Focus On Holographic: Gosh Holographic

Ahhh the pinnacle of my holographic week, the much loved Gosh Holographic. This was actually sent to me from Maria of rijah.dk quite a while back - and boy am I glad I kept my hands on this bad boy. I cannot believe the Bay of Evil folks are selling this for around $50 a pop! *gulps*
Man, this is such a stunner though. It is easily the most holographic polish I own, and if you wear this, they should give out warning labels - you have to make sure when you're driving to watch the road and not stare at your pretty nails!
This is a bit fussy, but not as bad as the Nfu Oh holos are. I had some balding, but I did a bit of the "glooping" trick I mentioned in my post about Nfu Oh 065 and it smoothed all my bald spots out and settled down nicely. This had thickened since I first tried it out a couple of years ago, so I added a bit of thinner the day before I swatched it. I used three coats for coverage.

LOOK at that! Guh. If it's amazing in my photos, it's easily ten times as amazing in person. Did you manage to nab this before it was discontinued or are you still on the hunt for it?
I was going to put up voting for next month's Focus On topic, but you know what? It's a new year, so I think I will do a "best of" in the opinion of me, of course for 2011. I think this will actually be the first time I do one of these posts! I sure hope you guys enjoyed my Focus On Holographic series.
Next up will be some birthday week manis!

Focus On Holographic: Milani Hi-Res

Only two days left of Focus On Holographic! It's been a good week but there were a lot more polishes I could feature. So, Milani Hi-Res is a polish you should be able to find in almost any drugstore these days - it's a beautiful lilac purple scattered holographic. This is a pretty strong holo; I think it's more strong than the DS I featured, Reflection! Application was great, it needed three coats since it's a bit jelly, but no balding at all and I really like the Milani brushes.

I know that first picture is a bit out of focus but I think it shows the holo a bit better than the other two photos do - they're not bad, but that first photo is more of the rainbow! I actually really like this line of holos, I also have the silver but my favorite is the green. I like that this purple is not as icy and pale as some holo purples are.

Focus On Holographic: Nfu Oh 065

Oh man. This is probably the second strongest linear holographic polish in my collection. I'd heard that these babies were amazing, but I'd never tried out one of the Nfu Oh holos before - I am not disappoint, son.
Haha, I'm such a weirdo. Anyway, everything you've ever heard about Nfu Oh holos and application issues is true. I had massive balding with this. I fought and struggled with it like nobody's business! I don't have the much touted aqua base coat - why yes, I refuse to drop that much on a base coat that I'd only need with these and my precious Gosh! - so I just used my regular base coat. I remembered a trick my friend Sara, from Daily Polish, told me though. She said if you just kind of glob it on, it will help cover the bald patches and it will eventually settle into a smooth finish on its own. Umm, I don't know about you fanatics, but that seems to go against everything I do when polishing my nails - but guess what, it works! I tried to be super careful on my first two coats, but no luck. I went slow. I had plenty of polish on my brush. Not. Working. So on my last coat, I globbed it on, and success! I only had a few tiny patches that weren't kosher.
Okay, so other than having to really baby this bad boy, it's STUNNING. Seriously. If your formula is a bit thick, try adding some thinner - mine was almost too thick to use. This is a perfect baby blue and when you get it into the sun, it explodes into amazing. Let's look at the end result.

Well, I'd say the struggle was worth it. What do you think? Remember, this is even more amazing in person!

Focus On Holographic: OPI DS Reflection

OPI DS Reflection is a scattered holo. This is two coats of perfection! Reflection is a coral, but more strongly pink than peach, and it has a gold flash in addition to the holo. So, would this be a duochrome holo? I guess so! I think this is probably the least holographic of the seven shades I picked out to show for Focus On Holographic week, but that's okay with me. This was a well applying shade, I had no coverage problems and I really could have gone with one coat on this if I had been more careful. I just had a few spots to cover in my second coat.

You'll probably need to click to enlarge this if you want to check out the rainbow of sparkles. See the gold flash in the bottle on that second shot? Wow!

Focus On Holographic: Nubar Reclaim

Oh, Nubar. How much do I love you? Not only did you come out with an entire collection of green polish - Going Green, from 2009 - but you had both a linear holo and a multichrome in this very same collection. You sure do know how to make a girl swoon.
So, Nubar Reclaim is a bright, grass green linear holo. No, it's not a pale green, and sadly it's not a deeper forest green - but I'm not complaining, this is awesomesauce. It's not as strong of a holo as say, China Glaze OMG or a Nfu Oh, but it is a strong, linear holo. The application is flawless, you guys. I only needed two coats for opacity and it's not fussy at all, no balding or anything. Best news of all? This is still readily available!

Why is it so difficult for me to show you the true rainbow beauty of this? Well, I hope you get the idea. Obviously, this is stronger than my photos are showing. Do you have this? Are you lusting after it now? If so, run don't walk and nab this pretty!

Focus On Holographic: China Glaze Let's Do It In 3-D

You nail fanatics are already aware of this, I'm sure, but let's start at the beginning properly. China Glaze, once upon a time, came out with two drool-worthy holographic nail polish collections - the OMG collection, which were linear holo nail polishes, and the Kaleidoscope nail polish collection, which were scattered holos. These are now discontinued and have been popping up on Ebay and blog sales for higher prices. I only have a scant few of these precious polishes.
Let's Do It In 3-D was from the scattered holo collection, Kaleidoscope. This is one of the strongest scattered holos I have, too. It's a stunner! It's a dark charcoal grey base with shimmery holo particles. Because the base is almost jelly, I used three coats here.

