A whole new experience.. cosplay contact lenses!

For quite some time now I've been thinking about starting to use colored contact lenses for my cosplays.. or well, at least for those characters with unreal eye colors (red, golden, violet..) or otherwise very vibrant eyes or just, whenever the hell I feel like I want to use contacts. xD Yeah, seemingly my twin Jäätynyt Enkeli had thought about doing the same thing, so we decided that for our Närcon Vinter Hakuouki cosplays we'd take our cosplaying to the next level!
   I had done a lot of research prior to buying my first lenses so I knew what online stores were safe to order from and had a pretty good general idea about lens care, how to put them in and take them out, what brands were recommended for lighter eyed people etc.
I knew what I was getting myself into... and I was excited.

A few weeks ago me and my twin placed an order together at HoneyColor. I purchased a pair of violet contacts, namely the Super Pinky Violet, for Toshizo Hijikata because.. let's face it, violet is not even an eye color that's possible to have naturally trolololo. And for some reason it bugs me more personally when I cosplay someone with unnatural eye color if I don't have said color.. it's more noticeable or something just because it's.. well, not normal. OTL

Toshizo Hijikata as seen in Hakuouki anime

I decided to go with the Super Pinky line because I had read that those had a smaller pupil hole than your usual circle lenses.. and one of my main concerns with getting contacts, as a light eyed person, was that because of a bigger pupil hole my real eye color would show like a ring around the pupil and clash with the contact's color and look.. off. ._. Circle lenses are mostly made with Asian cosplayers in mind and with dark eyes I can't imagine this pupil hole problem being hardly a problem at all, because brown is much closer to black (pupil) than say gray or blue is.. so brown "blends in" much better.
Oh well, back to the contacts. Except the contacts lenses I also got a random free cute animal lens case.. in my case a blue elephant one.

I must admit they are quite adorable..

Enough rambling. Okay, so I had already taken the lenses out of their original vial bottle and done the preparations earlier so I won't go through those. I mostly followed Pinky Paradise's Wear and Care Guide and had no issues. Before starting I washed my hands thoroughly with some mild liquid soap and I just followed the guidelines. Oh, I had also marked the bottom of my lens case earlier to be able to know which container was for the right and left lens. It's seemingly not recommended to mix the contacts up, like if you once use a lens on the left eye you should always use it on the left eye... or so I read.

This is what the lenses looked like in the lens case..

I know new contact lens users often have problems getting the damn things in but it didn't take so long for me.. maybe 5-10 minutes total for both eyes. I did have that "the contact won't stick to my eye" problem but after a few tries I got them in. But the most bothersome thing was trying to keep my goddamn eyelids from not blinking out of pure "ohmaigerd-something-weird-is-touching-the-eye!" syndrome. It wasn't the most pleasing feel having a new object touching your eyes, sure I had expected it would feel really weird at first but I didn't think it would be so hard to keep my eyelids open because normally I have no problems touching my eyes. Oh well, after some iron determination and mentally yelling "GODDAMMIT EYELID CALM THE FUCK DOWN. IT'S JUST A CONTACT, OKAY?" ... yeah. I'm weird. xD
When I got the contacts in I just blinked a few times to have them adjust themselves to the right place. For a few seconds my eyes got really moistened and it just felt really weird and a bit uncomfortable (no scratching, "dirt in my eye" or burning feelings though, so nothing bad) but that makes sense because this was my first time ever. After a few minutes it didn't feel all that weird anymore.. got slightly used to it I guess. I noticed it felt the most weird if I moved my eyes hastily. Oh well, nothing impossible to overcome, it's just a question of getting used to it.
By the way I had no problems removing the lenses, I just slid it down to the whites of the eye and pinched the contact very carefully with my thumb and index finger and took it out.

And now for some pictures.. taken in your usual yellow-ish bathroom lighting.
I'm wearing no make-up or anything.. but I had these obvious dark circles I just had to crappily edit out.. because I'm lazy. I've barely slept 3 hours last night.. go figure. Just ignore it and focus on the contacts instead. xD

Without flash

With flash

(flash!) Different-pair-eyes. o_o lololo
Uploaded this just for comparison. My real eye color (to the right obviously) is some blue-gray-green...

The color is pretty noticeable, not INYOURFACE but violet for sure.
My eyes do look a lot more anime-ish with contacts.. me gusta! I'm really happy with these contacts actually, I just need to try them some more times before Närcon Vinter just to get used to them. I hope for a photoshoot before the con but I can't promise anything yet. I will need to have to try these lenses with Hijikata make-up and the wig at the very least pre-con, preferably with the whole costume.. photoshoot or not.

Oh, and you know what guys? 8D
IT'S ONLY 10 DAYS LEFT TO NÄRCON VINTER!!
I CAN FEEL THE HYPE IN MY VEINS AS MY BLOOD TURNS INTO RAINBOWS ~