Showing posts with label shinsengumi outfit. Show all posts
Showing posts with label shinsengumi outfit. Show all posts

March 14, 2014

Souji Okita from Rurouni Kenshin photoshoot!

 Hi everyone!

A few days ago I received a few new wigs and one of them was a wig that I plan to use for Rurouni Kenshin's Souji Okita the Tsuiokuhen/Trust & Betrayal OVA version. Yes, I do plan to cosplay him this year!
Okay, so today I tried the wig on and decided instantly that it needs to be cut a bit to fit him and so I trimmed one of the sides, the one with the longer end, as well as shortened and layered the bangs so that I wouldn't get the Rock Lee effect when wearing it, brrr. Yeah, it had way too much hair in the front. ._.

Wig uncut, without the ponytail clip.
With the wig styled I put on the rest of the cosplay which is basically recycling parts from earlier cosplays, haha. The violet-blue kimono is new though and it's made by Hasakitsuki's mom as a gift, thank you. I wore my Volte Brown contacts for Okita and I think they are perfect for him!
I wanted a cosplay preview and a photoshoot on the same go and so we went outside the apartment and took a shitlot of pictures; it wasn't all that cold at the beginning but it was very windy and towards the end it got so damn cold I could barely move my fingers and hold the sword and, well, I was shaking quite badly... which could have been seen as being in character *coughsickcough* but oh well. ^^"

Cosplayer: Valkoinen Samurai (Souji Okita)
Photographer: Hasakitsuki










Nothing more to say, I'm terribly stoked to wear this to a con! I hope I will find someone who cosplays Battousai version Kenshin so that we could have an epic photoshoot. Would be so awesome!

But now Valkoinen Samurai goes samurai-ing elsewhere ~

August 7, 2013

Shinsengumi banner and pride!

 Greetings!

For a pretty long time now I've wanted to add something extra to my Hakuouki cosplays, namely a shinsengumi nobori - a banner or flag or whatever you want to call it. They had at least two different ones in Hakuouki that were shown in the openings (at least first and second season) and in some anime scenes. I had been smart and screencaped a scene in Reimeiroku long time ago with both banners visible for future reference. Aaw yeah!


So my plan was to make the big red one. Back in 25th June I started the project and I ran around mom's house pretty much all-day working on the banner like a madman. I must have been crazy because basically all bodyparts that could have hurt physically did so the whole day and still I kept working on it.. my feet hurt so much it was tiresome to stand, back hurt so I couldn't sit unless I leaned against something, hands hurt, arms hurt etc.

Oh well, what I did first was drawing those kanji on pattern paper and cutting them out.

This worked as my second reference
The two dots are placed inaccurately, I just put them somewhere
Remember the broomstick I bought earlier? Well, it would be used as a flag pole for this project. I already had a 2 meter long one which I got from grandpa's house and the one I bought earlier was 1,5 meter long. I placed them in an approximate position and used them as a sort of frame to figure out how much fabric I would need; I just cut out a fitting piece. The red fabric I got from the attic by the way.

Fabric cut out and broomsticks used as size reference
I had a perfectly sized scrap piece of white fabric left over from earlier cosplays that I used to make the "white mountain stripes". The length of the white fabric piece was just enough to cover the front and back of the red fabric (I want the design on both sides) and this was without me measuring them to fit in advance. Awesome.

"White mountain stripes" ready to be cut out
After cutting them out I went to sew them on. I first sewed a straight stitch along the bottom.


And then I sewed the white parts on with longer-than-usual stitches close to the edges to secure them in place.


And after that I sewed a narrow zizgzag on top to keep them from fraying. Also this made it look cleaner and nicer.


I then prepared to do the same for the kanji but first I had to take some yellow fabric, trace the parts onto it and cut them out. It was very tedious I must say... but I managed. With the kanji pieces cut out I tried positioning them on the fabric to figure out where I wanted them to be.

Looks promising ~
I kept working on sewing on the kanji over the next coming days and well, it proved to be a pain in the ass. I first decided to sew some straight stitches here and there to keep parts of it in place so that the kanji wouldn't move around too much from its desired position when I started zigzaging around them. Well, the whole "let's secure it with straight stitches" plan turned out to be very tedious and I got fed up with it pretty quick. I wondered why I seemingly more often than not want to do things the hard and/or most ambitious way? *coughappliquécough* I could just have fabric glued the thing on and call it done but my perfectionist side thought fabric glue would make a mess, "bleed" on top of the fabric that is being glued and besides it stinks and would make the kanji stiff and well.. a stiff flag is not sure if gusta. So yeah, no fabric glue for me.
I also tried handsewing the kanji on at one point but quickly decided it was just as annoying as machine sewing. I let it be for a few days and on 28th June I felt like trying to work on it again.

