Hits Demeter

NOTE:  THE POLISH IS NOT AS BRIGHT OR ORANGE IN REAL LIFE AS IN THE PICTURES BELOW.

It is not easy to describe the actual color of the polish on my nails, especially as the color looked different in different lighting.  Without sunlight or bright light on it, the polish was a dull or dusty orange.  It was still very pretty, though.  Sometimes it looked like the color of band-aids, like it had a little brown or beige in it.  Sometimes it looked like butterscotch pudding.  In its more muted form, I think it might be a nice color around Easter, and of course it would make a very nice color for Indian summer or fall.  I would say it is a work-safe color because it doesn't stand out so much inside an office.

I used three coats, and there was still visible nail line in some lighting.  At three coats it was a little darker than the bottle color, so I stopped at three, not to mention that adding another coat would have added more drying time.  It did dry well, though.

The brush is a slightly wider, flatter and thicker brush than the traditional Revlon brush, for example.  I normally don't like wider brushes, but I do like the Hits brushes.

The formula is very good.  It wears very well, and I had no chips.  I did have some regular tip wear, and I had some shrinkage from quick-dry top coats.

Here are some pictures:

Direct sunlight.  It has a pretty good linear holo effect.

Bottle shot, after a week of wear.

Same as above, but in different lighting.

Sunlight.

Indoors, office lighting, against the outside of my rust-orange suit.

Indoors, office lighting, against the lining of my orange suit.

Indoors, flash.

Indirect sunlight

Indirect sunlight.

Thank you for reading my blog!

Hits Speciallita Hula

This week I am wearing Hits Speciallita Hula, a Brazilian polish that I bought through the U.S. Stockist, llarowe.com.  I bought it on sale for $5, and then the price went even lower, to $4, and now they are sold out on llarowe.com, but ninjapolish.com has them for $6.50.

Hula is a very vivid red-orange polish with golden-orange flakies.  It reminded me of mercurochrome in the bottle, but once I applied it, it reminded me of my all-time favorite polish from something like 25 years ago:  Revlon Dragon Lady Red.  The Revlon was a creme, though, with no flakies.  Still, it's the closest I've come to Dragon Lady Red ever.  I wish I could find an old bottle of Dragon Lady Red.  I wish Revlon had not discontinued it or that they would bring it back, but for now I'm feeling a strong urge to buy a back-up bottle of Hula because it makes me so happy to look at it.  I tell myself that I don't finish bottles of polish anymore unless they're top coat or base coat, and I tell myself that there are at least six more manicures in the little bottle of Hula.  But, I may just succumb to the urge and buy a back-up bottle at some point anyway.

In the first pictures below, I have a coat of Sally Hansen Age Correct Growth (discontinued), three coats of Hula, and three coats of Seche Vite.  I took those pictures yesterday, on the third day of having the manicure.  In today's picture with the bottle (fourth day of the manicure), I have an additional coat of Seche Vite and a coat of Revlon Quick Dry Top Coat on top of that.  I add top coat every day to my manicure.  I use a little extra Seche Vite when I use flakie polishes because I want a smooth texture.  Hula was smooth and shiny without top coat, though.  It was relatively easy to apply, and I like the long, thin brush.  There was no dragging, no bald spots, and no flooding.  However, cleanup was not easy.  Trying to clean up this polish with a brush and acetone is like trying to clean up water paints with a brush and water.  The polish just dilutes and goes everywhere.  There was no staining, though.  Just tricky cleanup.  The old cotton and orange stick are better removal tools here than the brush.  There were some flakies on my skin here and there after cleanup, but they went away after a day or so.  The polish dried pretty quickly.  The wear is O.K.  It's a thin paint, but it hasn't chipped.  I did have significant shrinkage on the first day, though, and some tip wear, too.  Today (fourth day), I patched up the tips with a little polish and added more top coat.  There is still visible nail line in some lighting.  I wonder what the polish would look like with a creme underneath in a similar color.  Dragon Lady Red would have been perfect.  ;-)  The flakies here are sandwiched nicely and add depth and interest to the manicure.

Sunlight, Day Three.  Significant tip wear and shrinkage on tips.  

Sunlight, Day Three.  Love the orange flash in the sun!

Indirect sunlight.  Day Three.

Sunlight.  Day Three.  You can see the orange flash beginning on the left edge of the nails.

Sunlight.  Day Three.  You can see the flakies that create the orange flash.

Sunlight.  Day Three.  Love that golden orange flash.

Sunlight.  Day Three.

Office Lighting.  Day Three.

Office Lighting.  Day Three.

Office, with flash.  Day Three.

Yesterday, late afternoon sun.  Day Three.  You can see how in direct sunlight you get the orange flash and it's redder in indirect sunlight.

Yesterday, late afternoon sun.

Yesterday, late afternoon sun.

