Born Pretty Duochrome 205

Hello ladies! Today I have a lovely polish to share with you, which was kindly sent to my by Born Pretty Store for my review.  This is a multi-chrome polish from their "Chameleon" range Born Pretty Chameleon Nail Polish 205 ID#18622.  I'm a huge fan of multi-chrome polishes, so I was very excited to try this one out.

Born Pretty Chameleon 205 - natural shade

Multi-chrome polishes often give the strongest effect when viewed in shaded natural light, and this is certainly true of this polish (pic above).  The multi-chrome effect is nice and strong, showing the range of colours simultaneously across the nail.  The colour transition is a lovely maroon to gold with a lovely shade of green in there too.

Born Pretty Chameleon 205 - full sunlight

What I especially liked about this polish is that it was also really sparkly.  Viewed above in full sunlight you can see the effect of the shimmer in this polish, which gives it a real extra special finish.

Born Pretty Chameleon 205 - artificial light

Above and below I've captured some pictures that show the dramatic colour shift of this polish - from a beautiful maroon (this is the main colour, visible most of the time), through shades of bronzy/gold to finally a lovely olive green (this is the least seen colour, visible at extreme angles of the nail to the light source).  Pictured here I am wearing two coats of the Chameleon polish over the recommended 'black undies' (a single layer of A England Camelot, a rich black creme).  Multi-chrome polishes should be worn over a coloured base coat to give the colour shift the maximum 'pop', and black works best.

Born Pretty Chameleon 205 - artificial light

The Chameleon polishes are mini-polishes, with 6ml volume.  That's a good size really for this type of polish, because a little goes a long way so this size will  last you quite a while.  However, as with all mini-polishes, the brush is also small.  On this bottle the cap is very fat, and the brush is short, and the combination of these factors did make it a little tricky to handle.  The consistency of the polish, dry time and overall finish however were all excellent.

The Mini-Brush

I received this polish for free, but I have checked and the RRP is $12.88 (approx. £8.57) and at time of writing it is on offer for 25% off at $9.66 (£6.42).  You can receive a further 10% discount by using the code included in the banner below.  World-wide postage is free, although be aware that it ships from Hong Kong so typically takes 2-3weeks to arrive in the UK.

Born Pretty Chameleon 205

Conclusion: Overall this is a really lovely multi-chrome polish.  The multi-chrome effect is strongly visible in shaded natural light, and under artificial light this polish appears a very pretty shimmer mostly in the maroon shade.  My only criticism is that being a mini-polish the brush is a little difficult to use and also the pricepoint for 6ml does make this quite expensive in comparison to some other brands.  I did really like this polish, and I'm sure it's one that I will be wearing again.

Visit Born Pretty Store for a wide range of polish and Nail Art supplies, and use the code below for an additional 10% discount off any order.

Nine Realms by Crowstoes : Muspelheim

Hello Ladies! Today I have another of the fabulous polishes from the Crowstoes 9 Realms collection - tonight's offering is the lovely (but unpronounceable) "Muspelheim":

In Norse legend Muspelheim is the flaming inferno volcanic home of the fire giants.  I don't know that I would have picked a blue based shade to represent a fire planet, by hey I'm not the creative at work here.  Muspelheim the polish is a multichrome glitter in a blurple base.  It is packed with teeny tiny glitter particles in royal blue and golden yellow that produce a multichrome spectrum from royal blue to purple.  The golden particles don't really show on the nail as clearly as in the bottle (except in the closeup thumb nail shots below).

Pictured here I'm wearing my customary two coats with NE base and HK girl topcoat.  In the swatches at the top of this post you can see Muspelheim in the sunshine - in the shade is the only time you'll see both colours on the nail at once, otherwise the main colour is either the royal blue shade or the blurple. The magenta shade here is really hard to capture because it's not really seen except at really high angles to the light source.

 

In the thumbshots below you can see all the lovely details of this polish.  Unfortunately these details aren't quite so obvious on the nail unless you look quite closely.  I really did like this shade a lot, but it's one of those that's just not quite as fabulous as it promises in the bottle.

I bought my bottle of Muspelheim for £10.25 from Rainbow Connection (link in the Suppliers page). This is a lovely shade, I think I was just a little spoiled by this point because I'd tried collection-mates Huginn and Muninn, and Vanaheim, right before - and those are bonkers good!  I do recommend Muspelheim, especially if like me you're a big fan of purple/blurple shades.

