Made Rich & B.Girard: PHOTO

The young homie, Made Rich dropped this dope photo yesterday of him & the other homie, Ms. B. Girard all inked up...I love seeing a young man who understands business, marketing and BRANDING yourself....so many artists are talented but never truely understand what it takes for promotion & business... This brother is not one of those type artist..he has a real businessman spirit and he understands the game.... look out for "Made Rich" this is one of the young artists who will be a key player in this new generation of "professional" tattoo artists.... Rich is also one of the artist featured in my film releasing next year....he is a raising star... I see a very bright future for him





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Preview of the Illamasqua contest winning shades

Please refer to my previous post about these for details, cause I can't remember what they were! XD

These just arrived and I couldn't wait to get them on my nails, so I snapped a few dimly-lit and not so fantastic pictures and figured I'd share :) I will attempt to get 'real' pictures when the sun comes back, but for now I'm really enjoying this rain, even if it means crappy swatches!

(And I apologize in advance for all the smudges and fingerprints on the bottles... this acetone + glycerin swatching remover makes my hands kinda sticky... ew.)


Eclipse. A frosty dark blue with hints of purple. I had really high hopes for this one based on the promo images- it looked like a dark blue/purple duochrome with silver microglitter, but alas, it is not.


Raindrops. This is prettier than I expected! It is sheer- this is three coats- but the sheerness really helps the little silver flakes shine through. And it reminds me of this:



Shrapnel. This one doesn't quite look like I imagined it to look based on early images, but it's really interesting! It's a bright copper or perhaps rose gold metallic, a little frosty but more shiny/chrome/metallic than true frost and it has really tiny silver microglitter. Super opaque, this is one coat. Great coverage. Very flashy.

I want to evaluate these in sunlight to get a better understanding of the colors.... Will come back to these.

(These were sent to me for review.)

Comparison: SpaRitual It's Raining Men vs. Orly Sky Blue Pink

It just dawned on me what that Meow Skeptic shadow reminds me of- Orly Sky Blue Pink!

I don't know if I've ever posted that color here... It's an old one but it's really, really pretty.

I was getting ready to edit some of those China Glaze photos so I was trying to clear out all the pictures I hadn't edited yet, and this comparison was one of them! Yes... it has been open and unedited for months... that's how far behind I've gotten. Yikes! I mean, when did I take these pictures, January or something? O_o

Anyway, the reason I did the comparison was that while I was swatching my Orly collection, I noticed that a lot of the SpaRituals I had in the same drawer seemed identical to Orlys... and you know what? They were. This is one of them:

Index and ring finger: SpaRitual It's Raining Men
Middle and pinkie finger: Orly Sky Blue Pink

Very slight differences in formula and intensity, but still the same color. I'm sure Sky Blue Pink has received a formula update since I bought my ancient bottle, but mine's very thin and needed four coats. I did four coats of the SpaRitual too, just to be even. The SpaRitual seemed more opaque. I might have to pick up a new formula bottle of Sky Blue Pink one of these days to see if they thickened it at all.

And this is what reminded me:



It's totally the same color! Periwinkle blue with a really strong pink-gold duochrome! Sweeeeeeet. I love when I have an eyeshadow the same color as an awesome nail polish.

SPOON

I've been trying to restrain myself, but I just can't do it!

All of this Zoya spoon talk really only reminds me of one thing...

Intro to Spooning: How does it work?

Here's a little step-by-step guide to help you get acquainted with the idea of Spooning with Zoya. It may seem a little strange at first, but you'll end up hooked on Spooning in no time!

First, you visit zoya.com and pick out spoons of colors you're interested in- I am using Tosca as an example because it's the first search result, but Zoya Spoons are available in every color.

http://zoya.com/content/38/item/Zoya/TOSCA-SPOON.html <-- First step: get spoons! Then, in a couple of days, they'll arrive in a pretty little Zoya envelope!


Oooh, aaah! Neat! So... step 2: open the envelope! (With these particular spoons, Zoya demonstrates how to pick your perfect red).

You don't need to take the spoons out if you don't want to, but when you do they look like this:



Note the item number and shade name clearly printed on the handle. No hand-scribbled sharpie smudges here, these are neat and professionally labelled, bar code included!

Step three: Try on the color!


Here's the beauty of spoons: they fit over your nail to give you a clear idea of how the color will look on your actual nails! They're on the large side so I am using my thumb as an example. Hmm... not sure I like the oval nail shape on me! Haha!

With the spoons you get a true-to-life representation of color. Here's a closeup:

The color you see in the spoons is what you get on your nails. No more confusing or misleading stock photos that make you buy the wrong color!

Spoon color is even more accurate than bottle color because sometimes a color can look different when it dries. Here's how they compare to bottle color:

Jade, Nidhi, LC, Ruby, Carmen, Andi.

When you purchase Zoya Spoons (50 cents each), Zoya will email you a code for the value of the spoons. It will also be available in the "My Account" section on Zoya.com so you don't lose it. So say you order $3 worth of spoons like there are pictured here... You'll have a $3 credit toward your next purchase via a one-time-use code. That leads me to step four: Order your polishes with the spoon credit!

You don't have to buy the same polishes that you picked spoons for. You can pick any polish. Maybe some of the colors didn't work for you, or maybe you want some Armor topcoat instead of another polish color. The Spoon credit code will go toward any color or treatment. The spoons end up basically becoming free previews. Pretty sweet, eh?

I think this is an awesome idea for online polish shoppers and I wouldn't be surprised to see other companies 'borrowing' this idea in the future. It's way more useful than that completely inaccurate color picker with the photoshopped hand that you see on some other salon brand polish websites. You get to see the actual color, in person, against your very own skin.

