Comparison: Chanel Paradoxal vs. Revlon Naughty

A little while ago, I stumbled upon a bottle of Chanel Paradoxal. Never one to pass up the opportunity to do a comparison post, I went out the next day and found Revlon's dupe, Naughty. In viewing other comparisons online, it seemed to be that Naughty didn't have quite the same shimmery depth as Paradoxal, so I had to see for myself!


 The bottles:

 

Pretty similar here. The Chanel looks a little more sparkly, but that could just be the bottle shape.


The brushes:

 

Surprisingly similar. The Chanel version has a slightly longer handle and the bristles are a little shorter, but that's about it.


 And finally, the swatches:

 

I have Chanel Paradoxal on my pinky and middle fingers, with Revlon Naughty on my ring and index fingers. Quite honestly, I can't tell which is which! They are practically identical, from the subtle pink shimmer to the gorgeous greyish purple. The Revlon version might be a touch darker in this close up shot, but I could not see a difference in person.

 Application for both was very similar - no real issues at all with either formula.

In this case, we definitely have a true dupe. Unless you're really concerned with the label on your polish bottle, you can safely skip the $25+ on the Chanel, and pick up the Revlon. I've seen it on sale for as little as $3 a bottle.

Fish Egg Friday, Part 2: Gradient Eggs

Welcome to another edition of Fish Egg Friday! This week, I went with a gradient Fish Egg mani.

 

To complete this look, I used the Gradient Tutorial bye Laynefingers posted here. Mine didn't come out nearly as smooth as hers, but I still quite like it, and plan on trying this technique again! The colours I used are both from the OPI Nicki Minaj collection: Pink Friday and Fly. Incidentally, Pink Friday has become one of my all-time favourite pinks - it's light, but still opaque in two coats. For the microbeads, I painted a thin coat of Gelous onto the bottom half of my nail then dipped it into the pink beads, waited a few seconds and patted them in place, then cleaned up the edges with a small nail brush to remove excess beads. I then painted Gelous over the rest of my nail and dipped it into the blue beads, following the same clean up procedure. I really like how this turned out! It's unique, and a great one-day manicure.

 Bonus #FishEggFriday: here's a Fish Egg french manicure I did a couple of days ago for /r/RedditLaqueristas.

 

To do this, I painted my nails normally with two coat of Nubar Classic Camel, let them dry, then did a french tip with Deborah Lippmann Fade to Black. I let it dry for about 30 seconds, then dipped each nail into black microbeads. The effect is even more delicate than the full nail fish egg look, and I doubt this would last more than a couple of hours, but it looks kinda neat anyway.

Floam your... nails?

Some people out there might remember Floam, a toy that's advertised as a "molding compound" that could be used to decorate just about anything.

A while ago, Nail-Venturous released a Floam polish, and it is flippin FANTASTIC.



Look at that. Just look at all its awesome glory! The colours are fantastic - bright neon yellow and blue, mingling together to look green from afar, but close up? Oh man...

This is three coats of Floam covered with one coat of Gelous and Seche Vite. I could have gotten away with two, but I wanted to make sure I had full coverage.

Application isn't the easiest, it can be a bit goopy and tricky to get even, but it's worth the minor quibbles. You will need a glitter tamer of some sort for a smooth finish, what I used above worked perfectly.

Floam is available from ninjapolish.com - track the restocks on this one, it flies off the shelves fast.

Side note: this is messy as heck to remove. It comes off easily, but that tiny glitter lingers for days. Oye!

Welcome to Fish Egg Friday!

If you're not following the nail blogging world, here's a summary:

Ciate got their knickers in a twist over nail bloggers using the term "Caviar manicure". Odd, seeing as how this particular look is not trademarked by Ciate, and in fact was debuted a year ago by Dashing Diva.

I'm sure a good part of the twisting came from the fact that bloggers were showing how to recreate this look for a few dollars, as opposed to shelling out $25+ for the Ciate set.

When I saw the #FishEggFriday tag on twitter, I knew I had to join in! I stopped by Michael's on my way home and picked up a mixed package of Recollections Microbeads in the scrapbooking section, raced home, and produced this:




I used Deborah Lippmann On the Beach as my base colour, then applied a coat of Gelous to my ring finger and let it sit for about 60 seconds so it wasn't TOO wet, then dipped my nail into the bead vial.

I was honestly surprised at how easy and not messy this was. I used a nail brush to clean up stray beads over a small glass bowl, but that was about it. The Gelous helped the beads stick nicely to my nail - no muss, no fuss!

