretty:

This next photo is under the Ott Lite – I think that bright green flash that you can see near the bottom right of each nail is actually a reflection from the wall with its bright lime-green paint job, so I’m a little hesitant to post this, but I guess I’ll just say that this one isn’t totally accurate of what the polish looks like in real life!

Now, here is one coat of Deviantly Daring over one coat Kleancolor Black, in sunlight:

In shade:

So, one of these two polishes was nice but mainly just “okay” in my opinion, and the other is a definite winner! The other four shades from this collection are on my ever-expanding “to swatch” list!

Category:

China Glaze, Kleancolor

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Glitter Gal Buckled Bronze

I’ve got a gorgeous duochrome from Glitter Gal to show you today! This is one of six new duochromes they recently released, and the lovely Kerry from Glitter Gal gave me the opportunity to review it (thanks, Kerry!). This one is called Buckled Bronze and it’s got a great plum-burgundy-bronze-copper colour shift!

Here it is with the box it comes in. I really like these new Glitter Gal bottles, square and solid and stylish looking – they’ve really done a nice job on their new packaging.

These photos are of one generous coat of Buckled Bronze over one coat of Kleancolor Black; these are sheer duochromes that show their full effect over black (or another very dark colour).

No topcoat here; it dries quite glossy on its own. The formula was thin and smooth, perfect for this sort of layering polish.

As always you can click on any of these photos to get a better view.

These next two photos are with flash in addition to sunlight. Head-on, the flash shows just how nearly purple this polish appears in some lights!

And at more of an angle, the bronze tone becomes prominent:

At extreme angles, the polish even shifts to gold and green. If you click on the full size version of this next photo, you can see all the little multicoloured sparkles along with the gold-green shift – love it!

These next few photos are in indoor light.

Indirect natural light, sorry for the weird lumpy-looking reflections:

Under my Ott Lite:

Ott Lite plus flash:

And here is what the polish looks like on its own – as you can see it’s definitely sheer! Left to right, one, two, three, and four coats of Buckled Bronze. The pinkie with four coats shows how the base of the polish is kind of a smokey taupe colour.

Anyway, as you may have guessed by now, this is a great polish and I love it! The colour scheme is right up my alley. This and the other five new Glitter Gal duochromes, shown in the following company promo image, are available here on their website, or from one of their international distributors listed here.

Disclosure: This polish was provided to me by the company for my honest review. The opinions expressed here are entirely my own.

Category:

Glitter Gal, Kleancolor, Uncategorized

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China Glaze Kalahari Kiss and I Herd That

Here are the other two On Safari polishes that I recently purchased. First up is Kalahari Kiss, a very yellow-toned beige creme (I love this colour!). Shown are two coats and I had no issues with the formula; it went on quite smoothly. Photos are in partially sunny and shady conditions.

I did a glitter-tipped gradient using I Herd That over Kalahari Kiss. I Herd That is an orange-toned bronzy glitter with holo glitter in it. It was quite easy to apply, I just brushed and dabbed it on to make the gradient. I did two coats of the glitter at the tips, receding to one coat further back on the nail, then added top coat. The glitter dries a bit rough (and matte) so a layer or two of topcoat is needed if you want to smooth out the texture and get it nice and shiny.

Under my Ott Lite:

This next photo features my beautiful girl Azrael!

Next I have two coats of I Herd That over bare nails (plus one coat of Poshe topcoat) to show how it looks on its own. As before, it was easy to apply, no need to “place” the glitter or anything like that.

Since a few people had expressed curiosity about how this one compares to last winter’s Ulta-exclusive China Glaze glitter polish, Fireside Glow, I decided to do a comparison. I compared it to Fireside Glow and Ulta-mate Holiday, the other Ulta-exclusive glitter in that same release, both of which I was able to obtain thanks to a helpful US-based nail polish enthusiast! 🙂

Left to right, Fireside Glow, I Herd That, Ulta-mate Holiday:

The swatches show two coats of each polish. I found the formula thinner on the Ulta exclusive shades; they were not quite as easy as I Herd That to get opaque in two coats without getting bald spots, but no big issues. Index to pinkie, Fireside Glow, I Herd That, Ulta-mate Holiday, I Herd That.

As you can see, Fireside Glow is not all that close to I Herd That after all; it’s much more of a pinkish copper shade. Ulta-mate Holiday is obviously much more yellow than the others and seems to have a higher concentration of holo glitter whereas the others also have copper and orange glitters mixed in respectively. I Herd That seems to have a little less holo glitter than Fireside Glow.

On the other hand I found I Herd That to be sparklier than the others in lower lighting situations, probably because of the greater amount of non-holo glitter, if I had to guess why!

Slightly blurred to show the holo sparkle in the sun:

Category:

China Glaze

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OPI The Show Must Go On

Today’s post will be short on words but heavy on pictures. This is another example of my favourite type of polish – duochrome glass fleck!

OPI The Show Must Go On is from their Burlesque collection which was a holiday 2010 collection. It’s red but shifts colours from fuchsia through to orange, copper and even some golden yellow at extreme angles. I love it! It has a great formula too. Shown are three coats, but the third one I just put on before photographing because I’d had the polish on a while and somehow got some hairline cracks, not chips, in it while doing dishes! Two coats is enough for opacity. Shown in various lighting situations as listed.

