Vinylux

So the new buzz product right now is CND Vinylux.  It's a regular polish that claims to last 7 days.  Not 'UP TO' 7 days, the top coat clearly states on the box 'lasts 7 days without chipping'.  There is no UV light required with this polish and it comes off with regular polish remover.

I found it at my local CND authorized nail supply on launch day.  I think it's supposed to retail for $9.95 US.  Many of the colours match Shellac so I purchased 2 of the Shellac shades - Masquerade and Cake Pop and I also purchased Scarlet Letter, a nice dark red.  Unfortunately I now have to keep my clients in mind when purchasing colours.  The Weekly Top Coat was the same price as the polishes.  This system requires no base coat so of course I'm going to try the red one first to see if it stains right?

Please note that first of all, I am wearing Shellac underneath this so this may affect my wear since I usually do get extra wear out of my regular polish on Shellac.  So I painted 2 coats of Scarlet Letter and 1 coat of Vinylux Weekly Top Coat.  The Vinylux formula was really nice and almost a one coater.  I had doubts about the staining though when I applied the top coat and noticed some red on the brush.

And just for comparison I grabbed the closest colour in China Glaze - Red Satin and painted 2 coats on my other hand with a top coat of Seche Vite.  First impression is that they look pretty much identical although I did get a couple of small sheet marks on the China Glaze hand which is my non-dominant hand.

This is the China Glaze hand at 3 days.  No chips but the top coat has dulled quite a bit.

And the Vinylux hand at 3 days in.  There is more noticeable wear at the tips and scuff marks on the top coat.  Honestly after being used to the lasting high shine of gel polishes it was painful to continue to wear this scuffed up manicure for the rest of the week.  And although it looks like my manicure made it chip-free to day 3...

I got a tiny chip in my thumb nail.  To be fair, it did chip my Shellac underneath as well.  I did take extra care when doing Clients nails this week to not get any acetone or product on my manicure.  However if I hadn't been doing a test of this polish I would have taken it off at Day 3.

So here's the China Glaze hand at Day 7.  Not much going on here other than some cracking and dulling of the top coat.  The cracking is pretty typical for me with regular polish on Shellac since my natural nails are weak and bendy.

There really wasn't much tip wear to speak of either.  This is the typical sort of wear I get out of regular polish on top of Shellac.

And here's the Vinylux at Day 7.  No cracking like the China Glze but the polish is completely dull and looks dirty.

No chips here but I did have a problem with tip wear.  Unfortunately it's a bit difficult to see in my photos as I'm wearing a dark sparkly purple underneath.  In all fairness, this is my dominant hand so a little more wear and tear is expected.

So now for the removal.  As I previously mentioned I was wearing gel polish underneath.  This is the China Glaze hand - no staining, nothing unusual.

And here is the Vinylux after removal - no staining either.  I will say though, that the Vinylux came off slightly easier than the China Glaze which surprised me.  I used non-acetone remover for both hands.

So my overall thoughts on Vinylux:
I know I sorta cheated by wearing it over gel polish but I don't really have a choice.  The formula was really nice, the price was the same roughly as OPI.  Not having to use base coat was a bonus.  The dry time was better than traditional polish.  The wear didn't impress me.  The top coat dulled and scuffed so quickly.  Removal was a breeze.  I'd like to try this out over bare nails sometime.  Would I wear it again over gel polish? No unless I really loved the colour.  This will probably be a good choice for my clients who don't wear gel however I'm hesitant to offer it before I've tested it on bare nails.

And on the flip side if anyone was still curious or on the fence about gel polish, just take a look at those photos of my China Glaze hand!  It's absolutely worth it to invest in a gel manicure, even a clear or neutral colour and paint any colour in regular polish over top for extended wear and extra strength!  I think every girl should try out a gel manicure from a good professional Nail Tech who knows what they're doing and uses pro products only (there's so many garbage knock-offs out there, but that's a rant for another time).

Later
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A couple of before and afters

Here's a set of nails before I applied extensions.

And here's the after shot - gel extensions with a glitter french and some nail art.  Unfortunately my camera couldn't quite capture the awesome glitter.  I liked this design quite a bit though.

Here are my Mom's (the severe nail biter's) nails.  After a couple of treatments I managed to help her grow out a bit of free edge.