Straight helping/securing stitches to keep it in place
Edges zigzaged and trimmed
Several hours later I had this and man did it feel friggin' good!


...
Only problem - the joy was short-lived.
There was another kanji waiting to be appliquéd to the other side of the flag; the cut-out appliqué pieces in the small heap next to the sewing machine probably morphed into Cosplay Satan of Thousand Slow Deaths at this point and burned holes in me, one stitch at a time. After all, I had been a good boy and planned to have the design on both sides of the flag because that would be cooler and OH GOD WHY DO I INFLICT THIS TORTURE ON MYSELF??


After forever had passed I was done with the other side of the flag. I'm pleased with it though so it wasn't a complete hell.

Don't mind the wrinkles, this was taken before I ironed it..
Now the only thing left was to fix those holding loop things so that I can mount the flag on the pole. I first thought to make them out of the same red fabric as the flag itself but figured it would be less work to just use bias tape. Only problem was that it seemed mom's "fabric storage" didn't have any red bias tape, only shiny red ribbons in different widths and I'd rather not have shiny flag loops.. just no. 

...
......

Okay, so June went and July did too without me touching the flag. I didn't have time (and July was filled with anime conventions) but at some point I went to check some fabric stores in town but they didn't have any red ribbon that I thought would work; it was either too narrow, too wide, not the right shade of red or it was shiny. I decided "fuck red ribbons, I'll go with white" and then remembered mom had the 3 cm wide natural white ribbon that I had used for Masamune's coat trims. Yes!
On 7th August I checked the white ribbon against the flag and decided it was the way to go! But firrrrrrrrst I had to sew the flag closed because I realized my earlier plan to first attach the flag loops and then sew the flag closed wouldn't work because, well, the loops would be in the way. Duh.

Sewing flag closed
With the flag sewn closed I started measuring how long I wanted the ribbon loops to be and then I measured the spacing, aka how much distance I wanted between each flag loop. With that done I started cutting out the loops in the right lengths and pinning them in place.

One flag loop pinned in place
After I had cut out all the loops and pinned them in place I just had left to sew them on. This was quite a challenge because I just had to hope that the loop's other side (the side being against the sewing machine) would be of the same length and that I would sew both sides on at the same try. I had some weird luck because I managed to get pretty much all loops -except two or three- on with no problems, woot!

-------

About the pole I didn't have to do that much. I started working on it back on 25th June too.
I took a rasp (a coarse file for woodworking) and marked on the longer pole where I wanted the notch to be for the crossbar and then I just.. well, made a notch.

Notch after sanding (it cracked a little..)
I went to get the jigsaw to saw the shorter 1,5 meter pole in half - it would be the crossbar. Of course I sanded the sawed ends afterwards.

Pole sawed in half
On 26th June I started the painting mission. Not so much to say about it. The black paint is actually for house inside walls and shit but I've used it for wooden cosplay props before and never had a problem. Paint as paint, neh?

Preparations complete
Painting started! (this is the now 75 cm crossbar)
I asked Jäätynyt Enkeli to come outside and help a bit and to be a drying-pole-holder while I painted the taller main flag pole. When the painting was done we waved the poles around like hooligans until they were dry. :DD I then took the poles to the back entrance of the house and put them to dry a little bit more, just in case. I had to do some touch-ups because of some mishaps too.

That table was an awesome pole drying surface
the gaps in it were just right to keep the pole from rolling away.

-------

Okay, so with that the pole was done and the flag too!
With both done only the "how to assemble this" part remained. I had planned to keep the flag as travel-friendly as possible and that meant I didn't want to hot glue the crossbar in place with the flag on or else I couldn't disassemble it for easy traveling/storage.
I checked around and found a roll of black elastic ribbon that I figured could work in keeping the crossbar in place, booyah! So I just cut out a fitting piece of it, zigzaged the ends and tied it around the crossbar and boom, say hello to my sisäkumi shinsengumi flag!