Here's Zoya's spoon explanation (taken from Zoya.com):

"What's a Zoya Color Spoon?

Zoya Color Spoons are clear plastic, spoon shaped devices with actual nail polish poured in the nail shaped tip. Before you order a bottle of a color you are not sure of, order a color spoon of that color instead. You can order as many (or as few) colors as you would like. When you receive the Zoya Color Spoons, simply hold them up to your nails and see what the actual color will look like on your nails as though you applied 2 coats and a clear top coat. You never have to worry about ordering the wrong color again.

Ok here is the best part: Zoya Color Spoons SHIP FREE (Economy Ground). That's Right, weather you buy 1 or 200 spoons you do not have to pay for shipping unless you want to upgrade to faster shipping.

So how much are the Zoya Color Spoons? Well they are basically FREE. When you place an order for Zoya Color Spoons you are charged $0.50 per spoon, but as soon as your order is invoiced and ships you will receive an email with a personalized promo code for a discount in the amount equal to the amount you spent on spoons to be taken against you next order.You can use your coupon code towards the purchase of the real color you want to buy or any merchandise on our websites. You can even use it to buy additional color spoons."

Though, I am slightly confused about that last line because in the fine print on the press release it says you can't use the code to buy more spoons... Here it says you can use the code to buy more spoons. I'm not sure which is correct!

Color spoons are available now on Zoya's website!

(These were sent to me for review.)

Zoya introduces "Spooning"!

Zoya's been teasing us all week with this 'spooning' thing and now they've revealed the secret!

I'll post the press release below, but I wanted to weigh in on this too.

Honestly, I think this is an AWESOME idea. No other company does this! Seriously! A lot of us like to buy online (and for some it may be the only option because Zoya can be hard to find in stores) and a lot of people complain about how they can't tell what the color looks like from a company's online photos... Now they don't have to complain anymore! You get to see the real color in real life and hold it up to your own skin to see if it will look good on you. And then, the money you spent on the Zoya Spoons goes toward the polish you buy (or if you ended up not liking the polish, you can use it toward other things like treatments too), so it's like they're free. Genius, Zoya, genius. I think this is going to help a lot of people buy polish!

Anyway, this is it:

Zoya Nail Polish wants to Spoon with you!

Do you REALLY love nail polish? Have you ever purchased a color online or from a color chart only to find that it doesn’t match the picture? Have you always wanted to be able to try on nail polish the way you do clothing?

Well, what if you could see EXACTLY how any Zoya color would look on YOU before you buy it? What if you could make sure you ALWAYS get your perfect pink? Or perfect red. Or purple! ANY color! Any shade, EVERY TIME! Well now you can...

Zoya presents a new way to shop for nail color - The Zoya Color Spoon!

Every incredible Zoya nail color made will now be available as a spoon so you can try it before you buy it! This is a revolution for the online nail polish consumer and salon and spa buyers alike who previously only had online color representations or printed color charts as a guide. Never before have you been able to try so much color for so little money out of pocket. This is same Zoya color that comes in the bottle poured into small nail shaped wells to create a tester color spoon - you can see every subtle detail of the color and hold it up to your nail to see exactly how it will look. Plus, the amount you pay for the spoons will be added to your account in the form of code that will be available for use on a future Zoya purchase and BONUS Zoya will ship the spoons to you at no charge. “It’s amazing that we will be able to do this for our customers - there really is nothing else like it in the nail polish market today” stated Leo Reyzis, VP of Marketing at Zoya.

So quit the color guessing game when purchasing nail color online and try any one of Zoya’s over 300 formaldehyde, toluene, dibutyl phthalate and camphor free, vegan friendly shades. Now you can be sure that the color you try is the exact same color you buy!

See it - Try it - Buy it!

Zoya Nail Spoons - $0.50 ea. (free shipping on all spoons - value of spoon(s) will be added to your account for a future zoya.com purchase).

Zoya Nail Spoons will be available at www.zoya.com starting September 1, 2010.

Here’s how it works...

Simply visit www.zoya.com, select a color(s) to try, click on the coordinating Zoya Color Spoon option in the product ordering area to add the color spoon to your shopping cart. Order as many as you would like. After your order has been approved and processed, zoya.com will ship your selected color spoons out for you to try and email you a confirmation along with your spoon value code (code will also be available under the “my account” section of www.zoya.com so you never have to worry about losing it).*

* All Zoya Color Spoon sales are final. One time personalized spoon value code. Zoya Color Spoon value code can be applied to any polish or treatment item at www.zoya.com. Code cannot be used to purchase additional spoons.

BOOTLEG MB Original

Scratcher: a person who finds a way to buy a "tattoo kit" and begins trying to tattoo people without any health training or professional tattoo training...they are not safe and usally just copy other peoples art for money. Since they have no training the work leaks quality and may cause the person major problems later.

I was on facebook this morning and someone tagged me in a photo... When I saw the pic it was a bootleg version of one of my drawings from 2005 turned into a VERY WACK tattoo...I don't understand why this person went to a scratcher... If they were a fan of my art then they should've known how I feel scratchers and bootleg art....I wouldn't mind if a professional tattooist use my art are tattoos as long as I'm given credit for my work art but this tattoo is 100% low in quality....whoever did this so-called "tattoo" didn't do justice to my artwork and it's a disappointment.... But I don't feel sorry for the person who let them put this bootleg trash on them... We have to love ourselves more....this is your skin! Invest in your body you only have one of them...


The drawing I did in 2005... It was actually a tattoo design for a client I lose in touch with when I moved shop locations


Here is the bootleg tattoo.. They tried to copy the style but wasn't trained so they fell short on linework, shading, color, & quality... I just hope this young lady is safe now and didn't catch anything from a unsafe untrained scratcher with no respect for professional tattooing

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