Wet 'n' Wild Fast Dry polishes- Updated

Wet 'n' Wild appears to have spiffed up their normal line of Fast Dry polishes and released some limited additions as well, many of which I saw at my local Walgreens. I snatched up a few and then a few extras after some store-hopping.

I don't have any nail swatches myself at the moment because I spend time working around the house and yard during the summer and it ruins my nails, not that I had great nails to begin with. However, The Brilliant Brunette, a polish blogger, has a very nice entry with nail wheels displaying swatches of the main line and the limited editions - I encourage you to go look as I did.

The regular ones are mostly vibrant colors and cutely (maybe too cutely) named after television shows. The ones I decided to buy were, as shown from left to right: Teal of Fortune, Grays Anatomy, 9.0.2.1.Orange, Buffy the Violet Slayer, Saved by the Blue, SaGreena the Teenage Witch, Sage in the City, and Party of Five.

Most notable of the collection I thought were 9.0.2.1.Orange, Teal of Fortune and the Party of Five glitters. 9.0.2.1.Orange and Teal of Fortune are extremely glittery even if they are a bit sheer. Party of Five was a nice addition to the polishes I use for frankens with it's multi colored and multi sized glitters.

Teal of Fortune and 9.0.2.1.Orange

The others that I purchased have dupes in other brands; though perhaps not identical, they would be adequate substitutes.

Gray's Anatomy is a duochrome polish but extremely sheer. It's also a match for TKB Trading's Travel to Venus pigment (when used in polish). While it doesn't appear so from the bottle, they are both similar to Sally Hansen (Nail Prisms) Emerald Amethyst.

Buffy the Violet Slayer is a great purple but a close dupe if not exact match to Sinful Colors Let's Talk which is always available. It's also a slightly bigger bottle for the same price.

SaGreena the Teenage Witch, though a decent green and I love greens, is close enough to Sinful Colors HD Nails that I might've passed this one by.

When I was digging through my polish today, I realized that Sage in the City is very close to Sally Hansen's Hi Def from the original HD line.

Saved by the Blue closely matches two other polishes I own: China Glaze's Frostbite and Sinful Colors Midnight Blue. Saved by the Blue fits in between them based on vibrancy. China Glaze is on the right.

As I mentioned above, Wet 'n' Wild also released a set of limited edition polishes in a collection they called Mermaid's Cove but I found these only at my grocery store, not at Walgreens. I was able to grab one bottle of Waves of Enchantment and Ocean Grotto, both highly sparkly polishes which I adore. This weekend I managed to grab three more bottles of Ocean Grotto from CVS but no luck on the other.

Four of the limited editions: Oceans Grotto, Waves of Enchantment, Diving for Pearls and Magic Trident.

Waves of Enchantment and Ocean Grotto

The other colors were not original or exciting enough so I only bought two other polishes, Diving for Pearls and Magic Trident. After swatching them, I decided that Magic Trident, though it’s a limited edition for Wet 'n' Wild, is nearly identical to Sinful Colors Cloud 9.

All in all, it's a decent assortment of colors from Wet 'n' Wild but as they are not always available in my area, it was worth knowing about the alternatives. -MK

Related Entries:

Wet 'n' Wild Fast Dry Comparisons

Franken: #268 Tweeker

Franken polish #268 Tweeker, one of my franken base experiments, was a project I used TKB's syringes for because it started out in a mini bottle, was later drained into a full size (15ml) bottle and the amount multiplied. The supplies used were: 2 BBs, TKB Trading's Basic Yellow and Basic Blue bases for the green base, their Glamour base for glitter and the clear coat. The glitter isn't your standard glitter, it's actually TKB's Turquoise Tweak.

The green base was a combo of  1 ½ ml yellow base, 1 ml blue base, and 1 ml Clear Coat, then drained into a regular size bottle. To that I added +22 drops blue base and 34 drops yellow base making it 1/3 full. I added 3 drops (the mini spoon) of TKB's Turquoise Tweak and Glamour Base up to the ¾ mark (I mark the bottles). 30 liquid drops is equal to 1ml.

Photographed indoors. Nails tipped with a gradient of Turquoise Tweak, at least that was the idea.