I didn't apply a topcoat, and I'll probably take this off before I go to bed tonight. It does have a limited shelf life as the beads tend to slough off fairly quickly.

I'll admit I'm not totally sold on the look, but it IS different and very eye-catching, so I may try it a few times before I give up totally.

For more details on Fish Egg Friday manicures, check The Polishaholic's post here!

And check out more Fish Egg manicures at these posts below!
Sammy http://nailasaurus.blogspot.de/

Salla http://www.polish-em.net/

Esther http://fabfingertips.blogspot.co.uk/

Emily http://lacquerologist.blogspot.co.uk/

Danielle http://rocknpolish.blogspot.co.uk/

Anna http://prettydigits.blogspot.co.uk/

Susan http://www.thesubtleshimmer.com/

Melissa http://melissawhitenails.blogspot.co.uk/

Ivana http://zabranjeni-grad.blogspot.co.uk/

A Lacquered Affair http://alacqueredaffair.onsugar.com/

Cristina http://www.letthemhavepolish.com/

Stephanie http://sincerelystephaniee.blogspot.co.uk/

Tiffany http://2thelastdrop.com/

Jeanette http://the-swatchaholic.com/

Alli http://thedailyvarnish.com/

Deez Nails http://deez-nailz.blogspot.com

Goose http://www.goosesglitter.com/

Rie http://nailsandnoms.com

Today's NOTD: OPI Princesses Rule!, Claire's Night Sky, and OPI Save Me!

This was one glitter bomb of a mani.



I put three coats of OPI Princesses Rule! on as a base, then sponged on a layer of Claire's Night Sky, a fantastic navy and holo glitter, and finally sponged on Save Me from the OPI Nicki Minaj collection.

When I got out into the sun today, I thought I was going to go blind from the disco ball on my nails.

A pre-birthday haul and review of Deborah Lippmann Magnetic duo - Steal my Kisses

I went shopping this weekend to pick up a lil something for my upcoming birthday, and this is what I came home with:



Yep, that's Chanel Paradoxal! I can't believe I managed to find a bottle. Now of course this means I had to run out and pick up Revlon Naughty (the renamed Perplex Paradoxal dupe), so I'll have a comparison post soon!

In the meantime, how do those Lippmann magnetics stack up? I ended up getting the Steal my Kisses set and I'm glad I did!

Application wise, they are like butter. You would swear that they were normal polish and not magnetic at all! In my experience, the few magnetics I have apply in a very thick, sludgy manner that had me wavering on ever buying another, but this has completely changed my mind.

Following the instructions, I applied base coat, then one thin coat of each colour, let dry one minute, then applied a thicker coat of colour one nail at a time, held the magnet over the nail for 10 seconds. This picture was taken before I applied a topcoat. This was the result:



The darker colour is Love is a Battlefield, the lighter colour is Berry Metal. It doesn't come through a lot in this picture, but there's a subtle red shimmer in the Berry Metal polish that only shows in the lighter areas. Absolutely gorgeous! I was hard pressed to choose a favourite from these two.

When dry, both of these just seem to glow from within. The finish puts me in mind of one other polish I have - OPI Not Really a Waitress, in that it reminds me of a true enamel finish. Beautiful.

My one disappointment is that the cap isn't designed to fit over the polish bottle top like I initially thought. I'll have to be careful so I don't lose it!

If you've been shying away from magnetic polishes like I have because of the thick texture, give the Lippmann collection a shot - not only do they apply like normal polish, they look spectacular!

Sci-Fi/Fantasy Pick of the Week: Doctor Horrible's Sing-a-Long Blog!

Summary

The story of Dr. Horrible's attempts to get into the Evil League of Evil, while trying to romance love interest Penny, and defeat his nemesis, Captain Hammer.

Neil Patrick Harris, Felicia Day, and Nathan Fillion. What more could a geek girl want? This series was created for the internet by Joss Whedon and consists of three short 14 minute episodes. The acting is superb, and the story is by turns both hilarious and heart-breaking. Doctor Horrible's feud with Captain Hammer will have you in stitches ("The hammer is my penis."), and his clumsy attempts to seduce Penny will tug at your heart. It's an amazing mini-series, so worth the time to watch.

This series is available from several places! Buy it - you won't regret it.

Polish pick inspired by this POTW: For Doctor Horrible's Freeze Ray, China Glaze Frostbite, one of my favourite icy blue polishes.