Thursday, March 24, 2011

Nailed It

I only paint my nails a few times a year at most, but that doesn't stop me from a) amassing a whole drawer of rainbow colored polish, and b) drooling over photos like this:

By Foxy Grandpa, found via Craft:

Newsprint nails!

Perfect for grammar geeks, literature lovers, graphic designers - you name it.

The instructions are pretty simple, too: dip your (painted) nail in alcohol to wet it, and then press a piece of newspaper to your nail for 30 seconds. Next peel off the paper, top with a clear coat, and you're done.

BRILLIANT!

Also, imagine this with lines of binary (all ones and zeroes). Wouldn't that be awesome?

So now I just have to find a newspaper that prints in binary. Hm...


What's the coolest nail art you've ever seen, guys?

66 comments:

  1. I'm the girl that changed her nail polish every day to match my fishnets in high school! I can't wait to try that tonight! At the moment my favorite nail polish changes colors in the sun- thought it's pretty dreary in Philadelphia.

    Thanks for yet another awesome idea!

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  2. This is the most awesome thing I have ever seen. Clearly I need to look for more nail art instructions. And also buy some white nail polish.

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  3. Woah. I'm in love. My fave would be this...definitely now this. Wonder if they print shakespeare in newspapers, too?!

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  4. I had houndstooth nails a couple of weeks ago. I bought a product called "nail patches." They're basically tape made out of nail polish that you put on your nails. Really easy to apply, lasted about two weeks.
    This picture was taken the day I decided it was time to remove them. You can see it was chipping by then, and the pinky nail had none left.

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  5. I've been drooling over this too...and looking a multi-colored newsprint to print something on that.

    Found it! http://www.enasco.com/product/9727659

    Rainbow + Binary...killer

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  6. Such a cute idea! I saw some Mario 1Ups recently similar to these: http://www.flickr.com/photos/52242932@N03/4912499816/in/photostream/ Awesome, right?

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  7. comic books might work too!

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  8. Buy newsprint from the local art store and run it through an ink jet printer. Should work just fine.

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  9. It would drive me batty that the writing was backwards! It's still a cool idea :)

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  10. LOVE this idea! As someone who gets her nails done every 3 weeks, I totally am going to try this! The coolest ever was when I had my nail guy airbrush flames in blacklight ink for Burning Man. At night at the parties it looked like I had fire on my nails, but you couldn't really see it otherwise.

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  11. I am going to the NASCAR races in SoCal this weekend, and this just inspired me to make my nails look like checkered flags!! =)

    Then I am so doing this!

    LOVE IT!!

    wv: calicit - Illicit activity in California ;)

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  12. you should do this for the Cakewrecks 2 Book Tour! :D

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  13. I have a friend that did hers for Pi day. She had 74 numbers across her nails!

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  14. Now to find a newspaper that prints backwards! Love this!

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  15. I have no nail art for you, but have you seen the shirt.woot for today? I sure hope so! Super Mario Bros. FTW!

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  16. http://www.geekmom.com/ Not sure if you read Geek Mom or not, but they're doing a whole week of Steampunk! I think you'd like it :)

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  17. I have to admit that I find wearing nail polish makes my fingers feel heavy. My sister thinks this is hilarious, but it's true!!

    =/

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  18. Ooooh!!!! You could do this with the COMICS from the paper! How awesome would that be?!?

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  19. I srsly need to try this! One nail art site I think you'd love is daily-nail.blogspot.com. She does some amazing stuff, and it is frequently geek-centric!

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  20. This makes me wish I could wear nail polish! I don't see why this wouldn't work with any printed material. Make up your own text & print it out, or grab a copy of your favorite book from the goodwill for cheap. Or do I have it wrong & newsprint has some special quality?

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  21. OH. MY. GOD. i think i'm in looove.
    i wonder if the funny pages would have the same effect, but in color? i would love to have a little comic strip on my nails!!

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  22. I JUST went upstairs and did this! So cool! (only the letters ended up on my skin around my nails too, but I'm sure that'll wash off)

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  23. I can't remember who first showed this to me, but I actually thought about re-tweeting it to you yesterday. Good thing I waited until today!

    There's also this to show you how to do it too.

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  24. I just saw these at rite-aid today. They are nail polish stickers essentially. One of them is a lace pattern. And one of them is denim. Eek! I'm in love. And the box says it'll last 10 days. I'm totally going to try it.

    http://www.sallyhansen.com/products/nails/nail-color/salon-effects-real-nail-polish-strips

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  25. I think I'd try this... with the comics!

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  26. I usually go au natural with my nails, but this is something new that I've got to try!

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  27. I have made snakeskin nails before- paint your nails one color, dry, then stretch some crinoline fabric over the top, paint in a contrasting color, allow to dry just a bit before pulling the crinoline fabric away, and VOILA! Snakeskin nails!
    Looks ridiculously awesome if you use black first, and use a shimmery green on top!

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  28. My favorite polish look is something called water marbled nails. I haven't tried it yet, but I want to!

    http://27.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lf7994RWtP1qbkefco1_500.jpg

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  29. Back in the late 90s I had the Da Vinci of nail techs. Every two weeks I got something different and usually wild. One time I got a continuous tropical sunset scene hand painted on each and every nail. It was absolutely amazing.

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  30. Most awesome thing I've seen in a long, long time! Totally made my day :)

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  31. That is awesome!
    A friend of mine redid her nails in different themes every week for 30 weeks while she was at school, they had a bet going on or something. She did it all herself with either nail polish or sharpie ink.