Nine Realms by Crowstoes : Huginn and Muninn

Hello Ladies! Tonight I have a real treat of a polish to share with you, from a collection that is one of my absolute favourites of 2014 and in fact, ever.  There are two standout collections for me this year - the Picture Polish LE duochromes, and the 9 Realms collection by Crowstoes.  As a brand, Crowstoes stand head and shoulders above the rest for me.  The creativity behind each collection is just on a whole other level, so any new collection is something to get excited about, and boy did I get excited about this one!   Over the next few posts I'll be sharing with you all the polishes I picked up, and I'm starting with my favourite: Huginn and Muninn.

Art Credit: Jarnsaxe@DeviantArt

The 9 Realms collection is inspired by Norse mythology. In Norse legend, Huginn ('thought') and Muninn ('memory') are the raven avatars of the god Odin, they flew throughout the world and brought knowledge back to Odin.  The polish of the same name is a stunning multichrome in shades of royal purple, forest green and earthy brown:

Huginn and Muninn by Crowstoes - 9 Realms - natural light (shade)

Pictured here I'm wearing two thin coats over black, but from swatches I've seen you can achieve the same effect with three coats and no undies. The colour combination on this is strikingly beautiful, and quite unlike any other multichrome in my collection.  The green and purple complement each other beautifully, and the combination really drew to my mind the image of a mystical forest with dark green shade and purple autumn leaves, and the beady eye of a raven peering out from the canopy:

Art Credit: Ninjatic@DeviantArt

The multichrome effect is most apparent in natural light and shade.  Under artificial lighting one colour tends to dominate, depending on the direction of the light relative to the nail surface:

Upper Row and Lower Left: Artificial light, Lower right: natural light (shade)

In the swatch above you can see the gorgeous royal purple, the golden brown and green transitional shade, and the rich emerald.  In the lower right corner is a swatch taken in natural light and you can see the purple and green clearly together on the nail. In artificial lighting, at direct angles (ie most of the time) it's the purple shade that dominates, with the green appearing at higher angles/along the curved nail edge.

Huginn and Muninn by Crowstoes - 9 Realms - artificial light

This swatch captures the closeup detail of the two main colours at the opposing ends of the multichrome spectrum.  In the purple you can clearly see royal blue and magenta shimmer, and the green is a combination of forest green, teal and gold.  Quite how they managed to pack so much depth into one polish is a mystery to me.  I couldn't love this polish more, it's utter perfection.

Huginn and Muninn by Crowstoes - 9 Realms - natural light

I can confidently say that Huginn and Muninn will make it into my top 3 polishes for the year 2014. It has as sold out faster than any of the other 9 Realms shades but is not LE so keep your eyes peeled for restocks.  I picked mine up from Rainbow Connection for £10.25.

Spotted! The 'Amazing' new Revlon Collection

Hello Ladies!  I was out shopping today (you know, where you decide to just 'go look at the nail polish' and end up buying 6...) and I spotted a gorgeous new collection from Revlon - The Electic-Chrome limited edition collection released as a tie-in for The Amazing Spiderman 2.  The reason for this post is that THESE ARE CURRENTLY ON OFFER! These sell for £6.49 each but Boots is currently doing a 'Buy 2 for £10' offer.

Here's a collection marketing pic I shamelessly nicked from the internet...

Electric Chrome Collection - Revlon

IRL these don't appear to have quite the multi-chrome pop that the promo shots are showing, and instead look more to me like gorgeous bright metallic foil shimmers.  A quick hunt for collection reviews suggested this was the overall effect on the nail, although I have seen a couple of shots where the blogger used black undies to give the shade more pop. I'll definitely be trying that.

left: "Super-Powered", right: "Spidey-Sense"

I chose 'Super-Powered' and 'Spidey Sense'.  It was a really close call though with the magenta 'Gwen's Crush' which is also lovely.  But in the end I'm a sucker for a metallic red so it had to be Spidey Sense.  You may recall that a few years ago OPI released a Spiderman collection (great review post on the PolishAholic) to tie-in with the first 'reboot' and in my opinion this offering from Revlon is more exciting.  I also love the gold spider's webs on the bottles, that's a really nice touch.

Swatches to follow...at some point...really I must get quicker at this swatch and post business!  But I wanted to get the word out before the Boots offer ends....