Yesterday, late afternoon sun.

Today, indoor lighting.  Day Four.  I patched up the worn and shrunken tips.

Thank you for reading my blog!

Nail Mail: Lynnderellas!

Last week I got two packages in the mail on the same day.

I got some nail art tools and brushes, including my first dotting tools, that I had ordered at the end of April from this store on ebay recommended by Lacey of Lace & Lacquers.  She had used the tools for an Easter-themed manicure.  You can see her manicure and more pictures of the tools here.

I also got my first two, my only two Lynnderellas.  I got them during a flash sale the week before last on llarowe.com.  They didn't take long to get to me!  I got Cauldron Drippings, which I had been wanting for a while, and I got Funny Money on a whim.  Turns out I don't really like Funny Money now that I see it up close.  If any of you would like to trade with me and are interested in Funny Money, please let me know.  I've never done a swap or trade before!

I also got HITS Speciallita No Olympo Ares, a truly red holo, deep cherry red!  This was also from llarowe.com.  I am just a sucker for that No Olympo collection of holo polishes.

Here are some pictures of the packaging and the bottles and some swatches on nail wheels:

Cauldron Drippings on #14 on the top wheel (and #15 on the top wheel is HITS No Olympo Ares and #13 on the top wheel is Lynnderella Funny Money).  China Glaze Cross Iron 360 on #9 on the bottom wheel and Confetti 053 Papa-Razzi on #10 on the bottom wheel.  I was trying to find a suitable "underwear" color for Cauldron Drippings so that I don't have a crazy amount of glitter layers from Cauldron Drippings.

#13 on the bottom wheel is L'Oreal L'Orange.  This may be what I end up using as my "underwear" for Cauldron Drippings (#14 on the top wheel).

All my HITS No Olympo holos.  Ares is #15 on the top wheel, Demeter is #6 on the bottom wheel, Hermes is #7 on the bottom wheel, and Poseidon is #8 on the bottom wheel.

 

Funny Money is #13 on the top wheel.  On the bottom wheel, #7 is China Glaze Holly-Day, and #8 is China Glaze Glittering Garland.

Thank you for reading my blog!

HITS Speciallita No Olympo Hermes Gold Holo

HITS Speciallita No Olympo Hermes is a light gold holo polish, a kind of taupe gold that almost looks nude on me in certain lights. It has a very noticeable holo effect, even indoors, but it's not as strong as the holo on HITS Speciallita No Olympo Poseidon.  The formula was good, I like the thinner and longer old school brush, and the application was easy.  The polish goes on in easy thin coats.  I used three coats.  Two would have been enough, but I wanted to cover up any nail line, so just to be sure, I used three coats.  I used Seche Vite on top.  Seche Vite didn't cause shrinkage, but the Revlon Quick-Dry Top Coat that I add every morning did cause shrinkage.  This is a very classy gold holo.  I think it's work appropriate and it's also a nice touch on a night out.

I still have this manicure on today.  I will be taking it off tomorrow.  I plan to put on Revlon Whimsical tomorrow, but I haven't chosen a blue polish to wear under Whimsical yet.  If any of you have worn Whimsical before, please let me know if you wore a different color underneath.  I'm thinking I may use Sinful Colors Cinderella.

The Hermes manicure has lasted a while, though.  I put it on last Sunday, so it's been 6 days.  It still hasn't chipped, but there's serious tip shrinkage and tip wear and noticeable growth.

In the pictures below, I am marking my photos with my blog address for the first time.  I looked for an iPhone app to use to watermark photos on the iPhone, but many of them will significantly reduce the resolution of the photo.  I have a couple of apps on price watches to see if they lower the price, and those apps are not supposed to reduce the resolution, but we'll see.  Right now I'm using the PicShop HD -- Photo Editor app.  It was free for the day yesterday (and today, too, I think).  From what I can tell, the newly saved photos with my blog address are about half the size of the original photo files, but at least the images still look O.K. to me so far.  If any of you use a good iPhone app to watermark your photos on your iPhone, please let me know.  And, let me know if you think the resolution of these photos is much lower than my usual photo resolution.  You should still be able to click on photos to make them larger and hopefully sharper, too.

These next two photos were taken in my office, under office lighting.  The top photo is without flash, and the bottom photo is with flash.  You can see that the polish has a holo effect even indoors under regular office lighting.

The next few pictures are in sunlight:

Indirect sunlight, and still there's a lot of holo!

Different angle of indirect sunlight.  Cool gradient effect.

Indirect sunlight.  This gives you an idea of what the polish looks like without the big holo fireworks.

Again, in indirect sunlight, after several days' worth of wear.

If you are interested in flakie polishes, please don't forget to enter my first giveaway.  I am up to 45 followers now (YAY!) and almost 2,000 page views, so I may be having another giveaway once this one ends.

Thank you for reading my blog!