Pacific Palm- Tropical Design

Hello everyone! Hope all of you are having a great summer. As you all know, if you have been following my blog I just recently went to Hawaii. I am still in a tropical mood, and thought I would share a little piece of Hawaii with you, through nail art. 

For this nail tutorial I am somewhat using a different medium, other than nail polish. For this tutorial along with nail polish, I will be using acrylic paint. 

     Tropical palm tree nail design, using both nail polish and acrylic pant.

Here are the polishes and tools used for this tropical nail design:

Base and Top coat- Nicole OPI-  3in1- base, top, & strengthener and - Revlon Extra Life No Chip top coat.

Nail polishes-  Finger paints- Tiffany imposter, Cover Girl- glosstinis Blue Hawaiian, NYC- Water street blue, and NYC- Water street blue.

Acrylic paint- (the actually paint I used not shown in the photo above) red, yellow, white, blue, green, and black.

 

Nail art tools- a very thin detail nail art brush, and a makeup sponge.

* Other tools- (not shown) a paint brush to mix the paint together, foil for putting the paint on or any surface to mix paint on, a cup of water to clean your brush off with. 

The Skill level for this tropical palm tree nail design is:

 Intermediate to Advanced

This design is rated intermediate to advanced, due to the difficulty with the fine details of the palm trees and the mixing of the acrylic paint to get the correct colors. Other than that the actual design it self really is not too difficult. For this design I suggest having some knowledge in painting on a canvas, it may come in handy. 

Want to know how to paint fine details with acrylic paint to create a beautiful tropical scene? Then follow these steps:

 1. Start off with a thin layer of base coat.

2. Paint all of your nail with a sky blue.

3. Next we will be creating a sponge gradient or ombre for the ocean. Take a small piece of a makeup sponge, paint the sponge with a slightly darker blue, then dab on the color part way up your nail. Repeat this step with a darker blue, by going half way up on the last color you just sponged on. You should have three colors for your gradient.  

4. To finish off your ocean/ beach scene, we will be adding sand. Take a tan sand color polish, and the brush that came with the polish and paint a french tip, this does not need to be perfect. I actually painted upward, other then sideways the way you normally do a french tip. 

5. Now for the fun and different part. We will be using acyclic paint for the rest of this design. To make a brown color, seeing how we don't have a brown we will have to make one. Take your red, yellow, and blue and squirt a small bit of paint on to your foil, then with a basic paint brush mix all three colors together to make a brown. 

Once you have the brown you like, take your very thin nail art brush and draw a thin curved line for your palm tree trunk. 

*Make sure to clean off your nail art brush with water each time you change colors. 

6. Once again we will be making a different shade of green. We will first start off with a lighter green then add a darker green to the leaves. Take a small amount of green and yellow paint and mix then together on your foil, to make a lighter green. 

Once you have the light green that you like, take very thin nail art brush and draw four curved lines to start your palm tree leaves.

7. For the small palm leaves, take the same light green paint that you just made, and dip your thin nail art brush and slowly make very small lines to make the leaves. Repeat this for each curved line you make. 

8. Once your palm tree has the palm tree shape. We will add more depth to the leaves, by adding a dark green. Take your original green paint color and add a small bit of black paint to make the green darker.

Once again, when you have the dark green that you like, with your thin nail art brush go over the curved lines, and then draw a few darker lines over the light green lines, for the leaves.  

9. For some details in the ocean, take the blue paint and some white paint, mix the two together to make a lighter blue, then make a messy line over the sand. Then once again  take a very small amount of white paint and make another messy line under the light blue.  

10. Just for a added touch, we will add a sun on the pinky nail. Take your yellow paint and draw a sun shape in the corner of the nail near the cuticle. Also if needed you can always add more palm leaves to your tree, I ended up adding another leaf to the thumb nail. 

As usual apply a top coat once your design has dried. For this design I felt that applying a top coat is very important, that way you design will not smudge. Acyclic paint is a plastic paint, that can be cleaned with water. That was one reason why I was a little bit afraid to use acyclic paint, not knowing if it would rub off, but with top coat it seem to be just fine.

Unlike nail polish, using acyclic paint for your small details in your nail designs is much easier to work with, it is blend-able, does not dry out as quick, and just much easier to work with.    

I really enjoyed working with acyclic paint for small details, and recommend using it.

Hope all of you enjoyed this tropical palm tree nail design! 

See you next time for more fun and bright nail designs!