Picture Polish Illusionist

Hello Ladies!  Well it's a little late, but here's the final instalment from the Picture Polish LE multi-chrome set - the fabulous "Illusionist". (previous posts on its collection mates: Aurora, Borealis, Gravity, Altered State, Solar Flare).  To think I almost didn't buy this one! I thought it would be too similar to Aurora but for me, its different enough to justify having them both.  I've put some comparisons in this post, in a similar vein to the ones I did for Borealis and Altered State.  But first, here's some pure swatch porn...

Picture Polish "Illusionist" - artificial light

Illusionist is a Teal Green-Purple-Magneta multi-chrome polish with silver scatterchrome particles.  This is a similar colour shift range to Aurora (see below), the dominant colour is a lovely teal green and under shallow angles this shifts to purple, and magenta at large angles.  The scatterchrome particles give this a gorgeous silvery shimmer, and 'dusty' look.

Picture Polish "Illusionist" - artificial light

Pictured here I'm wearing a couple of coats on top of a single coat of black 'undies' with NE base coat and HK girl topcoat to sandwich it all together.  As with the other polishes in this collection, the formula is as smooth as melted butter. Its very sheer, so you definitely need undies with this, but you don't need to use black....I had a major lemming for this beauty ever since I saw these swatches from Emma at Imagination in Colour where she layered this over paler colours to great effect.  I'll definitely be trying this next.

Picture Polish "Illusionist" - artificial light

Here is a comparison to Aurora...as you can see the colour range is identical, its the finish that is different.  Aurora has a densely glittered finish and is packed with multichrome glitter particles.  This intensifies the colour shift (see below, upper right).  The silvery finish of Illusionist, from the scatterchrome particles, is a more subtle muted effect but really sophisticated.  Its basically identical to the relationship between Borealis and Altered State(comparison on Borealis page).

Picture Polish "Illusionist" vs. "Aurora" - artificial light

I picked up my bottle of Illusionist from the lovely Sally at Sally Magpies (link in the suppliers page) for £13.50.  I highly recommend it, especially if you missed out on Aurora. 

I did notice that the new Dance Legend Galaxy series look a lot like the PP Limited Edition series! So there might be an option out there if you missed out on these.  The link above is to a blog that's in Russian, heaven knows what it says, but I'm guessing its something along the lines of 'bloody hell look at these stonkingly awesome polishes'....if anyone has any of these I'd love to hear what you think of them!

Picture Polish Borealis

Hello Ladies! Today's post is something really special - the ultra Limited Edition "Borealis" by Picture Polish.  This post is pure swatch porn, and I apologise in advance if it gives you a lemming you can't scratch.  The latest from PP is that there were only enough materials to make 400 bottles of this and it won't be made again.  Then again, they said there would only be 800 bottles of Aurora and then miraculously found enough material to double that number, so you never know....

This is a very picture heavy post, I went a bit nuts with the camera and then struggled to pick my favourites. 

Borealis by Picture Polish - artificial light

Borealis is the last release in the Limited Edition multi-chrome series that included: Aurora, Illusionist, Gravity, Altered State, Illusionist and Solar Flare.  These polishes are absolutely stonking, quite possibly the most gorgeous collection I've ever seen.  I was so excited to hear that there would be another addition, I sat over my laptop like a crazy woman pressing the refresh button every 2 seconds....quite seriously allowing my husband to witness the level of my polish crazies could be the first step to my divorce...but look how lovely....

 

Borealis by Picture Polish - artificial light

Some bloggers have described Aurora as looking like an amped up version of Illusionist (comparison of these in the Illusionist post).  It does strike me that Borealis is like an amped up version of Altered State so I did a quick comparison.  The finish on both is quite different - Altered State has the silvery scatter-chrome particles giving it a starry finish and a slightly 'dusty' look, and Borealis is packed with conventional colour glitters.  The multichrome shift colour range though is very similar, with Altered State being a paler, slightly more silvered version of the same colours that Borealis shows.

Borealis vs. Altered State

99% of the time Borealis appears to be an electric metallic blue.  This is the colour that pops out when the angle of the nail to the main light source is 'straight on'...

This is the main colour that shows on the nail

At slightly tilted angles, metallic purple pops out of the mix, oh lordy do I love a good purple, and this one's a doozy...

At slightly higher angles to the light, a metallic purple shines through

But my favourite surprise is that at high angles of the nail to the light this polish bursts into the colours of the sunset - magneta, red and gold.  This was hard to get on camera, because I had to position the light source behind my hand.  It's not a colour you see often when its one the nail, but it is totally amazeballs...

