Okita wig styling, fabric and quick photoshoot

Hello neh ~

With Desucon closing in I decided that I should try styling my wig for Okita ahead of time. Cosplay plans spoiler ahead! This time I wanted to do the first season version on which he still has the hairknot in the back. I'm happy that this one wig I have (I actually have three wigs for Okita currently, oops) has some additional hair pieces that you can just clip on and tie into the knot. But yeah, this is what I started with:

Wig before styling. (has been straightened)

Wig after styling.

I must say I barely have any wig styling experience to speak of (I've mostly just cut wigs shorter, once I tried spiking a wig slightly and that's about it) so it's not the cleanest wig work ever but oh well, it's not horrible either.. I guess. Then again I'm cosplaying a version of Okita on which he is more or less constantly lying in bed; sure that anime has always-perfect-hair logics but it would make sense if his hair was a bit messy on this particular version haha... seli seli
   Making that knot was a fucking bitch, by the way. It took several tries and I would have needed at least four hands at times... but with some determination I managed to do it alone. I might have to retie it sooner or later though because some of the hairs came out of the knot and just, well, hang. ._. I've already cut some like this but more will eventually appear and it's better I just retie it when that happens instead of gradually cutting all the long hairs off, haha.

With the wig done I got excited and had to try it on with the cosplay makeup and contacts – and then I put on the whole shit. And I mean shit as well in the way that I used my old soon-to-be-remade-for-Desucon violet yukata that is too short, not wide enough and everything in between. Gah. I can barely stand wearing this thing because it's so bad. xD I need to remake it soon! Yep, cosplay plans spoiler totally revealed.

I went outside with my photographer and had a quick photoshoot between 21-22 May. Yeah, basically we had a midnight shoot but hey, midnight sun to the rescue! Main reason was to show off the wig but I ended up playing with blood as well...

Taken by Hasakitsuki.

We didn't get much in the name of good-enough-to-publish photos because of random photobombing cars in the background and me being a derp and such. I ended up taking a bunch of selfies though, cuz I wanted to have face-pics because of blooooooooood ~

Actually I have a bonus story to share! After the photoshoot I was... quite freezing so to speak, so we went back inside and boiled some tea. As soon as I drank from my cup I blew a coughing fit because well, I'm a master at choking on things. Like, it's bad. This made Hasakitsuki look at me with a "not again" face and then, when I moved my hand away from my face, I noticed it was bloody. Of course, I still had blood on my face from the shoot but for a split-second it looked like I had coughed it up and Hasakitsuki screamed at me "ARE YOU SERIOUS?!". Well, I'm sorry, but I can't help choking on pretty much everything and having random not so random blood on my face...

I'm pretty sure that I will end up running around bloody at Desucon as well, but we'll see about that. Before I promise anything I should really get going with remaking this dang yukata. I've already bought some fabric for it that is very very slightly darker than the fabric I have on this first version; would have preferred lighter but it's pisshard to find, like, it's not even funny how hard it is to find a pale-ass violet. Actually I found an almost perfect shade in Eurokangas but it was a scrap piece and there wasn't enough of it... *insert sobs here* Even this fabric that I ended up buying barely had the amount that I needed so I bought everything that was left of the roll in the store haha.

Fabric, slightly color raped because of bad lights.

Mom brought some violet sewing thread rolls that I can use, along with the sewing machine.
(flash photo)

I've borrowed the old sewing machine that used to be grandpa's but we'll see if this thing obeys my commands when I start sewing. I have a bad feeling about it. Last time I tried I barely sewed 10 centimeters before it decided it was time to fuck things up and not work properly. Heh, I don't have much hope in this thing but I will try taming it at least.

Oh, and I'm currently storing my styled Okita wig on my one-and-only wig head which means that my Kondou wig, which used to have this beloved place, had to move. Needless to say I had to look for a replacement wig head and after some seconds of thinking I had a flash of genius!

Konhorse!! ... or is it Horsedou?

IMMAH HOERSSS!!1

It's beautiful. I know. xD

Valkoinen Samurai says byebye!

*slinks away into the darkness*

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 ~

Chibicon 2013 cosplay plans + A wild Ibuki appears!

 Hi everyone!

Yes, I'm totally going to Chibicon in Oulu, Finland, held 9th November. How could I not when it's only about 100 kilometers away?

