Acrylic, gel course & nail art courses

[411]

Hiya,

I have done a Nail technician course. It was done at a local college.
I gained a VTCT qualification. I dont feel i have gained much knowledge doing this course at the college.

I have been practising on myself, family, with the bits i had in my college kit. I take upto 3-4 hours to do a full set of Acrylics. I dont know if my application is wrong, because i end up fieling for ages.

I would like to do a refresher course in Acrylic. And like to learn the Gel system along with Nail art.

Any suggestions? I live in Newbury Park,London.

 

[hannajadem]

Hi there, welcome to the site. When did you qualify? It may be that you haven't had enough practise rather than need a refresher. Some say it takes you to do over 30 sets of nails before you get your application sorted.
If you feel you need extra tuition, a 1 to 1 with an educator may help. I don't have the numbers of any companies to hand, but I'm sure another geek will post them on here for you.
As for gels, this is only my opinion and everyone's different, but I'd try to master one system before learning another, as the extra learning just slows you down.
Nail art - what sort of nail art do you want to learn? Freehand painting, applying gems and transfers etc can easily be self taught, I wouldn't bother forking out money for something like this. You can search on the galleries on here and try to copy some of the designs. I paid £95 for a nail art course and we were basically shown how to draw dots, flowers etc freehand, and you could easily sit down with a box of tips and some paints and learn it yourself.
However if you wanted to learn something like 3D nail art or airbrushing, then a course would be best for you.
Hth.

 

[411]

Hiya,

Thank you for great advice.

I have done about 20 sets, but still feel my application is not right, as i feel i have to do a lot of fileing. I would like to do voluntary work in a salon,to learn and polish myself up, but salons dont want to have people in to learn like that. They say you must go and learn somewhere else.

I qualified last year in July 2008. I was thinking of going mobile,but dont feel i have enough confidence to do it.

As for the nail art, a lot of people have advised me,not to do a course,but practice at home. Would equipment would i need? and where do i buy the paint from? someone on this site did mention buying acrylic water based paint from art shops?

 

[hannajadem]

Have you got any textbooks? Most of the comprehensive ones have section on basic nail art and also some photographic step by steps. I have The Encyclopedia of Nails by Jacqui Jefford and Anne Swain, and the nail art section is very good.
A basic starting point would be to but a dotting tool (or use cocktail stick, but you'll only get one size of dot!), striping brush (can get these form most wholesalers or www.nsinails.co.uk), water based acrylic paints (I get mine from Hobbycraft for £1.99 in tiny pots, like paint by numbers).
If you wanted to add extras like rhinestones, decals, striping tape etc this I usually get from Millenium Nails, but I'm sure there are cheaper places, if you just wanted to use them for practising.
The NSI site has a good nail art section. You can actually buy the paints in pen form with a striping brush in the lid like enamel, but IMO the brush and paint method is far cheaper.
Also, if you are any good at painting designs freehand, get a tiny detail brush from an art store, or Games Workshop (the ones they use for painting Warhammer models), they are fab.
Hth

 

[hannajadem]

Oooh also, forgot to add, if you need to do a lot of filing (I sometimes still do!), your applicatiopn may need tweaking. The book 'Nailclass' by Gigi Rouse is absolutely fab for teaching you the best way of holding brush and manipulating the bead etc. in detail. Best money I've ever spent, also a section on rebalancing, which helped me a lot.

 

[bubbles29]

Hi

I understand Star Nail's do conversion courses for all systems so if you have trained with college or another company, you can spend a day or two doing conversion which would help. The trainer would even come to your Salon if required. Not sure of costs but when I looked at their courses prices were reasonable.
Give them a call and see what they can suggest

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