Nail Art

Today I wanted to share some old nail art. And by art I mean it was done during my Fine Art rotation during my art foundation year at college. That's art!

These were inspired by my then recent holiday to Australia and New Zealand back in 2008. There's a palm tree, a beach, the Sydney harbour bridge and the Sydney Opera house.
They were all done using nail varnish on fake nails (they were blu-taced to my sister's fingers for these photos!)

I did a series of animals I saw at the Sydney zoo! There was also a koala and an emu I think.

After the single nail pictures I tried painting an image across all four fingers (sorry thumb nails, you miss out).

This above nail set was based on this photo of Manley Beach in Sydney. 

This one is of mountains in Queenstown, New Zealand. I like how the use of metalic nail varnishes made the lake shimmer.

To present this work for assessment I made some little wooden frames.

I'm still pretty proud if these. What do you think? 

Nailed It

I first saw the marbled nail technique on The Cheese Thief, but it was a while between seeing it and actually trying it.

My first attempt, without checking the tutorial, had some good results...

...and some hot messes.

After looking at a couple of different tutorials I realised where I went wrong.

When I put my nail in the water to get the polish I pulled it straight out again, bringing the rest of the polish with it. What you're meant to do is keep the nail under the water, clear the surface of the water, then bring it out.

I did remember about Vaseline-ing around my fingernails though. That is an important step.

This was my set up for attempt #2.

I thought a bigger receptacle might be a good idea, since the first time I was just using a Petit Filous yoghurt pot.

Red solo cup, you really are my friend.

This attempt went better.

But because I didn't want to re-do the nail polish in the water ten times, I put four nails in at once which resulted in only a subtle pattern.

This brings me to attempt #3.

I still haven't got it totally right, but I'm learning from my mistakes.

Look at that pinkie finger. Beautiful.

The fourth finger is cropped because I smudged it while it was drying. Argh!

But the one next to it is a beaut!

Have any of you tried this nail technique? With good or bad results?

Any more tips for getting it right?

Colourful wordy necklace

I made this necklace a long time ago using plastic false nails and words from magazines.

It's inspired by decorating my fingernails like this.

But not everyone is down with the nails so I made a new version.

I used one of these wooden discs from Hobbycraft - 29p for a packet of 4 heyo! - and drilled a hole in it.

Then I stuck on the little words with slightly watered down PVA glue and applied lots of coats of it over the top to seal it. 

I like how colourful it is, but I could also make a version using words from a newspaper for a black and white look.

Words at my fingertips

I don't often paint my fingernails but when I do I like to go for something fun like this. I cut little words out magazine and stick them on my nails.

I start with a coloured layer - usually black cos I'm edgey like that - then a clear coat, stick on the word and then a lot more clear polish so that the paper is completely covered and waterproof. 

Here are a couple of other nail art ideas I've recently come across:

Green aliens from The Ramblings of Crazy Woman.

And a cute panda which I saw here.

Rockstar fingernails

For Halloween 2008 I dressed up as a rockstar, so I had some pretty rockin fingernails to match. Black with different coloured glitter on. Awesome.

Inspired by this look I created another version of my fingernail necklaces. Instead of black nail varnish I just used black acrylic paint and covered them with layers of PVA glue. There's no danger of these nails chipping.

Beach

This is my go-to beach image which I like to paint. A lot. It's Manley Beach in Sydney, Australia from when I was there in the summer of 2008.

I paint it on finger nails...

...on sunglasses (this piece is from my Make 20 Paintings project)...

...on milk bottle tops...

...and on toy cars. I think I've gone too far with the car. It looks okay in the photo, but it's usually viewed from above so it looks a bit strange having a ring of sea around the sky, and I didn't know which direction to paint the clouds. I think an image which is a birds eye view might look better.

Except for the fingernails, I painted all the scenes with acrylic paint so that it would stick to the surface and dry. Which is a bit annoying because I prefer to work in oils but they would never work with the plastic surfaces.

Hmm, what should I try painting on next...

Fingernails

In the past couple of years fingernails have started to influence my art and my crafts. And I like it. Hand painted scenes of Sydney, Australia. Nail varnish on acrylic nailsNail necklace

Another view of Sydney. Painted using only nail varnish
This is from my Make 20 Paintings project


Nail earrings