Encapsulated Gold Leaf Nail Tutorial. I'm going to show you how to do a clear nail, which is a real big look at the minute and it's got gold leaf in it and a black edging. On this nail I've already applied a clear tip. If you want to see the video for tip application, you can check that out. And so now we've got a clear tip on for a reason, we're going to use that nice, transparent look and we're going to use that with some gold leaf and we're going to break that up in a second. We're going to use clear powder. I've already primed the nail, I'm just going to take little pieces of the gold leaf. It's really soft, really delicate and very, very, fiddly.
I'm going to get a small bead and just literally wet that with acrylic, and then we'll pick up the pieces and place them where I want them. I'm going to do a really random... you can even break them up with the end of the brush a little bit. And now we're going to encapsulate them. We're just going to make sure that they're nice and flat and then we're going to use a bead of clear acrylic straight on the top, and wipe my brush. Then I can start to pull the product down over the top of the foil and right to the very tip. I'm going to check the nail and see if it needs any more product anywhere. I'm just going to put a little bit on each side here and I'm going to get a small bead. I'm not leading the bead out, I'm using it straight off the brush, making sure all of the foil is encapsulated. The reason you want to make sure it's flat before you apply your acrylic, is... it's a lot easier than to encapsulate. You're not going to have any lumps and bumps to cover. I'm just going to check the thickness at the end and put a tiny bit more product on there. I'm putting it right on the end, where I want it, and pulling it back. We're going to let that set.
Before it's completely set... when it's still got a little bit of bounce, we're going to pinch it. I'm test pinching it with my fingers first to make sure it's not sticking to me. Also when I apply a little bit of pressure, it's not going to move, so you can see how that's sticking to my finger still a little bit, it's not ready to pinch yet. I'm going to keep testing it until I think it's ready. We can go in with it now, it's not sticking to me, it's not moving. I put a bit of pressure on the sides of the nail. I can slide the pinching tool up if I want a little bit more pressure. This is just going to contour the nail. I'm just going to pinch through to the end a little bit. I'm going to wait till this is set before I file it. As I tap the nail, the higher pitch the sound, the more set it is. If it sounds really dull then it's not set. Right, we can file that now.
I'm going to do the same filing routine as we always do, so I'm going straight up the sides first, round the cuticle area. Then I'm tipping the finger down slightly, you can see the position of my hand, I'm still pulling away the skin, so I can get right into it. I'm not holding the file flat, I'm angling it in, getting that nice and flush. Now we're going to contour the full surface of the entire nail. I'm just going to shape the end a little bit better, a bit neater, and I'm checking down the barrel of the nail. I'm removing any bulk, making sure it's not too thick, but I also don't want it too thin. I'm going to buff this nail now. Just going to wipe over with some acetone which will slightly melt the top surface and also remove any demarcations from the nail. So using the black UV gel, I'm going to frame this nail. I'm going to start round the cuticle. You want a really fine brush that has a little bit of length to it, and I'm going to go right round the very edge of this nail Framing nails in this way is really popular at the minute and it's not too difficult to achieve. You do need to just take your time. Pop that into the UV lamp for two minutes. Now we're going to apply some Mega Gloss Sealer Gel to seal this. You've got to make sure you go right up to the black border that we put on, capping that as well, make sure you cap that edge. You're letting the brush run round. That can go into the LED lamp for one minute. So that's come out of the lamp and it's cured now. So you've got that nice shiny surface. I'm going to apply some cuticle oil to finish this nail and I'm going to go right underneath as well. That's going to help with it being so transparent. So the nice thing about this nail is that you have this transparency running through the entire nail. Look, as soon as that top coat goes on, you can see all the gold leaf, sparkling away.