In lower light, the charcoal base is more clear - but I had to show this off in super bright light to give you an approximation of the rainbow this has. It's much, much blingier in person, let me assure you. For some reason, the face print on this bottle is just peeling off. Sad. Both the OMG and the Kaleidoscopes are well worth hunting down, if you can nab them at the higher prices please do it. I wish I had nabbed them all before they became as rare as they are now.

Focus On Holographic: Glitter Gal Red 3D

Okay, everyone stoked? I think this is one of my most requested Focus On weeks, and what more perfect month than December to do a Focus On Holo, right? The blingier the better for this month.
Up first is a lovely holographic nail polish from the Glitter Gal family, Red 3D. Kim of Overall Beauty popped this one in my latest package to see what I would think of it - and big surprise, I adore it! I'm sure you guys all know who Kim is, she sells BB Couture nail polish on Overall Beauty - well now, she's not only selling that, but Glitter Gal, Cult Nails, and Ozotic Pro! To top it off, she ships internationally.
Anyway, on to my review of this polish. Red 3D is a linear holographic, and it looks like a rainbow on my nails! It was hard to capture all the colors flashing in the rainbow, but I did give it a good try. I had some nice sun for holo week, so I did my best here. Red 3D is like a raspberry toned red, so it's a tiny bit pink. You rarely see a strong red holo, so this was a nice surprise! I ended up using three coats here for coverage, but had absolutely NO trouble with formula. There was no balding or pulling at all - one of the best holo formulas I've ever used. Later on in the week I'll be showing you both a Nfu Oh holo and the spectacular Gosh Holographic, and both of those have a formula that requires a lot of babying - Glitter Gal does NOT! You don't need any special basecoat, or anything with these. Enough yapping, let's look at the pretty pictures.

Wow, is that hot or what? I encourage you to click to enlarge and get a better look at that rainbow. *hands around drool towels* What a good start to the Focus On Holo series, eh?

Disclaimer: Product(s) in this post were sent to me in return for an honest review.

Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Night Lights

Okay, a bunch of photos of this. Well, not a bunch, three. I had a heck of a time capturing this pretty little charcoal scattered holo jelly!
I think I first saw this on Kellie's blog, Also Known As. And I wanted it! I heard rumour that they could be found at Five Below. There's a Five Below in Raleigh, so I scooted in there one night while I was working. That's where I found the Funky Fingers polish too! I'd never seen that in Raleigh before, so I snagged a couple of those as well as the Sally Hansen Night Lights. This particular polish has the white cap, so that means it's an older polish - the newer Sally Hansen Xtreme Wears have a silver cap, of course. This polish is pretty sheer, as a jelly you expect that though. I've shown it here alone, on my index finger, with four coats. I layered it over Essie Licorice for the other three fingers. A little gritty from the glitter, nothing two coats of top coat wouldn't cure though! It's a beauty.

I included that last blurry shot so you can really see the glitter holo sparkle! LOVE this. Glad I was able to snag it and add it to my collection!

Funky Fingers Sand And Stilettos

I usually don't bother with a lot of photos - I used to be really in depth, but I've decided not to go that route unless I think it really warrants it. In the case of Funky Fingers Sand And Stilettos, it definitely warrants it! Funky Fingers is a brand I'd heard of but never seen in my neck of the woods, but I stopped by Five Below because I'd heard they had Sally Hansen Xtreme Wear Night Lights for $2. They DID. I bought 2, one for a giveaway. More on that later.

Then they had these little plastic bins of Funky Fingers colors, behold - TWO glitter holo polishes. One silver, one gold. This is the silver. It's got a little tinge of pink or purple to the base, but I tell you, I thought I'd need to layer this - NOPE!!! This is frigging awesome. At one coat, I was drooling. If I'd been more careful to wait until it dried better, I could have done with two coats. As it was, I was impatient and then had bald patches. Fixed that with coat number three. This is not too bad of a topcoat eater - I used two and it was relatively smooth after that. It was a wee bit stubborn to remove, but I was patient and left my cotton balls in place for a good length of time, and then the glitter slid off - EVERYWHERE. Haha. Nothing a good sugar scrub didn't cure.

First photo is in low light outside - you can see it's even sparkly in the shade. The rest are in sunlight, including the macro I decided to include. I'll have the gold holo for y'all up next.

Okay, since I don't have glitter-phobia, this is frigging MADE OF WIN. I heart this so damned much. I need backups, because I want to see if it will work in frankening.

ULTA Bombshell

I had some extra birthday money a couple months ago and picked up some of the OPI Burlesque collection, as well as three ULTA polishes. Bombshell has been mentioned with great affection, so of course I snagged it. This is a raspberry, pink leaning, red jelly with holographic glitter. I may have to reswatch this at some point for better photos, but I'm going to be a dissenter - I don't like it. I know there's a lot of love for this polish, but I'm not feeling it. The shade of red is one I can wear, and I do love jellies - but it's prone for balding; see my pinky finger for an example. Also, the glitter is SUPER chunky, so I had to use a pile of top coat - I think I used three layers or four. It seems to suck the top coat dry. Also, I just wasn't falling head over heels for it on me. I dunno, I guess I just felt kind of "meh" when looking at it. Am I the only one?

What polishes do you not fall in love with, despite them being popular?