Nars in Night Flight + Comparisons

Direct flash

Here's the oldest mani in my backlog. It's Nars in Night Flight. Night Flight was released with the Fall 2011 "Night Series" collection, modeled after the apparently famous Nars eyshadow. It's still available on the Nars website, even though they list it as limited-edition.

Nars describes Night Flight as a "black with cobalt blue pearls." It's a blackened blue with blue, teal, purple, and violet shimmers. Now, I really love blackened polishes, but I was disappointed with this one. The multidimensional shimmer that you see in the bottle is a bit more apparent than my pictures sometimes capture, but it is also only visible in strong direct light. That's not usually a problem for me, but I don't know, I just didn't appreciate it in this polish. Maybe this disappointment came from the fact that this polish dries really dull. These pictures show Night Flight with Seche Vite on top, but there's just a flatness to the polish. In my comparison pictures below you can get a better idea of this; even with more blackened polishes, there is a sparkle when the shimmer hits the light, but Night Flight's shimmer is kind of deadened.

The formula is awesome - opaque in 1 coat and the perfect consistency. I did 2 coats because I wanted to make sure I had brought out the full extent of the shimmer. For those of you that aren't familiar with Nars polishes, the big square cap is not an overcap, so you can't remove it. However, I don't find it problematic to use.

Worn January 11 - 15, 2013.

Direct sunlight

Direct sunlight

Indirect natural light

Indirect natural light - indoors

Direct flash

Bottle pictures to fully capture the shimmer (just know it will never look like this on your nails).

These are the blackened blue shimmers in my collection that are closest to Night Flight. Night Flight is the only one of these polishes with multicolored shimmer; the others only contain one type. I lightened the third picture so you could see the undertones better. Chanel in #461 Blue Satin is one of the most blackened of these polishes, much more blackened than Night Flight and with subtler shimmer but more of an overall glow. It is a glowy neutral blue with fine shimmer but it is so dark it looks black in everything except bright direct light; even so, I love this one. Illamasqua in Phallic is also a neutral blue, darker than Night Flight, but not as dark as Blue Satin with shimmer larger than in Blue Satin but not as large as in Night Flight. Rescue Beauty Lounge in Under the Stars is a slightly green-leaning blackened blue. It is just a touch darker than Night Flight, but it also contains very fine silver glitter. Ulta in Underground (a mini polish from the "Gothic Glam" set) is a bit darker and more green-leaning with subtler shimmer. Barielle in Blackened Bleu is also more green-leaning and the shimmer has much more sparkle. BB Couture for Men in Night Ops is like a more subtle version of Blackened Bleu. Chanel in #357 Nuit de Russie is a neutral blue, more blackened and with teal shimmer (it is prettier than my swatch stick shows). By the way, the white blotches on my Under the Stars swatch stick was done with editing so I could clearly label these photos - my physical handwritten label was interfering with visibility.

There are additional swatches of Night Flight at Scrangie, Steph's Closet, All Lacquered Up, Stuff I (S)watched, Polish Wasteland, and Karla Sugar.

Does this one appeal to you? What's your favorite blackened blue shimmer? Or can you just not with blackend polishes?