Hey Everyonee

Just wondering if anyone could help me out! I am currently new to Brisa gel nails and I know my process for overlays, tip applications and sculpted nails perfectly but I'm having some trobule deciding if it is okay to use certain polishes and different things over cnd products. Would love if someone could Help to answer these questions, or write whatever DO's and DONTS you can think of


1) What would you use to get a full sparkle nail? like not the sheer sparkles but a vibrant sparkle. Can you use like sparkle pigments from mac? And when would you apply this?

2) Can You use any nail polish on top of brisa gel? Yes i know you can mix colors and basically create any color using brisa primary and secondary colors but Im talking about colors like gold, and silver.

3) Is there a product you can use to blend tips more? Im having trobule blending the tips I work free edge to cuticle while buffing but i find on some clients you can notice the tips more. I've tried using the opaque pink also.

Lots of good questions here.

For full sparkle, I use a glitter from Michaels called Reflections (i think). It's really fine and looks amazing. To do that, I use the Shellac system, but you could surely do it with Brisa gloss. After finish filing, I would apply a coat of gloss, cure, sprinkle with glitter and pat it into the dispersion layer, then add two more layers of gloss so they are even.

This method tends to add a good amount of bulk with gel enhancements though, and you will need a seperate gloss for glitter work. Lots of girls use the Martha Stewart glitters, also available at Michaels, but the one I use is great and comes bulk for a good price.

You can certainly use any polish overtop. CND has some nice polishes in their colours and effects line, including gold and silver.

What brand of tips are you using? I usually take some bulk off my tips prior to glueing. I believe CND has discontinued their well-less tips however you can cut the tips to make them basically the same thing.

Starnail has a blender for tips but I don't know how this would affect the integrity of the enhancement.

Hope all this helps hun!

So for the full sparkle you just basically do as you would for rockstar toes? I was thinking the same thing about it creating too much of a bulky look using the gel enhancements.

When you use nail polishes do you apply the uv gloss or do you just apply a topcoat nail polish?

With shellac you can use that as your full color on a gel enhancement but then do you use the top coat from the shellac system or do you use your brisa uv gloss?

I find that Im on the right track, I just want to make sure so thanks alot for answering my questions, its greatly appreciated hehe xx

Yeah, pretty much rockstar toes on the fingers. I'll make the enhancements much thinner than usual for that.

If I'm putting polish on gels, I just use the CND Shiney.

For the Shellac on gels, I finish file, apply gloss, cure, two colour coats and then shellac top coat. No base coat neccesary.

np hun!

oh and just fyi - cnd is coming out with a sparkly shellac in september.

Oh and tips I use to use CND formation but like you said they are discontinued. I usually do thin them out more and well them to 1/3rd of the natural nail but on severe nail bitters I find you can still see the tip and it looks like i have not blended it enough when I cant really blend it anymore. I started to use velocity and I find them alot better than formation.

Last question, you just seem to have ALL the answers but when rebalancing a nail bitter who has cracked their tip would you just file as close to natural nail as possible then apply a new tip? I havent done many re balances with cracked nails I just feel as if the tip wouldnt stick to the old product as well as a natural nail.

Thanks again!!

I'm not too sure what you mean by cracked the tip. Could you explain it in a bit more detail?

Nail biters are always a challenge. And making the tip fit 1/3 of their nail is like trying to find 1/3 of a needle in a haystack!!!

I wouldn't apply a tip over old product. depending how far down the crack goes, I might file off some bulk from the entire enhancement and throw a form under to fix the corner (i think thats what you mean).

I sometimes find it's necessary to create thicker enhancements on biters because of their habit AND because of their backward placed stress point. This will help to prevent breakage.

I definitely don't know everything, and I am shaky on my skills with "problem" clients who don't have model nails. But thanks haha