Scaled Gradient nails tutorial

This week I felt quite uninspired so for this tutorial, I decided to get back into my gradient game to see if I still got it. I tend to ignore this technique mainly due to laziness, as I barely have liquid latex left, so this is a nice exercise for me.

 

Let's review how to do these. I wanted to play around formulas, and I noticed that Holo Taco's crushed holos gradient beautifully. I used:

 

This whole nail only uses two polishes:

• Holo Taco's Sugar Rush
• Holo Taco's Sour Note

I also used a make up sponge to apply my gradients. I started with Sugar Rush as my base colour, but honestly I could have used Sour Note if I wanted to. We have talked about all the effects that the base colour or lack thereof have on gradients, so we're not going back to that topic:

The key for this look compared to a regular gradient is making your gradient in the sponge quite narrow. You want to only cover a small fraction of your nail with it. After two coats of gradient, my result was:

 

It looks good enough if you just want a subtle variation instead of a full on gradient, but I want more. That picture already has a top coat and I let it drying for around 15 to 20 minutes. The day I did this nail it was quite hot, so I had a fan in the room, which could have decreased the drying time. And yes, I turned it off for nail painting and back on while waiting. It was dreadful.

You will want to place your nail vinyl in the place you want. If yours is skinny, like mine, you can use a further barrier for the next layer of gradient. I used scotch tape. If you plan on using a product like liquid latex, make sure it doesn't interact with your coats below and it will be easy to peel off. Don't ask about that swatch stick in my trash can.

 

You will notice that it looks like the gradient is basically covered by the vinyl, and that's what you want here. When you apply your gradient and you're satisfied, peel it off quickly and you will reveal your scale!

Don't pay attention to the small imperfections closer to the tip of my nail, I corrected them later on, and I blame humidity, heat and the fan. You can see that the white section kinda embraces the green, so the placement was correct. It's something you won't be able to know until you are done and peel it off, so if you mess up a few times, don't be hard on yourself!

Plan ahead your gradient widths, unlike me, because this gradient was a bit too wide, so it is awkward in the placement, in order to add a third gradient to this very nail. I did as a demostration:

 This is something I personally struggle with, but it's lack of practice. You can also opt for not using a gradient and putting a solid colour in between gradients, your nails are your oyster!

How did I decide to do this? Because this is what I wore for a family celebration last weekend, before getting quite sick! I am still wearing it, at the moment, because it has not chipped a bit! And yes I know this is a death flag for the manicure.

I reshaped my nails to be a bit more of an almond inspired shape instead of ovals, as my C-curve is personally too strong and makes my nails look like they're strongly growing downwards and not in a good way:

 

On my nails there have been a couple accidents with layering creating bumps that the top coat could not perfectly solve, so we live and we learn, but I hope you like my new shape! So far, I'm liking it a lot, it looks slender and elegant! And of course I could not leave you without a pic with flash:

 

I hope you like this technique and I will ask of you to keep me accountable and try more gradients on my nails, because I don't do them too poorly, considering the results! Let me know if you want more variations or other nail arts you want!