While there has been some settling, there has also been some that stayed suspended and it looks like what it's supposed to look like, a sparkly green, before I shake it up. The only problem is sheerness so if you attempt to make this one, you might want to adjust the amounts slightly. For the pictures below I lost count of how many coats I used to make the green opaque enough.

Tweeker alone, outdoors in partial sunlight.

Outdoors, daylight but no sun.

Indoors, daylight but no sun.

After looking at it on my own nails I decided to do the glitter gradient on the tips because in most lighting the sparkle wasn't obvious enough…

Indoors under the lamp.

… But I didn't say I did it well.

Outdoors, sunlight but not direct.

-MK

My Thoughts on Social Networking

I was reading a book today and there was a quote/comment about there being a time that the word "network" was not a verb. Now naturally that was before the popularity of places like MySpace, Facebook, Yahoo and the like, probably before everyone had cell phones as opposed to "land lines" and rendered the White Pages useless. Now, however "network" is a verb and damn near everyone has their own page, myself included. It's convenient no doubt; if anyone wanted to find me they certainly could, after all you can send a "friend request" to anyone but its the use of the word "friend" I take issue with. One, if you have 80 something "friends" on your list, what are the odds you talk to those people with any regularity? Which brings me to my second question: why the hell would you bother friend requesting someone you don't plan on ever conversing with? My definition of friend is not synonymous with "someone I used to know"- if they were my friend it wouldn't be "used to know", it'd be "I know them". Friend requesting doesn't imply true friendship any more than being a friend on a Yahoo Messenger list or being a watcher on DeviantART. "Social" networking is bullshit. People were not meant to be place holders, ego boosters or time killers.

Swatches: Updated Travel tos & Mixes

Links checked 12/12/13

All pictures can be enlarged.

TKB Trading's Travel to series (also sold as the Planetary Sampler) are easily among my favorite pigments, the reason being the endless variety of color they offer if you're willing to play around with them.

I've used these pigments in both clear polish, shown on the left and in black, shown on the right; you can see, there really isn't much difference. In my other post(s), they were shown on a white index card whereas this is a piece of black cardboard. The black background shows the color much better I think.

The order is Jupiter, Venus, Pluto, Neptune, Earth, Mars and Mercury.

These are the same bottles I posted in the first entry Swatches: TKB's Travel to…Pigments only downsized. I used these for the swatches above on the right and those below. The formula was basically the same for all seven (based on the full size bottle): ¼ Luster base, 30 liquid drops L.A.Colors Black Velvet, ½ clear polish, 6+ smidgen (the mini spoon) pigment.

Both of these were taken under the same lighting as the swatches I'll show you later.

Jupiter, Venus, Pluto, Neptune

Earth, Mars, Mercury

Now all those swatches were for comparison purposes. I have taken some of the more notable combinations from the Duochrome Combinations list and mixed them up as color recipes and polish. The (dry) color recipes are simply equal parts of each pigment required.

Set A-I

The formula on each of these was the same. 7½ drops L.A.Colors Black Velvet, 1½ ml Luster base, 3ml clear polish, 4 drops (mini spoon) of the mix. The recipe was broken down for TKB's Duchess Elizabeth mini bottle that I have measured as holding 6ml.

295- Mix A: Venus-Merc 3:1

296- Mix B: Pluto-Jupiter 3:1

297- Mix C: Earth-Jupiter 3:1

298- Mix D: Venus-Mars 3:1

299- Mix E: Jupiter-Mercury 1:1

300- Mix F: Jupiter-Mercury 3:1

301- Mix G: Pluto-Mercury 3:1

302- Mix H: Earth-Neptune 3:1

303- Mix I: Neptune-Venus 3:1

From top to bottom we have Mixes B, H, A

From top to bottom we have Mixes E, D, C

From top to bottom we have Mixes I, G, F

Set J-Q

The formula on each of these was the same. 3-4 drops L.A.Colors Black Velvet, 22 drops Luster base, 1½ml or 45 drops clear polish, 2-3 drops (mini spoon) mix. Recipe downsized for a 3ml Bon Bons mini bottle.