FINALLYYYYYYYY
I don't know if it's very noticeable but the crossbar isn't straight because there's just a length of elastic holding it in place at a certain point (that isn't in balance either).. and the pole I made the crossbar out of is actually a bit thicker/heavier than the pole I used for the main flag pole itself. I'm not sure if it's even possible to get it super straight without hot gluing or securing it in place foreverrrr but I don't mind; I'd rather the flag be easy to take apart so I don't go around hitting random people in the train with it or something else hazardous. xD

Yeah, that's that. I'll totally be taking this banner with me to future cons whenever I'm donned in a shinsengumi outfit and feel like bringing it along!

January 15, 2013

Third time's the charm - Shinsengumi headband

Konnichiwa!

Finally decided to try and finish my shinsengumi headband. The last try didn't work and I learned from my mistakes.. aka do not use stretch fabric.
I went to the attic and looked at other fabric options; I found some semi-glossy black slightly sturdier non-stretch fabric.. I have no idea what it is but it seemed okay so I decided to use it. Not so much to say about the process because it's very basic, I'll let a few photos speak instead.

Fabric cut out (I cut extra for seam allowances)
Zigzaged around
Folded in all the sides and sewed
Sewing it in place on headband
I don't understand why it took me so many tries to get such a simple thing right... troll!headband. OTL Oh well, now it's done and I decided to do a very quick try-on in cosplay to see that it wasn't trolling even after being finished...

Excuse my lack of pretty much all make-up except eyeliner.. I couldn't be bothered. Also mostly mirror photos.



 

Just to show length of headband
(note: ponytail is under it on this)
It seems to be working all right, thank God for that. I was getting fed up with this project. I think I'll use the headband for Hijikata at Närcon Vinter, possibly the other shinsengumi guys in the future too.

Hmm, not so much more to say. I'm really looking forward to Närcon Vinter!

January 4, 2013

Shinsengumi headband modification + stuff

Hi everyone.

I went to town today on the morning together with Jäätynyt Enkeli. First thing we did was that we went to his study apartment and ordered the train tickets for Närcon Vinter. Yay finally it's out of the way... sadly we couldn't get the Närcon discount herpderp. Oh well, after that we walked to the post office and I picked up the black ponytail clip-on I had ordered from eBay a month ago. It sure took its time to get here. ._. Better late than never... it was from China but still, never taken this long before for anything I've ordered to arrive.. except that one wig that got lost lol, I got a replacement wig though free of charge.
I must say that when I got the package in my hand I was... weirded out. My first thought was "is this now the right thing I ordered? It can't possibly fit into this... ó_ò" and then I started imagining all possible more or less bad scenarios. xD Oh well, I put it in my bag and went back inside the shopping center (post office is on the outside of the same building). When inside I remembered I needed to buy some cosplay make-up, namely some good concealer/foundation/whatever-stuff-to-cover-derpness-on-your-face (I'm soooo knowledgeable when it comes to make-up terms.. lolnope) because yeah, powder alone just doesn't really cut it and the one thing I have is just... well.. it takes forever to dry and doesn't fit my skin tone - first I look like Simpsons and then I look like I have airdried poo on my face.
So I wobbled into the make-up specialized store like "herpaderp I know like almost nothing about this shit -and I wouldn't put my foot in here unless my nerdy hobby called for it- but I need some stuff that gives me this effect herpaderp". Yeah, go figure. Luckily I got some guidance to some kinda promising concealer which I decided to give a try.. but the price wasn't as yummy: 25 €. My poor wallet cried tears of blood. *pats it* I'm happy I only use make-up for cosplays...  



When I got home I took out the package. It's sooo tiny!

package in size comparison with normal (bigger) scissors...
... but sure there was my ponytail clip-on in there!
It was tightly rolled inside. I must say I was surprised. XD I took it out and it unrolled like WROOM and I was all "mistä tämä pituus oikein tulee? : DD" no ei Saunalahdesta ainakaan. Highly space effective way of packaging lol.

Now over to the progress part. You might or might not remember that I did a shinsengumi headband quite some time ago. Yeah, I never wore it to a con because I noticed it derped. It was a bit too wide to wear on your forehead with a wig. It would look derp.. or at least on my face it did. Also the craft foam protector part thingy creased when bent and the glue didn't hold it super securely in place. So I've been thinking about modifying it for a long time and today it was time for it to finally get a long awaited make-over.

