Fawkes the Phoenix

I know I told you I was going to show you the nail art I did over Green with Envy today...but then I changed my mind. With the last Harry Potter movie coming up, I've been re-reading the books like mad, so of course I had to do a correlating manicure. I've been making a list of ideas as I've read the books, and one that I couldn't wait to try was a Fawkes manicure. If you don't know who Fawkes is, well, Google "Fawkes the phoenix," and also, really?! Anyway, I knew that painting a non-cartoon bird on my nails would be pretty much hopeless, so I just did a feather on each nail. I used one coat of Wet n Wild Black Creme for the base (over base coat, naturally), then my red Nubar nail art pen, OPI Red My Fortune Cookie, China Glaze White Cap, and Nubar 2010 (sparingly) for the feathers.

 indoors, artificial light

 outdoors, sunlight

 outdoors, shade

Honestly, this manicure did not turn out as well as I would've liked, which I think is partly due to the fact that the reds I used are not perfectly opaque in one stroke over black. This meant I had to go over and over the lines I made to make sure that the red showed up vividly, and that compromised the cleanness of the design. I kind of saw this coming and would've tried it over white, but I knew that black would set the red and gold off so much better that I had to try it anyway.

That said, I cannot wait to do more Harry Potter manicures, and you'll probably be seeing them past the 15th, so be warned. :)