I Love Nail Polish: Birefringence Review and Comparison

Oh. Em. Gee., guys.  Seriously, I'm so excited I can't even greet you all properly!  A few weeks ago, I joined in the absolute craziness that was I Love Nail Polish's Ultra Chrome pre-order.  After a frustrating website experience (and I understand that they've fixed things up over there to make it all much smoother...none of the web site people ever seem to understand how nutty we nail folk are about our polish!) and an almost unbearable wait (and a shout out to Raquel from Sunshine Nails who made the wait more bearable by sharing the pain lol), my Ultra Chromes arrived today!  I could not wait to try them out, but I couldn't decide on which I wanted to use first because they're all so beautiful.  So, I asked my bf to pick.  After a little deliberation (the bf takes his polish-picking duties seriously), he handed me Birefringence.

Now I have to apologize that my photography skills aren't enough to give you guys every color shift this lovely has.  I did my best and I hope you'll get an idea of how magical this polish is.  Birefringence (which means "double refraction" according to Google, rather fitting) is a shifting fantasy, teal to sapphire to amethyst to fuschia, with a touch of gold around the edges.

In addition to the sensational shiftiness, Birefringence and the other Ultra Chromes are opaque by themselves, no undies, in 2 coats!  Most other duo/multichromes require a dark base to show off their shifting powers.  Not so with these beauties.  I did use 3 coats in these photos, just because I could.  The first coat goes down a little thin and you'll want to make sure each coat is completely dry or you'll probably bald and drag a bit, but the second coat covered completely!  Color me impressed!

After staring at the gloriousness of Birefringence for a bit, I realized it reminded me of my precious bottle of Sally Hansen's Nail Prisms in Turquoise Opal.  I was curious to see how they'd compare side by side.  The following photos are the result of that experiment.

Ok, ok, I know the font is tiny, so I'll give you a run-down of what's happening here.  My index finger and thumb are sporting the aforementioned 3 coats of Birefringence.  My middle finger has 5 (!) coats of Turquoise Opal.  Then my ring and pinky fingers have 2 coats of Birefringence and Turquoise Opal respectively, over 2 coats of Deborah Lippmann's Edge of Glory in black.  I had to use a flash to get the difference to show up here.  In many lights and from most angles, they look the same.  However, TO is more green in ambient light whereas Birefringence shows more blue.  The shift is remarkably similar.  Since TO is discontinued and the prices I've seen on Ebay make Lynnderella's look like a steal (hello $40!), Birefringence seems very reasonable at $12.50 for a 12ml bottle.  It might be a good substitute for those not willing to take out a second mortgage for TO. (I bought my bottle a million years ago on CLEARANCE.  Seriously, if I'd known then what I know now, I'd have cleaned them out and be making bank on Ebay myself lol)

I decided to try something I've never done before.  I'd read that photographing your holos and multichromes underwater really make the colors dance.  I figured now was as good a time as any to test it.

Dance, baby, dance!  Holy wow!  And that's what I'll leave you all with this evening.  You're welcome ;)

Thanks so much for reading!