First things first. Rip off the craft foam part.
It left some glue remains.. not sure if gusta.
I then took the seam ripper and unstitched the whole thing open again. I didn't want to cut any fabric because who knows, I might need the extra fabric someday later if I want to resize the width again.
When I had unstitched the whole thing I wondered what to make the forehead protector part out of; I wanted something that was glossy and would bend with the fabric... and so my mind went to the roll of pvc fabric my mom has. "Why not?" I thought and went ahead to try. Oh boy little did I know what hell awaited me...

After cutting out a fitting piece of pvc fabric
I went to iron the headband itself, this time folding in the sides twice to get it thinner and after I just resewed it shut again.

Double folded and ironed sides before sewing.
Sewn shut.
And now to attach the pvc piece to the middle. I just thought that it would be easy peasy to sew on. The first few stitches went all good and I was positive it would work so I continued sewing. I noticed very soon that every second stitch I had to lift the presser foot because the fabric wanted to turn to the side and crease and fold up under the presser and ahgjfdskjadskgj. But I continued sewing... and when I was almost done with the upper part I finally noticed that the whole thing had turned into a fucking drunk banana crooked beyond all points of hope!!

"Tell me again how you were supposed to be a headband..."
(yes, that's the default form it took if I tried to lay it flat, go figure)
I raged silently for myself and here comes the seam ripper. But sweet Jesus! Dx The stitches were so small it was impossible to rip them up because the seam ripper's.. rip.. point.. thing.. seemed gigantic in comparison. OTL So I tugged the pvc fabric upwards and somehow, slowly, managed to unstitch it. But the hand position I had to keep hurt like fuck and it felt like my thumb muscles or something would disintegrate when I was done. Needless to say my feelings were nothing less than..


If you didn't figure it out already - I left it unfinished.
Maybe another day I'll finish that sucker up... now it can just go and... sew itself goddammit.

June 12, 2012

Fixed the last details for my shinsengumi outfits

 Hi guys!

I've been packing most of the day and I hope I don't forget anything now. I wonder where I've put my hair tie for Saitou... I've done some cosplay progress too: I added the long ties for the shinsengumi haori today and made the headband.

It's ready ~ <3
I just cut two 2 meter pieces of some random white cord that we had lying at home and tied them to the loops inside the haori, then I test tied it to see about how far down the ties fell on my back.

reference for haori himo length (and headband too..)
Turned out 2 meters was waaaay too long so I cut around 50 cm or something off each end and kept tying them together until I got them to look about right.

Next (and last) thing to do was the shinsengumi headband.
I had yesterday bought two strips of around 12 cm of thin bed sheet-ish flowy fabric (whole fabric width) and I started from that. First thing to do was sew one of the ends together so I got one long piece. Then I zigzaged around the whole thing and next up was to iron it. After ironing it in the middle I put it on my head to see how long it was. Too long. Again. So I cut 40 cm off both ends.

After I had cut off excess length. lol why do I look so angry?...
Then I folded and ironed the sides...
... and sewed it closed ~
And when that was done I went and grabbed my bag of craft foam. Yes, I'm cheap. XD I took the brown sheet because, well, brown is better than yellow or green or something. lol
I cut out a 21 cm long (whole width of the sheet) and a 5 cm wide piece and proceeded to mix together some glue and water in a glass bottle. I needed to seal the craft foam because craft foam is kinda like a sponge and it sucks up paint like a monster otherwise. Or something.

Craft foam sealing preparations
I coated it around 4 layers and then I got lazy and picked up the silver spray paint and went outside. Several coats of paint later I let the piece dry and then I used some Karlssons klister (it glues everything pretty much) and glued it to the headband. I tried to sew it on at first but it derped so I resorted to using glue. I let it dry again and tried it on ~

Finished headband
Closer shot of it
When it's not on my head trolol
I'm not 100% sure what color it's actually supposed to be because the pictures I looked at showed different colors... ._. Oh well, I made mine silver and if I later find out it's the wrong color I can always make a new one, not much trouble. Now I did some quick version because, as you all know, I'm leaving tomorrow. I will use the haori and headband for both Saitou and Hijikata and also other future shinsengumi members I will cosplay. That means now both my Saitou and Hijikata cosplays are finished and con ready, YAY! ~

Bye bye!