Ott Light:

Sun:

Natural light, various degrees of overcast/partly sunny:

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OPI

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Nubar Wildlife and LA Girl Crowd Surfing

Wildlife is one of Nubar’s amazing duochrome polishes. It was released with their Going Green collection, and it’s a green that is olive but that shifts to leafy green at one angle and to gold through to copper complete with pinkish tone at another angle. It’s a great shade and quite unique!

I layered it on my ring finger with LA Girl Crowdsurfing from the Rockstar line since these two polishes seem to go well together. Crowdsurfing is a very very sheer green jelly base (definitely best for layering rather than on its own) with red-gold flakies and tiny green iridescent glitter. It actually reminds me of Cult Nails’ Toxic Seaweed, which I recently reviewed, except it’s like its very, very watered down cousin with much less colour and glitter. I have the same “hmmm” uncertain feeling about Crowdsurfing’s colour scheme as I do with Toxic Seaweed (in that it kind of has a red-green Christmasy thing going on), but it really does go quite well with Wildlife! Just adds a subtle sparkle to it, and a slightly more green tint.

Shown are two coats of Wildlife. Wildlife has a great formula, like all the Nubar duochromes I’ve tried, and applying it is a breeze. On my ring finger are two coats of Crowdsurfing overtop of Wildlife. No complaints with Crowdsurfing’s formula either; it’s your typical flakie consistency and easy to apply.

More photos to show off all the different angles! As usual, you can click on any photo to see more detail of the lovely duochrome.

Category:

LA Girl, Nubar

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China Glaze CG in the City

Today I have for you China Glaze’s CG in the City from the fall 2011 Metro collection. This is a really interesting and unique glitter with lavender, silver, copper and opaque black very fine glitter.

These photos show 4 coats with Poshe top coat. Since the glitter is fine, one coat of top coat is enough to make it pretty smooth. The first two photos are taken directly under my Ott light, look cooler than in real life, and if you click on the full-size versions, the second one also seems to show more colours in the flashes of glitter than are generally seen in real life.

The next two photos are not the greatest pics but are taken under warm indoor light and I think they give a better representation of how the polish looks in everyday life.

Although this polish is fascinating and has a nice formula, for some reason it just doesn’t do much for me. I guess I just don’t really care for the lavender/silver on my skintone. I like how it looks in the first two photos better than how it really looks. Actually, I like how it looks in all these photos better than I liked it as a mani. Maybe the glitter is just too fine for my tastes and I’d prefer it if there were bigger pieces of the individual colours to distinguish them better at a glance. I’ll have to try it again using only a couple of coats layered over top of another polish (I’m thinking something bronze or coppery) to see if I can make it work for me…

Category:

China Glaze

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Wet n Wild On the Prowl (partial) collection

On Halloween I posted Wet n Wild’s Cougar Attack (an awesome brown jelly with orangey-copper glitter, shown again above) from their limited edition and annoyingly hard to find On the Prowl Halloween collection; here are the other polishes I got from the same collection.

Buy Me a Drink

A gorgeous glowy shimmery plum burgundy. This is my favourite from the collection after Cougar Attack. Shown is three coats, no top coat (none of these photos have top coat).

Ready to Pounce

This is a blue-based purple with red-purple shimmer. It’s also nice and glowy, though less so than Buy Me a Drink. This was two coats, but it could have used three because of the crappy brush (more about that later). The colour is off in the last photo, but it shows off the shimmer really well if you click on it for the larger version.

Jungle Fever

A light grass green shimmer with metallic shimmer particles. This was three coats.

Tangled in My Web

Medium-sized, opaque black hex glitter in a clear base. This is one thick coat over Jungle Fever, sort of dabbed on more than just brushed on, which is how I usually apply polishes like this. I really like this one too.

I decided to turn the Jungle Fever – Tangled in My Web layering into a jelly sandwich by adding a coat of Barry M Lime overtop. Here it is in natural light and then under a lamp.

I did have application problems with the shimmers from this collection. I don’t know if I was just unlucky, but the brushes were awful. Uneven bristles that leave big drag marks all down the nail. The formula of the polish is thick and not very self-leveling too, which certainly doesn’t help with the drag marks! Cougar Attack had a better brush than the shimmers, or perhaps I just didn’t notice anything since it’s a glitter polish so I expected it to end up a bit bumpy. I didn’t notice any issues with the brush on Tangled in My Web, but then since it’s a clear layering glitter, again, it’s quite possible that I just didn’t notice since it applies so much differently.

Anyway, this collection has some great shades, brush problem notwithstanding! My favourites are Cougar Attack, Buy Me a Drink, and Tangled in My Web. The other two shades in the collection that I didn’t end up getting are Behind Closed Doors (I have NYX Girls Dorothy which from what I can tell online is a dupe with a much better formula) and Correction Tape, a multi-coloured layering hex glitter.

Category:

Barry M, Wet n Wild

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Vegan Claws

A vegan nail polish blog. A celebration of colour and light, as well as of justice for nonhuman animals.

Posts tagged ‘copper’

Nicole by OPI Just Busta Mauve

China Glaze Fast Track

Misa Epiphany, Taking Chances, and a comparison

China Glaze Deviantly Daring and No Plain Jane

Glitter Gal Buckled Bronze

China Glaze Kalahari Kiss and I Herd That

OPI The Show Must Go On

Nubar Wildlife and LA Girl Crowd Surfing

China Glaze CG in the City

Wet n Wild On the Prowl (partial) collection

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