u/elston-gunn41

Took this video a little over 24 hours after finishing my nails. As you can see nothing happened past the expected dispersal of the magnetic pigment once the polish cured.

I think I'll only be magnetizing the top coat from now on. It's worth noting that I did the same experiment with Cracked's Fermented which has a plain, dark red jelly base with goldish magnetic pigment. On the fingers that I only magnetized the topcoat of, you can see gold shimmer in the red base if you look closely or with flash. On the fingers that I magnetized all layers you can't see anything in the jelly base. However, the actual cat eye formed by the magnetic pigment on all fingers is extremely similar regardless of which method is used, so despite some magnetic pigment clearly being left behind when magnetizing only the topcoat it doesn't seem to be an amount that effects the overall magnetic effect. The visual difference in the base if you're not staring closely or under direct flash is negligible to me. It should also be noted that Fermented's base is a very vampy red, so I think the magnetic pigment that is not pulled when only magnetizing topcoat would be more apparent in a polish with a paler or sheerer base.

As a reminder, the coats I did magnetize I did so for 1 minute, and I waited until each coat was "touchable with no strong fingerprints" dry before adding the next coat.

Thumb is 2 coats magnetized and Sally Hansen red bottle magnetized

Pointer is 1 coat unmagnetized, 1 coat magnetized, and Sally Hansen red bottle magnetized

Middle is 2 coats unmagnetized and Sally Hansen red bottle magnetized ONLY

Ring and pinky is 2 coats unmagnetized and Essie Gel Setter magnetized ONLY

Base coat is Cracked Ridge Filler and polish is Cracked Gherkin.

I've been fighting with getting my cat eye right and and did a little experiment. Essie Gel Setter had been smearing/dispersing my magnetic effect when I've magnetized the first coats so that's why I only used it on top of the unmagnetized coats.

Each nail has a basecost of Cracked's Ridge Filler and the magnetic shown is Cracked's Gherkin. Every coat that I magnetized I do so for 1 minute. I was careful to float the top coat on and used a generous amount. I waited for each coat to dry, including the final layer of polish (I've seen some people say that they apply their topcoat immediately after their final polish coat but I DID NOT do that).

Thumb: 2 coats magnetized, Sally Hansen red bottle also magnetized. Thumb seemed to disperse a lot more, though the cat eye is still visible, just wider.

Pointer: 1 coat unmagnetized, 1 coat magnetized, Sally Hansen red bottle magnetized. Nothing glaring, looks fine.

Middle: 2 coats unmagnetized, Sally Hansen red bottle magnetized ONLY. Looks pretty much identical to my pointer finger. There's some dispersal/weirdness at the very tip of my middle finger vs. my pointer but my nail has a slight dip there and my pointer is short from a break right now so I can't say for sure if that's because of only magnetizing the topcoat.

Ring (and pinky): 2 coats unmagnetized, Essie Gel Setter magnetized ONLY. It looks like the Essie topcat still dispersed/smeared my magnetic to some extent. You can see at the base of my finger towards the cuticle that the magnetic pigment is visible there as well and not just in the cat eye.

Overall I don't know if I see enough of a different between magnetizing the final coat of polish + topcoat vs. only magnetizing topcoat to keep doing it the first way. It's also very satisfying to apply the topcoat and then see the magnetic effect take place from nothing before.

Feeling like a bit of a thief getting there for $5 a piece!

1x CVS's Nail Protein Formula 1x Cracked Ridge Filler 3x each of the various polishes 1x Essie Gel Setter

Thumb to pinky: Mystery polish (no label) Branching Out (thermal, half dead) Mystery polish (no label) Mystery polish (no label - it looks like Sleet Deal) Pier Genius (PBE '25)

Bottle is an off-spec Crimp My Style (it looks like mine is darker/more purple).

3 coats in velvet and cat eye styles. It's a subtle effect and I'm not sure how much it will hold up once it dries down + topcoat but it's a fun thing to discover!

Also, any glaring shaping issues (besides not having quite enough length on some of my fingers)? My first time trying a shape other than "slightly more symmetrical than how they grow naturally."

1x CVS's Nail Protein Formula

1x Cracked Ridge Filler

1x Clionadh Cosmetics Forge

1x Emily de Molly Black the Night

1x Essie Gel Setter

Our brindle (rolling around in the first picture) does not enjoy roasting nearly as much as her sister. I think she gets too hot too fast since her coat is much darker.

I never thought my hands would look like this. I'm still fussy and not totally satisfied with my nailbeds and the way that some of my nails seem to flair upwards but I'm hoping those issues resolved themselves with more time and length.

I didn't have great light so it was hard to capture the shine and shimmer of Dais accurately.

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1x Cracked Ridge Filler

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2x Cracked I Love You So Matcha

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1x Clionadh Cosmetics Dais

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1x Cracked Quick Dry Topcoat

Wound is 3 days old. It's a pretty thick skin flap that I think will likely fall off but is for now restuck on the wound underneath. I was advised from family friend RN to Vaseline and bandaid and have been but I feel now that it's too wet. At the same time a bit worried about keeping it uncovered since it's on my toe and I don't want it to get dirty since it's still fresh and kind of "open" in some places. It bled for about 24 hours, gradually tapering off, and is still a bit weepy which I think is why it's staying moist with a bandaid even when I haven't added Vaseline.

I am extremely new to painting my nails as a lifelong nail biter and this is the most involved thing I've done so far. Any tips or advice for issues y'all see would be much appreciated.

1x Nailtiques Formula 2

1x Cracked Ridge Filler

1x Cracked I Love You So Matcha

2x Clionadh Cosmetics Myrrh

1x ILNP Open Fields

1x Seche Vite

I used I Love You So Matcha underneath Myrrh because they're really close in color but 3 coats of Myrrh is still extremely sheer. Matcha is more milky and so it provided me enough opacity.