Gold Polish Comparison Swatches Part 1

Here are a few comparison photos I did yesterday. They are mostly golds (all of the commercial golds in my collection, that I could find easily - my mom has custody of at least one). I tried to match them up by similar color, but I haven't worn some, and don't remember others, so I did a few repeats to be thorough. All are without base coat (sorry about the ridges), but with topcoat and taken in my DIY lightbox, unless otherwise noted. My cuticles are terrible, especially after having been subjected to copious amounts of acetone. Consider yourself forewarned.

The pictures are large (and clickable) to show detail, so they may take awhile to load. Most of the pictures are hiding behind the cut.

Let's get the non-golds out of the way.

no topcoat

Zoya Tiffany and Wet 'n' Wild Waves of Enchantment are similar, but WoE is brighter and pinker with smaller gold particles.

no topcoat

OPI What's With the Cattitude and Wet 'n' Wild Bird Bath are dupes as far as I can tell. I walked around and checked them in different light, but couldn't differentiate the two. My super pale skin with yellow undertones makes this look different on me than it does on the rest of humanity. I tried to edit it so that it appears the way it does on everyone else, but I gave up.

sunlight

Obviously, these are not dupes, and is really two comparisons, between the Orly and Wet 'n' Wild, and the L'oreal and the Sally Hansen. The last two (Blue Marine and Spectrum) are similar in finish, but have a slight variance in color. Blue Marine, is not quite as blue. Both took four coats to reach this level of opacity (HC and ToF are shown with three coats). While they are not exact dupes, only nail polish hoarders collectors, or someone with an affinity for teal, would probably want to own both.

The first two (Haley's Comet and Teal of Fortune) are similar, but the Wet 'n' Wild  has fewer of the larger glitter particles. It also has tiny iridescent glitter (there is some of this in the Orly, also, but it's not as noticeable) that flashes gold to orange. Because there is less glitter, or at least less glitter that rises to the surface, and the interesting flashes of orange, Teal of Fortune has more depth. It also appears darker, though I'm not sure the base color is actually darker. I tried several different light sources, but couldn't manage to capture the orange flash, but I promise it's there.

Based on how they appear in the bottle, I would choose Haley's Comet (or it's proper dupes, Charla and Catch Me In Your Net), but I really love Teal of Fortune on the nail. Luckily, I don't have to choose just one!

The golds, part 1

The bottles are set in the order I applied them, left to right, thumb (or index finger, if there are only four) to pinkie.

Sorry about the blurry pinkie, but I didn't notice it until I had removed the polish, and this picture was the best, otherwise. Sea How Far You Go, is somewhere between green and gold. Debutante and 2030 are similar, though not the same. This was one coat of 2030 (which is why you can see every ridge in my nail.)

I realize that Tipsy is obviously copper, rather than gold, but I remember someone suggesting that it was an affordable dupe of Golden Ticket. This just isn't the case. I love them both. Ipnotico gold probably could have stood two or three more layers of top coat. All of the matte glitters from Borghese's Scintillare  collection eat topcoat like I eat ginger candy. It's not pretty, well, actually they are quite pretty, once they've had their fill. 

lightbox

under lamp to show holo 

I intended to take these photos outside, to show of the holo as much as possible, but my camera died, and by the time the battery was charged up, the sun was gone. The lamp acted as a reasonable facsimile. As you can see, GR8 is the only linear holo, though Mega Bite may be in ideal lighting conditions. The holo particles are large, and more sparse than those in GR8, though not as large, or sparsely distributed as 3D. Donner and the snowman are both gold bases with holo glitter, and I'm inclined to lump 3D into that category as well. 

That's all for now, I hope to have Part 2 up tomorrow.