Nail Art Tips & Techniques

ネイル★アート★コツ

Hello my lovely mofus~!

Nail art has been one of my hobbies on-and-off for the past couple years. Today I want to share a few tips I've picked up through my time playing with nail art. First you should know that I love D.I.Y, and I'm really cheap, so I'd rather use things I already have than go buy some special tool. So hopefully a lot of this stuff you have already!

1. Tools
2. Polishes
3. Painting on the Dominant Hand


1. Tools:
   Lots of nail art designs involve dots, so you'll need something to make dots. You can buy dotting tools of different sizes that are specifically for nail art. You can find them online and/or they might sell them at Sally's beauty supply.

   But you don't need to go buy a dotter, you can use things that are just lying around your house!
My favorites are:
Tooth picks! Toothpicks are great because you already have them, and you can cut them to make different sized dots.

Above are some ways to get different sized dots using toothpicks. Toothpicks are not that great for creating lines, the lines end up wobbly, as you can see in the picture.

The ends of paintbrushes & old lip liner caps.

In the picture I'm pointing out the dots that have 'dimples'. You should use a light touch when dotting.

    Really anything with a slightly domed tip will work. For example, the clicker on a ball point pen, a dull pencil, etc.

    Lines are another important part of nail art designs, so you'll need a liner! There are polishes called 'liners' that come in a slender tube and have a long, thin brush which is great for making straight and slightly curved lines. They're not good for much else. I do suggest trying it, because they're not very expensive. You can get them in a variety of colors, but I suggest black, it's the most versatile. I have a white striper but it's completely useless; it got really goopy.

In lieu of the striper, you can use the most versatile of nail art tools: the paint brush. A small paintbrush can make lines like the striper, but it can also make tight loops, leaf-like shapes, and much more. You can pick up a small brushes from the craft store for pretty cheap. For nail art, you'll probably want to trim them a bit. Cut it into a tapering point and make sure there aren't any fly-aways.

In this picture you can see the striper can make straight lines, dashes, and slight curves. The paint brush can make straight line, dots, dashes, and leaf-like shapes. The bobby pin is similar to the toothpick: not good at lines, but it can make fairly uniform dots. 

Size Comparison. The details on this nail were done using this brush.

2.  Polish:
   In my experience, the best polishes are those that are pretty water-y straight out of the bottle, but dry rock-hard. Sometimes polishes come out of the bottle goopy or sticky, and never fully dry on the nail. It's really frustrating when you've worked so hard on your design, and it doesn't dry correctly! White polish is the worst, no matter what the brand, white polish tends to be the goopiest of all the colors. I haven't found a particular brand I like: you'll just have to search by trial & error. The older the polish gets, the more goopy it will become. On the other hand, I've noticed that black polish is always pretty easy to work with, so it doesn't matter what brand you buy.
 
    I hate buying $8 or $10 polish, when I could buy 4 colors for $2 each. One of my favorite brands (because it's cheap, and they tend to dry well) is essence. I find it at my local all-purpose grocery store, Fred Meyer. The regular polishes are $1.99, and they have a couple top coats, base coat, sparkle polishes, nail stickers, and even nail stamping stuff. Their 24/7 nail base coat can double as a matte top coat, and it's super inexpensive compared to other matte top coats on the market (I think it's $2.99).

    I also like Essie polishes, they're around $8 at drugstores. Revlon polishes are good too, they're around $6 I think.

3. Painting on the Dominant Hand:
    It's the thing we all dread. I'll admit, it's pretty difficult. The key is patience. Take it real slow, and be patient with yourself. No one's going to look too closely anyway.

  I've picked up a habit of painting my dominant hand first. Why?

• First, you're knocking the hard part out of the way at the start. You will have more patience with the first hand you do; I find myself rushing and getting frustrated with mistakes when I'm tired. 
• Second, it's kind of a test: if you're able to paint a slightly recognizable design on your dominant hand, you'll definitely be able to do it on the other! 
• Third, if you already have your non-dominant hand perfect, and you can't manage to do your second hand, you will have to destroy all your hard work. 
• Finally, while working on your dominant hand, you risk the possibility of ruining your previous work. When painting with your dominant hand, you will be less clumsy, and can avoid ruining your manicure. 

I hope that helped someone (^_^) I'm planning on doing a tutorial soon~!

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving, mofus~!
~Usagi