321- Mix J: Pluto-Mars 3:1

322- Mix K: Pluto-Neptune 3:1

323- Mix L: Jupiter-Pluto 3:1

324- Mix M: Earth-Pluto 3:1

325- Mix N: Neptune-Earth 3:1

326- Mix O: Venus-Pluto 3:1

327- Mix P: Venus-Neptune 3:1

328- Mix Q: Venus-Jupiter 3:1

From top to bottom we have Mixes L, K, G

From top to bottom Mixes O, N, P

From top to bottom Mixes Q, P

Now aside from the original 7 Travel to's, none of these formulas were configured for actual use on my nails. I wanted to test those particular combinations to see them in transition but they are all very sheer as is, requiring at least 4 coats for these swatches.

Happy Duochroming! -MK

Related Entries:

Swatches: TKB's Travel to…Pigments

Duochrome: what does it really mean?

The Lust for Duochromes

Franken: #266 Atlantis

Links checked 12/12/13

This franken polish, #266 Atlantis is another layering polish but also a duochrome, shown in this post (on the nails) over #224 Blackstar Turquoise. Any resemblance to China Glaze's polish of the same name is coincidental as I made this before I knew of it.

The supplies used were: 1 bottle, 2 BBs, Sinful Colors Nail Junkie, L.A.Colors (Color Craze line) Radiation, Sally Beauty's glitter I labeled Sally B & Vial A from my Hobby Lobby glitters (view both of these here), Then there was the later addition of TKB Trading's Black Basic Black base to darken it slightly and TKB's Travel to Earth pigment making it a D/C.

The bottle up close.

A closer shot of the glitters used, taken outdoors in sunlight.

Both glitters shown in small swatch in clear polish.

Travel to Earth photo also taken outdoors in sunlight. Though you can't see the color transition you can see its bright green flash.

The exact formulation was 1/3 SC Nail Junkie, 1/3 LAC Radiation, Sally B & Vial A glitters, 3 drops Earth pigment and 3 drops TKB Trading's Basic Black base to darken it slightly.

When any of the glitters I own are used, the appearance of the polish is bumpy; the texture changes with the size and amount of glitter used.

Swatches of Atlantis by itself on paper, the left on black, the right on white. Taken indoors in sunlight.

And shown below on nails over #224 Blackstar Turquoise. I have to rely on these to display the duochrome effect (as the angle changes) so these are in the order taken.

This set photographed indoors, daylight but no sun.

Outdoors with sunlight but not direct.

One last photo, outdoors in direct sunlight.

 -MK

An Early Warning about Posting Delays

I realize I haven't been regular the last couple months as well but starting June 1^st both my sons are out of school for summer vacation from then until sometime in mid-August. Most of the days during the week I will be at my father's with my boys while the spouse of mine goes to work. I will have access to my normal frankening supplies but not regular access to a computer for posting. Under those circumstances expect delays in posting and my replies since I arrive home late these times which doesn't leave me time to play catch up but rest assured I haven't forgotten any of you.

-MK

Franken: #224 Blackstar Turquoise

Links checked 12/12/13

I wanted to show you another franken polish but didn't want to remove my current polish so I'm using my model for this post. This is both a franken and a color recipe comprised mainly of Coastal Scents pigments.

In the Blackstar line of pigments there is a blue, green, red and gold but no purple or aqua color which I thought was a shame so I decided to try my hand at making them. The final result turned out like I wanted but is somewhat diminished in polish.

The supplies used were: CS Summit Turquoise, TKB Black mica, CS Ocean Blue and CS Emerald glitter (using TKB Trading's mini spoon set) for the color recipe. For the franken I also used the requisite BBs, clear polish, Sally Hansen Black Out (XtremeWear) and CS Crystal Ice mica.

The recipe is ®SS Blackstar Turquoise

3 tad (TKB) Black mica

2 tad (CS) Summit Turquoise (like Hilite pigments)

2 smidgen (CS) Ocean Blue Glitter

1 smidgen (CS) Emerald Glitter

Blackstar Turquoise shown below as dry swatches in natural daylight. The swatches on the left were taken outdoors in direct sunlight.

 

The polish is: an unspecified amount of ®SS, ½ clear, ¼ SH Black Out, and a small amount of Crystal Ice mica for sparkle. Is there such a thing as "too much" pigment? Sure, but I add it until its opaque enough to suit me and settling be damned. I can't paint well on fake hands either.

Outdoors, no sun.

 

                                            Outdoors, direct sunlight.  

 

                                        Indoors, daylight but no sun.

-MK