33DC2013 Day 33 - Freestyle / recreate someone else's mani

It is day 33 of the 33 Day Challenge... the very last day! I actually made it! And managed to post each mani on the day itself! Whoohooo! I finally decided what I wanted to do for the last mani. I really liked Marisa of Hey, Darling Polish' Day 30 manicure. So I have recreated her stripy nails today! I decided to go for pink because I hardly did any pink manicures for this challenge and I needed an excuse to use this glitter!

Polishes from left to right:

• Essence LE Me & My Ice Cream - 01 Ben & Cherries
• Essence - 106 Free hugs
• Barry M - 273 Raspberry
• NYC - 031 Flame the night

My base was Ben & Cherries, a LE polish I only got because it was discounted. It is a nice shade of pink with a very subtle shimmer, but I doubt I will use it much. The brush was not flat enough, making application a nuisance, it would pull stripes into the polish. Good thing the polish did self-level a lot, otherwise it would have been horrid. Also I needed 3 coats. I dislike polishes that need 3 coats that are not glitter crellies.

The glitter topper Flame the night is very sheer unfortunately, I am wearing two coats on top of Ben & Cherries. I would have preferred a more dense glitter topper myself. It consists of magenta, blue, red and gold micro glitter.

With my smallest nail art brush I freehanded the stripes in the other pinks, free hugs and raspberry. I do like this effect, though Marisa did smaller stripes herself, and I am not sure which I prefer. The smaller ones are nice as well.

Also, please let me know what you think of the larger pictures, is this size good? Do you prefer even larger pictures?