31 Day Nail Art Challenge 2.0: Day Ten, Animal Print

Hi everyone! I'm very behind on the 31 Day Nail Art Challenge 2.0 that I'm doing with The Nail Polish Challenge and Wondrously Polished. I hope to catch up very soon. Today the theme is animals, but we are interpreting it rather loosely to include not only mammals but also insects, birds, reptiles, and so forth.

Freehand butterfly nail art

About this design:

Last year I did leopard print, and while that was fine, it doesn't really inspire me. So this year I wanted to find something both unconventional and challenging. I found this image of a butterfly, unfortunately the original photographer was not credited. Many nail artists have done butterfly patterns before but it's typically monarchs or other similar types. I liked that this is different than those. Also the wings have a lot of variation, texture, and details.

Freehand butterfly nail art

Source image

To get this look:

I painted the entire design with acrylic paints. My technique for doing something like this is to block in lightly the basic colours. Then, when that is dry, go in again and paint more details.

Freehand butterfly nail art

My only issue is that the paint became more "splotchy" looking when I put the top coat over. I can only assume that it's because the acrylic paints were not 100% dry. I've seen this happen before, but only minimally. I really like this brand of acrylics (Golden Open) because they stay wet on the palette, however, I might start trying some other brands.

Freehand butterfly nail art

• Base: OPI My Vampire is Buff - I used this in order to have a "blank canvas" to start with. You don't need to paint your nails to full coverage, 1-2 coats will do.
• Design: Acrylic paints in white, black, van dyck brown, indian yellow, and phthalo blue.
• Detail brush: Pure Color Glamor 1 from Stylish Nail Art on Etsy
• Top coats: Rica Glossy Glam and Essie Matte About You

Freehand butterfly nail art

Final thoughts:

The more I use acrylics, the more I love being able to paint things that are too difficult with nail polish, such as landscapes, or intricate patterns like this. I think for some people, this design might be too odd, but I like it on it's own. I'll admit though, it makes more sense when compared to the source image.

Freehand butterfly nail art

What do you think of this? What are your favourite animals or animal prints to draw inspiration from?

---