Flashback Friday: Pokemon!

It's time for another Flashback Friday!! These nails are from March of 2011 and despite the fact that they are obviously awesome (since they are Pokeballs!), they are a tragedy!!  In 2011 I really wasn't blogging for people, it was more of a way for myself to keep track of my designs and I normally snapped pics directly after I had finished the artwork. Hence the messy cleanup. On top of I wasn't very steady with my hands and I didn't have any legitimate art tools so I was using all the wrong things to make designs. I REALLY love Pokemon so I wanted to do something for the release of Black and White and balls seemed the easiest. I remember at the time I didn't have many colors so a lot of these were mixed to create the different shades. These took an hour from start to finish. AN HOUR. I recall that the net ball (second pic, middle finger) was my favorite at the end and I was WAY too proud of that little "M" on my Masterball.  So...naturally they recently released Pokemon X and Y and I thought, what better time than to recreate these nails?  So here we go:

Biggest difference here (other than the cleanup and neatness!) is the shape of my nails!  I recently rounded them off and it never lasts but I really want to try to keep them rounded for a bit so I'm trying to do things that really work on round nails that might not as well on square ones. This is a great example. Pokeballs just look better round!  I realized after the fact that I also did these on opposite hands this time. Originally I tried to keep the easy ones for my dominant  hand so I wouldn't have to worry about fiddling as much with the difficulty of the design. But this round it didn't even cross my mind. I used my new Born Pretty brush set and also my dotters for these. Also used a Models Own striper for the black lines so that made it a lot easier to do. Additionally, I didn't have to mix any colors because my stash has increased times a thousand!

Here's another pic with the thumb included! For reference, from thumb to pinky we have the Masterball, Ultra Ball, Great Ball, Dusk Ball, and standard Pokeball. I really love how these turned out! And don't think I forgot about the other hand because I surely didn't!

My Luxury ball is still a little "meh" but my pinky nail here is my favorite of the bunch! Also realized this go round that my Dive ball should have had TWO shades of blue and not one so I made sure it was corrected this time. I was also able to use all cremes this time so that everything looked much more uniform. I think it made the Luxury ball look a little more luxe since it has the metallic finish throughout. It also made the little closes on the balls a little more noticeable.

From thumb to pinky we have the Repeat Ball, Dive Ball, Net Ball, Luxury Ball and Net Ball. Which is your favorite? Do you think they look better now or before?