Matte Magenta Moons

  All the nail blogs say the easy way to do a moon manicure is to mask off the moon area with one of those round-sticker-binder-ring-protector-thingies to make the moon shape.  They're easy to find anywhere, and they're not so sticky they'll peel up your base coat, which I suppose makes them fairly ideal.  I've always been a bit skeptical about it - are the circles the right size?  Will they stick well enough to prevent leakage?

  So I decided to find out.    

  I thought the overall effect was...okay.  I'm not thrilled, and I think I could do a nicer job by hand after three glasses of wine, even.  Hey, sometimes I get better at this shit when I'm drinking!

  Anyhoo, there was minor seeping, especially at the corners!  In fact, the binder rings are rather thick for a sticker, and they kept trying to pop off the edges of my nails!  I have very curved nails, so if you have a flatter nail plane you may have more luck.  This was a total pain-in-the-ass for me.

  To conclude this experiment, but not this post, I would say that I prefer not to use a masking method for the moon manicure, or at least not with binder rings.  However!  This method is useful if you want a 'moon' that is a lighter or sheerer shade that won't work as a top layer.  For this mani I used Sally Hansen Smooth Perfect in Dune as the moon color, which is a lovely sheer nude that would never show up over anything!  The top is Revlon Plum Seduction, which is a really lovely magenta.

 Finally, I decided this would be a good look to try with the new matte top coat I just got!  Inspired by a shiny-black on matte-black french manicure I saw, I have been dying to play with matte colors!  It's about time a matte top-coat was made readily available!  I've always hated how the oh-so-necessary protective top-coat always ruined the finish of a matte polish.  BUT NO MORE!  Behold!  The matte-ness!

Regular polish on top; with matte top coat on bottom.

 Yeahhh!  I think it turned out puh-retty sweet!  It's a bit less drastic a difference due to my camera's overactive flash, but I think it's a pretty good representation of what we're working with, here.  I paid like, ten bucks for this matte top coat, goddamnit, so it better work!
  Oh yeah,  it's Sephora by OPI brand, if you are interested.  It was the only one I could just walk to a store and buy, because no drugstores seem to have caught on yet, but I work a block away from Sephora.  (Danger ranger!)

  You can really see on the thumb in the bottom image, how the light diffuses much more softly on the matte finish.
  The only downside to the matte is that it tends to highlight any imperfections in your base.  I felt like uneven spots or brush streaks were more apparent after I applied the matte, so that's something to think about if you're gonna try it!  Nonetheless, I'm excited to try some new looks with this stuff!  One day I'll make the black-on-black look as good as the pros...my attempts so far have been too embarrassing to share - I'm sure you understand.