Oh well, first things first. For some time ago I bought an Ibuki cosplay from my friend Sebastian. I had planned to cosplay Ibuki at some point anyway but yeah, so much cosplays to do and so little time.. and money. xD So when I found out he was selling his Ibuki costume I jumped at the chance! I just had to order a wig and so I did back at late September. I ordered contact lenses as well but more about that later. The wig I ordered from China and it had been sailing around the globe for a little over one month and boy did I get worried that I wouldn't get it on time for Chibicon. I swear just when I started thinking "I probably won't get it in time.." well, guess what? It showed up!

With the wig in my hands I figured it's safe to announce my Chibicon cosplay plans now. I guess it's not a surprise for anyone anymore that it will be..

Ryunosuke Ibuki from Hakuouki

I'm not sure if I will have a sword with me or not.. my swords are still broken so unless I can borrow one from Jäätynyt Enkeli or so then I'm out of luck. Oh well, it's not like he used his sword in the anime much at all so...

Uhm also, today I did a quick Ibuki try-on or what to call it, basically just checking that the cosplay fits me and such. It's all okay except that I'm missing that little violet ornament he has hanging from that blue string. I'll eventually make it later, don't really have time now and I don't want to open/waste my package of clay on such a small piece.

Well well, now time for a few pictures!
Excuse the shitty lighting and that I'm wearing zero cosplay make-up, save for slight eyeliner and darkening of eyebrows. I just couldn't be bothered. It happens. Pretty often.

Photographer is Hasakitsuki

 Also have a more close-up'ish mirrror self-photo..

You might have noticed that I'm wearing waraji. Yes, I finally got me some.. or more like, Hasakitsuki's awesome mom made them, whopee! ~

And just because I feel like sharing the woven goodness, have some waraji pictures!

They are pretty fabulous if I do say so myself. Sure, after walking/standing around for a while the soles of my feet had gotten waraji weave prints carved on them and it wasn't painless. xD Oh well, it's not too bad and come on, as the Finns say - "cosplay ilman tuskaa on teeskentelyä". It translates to something like "cosplay without pain is pretending". It's true amirite? :-DD
I'm just not all that keen on walking outside with these in November.. I'm gonna freeze.. and curse perkele if there's snow in Oulu...

Oh oh oh, and one thing! One thing!

When I put the wig on I noticed it was a bit too long at the sides and bangs so guess what? Yeah, that.

Wig cutting if you hadn't figured. Ibufag

I'm outta here for now. Chibicon summary post next and Ibuki contact lens review coming up soon enough as well. Hopefully also an Ibuki & Kosuzu photoshoot!

Until then, see ya!

Got fake blood on your wig? No problem!

Tracon is now over but you won't get to read about the con just yet; I have a fucklot of photos to go through so, yeah, 'dis gonna take some time. xD But you can expect a Tracon con summary to pop up later this week!

So, uhm, let's get on with what this post was supposed to be about.. namely a quick discovery I made after Tracon. You see, I was cosplaying rasetsu version Hijikata (Hakuouki) on Sunday and I had fake blood on my face, neck and hands. You'll get pictures in the Tracon summary later! During the course of the day I got some blood in the wig because the bangs would occasionally touch my face and such. I tried to avoid having the wig touching the blood as much as possible but, yeah, kinda impossible. But yeah, when I had to leave from Tracon I just took off the wig and put it into its plastic bag with pretty much all blood still on it; not like it was much but you could still tell it wasn't pure white everywhere.

When I finally got home a few hours ago I took out the wig from the bag. This is what it looked like:

Colored wig ends

Random bloody streak

It's not super noticeable on these pictures but the wig had some obviously pinkish red coloring going on. :D Still minor though.
What I did was hold the wig in my hands and carefully wet it with some tap water. I'm not sure if it matters or not but I just took the first best water temperature that came and it was semi-cold. I made sure to only wet the parts of the wig that had been in contact with the fake blood to avoid unneccessary tangling. Oh, and while holding small clumps of wig fiber under the water I rubbed them carefully between my thumb and index finger. To my joy the blood came out like a charm!

Then again, it might depend on what fibers the wig is made out of (this one is some kind of heat resistant fibers, I don't know the actual fiber name..) and what fake blood you use; the brand I used was Grimas.

Wig put to dry on a wig head

When I was done I just put the wig on a wig head to dry. Don't try to comb a wig while it's wet! Now I'll just wait for it to dry and with that I now know that getting fake blood on a wig -even if it's pure white- is seemingly not a problem!
Hohohoho, bloody photoshoots.. here I come! >8D

Ciao!

