Emma Clark's Senior Project: Nailed It!

This week I continued working on different nail designs and experimenting with more intricate nail art. As seen in the picture below, I worked on three different nail looks. On the first nail, I used only regular polish and found that the black nail polish I used must've been too old because it would clump together and form sticky, uneven lines. On the second nail, I used a combination of regular and gel polish. Again, I found that when using regular nail polish to create the actual nail art (in this case, the light blue french tip), the polish would dry too quickly and the final result would look lumpy. On the third nail, I use only gel polish. I found this to be the best out of all three attempts. The final result looks professional and smooth. I learned that when doing difficult and tiny nail art that requires a lot of time, it's a good idea to use gel polish instead of regular polish. This week I also painted a friend's nails using a mixture of white and blue gel polish...

This week I toured YAME Nails and Spa and talked with a few nail technicians on the different nail applciation techinques. I also talked with the owner, Man, about where he purchases supplies, the different services he offers, and on what it takes to be a nail technician. After my visit and after watching several youtube tutorials, I attempted my own set of acrylic nails. I decided to try and replicated these nails that I found on Pinterest: I think they eventually turned out pretty good, but I definitely encountered challenges along the way. I actually had to redo an entire hand because I didn't let the base polish dry for long enough, so when I went to create the blue and white design on top, the entire nail smeared. I also bought some polygel and attempted to create a nail but each time I would press down and try to cure the gel, the nail form would get stuck. The portion of the gel attached to my real nail also always turned out too thin and flimsy. In the following weeks, I w...

For my senior project, I will be experimenting with nail art/design. Over the next few weeks, I will be learning the different application types and techniques when creating fake nails (like working with acrylics, poly gel, regular gel, and more). I will also be tapping into my creativity by designing and producing some intricate nail looks on myself and friends.  I chose this particular project because I wanted to do something creative and work with my hands. Plus learning to do my own nails instead of paying $50 or more to get them professionally done would be great :)    I will mainly be working alone on this project, although I plan to spend a few hours at a local nail salon taking pictures and talking with the nail technicians on the application process of the different types of false nails.   My three goals for this senior project are to successfully create a few sets of acrylic nails, create at least 3 intricate nail designs, and to visit a local nail salon to...