Acrylic nails - fills
| November 14, 2011 |Now that you’ve mastered your acrylic technique with overlays and sculpting, learning to do a fill will be a breeze. When I first learned to do fills I was taught to do it by using an acrylic nipper. We used the nipper to remove the portion of the product that had become loose or lifted around the cuticle. I’m telling you about this because I never want you to do it.
Using an acrylic nipper to remove the lifting acrylic is a very easy way to damage the natural nail. Besides damaging the natural nail plate, you can cause the product to lift even more. In addition you will be left with a thick ledge between the old acrylic and the nail plate. You will have a hard time getting the old acrylic even enough with the nail plate to apply new acrylic properly.
What you should do is use a 180 grit file (or finer, it’s not a good idea to ever use a file with a courser grit then 180) to remove the existing acrylic product. You want to reduce the thickness of the existing acrylic product by 1/2 to 1/3. Make sure to file away any parts that are lifting and blend it into the nail plate.
If you prefer to use a drill to do your filing that’s fine. As I said, I prefer to do it by hand and recommend doing it that way, but as long as you have the proper training on a drill you can go ahead. Once the nail is filed, prep the nail the same way as you would if you were applying new product. To review the post on prepping the nail click here.
You want to take a ball and start at the cuticle edge at the base of the nail. Pull the acrylic up the nail to the free edge. Again leave about 1/16th of an inch around the cuticle base. You want to apply a relatively thin coat of acrylic over the entire nail, with the acrylic being only the tiniest bit thicker at the base of the nail. You still want to have a smooth transaction from the base of the nail to the product. You just want to put a little less product towards the free edge of the nail. I feel like I’m having a hard time explaining this correctly so if you have any questions just leave a comment.
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February 9th, 2009 @ 5:49 pm
i want to make my nails french, so i thought to buy white and clear acrylic. but how should i make the fills? the white time will move further so how can i fill the now clear area with with white??
February 16th, 2009 @ 3:02 pm
Filling pink and whites are a little more difficult. While I am not a big fan of the drill, it is the best and easiest way to do fills with pink and white. You need to file away at the smile line, they have wedge bits that work well to do this. Take away a little of the clear or pink acrylic (slightly below the existing smile line) so that you can replace it with white. If you have never used a drill before do not start here. You really need the proper training so as not to damage the natural nail. If you are familiar with how to work a drill, just be careful if you are learning a new technique. If you don’t want to drill you can follow the steps in the posts on acrylic and fill the same way. The difference would be to stop using the clear acrylic right below the old smile line and use the while to create a new smile line and fill the rest of the way. This is a little more difficult and you need to be really careful not to make your nails too thick.