Here’s a quick picture tutorial on how I did my accent nail of the zombie manicure I’m currently rocking to celebrate the return of one of my favorite shows on tv right now; The Walking Dead!

1 – You’ll need 4 colors of acrylic paint for this. Black, White, Magenta and Green.

2 – Some fine nailart brushes and a fountain pen, if you’re careful with your topcoat you can also use a permanent fineliner pen for the black lines. The topcoat will smear this easily though, so please watch out if opting for that version!

3 – A tiny bit of water and I personally use a bit of plastic to mix my acrylic paints on.

4 – Start with a polished nail. I choose Catrice Planet Tokyo out of the current Neo Geisha collection because the idea for this manicure came off a set of shoes called Zombie Stompers by Iron Fist and those are a nice bright green. Wait until your nail is completely dry before working with the paints.

5 – Dab two rows of teeth, don’t be too precise, these are zombie teeth we’re talking about here! And also add two white splotches where the rotting pink flesh around the eyes will be, this will make the pink that we’re painting over it pop. Most colors in acrylic paints are a bit jelly like and the white will help them become opaque.

6 – Once the white is dry, paint the pink over the white splotches, you can be a bit messy if you want, it will only add to the rotting flesh effect.

7 – Once that bit is dry (and acrylic paint dries quite quickly if you don’t paint it on too thick) make two white circles for eyes.

8 – To add to the Zombies sickly green color use a bit of light green for a bit of contrast in the face and also highlights.

9 – After everything has dried the hard part comes. Thin your black acrylic paint and use it with your little fountain pen to add on the black. Again, don’t be too precise, the skin is yucky looking so a dot or line of extra black won’t matter too much. Just make sure the eyes, nostrils and teeth stand out and you already have quite the face. I made sure to add in cheekbones and the little lines over the teeth that you usually find in real skulls as well to add to the image of a creepy little zombie.

On my other nails you can see that I just painted a few stripes with foilglue and once that had dried I dabbed some glitter onto them and used my black acrylic paint to add some cracks and lines to kind of match my zombie’s face. But you don’t have to do that if that’s too much for you and you just want a little pet zombie on your nail.

And we’re done! I hope you’ll try this tutorial for yourself and you’ll show me how you did!