At extreme angles all the colours of the sunset appear, stunning

 As with the other shades, the only time there's a chance to see multiple colours on the nail simultaneously is in diffuse natural light.  Under artificial light this polish appears as one of the three main component colours seen above.  This is a crappy camera phone pic, but it's the only one I captured in natural light, and here you can see all the colours together...phwoar....

Picture Polish Borealis  - natural light (shade)

I'm  wearing two coats of Borealis on top of two coats of black 'undies' polish ('Just Black' by No7) with NE base and HK Girl top coat.  Like all the PP LE shades this is a sheer polish that requires another shade underneath to show the colour shift.  I think you'd need 4+ coats to get this opaque on its own, and who wants to use that much up in one mani? not me!  As with all the other shades, formula and application on this shade was perfect.

Picture Polish Borealis  - artificial light

So in the end, how does this stack up against the other shades?  It's certainly very pretty, and a fantastic addition to the collection.  On balance though, I think that Aurora is the better polish.  The paler colour of Aurora allows the multichrome effect to be more obvious all of the time.  The colour palette of Borealis is gorgeous, but for the most part this appears as a nice glittery blue, which is good but not as exciting as the pink/green combo of Aurora.

Picture Polish Borealis  - artificial light

I picked up my bottle of Borealis from the lovely Sally Magpies (link in suppliers page) for £13.50.  At the moment the word is that this polish is sold out and won't be restocked, but given the restocks that the rest of the collection received I think there is still hope.  PP have courted controversy with this collection though, there is a lot of bad feeling out there about the restock of the original shades as some people felt they'd been 'tricked' into thinking they were more exclusive than they turned out to be in reality.  I think this would be a valid argument if the polishes were sold at a higher price than other LE shades. I do wonder though if customer reaction is going to influence future PP releases. Perhaps we will be less likely to see LE shades, and if that means we miss out on collections like this one I think that would be very sad indeed.  So fingers crossed that this collection is a sign of things to come and not the last of a dying breed....

 

 

Picture Polish Altered State

Hello ladies! Today I have the final instalment in the Limited Edition Picture Polish collection - "Altered State" (see collection-mates : Aurora, Borealis, Illusionist, Solar Flare, Gravity).  Please excuse the nasty cut on my index finger.  It's not pretty and it stings like a beyotch when rubbed with acetone I can tell you...anyway onto the swatches...

Picture Polish Altered State - artificial light

Altered State is remarkably similar to Gravity -  it's a Purple-Blue-Magenta multi-chrome (whereas Gravity is Blue-Purple-Magenta) with the 'scatter chrome' finish.  The shade of the blue is different, the blue of altered state is more of a denim/royal blue, and the blue of  Gravity is slightly more green leaning to come out as more of a teal blue in the sunshine.  But in essence, these polishes are very similar and just have the order of the multi-chrome effect reversed.  In each case, in most lighting conditions, the polish will appear to be the dominant colour.  So Gravity looks blue most of the time, and Altered State looks purple most of the time.

Picture Polish Altered State - artificial light - the dominant colour is purple

In these pictures I'm wearing my usual two coats of colour atop black undies ('Just Black' by No.7) and NE base, finished with HK girl topcoat.  Like all the Limited Edition shades the formula is great.  It's a sheer polish, so you will definitely need some type of base colour if you don't want to wait for 20 coats to dry...

Picture Polish Altered State - artificial light

This is a very pretty polish, and if I hadn't seen the other polishes in this range I'd think this was amazing. But as it stands, this is my least favourite of the bunch.  In order of awesomeness I'd rank these (best to last) Aurora, Solar Flare, Borealis, Gravity, Illusionist, Altered State.

Picture Polish Altered State - artificial light

The multichrome effect on Altered State is the weakest of the bunch.  It's almost impossible to catch a glimpse of all the colours on the nail at once.  Your best chance is in natural light, in the shade.  This crappy phone pic shows the best I was able to capture.  Nothing like the wow factor of Aurora, but still a very pretty polish especially with all the sparkly scatterchrome particles which look gorgeous in all types of artificial lighting.