Cutting le rasetsu!Hijikata wig

Today I decided to cut my rasetsu!Hijikata wig. For some reason I can't find any really good clean references that shows his hair but this one is kinda okay:

This is what the wig looked like before I attacked it with the scissors:

The bangs are fine as they are (maybe a bit on the short side but still okay) but the back and sides are too long. I went ahead and trimmed and layered the sides and back. I've only done small styling modifications on wigs earlier (just slightly trimming bangs for example) so this was quite the leap for me. I was actually rather nervous although it probably didn't show on my moves; I kept my head cool and just thought that if I would butcher it at least I have enough time to get a new one. But my wallet wouldn't be happy about spending extra money...

Oh well, about 1 hour later I had this in front of me:

I'm pretty satisfied.. although I could have done some things a bit better, more carefully. *coughlayeringcough* The sides aren't identical when examined closer but good enough anyway.. or so I think at least, considering so far this is the most I've ever cut a wig. lol xD No one is a pro at start.. small steps I take, small steps, always a little bit more challenging ~

New wig additions, Hakuouki style ~

I ordered two wigs some few weeks ago and yesterday I got them. Today I decided to try them on because I've been all cosplay hype-ish all day. xD I can't wait for summer con season to start ~

About the wigs.. both are for Hakuouki character cosplays I will do in a more or less close future because that series is so.. ghfjdskjf;afgh. <3 I swear I'm probably never gonna stop loving it.. xD

But now for le wig photos. Excuse me the messy background.. the only mirror currently in my apartment is in the bathroom so, yeah. Obviously this means my photos are mirrored. I have bought a fullbody mirror but it has yet to be put to its proper place.. Oh, and I'm wearing a yukata for the heck of it, didn't feel like wearing "normal clothes" today. Also I didn't bother with make-up except some rather sloppy eyeliner, pretty much. For some reason it looks way better on photos than in real life though. lol

Oh well, be prepared for some rasetsu (aka "fury") time this con summer autumn becaaaaaaause.. ~

le rasetsu!Hijikata wig

The ponytail is a clip-on so I can use the base wig alone for western!Hijikata's rasetsu version too. I just need to trim and layer the back a little and it'll be all good to go. Now to just buy some red contact lenses hohoho...

The next wig I might not use this year or I might ehehe ~ but the temptation was too great to resist anyway because the character is one of my absolute top favorites ever.. if not my favorite.

Okitaaaaaa ~

I seriously love this wig.. so fluffy. <3 It's extra awesome because it can be used for both of Okita's hairstyles! I didn't take any pictures with the hairknot thingy because "my" *coughborrowedfromschoolcough* wighead isn't here and it would be quite a challenge to fix it with the wig on my own head.. oh well, I'll take photos of that variant later.
Oh, and if anyone wonders I do have a wig for Okita already (I cosplayed him at Desucon in Finland last year) and it's all cool and all but I couldn't resist buying this one because it was so cheap and works for both his hairstyles. This new wig also is a bit bigger by cap size so it fits me better.. I guess I have a sort of big head... OTL

Not so much more to say than that. I'm eating Easter marshmallows (candies) and I swear to God the green one tastes just like fish oil, what the fuck man. xD See ya!

New wig and more shinsengumi for the summer

Went to town after school today and picked up a new wig from the post office, heheh. I have planned to cosplay Souji Okita from Bakumatsu Renka Shinsengumi this summer and I'm one of those persons who tend to buy the wig almost first so, yeah. It took me quite a long time to settle on what to get because his hair is this color that seems to vary from silver to light gray-blue to white-ish blue and ahkfdsjk. Don't we all just love inconsistent references so much? lolnope

Okita from Bakumatsu Renka Shinsengumi

I found a few (Japanese) cosplayers who had cosplayed him and it seemed the majority had used a light blue wig.. but I personally wanted to have some white/silver in it too. I then found on eBay this rather cheap blue-white mix wig that made me go "close enough" and I went with it because hey, the cheaper the better, heh. I don't even need to cut it or anything and I finally got a reason to buy a two-color wig, hehehe ~

I really like this wig's color and it's not too thin either.. I was afraid it wouldn't have so much fibers because it was on the cheaper side. Only not-so-cool thing was that it shedded a bunch of fibers when I touched it at first so I got a bit worried. Oh well, it stopped doing that after a while of hand-combing so it's pretty okay now.

Later at home I just had to do a very quick try-on. Excuse me the yellow bathroom light. ._. I didn't bother with make-up either. I'll take better photos later when I've made the armor and stuff.

The red collar is temporary and ghetto; I just took a wide sash I had lying around, folded it in half and wrapped it around my neck and the excess I tied around my lower chest... it was uncomfortable so I'll either make a juban or a fake kimono collar later.