    I know she did an awesome pac man design and she did binary code one week too! if you want I'll ask her for pictures...

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  32. Too cool! I loved this so much I did it to my nails tonight. It looks great! Thanks so much for posting this inspiration. :)

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  33. I just tried this without polish--just put a clear coat on, and it worked like a charm!

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  34. This is AWESOME!!!! I'm totally doing this next time I paint my nails... :-D Thanks!!!

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  35. We must be looking at the same blogs, I saw this last week and did my nails this way... it looked so awesome! I'm a librarian, so I called them "librarian nails". A mini reference section at my fingertips. :)

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  36. You will be needing to look at these: http://wahnails.tumblr.com. OH YES! So fresh!

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  37. Must. Buy. White nail polish.

    And a newspaper...

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  38. I just did this last week, it's super easy and cool! I love the gradient nail designs, like this

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  39. My sister got me some sally hansen "salon effects" houndstooth nail polish strips, you just press them on (and then i put a top coat over it) and they stayed on for like 3 weeks! Gasp!

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  40. I've done the following once for a project:
    If you want something printed as if on a newspaper, all you have to do is buy some newsprint (dirt cheap at art stores) cut it to size, and run it through your printer. The text you print should be a light grey.

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  41. The nails on this blog:

    daily-nail.blogspot.com

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  42. This chick has AMAZING nails (they are NOT acrylic).

    She also does really great tutorial videos!

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  43. Eeep! I work at a newspaper. I'm growing my nails out (again, again, again, the sad cycle of a nailbiter) I know what I'm trying this weekend!

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  44. I LOVE it! And I work at a newspaper too...gotta try it this weekend.

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  45. My current obsession is with Sally Hansen Nail Effects: Seen Here
    I've tried 3 different patterns so far and love them all!

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  46. I did more nail design stuff on my own nails when I was younger. I still do it sometimes nowadays. What I love is the new nail polish that comes in beautiful vibrant colors and drys super fast.

    My nieces gave me some type of slightly holographic (I hope that is the right word) nail polish for Christmas. I guess I need to see if it will take a good picture. :D

    Karen in TX

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  47. you have to try this marble manicure: http://www.sweetspot.ca/SweetLife/test_lab/22784/diy_marble_manicure/

    My daughter and I have done this in many different colors and it's so easy and quick. Also, because it's a little thicker than a regular manicure, it lasts longer!

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  48. For those that the backwards writing would bother, you could probably just lacquer the newsprint onto your nail, kind of like you can lacquer rice paper over your nail to 'patch' a tear before your tip breaks off. Trim the newsprint to fit (maybe use a press on nail or something as a pattern?). Paint a little clear polish onto the nail, stick the newsprint down, and seal it over with another thin coat of clear polish. You could do this with other cool thin papers (like decorative rice papers) too.

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  49. two words: Funny Pages! Oh how I wish Calvin and Hobbs and Far Side were still printing in the daily

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  50. I didn't use newspaper--thought any paper would work and it did! I'm a medievalist, so I have old English paradigms on my fingers. :) I cut up a print out and followed the instructions. I'm going to try typing and mirroring, so I can read my nails and my nails can say something cute.

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  51. If you don't wan't the print reversed on your nail then type up what you want in a text box in Word (can be done in 2010 - not sure about earlier) and then rotate it about the axis to make a mirror image.

    Your printer may also be able to do this depending on its settings.

    And for the ultimate geek go for binary Pi.

    11.001001000011111101101010100010

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  52. Hm. I think you can get a newsprint pad at the art supply store and there are backwards fonts out there..so you could get forwards text if you're willing to work for it.

    I think maybe this works because newsprint is relatively porous so the ink comes back out??

    Anybody else remember using Silly Putty to copy the Sunday funnies?

    That marbling looks like fun. Messy, but fun.

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  53. pretty silver binary nails :)
    and just a whole bunch of geeky themed nails
    including some awesome Star Trek :D
    and Disney
    And just a lot of awesome

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  54. I'm definitely doing this for my next concert. Except with sheet music.

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  55. I wore my nails like this for 1 day and it created a whole new fad with my friends :)

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  56. I just want to say this works great with the funny pages after seeing this post I had to try it and I LOVE IT!!!!! I am thinking to go for a new theme each week. Oh everything to try now!!!!!!!!

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  57. I just did this with the pets section from the classifieds. Each nail is a different ad for dogs! Super cute. And the words in the classifieds are smaller than regular newsprint, so there are more words on the nails. I found, though, that 30 seconds was a bit long and the paper stuck to a few of my nails. I did about 20 seconds or so and it worked fine. Can't wait to show them off at work tomorrow!

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  58. Very cool. I've been known to paint my toenails in color schemes representing to my favorite characters. The last one was scarlet & gold for Iron Man 2's release. :)

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  59. I tried this as soon as I had time to go buy white polish and a newspaper!! My first try got pretty smudgy, but the second try came out a lot better.

    Two hints: 1. Don't hold the newspaper on there for too long or else it starts to dry and leaves behind shreds stuck to your nail 2. Use a liberal amount of top coat in order to help deter smudges.

    Other than that, I love it. It's perfect for a bookwork like me! :-)

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  60. Oh - And I used the horoscopes the first time. I thought it was funny... The second time it was a piece about Jackson Pollock...

    I like the idea I saw in the comments about the dog ads. Cute :-)

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  61. marisa, I thought it was Always Sunny in Philadelphia!

    -Nicoletta;)

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  62. Love the silver binary nail, was my absolute favorite!!!!

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