And after a couple of months of extensions and proper care I managed to help her grow them enough that I was able to give her a Shellac French on her very own natural long nails!  It's a pretty awesome thing for a lifetime nail biter.  Her nails are still quite weak and she's had some breaks but she's been able to maintain them for the most part and now we exclusively do the gel polish on her every two weeks.  She's enjoying the Hologlam collection over her Shellac right now :)

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A set of gels and 2 fills

So just because I said I wasn't going to show you how to do extensions doesn't mean I'm not going to show them off ;)  And just one more thing about that topic, I'm absolutely willing to share my opinions and answer any questions you have about extensions in general, like the difference between acrylics/gels/soak offs, or product safety etc.

So here is the before pic of naked nails with a fresh manicure.

And here is the result.  We didn't realize until after I took the photo how the cuticle oil and lighting made it look like she was bleeding.  Anyways, I used clear tips and painted her tips in Gelish Amazon Flirt and then OPI Gelcolor Lincoln Park After Dark.

And here's 2 weeks later after her first fill.  I used OPI Gelcolor in Pink Flamenco and then added a little Konad flower and some dots.

And another 2 weeks and here's her second fill.  The colour is RCM After Party Playful stamped with an old fuschia L'Oreal polish and the pewter colour from the new China Glaze Hologlam collection.  I also rounded her nails quite a bit here. 

Unfortunately, she's a picker and she didn't make it to a third fill.  I'm finding a lot of people pick them off.  Please don't do that, it ruins your nails.  Most of the time when people say they don't get extensions because it ruins your nails they are wrong, they ruined their own friggen nails by picking and pulling them off.  And yes we Nail Techs can tell by the state of your nails that you've picked them off ;)

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Random soak offs

Now when I said my new camera was shitty I wasn't joking:

This is just a plain old french with gel polish on natural nails. I used OPI Alpine Snow for the tips.  I got a kick out of this because it really looks like I'm wearing extensions.

And then this one shortly after.  I used OPI Gelcolor in Pink Flamenco and then Lincoln Park After Dark.  Finished it off with a konad stamp.

And finally this was the one I got loads of compliments on and nobody could believe these were my natural nails.  I used a little bit of Shellac Silver Chrome in a diagonal french and then dabbed on Akzentz Options Aurora Sparkle in Silver.  I stamped with konad and did a little dotting as well.  I actually wore this for 3 weeks since the growth was hardly visible.

I have some post ideas rolling around in my head but I'm not sure if there is any interest.  Some feedback would be great as I'm not entirely sure that my posts on soak off gels are helpful or interesting.  I have probably 100 gel polishes now that I could swatch, I could do a gel marble tutorial, removal tutorial, embedding/layering tutorial, gel polish tips/tricks.  I am going to state up front though that I won't be doing any tutorials on nail extensions since I don't believe that it's something you should attempt without the proper training, and the available products for a non-professional are complete garbage so it's not even worth your time.  Soak off gels however are becoming more widely available and there's really minimal risk of damage other than the usual picking and peeling that people tend to do.  Besides, soak off gels are really what sparked my interest in becoming a certified Nail Tech.  I have a ton of knowledge on these products so feel free to ask or suggest anything you like.

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Extended break

I missed blogging.  Not sure if I can keep up to my previous pace but I'm going to put some effort into this again.  And my direction is also going to change here somewhat as well since I'm now a licensed Nail Tech.

I have access now to so many cool things in the nail world and I'm still obsessed with Gel polish.  I pretty much lost my passion for the nail blog world last fall.  I was tired of seeing all this indie crap being posted and just really didn't see what the fuss is about.  I still don't, but in any case you won't see much regular nail polish on this blog anymore.

So having said that, let's see some RNP (regular nail polish) photos:

I picked up all 3 of the China Glaze Ombre kits when they came out.  $11 for 4 CG polishes was a friggen steal so I bought them all!  FYI my new blackberry camera sucks ass so the quality of my photos has declined quite a bit.

For my birthday this year I treated myself to the entire Hologlam display:

Yeah it's sideways, I don't give a shit lol and you guys have all seen it a million times now anyways.  This looks pretty awesome in my nail studio.

That's pretty much all the RNP I've purchased over the last 6 months.  I've spent a lot on gel supplies though.  In fact my haul from last weekend was pretty awesome:

The Axxium and 6 of the OPI Gelcolors were a steal at less than $50.  I did splurge on the OPI Gelcolor from the Oz Collection - When Monkeys Fly (which doesn't curl like the RNP version does).  I also picked up 3 colours from the brand new CND Vinylux line (not pictured) and I'm excited to try those out but have no one to test them on.  I suppose I could wear it over my gel polish.  I'm overwhelmed right now with new stuff to try.

Hopefully I can keep this up again.

Later
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