Oh well, I'll reveal what con I will cosplay this portrayal of Okita at later. I'll also work on him more around June or so; I need to finish Masamune Date first.

Hair cutting scissors and Kazuma wig trimming

I bought scissors for wig hair cutting from eBay some time ago and received them today. Earlier I just cut my wigs with mini scissors and well.. it worked but it wasn't the best and my hands hurt like hell if I had to cut for a longer time. I figured that if I will cut a lot more wigs in the future, which I will, so why not get some scissors actually meant for doing just that? Okay, I had my doubts buying from a cheap-ish eBay Hong Kong seller but turned out these are actually pretty sweet.. at least for someone non-professional like me who just needs 'em for a wacky hobby ~

le hair cutting scissors
(yes, I'm left-handed and these are leftie style. Haters gonna hate ~)

And with those I attacked the wig. Sure there wasn't much to cut, I just wanted to trim the bangs a little shorter because the bangs, although pretty nice, were originally of that derp-length that makes me look, well.. derp.

Wig before cutting
(sorry, flash photo)

After trimming the bangs (also layering them slightly) and trying the wig on my head it looked like this:

Excuse yellow bathroom light..
(mirror photo)

Now the bangs barely cover my eyes and thus don't look as derp anymore. I'll do a Kazuma cosplay preview later ~

Kazuma wig test

Got my wig for Kazuma yesterday. I'm at Jäätynyt Enkeli's place right now and I will stay here the whole weekend but I took with me the kimono items needed for Kazuma so that I could do a quick wig test preview while here. Oh, and this is pretty much a closet cosplay for me.. I happened to have all the clothing items for this already thanks to my kimono hobby. xD I just bought the haori and the wig.. not like he always wears a haori but it doesn't hurt to have it ~

I barely bothered with make-up and I'm not sure if I should trim the bangs on this wig a bit or not because on the manga Kazuma's hair length varies; sometimes it covers most of his eyes and sometimes it doesn't. ._. But I think I might shorten the bangs slightly because it might look better on me.

This is the only at least semi-decent photo I got and it's taken with the help of a mirror too so yeah, I'm not actually dead. lol Oh, and it's the manga version.

derp
(oh, yes, the mirror is dirty..)

Not so much more to say, if I decide to trim the wig you'll get a proper preview later.

Battousai wig styling + preview!

I got my wig for Battousai yesterday and today I decided cut it. It was originally sold for another character but the color was perfect for Battousai in my eyes and it also had a short clip-on ponytail, double yay!

The wig looked like this before my scissors attacked it:

le wig in its original glory

I cut off this much hohoh

I can't say I'm all that pleased with the wig, it's decent but could have been better.. I'm still really new to wig cutting and I hesitate a lot and doubt myself, hah. Oh well, maybe I can fix it a bit better when I have more proper hair/wig cutting equipment. Oh well. With the wig cut I decided to do a cosplay preview. The sun was about to set, but it wasn't dark yet outside, so I put everything on as quick as I could manage (while still looking decent) and went out in the snow. I must say.. wearing geta in snow was... interesting...

Cosplayer: Valkoinen Samurai
Photographer: Jäätynyt Enkeli 

And those were pretty much the only decent ones.. OTL I will try to get better pictures after/during Närcon Vinter.

I find it a bit funny how when I earlier tried to be does-not-kill Kenshin I ended up looked super serious on photos and when I now cosplay Battousai I looked like I'd hug a squirrel before killing anything on most photos. Not sure if going the right way... x'D

Ponytail clip-on test

Remember that ponytail clip-on I mentioned in the last post? Well, I decided to try it on together with my Sebastian/Hijikata/whatever wig to see what it looked like when worn. Ignore my lack-of-everything face. herpderp

Actually I noticed that the wig is a very dark brown-black and not full black like I had thought at first; the ponytail is black but luckily the color differences aren't disturbingly noticeable. Personally I don't really mind at least not yet xD that the colors don't match perfectly... it's understandable seeing the wig and ponytail are from different eBay sellers and wig colors are hard to match perfectly anyway. The difference is a bit noticeable when both wig and ponytail are hit by the light at the same time but otherwise okay. It will do just fine for me.

I will use this for Toshizo Hijikata's first season version from now on at cons, I think,  because it's easier to care for. That longer wig I will save for private photoshoots and when I do his calendar version. Also this combination works for another character I have in mind too, but I won't reveal that one just yet ~

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.