Picture Polish Altered State - natural light

I picked up my bottle of Altered State from Rainbow Connection UK (link in the suppliers list) for £12.50.  It's currently out of stock, but I believe there is a restock due sometime in March so keep your eyes peeled :) 



Picture Polish Gravity

Hello ladies! Continuing with the series of Limited Edition Picture Polish shades today I have Gravity to show you (you can see also collection-mates Aurora, Borealis, Gravity, Altered State, Solar Flare and Illusionist)....

Picture Polish Gravity - natural light

Gravity is a blue to purple duochrome with the same holo shard glitters that Solar Flare has.  Like Solar Flare , Gravity has a more subtle duochrome effect than Aurora. In the shade, you can see both of the main colours on the nail at once, but most of the time this polish appears completely one colour of the three: teal blue, royal purple and magenta.

Picture Polish Gravity - artificial light

I'm wearing two coats of Gravity atop a couple coats of 'black undies' ('Just Black' by No7) with NE base and HK Girl top coat.  Like all of the Limited Edition collection polishes, this is a relatively sheer polish that applies smoothly and evenly, formula is fantastic and the brush is easy to use.

Picture Polish Gravity - sun light

This is a gorgeous polish, like its collection mates this is something really special.  Picture Polish is a bit on the spendy side, but for these polishes I'd say they're worth every penny.  With my love of metallic purple polishes Gravity really appeals to me a lot, but being objective I would rank these polishes (first to last) as Aurora, Solar Flare , and Gravity.  That being said, these are some of my favourite polishes in my entire collection, so third place ain't bad.

Picture Polish Gravity - artificial light

I picked up my bottle of Gravity from Rainbow Connection for £12.50 (link in supplier page).  It's currently out of stock, but a restock is due sometime in March...

Next up will be Altered State, the last of the collection that I picked up.  I have no idea why I didn't buy Illusionist at the time, I think I had some mad idea that if I left one behind that was evidence that I'm capable of restraint, which we all know is a lie.  So I'll be eagerly awaiting the restock too....

Picture Polish Aurora

Greetings Ladies!  Allow me to introduce you to one of my favourite polishes of all time....Picture Polish "Aurora"....

Picture Polish Aurora

Aurora is, bar none, the most astonishing multi-chrome polish I have ever seen.  Like its name suggests, this polish is the embodiment of the Northern Lights.  The colour shift is predominantly Emerald - Magenta - Purple but there are hints of blue and gold peeking through.  As if all that wasn't excitement enough this polish is also packed with multichrome glitter that is similar to Ozotic 528 (hardly a big surprise given that Picture Polish is made by the same company as the now-discontinued Ozotic).

Picture Polish Aurora - one bottle, a rainbow of colour

Pictured here I'm wearing a couple of coats of Aurora over a plain black polish ('Just Black' by No.7) to make the colour shift pop.  As usual, there's NE base underneath is all and HK Girl topcoat to finish it off.

Picture Polish Aurora - a chameleon polish

This polish simply has to be seen to be believed.  Sadly this is really limited edition.  Originally it was announced there would only be 800 bottles worldwide and that customers would be limited to purchasing one bottle each.  Nail polish addicts worldwide went absolutely crazy trying to get hold of it and it sold out in tens of minutes.  Then miraculously they announced that a further 1000 bottles were going to be made available.  That's some smart marketing right there...

Picture Polish Aurora - natural light

The best colour shift is seen in natural light, in the shade.  It's then that you see several colours on the nail at once and it's 10x more beautiful than this crappy phone camera picture suggests.  In fact it was so pretty that I actually had to drive with gloves on because the effect was so distracting I was worried I was going to crash my car.  I'm absolutely serious about that.  This here is crash your car nail porn. In artificial light, most of the time this polish appears one colour, but whichever colour it picks is GORGEOUS...sit back and enjoy the show:

Picture Polish Aurora - artificial light

This emerald green shade is the dominant colour, and its a beautiful jewel tone, I'd love a polish that was just this single colour all the time. 

and it's also a lovely royal blue....

and a fabulous magenta/purple....

It's so many colours, and all of them gorgeous. What I loved about this polish were those moments when three or more colours were on the nail at the same time, the combination of the green and the pink is just astonishing. 

I bought my bottle from Sally Magpies (link on supplier's page) for £13.50.  There will apparently be a restock of this shade sometime in March (at Sally's and at Rainbow Connection).  So get your clicking figures at the ready ladies because you're not going to want to miss this. 

I predict that this will be my favourite polish of 2014...

Also check out collection-mates Borealis, Gravity, Altered State, Solar Flare & Illusionist.