OPI Touring America comparisons

Finally, I managed a few comparisons of the Touring America lacquers. I worked my ass off today for these pictures, but they all turned out being shit anyway. Still, I think you'll be able to get a decent idea of how these compare to other popular shades in the same divisions. Some of these have been slightly, slightly, teeny tiny overexposed to better show the differences. The darker ones preferably shot against a black background to amp them up, the lighter against white background for added contrast. The science of physics working miracles for your photo objects!

First up: one of my favourites from the collection, I Brake For Manicures.

The closest in my collection is Essie's Smokin' Hot.

As you can see, they're not that close, as the OPI is darker and more red toned.

Next, I put the brownish shades next to a wellknown and widespread OPI:

A-Taupe the Space Needle, You Don't Know Jacques!, Get in the Expresso Lane. As I do not own terribly many brownish cremes this is probably the best reference I can give you, since I'm pretty sure many of you own You Don't Know Jacques!.

It would have been interesting to put A-Taupe the Space Needle next to OPI & Apple Pie, had I owned it. But I don't, so this is what you get!

Furthermore, this is one of the greys of the collection, French Quarter For Your Thoughts:

After a whole lot of searching and comparing, I found that Essie Chinchilly is closest to being in the same vein.

And this is how they do side by side - not that close, as you can tell.

And now for the purple I reckon we all feel to be somewhat dupey - Honk if You Love OPI:

Closest I could come up with: Jordana Hypnotizing, and to the right Give Me Moor! from the Espana collection from two years ago. In low light, many of my plum purple cremes look just the same, but with some added light, it turns out that there are no exact dupes:

However, I still think Honk if You Love OPI and Give Me Moor! are close enough to not own both. Though, choosing between them, I'd go for the new release, since Give Me Moor! has that strange hidden shimmer grain some of the shades in the Espana collection did, and Honk if You Love OPI is better pigmented, and also a tad lighter and cooler in tone.

Now for the blue creme, Road House Blues:

I felt that none of my blue cremes came close enough, so I ended up comparing to the slightly more blurple blue Sapphire in the Snow from the 2009 holiday collection.

And here is also a quick lesson in how the surroundings of your photographical objects will alter the overall appearance. As they just look dark and very similar against a white background, here's what they look like against a black one:

Blurry as ...damn, but you get the idea, right? It's much easier telling them apart this way. However, the difference isn't really vast, so if you're not a collector of blue and blurple cremes, perhaps you should settle for only one. And as I understand Sapphire in the Snow is now somewhat hard to find, maybe Road House Blues is a good option if you missed out. But of course, still not the same.

The other grey of the collection is slightly green toned, but as a lover of greens I prefer putting this one in an overall grey context:

For mere reference, to the left we have Stranger Tides from the recent Pirates of the Caribbean collection, Suzi Takes the Wheel, and to the right Nubar Barricade.

No dupes to be found here.

Last, the popular favourite among the cremes, the olive green Uh-oh Roll Down the Window:

I searched high and low for dupes among my olive cremes, but it turned out I had no dupes, but one very similar: the Viva La Diva mini 2. I also added two wellknown olives for reference: to the left Illamasqua Hectic, and to the right Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics Swamp Thing.

As you can see from the slightly dark picture above, the Viva La Diva comes very close. This is of course good news for those of you who have previously been lemming the now discontinued Swedish special, but a little less good news for those who already own it - unless you're a collector like yours truly. Hectic is way more yellow, and Swamp Thing is a whole lot more brown.

As for the rest of the collection, namely the shimmers, I have no dupes. I don't own a lot of coral, and most are cremes, and for some reason I don't have many red shimmers either. Though, I can say that the shimmer in these, which is the same throughout, is somewhat special, as I perceive it to be a pink flash golden one. If you haven't yet peeked, Cammi posted swatches of those just a few hours ago, so be sure to check them out if you're into these kinds of colors.

Swedish word of the day:
turné -noun tour
Travelling far and wide.