A quick Falkner test + making shoes

Today when I woke up I decided to do a quick Falkner cosplay try-on with everything I had finished, aka everything except the shoes. I didn't really get any good photos but here's one which isn't too dorky, wonderful wig eye censor:

Oh, and I also tried to do something vaguely resembling Falkner's Gym Leader battle pose.. thing.. you know when you battle a trainer on the newer Pokémon games their game sprite will do something. I'm so good at explaining. lol

Falkner battle sprites

Me being a dork. xD
(and now I noticed le twin gave me wrong pose directions. lol)

Much later on the evening/night I decided to brainstorm ideas to make Falkner's shoes. First I focused on his red ball things he has around his ankles. Mom had bought some.. err.. I think they're called paper mache balls in English ("vaddkulor" in Swedish and "massapallot" in Finnish) when she got home.

Paper mache balls

I decided to start painting them red. I used fabric paint.. it worked without problems. I just held the ball with my fingers and painted around it.. after a while I noticed my fingers were red and messy so I took the closest sharp-and-thin object I could get my hands on: mini scissors. I just shoved the scissors into the hole in the middle of the paper mache ball and voilá, no red fingers anymore and a good way to keep the ball from rolling around on the newspapers while drying.

When the balls dried I tried to come up with what shoes to use for Falkner. I didn't find the black ones I originally had planned to use.. but then I noticed mom's black crocs. "Maybe if I could cover up the holes they would suffice." I thought and with mom's help we tried using some black fabric for shoe covers. It failed, I couldn't wrap my head around how to get it to look neat. Plan B was mom's idea: black pantyhose. Mom basically took the shoe and shoved it inside one of the pantyhose legs. She then gave it to me and told me to cut off the excess length and seal it. All I could think was

Then mom found some black socks.. and stretched them over the crocs... and now it actually didn't look half bad. Well, they looked better than my Plan B (C?) at least which involved just not giving a crap and using my black slightly shiny-ish fuzzy ("soft hairy"? I don't know xD) slippers as-is....... yeah. I decided to go with the sock version.

After the paper mache balls had dried I took the paintbrush I had used while painting and used the other end of it to make the hole in the ball bigger and so that it went through the whole ball and not just half-way like default. After that I took some black elastic (maybe 1 cm wide), zigzaged the ends and put it through the hole it was rather annoying and time consuming and then just sewed the ends together. Now I had these:

Jingle bells, jingle bells,

Jingle all the way-- err, no.

Then I just took another strip of elastic and glued it to the back of the ball and BOOM le Fazer Falkner shoes were done! The shoes are not the best ever but they work me thinks.

With this my Falkner cosplay is now ready for debut at Skecon. Now if only I could be ready myself.. I have still left to pack everything and solve what I will sleep on during the con.. sleeping bag or what...? I have no idea, I can't take anything bulky like a normal mattress. First time ever during a con when I will sleep cheap floor lodging style (aka on the floor of a school most commonly) instead of a hotel or at some family member's/friend's place.. We'll see how this goes... interesting...

Bye for now.

Falkner close to done!

Guess what's up guys??

I've done some more Falkner progress today, I'm close to the goal now!

I finished the feet things. They feel rather.. funny.. when worn because they're like mega long sock tubes held up by elastics. xD

 Here's a photo of what they look like:

I continued on the jacket also. I added the white trim to the bottom by piecing together long straight 11,5 cm wide strips of off-white leftover fabric at the jacket seams. Like this:

After I had done that the only thing left was to hem the front and add the pom poms. I actually ordered the pom poms from America (eBay) because I couldn't find big enough ones in Finland. They were cheap too; I think they cost under 5 dollar with shipping included. Beat that Tiimari. lol

Huge and fluffy pom poms!

I just handsewed them to the jacket's front. I didn't want to glue them on because if I would need to wash the jacket in the future the pom poms would get damaged. It's better to sew them on so I can just remove the stitches holding them in place if I need to.

The finished jacket looks like this:

Yes, the pom poms are huge. They stick out and make the whole thing look cartoony. xD

I'm kinda pleased with the cosplay so far except that there's some flaws like the skipped stitches and some other things. *shrugs* Oh well, I think it's fine considering I've done this in such a rush, ahaha. It's not too bad but I could have been more careful with the sewing sometimes. ._.

Hmmm... now I only have left to fix the shoes. I hope I'll get them over and done with soon so that I can start focusing on the packing.

Stay tuned!

More Falkner progress

Been working more on Falkner today. I've almost finished the jacket except for hemming the front and bottom as well as adding the white bottom trim and the pom poms. I didn't take any photos of the progress but the jacket is like a mutation of a haori. The sleeves are short but kinda wide and the jacket is bell-shaped with an open front.
Oh, and let me share you what happened yesterday evening when me and mom were cutting out the pieces for the jacket.. rage comic style!

Mom got this rageburst out of the blue when I told her I'd rather do it without shoulder seams, Falkner's outfit clearly is inspired from traditional Japanese clothing after all. She was so scary I went all okay-guy and as soon as I had submitted to her will she was all happy again. Dafuq mom.

So as I already mentioned the jacket is coming around nicely and I also shortened my "hakama" and hemmed them today. I think I might be able to finish this cosplay in time if I keep this pace...

Here's what I had finished earlier today:

Camera face censor ftw

Some hours after mom came home she helped me with figuring out a way to make Falkner's... feet... things. I seriously don't know what to call them. lol They are finished I hope except for adding the elastic bands to keep them in place. I will fix that next time and hopefully finish the jacket too. Then I just have left to fix Falkner's shoes if I'm not missing something. I know I should have some black almost unworn shoes somewhere which are close enough for me.. but.. of course when you need something you won't find it even if you turn the whole house upside down. Guh.

I guess that's it for today. More progress next time and if I'm lucky I might be able to do a Falkner cosplay preview test before leaving for Skecon. Time will tell.

Arm bracers for the Gym Leader!

Today I cut out most of the parts for Falkner's jacket, I will start sewing it tomorrow. Tomorrow I'll also finish his "mini hakama". The progress for today is Fazer's Falkner's arm bracers. They are just made of red and dark-blue-almost-black rib knit fabric. Mom sewed them with the overlocking machine (I guess it's also called a serger) because, err, she just did.

Yo bro, I dig these things

You might notice I'm wearing kimono. I wore that kimono all day together with a matching haori.. even when I went to vote at the town's municipal election. The stares... xD Oh, and don't ask me why my hair is standing up like that. I have no damn clue. When I woke up today my hair had decided to go SUPER SAIYAN and when I went to look at the mirror I lol'd so very hard. I tried to comb it down but it bounced right back up and my hair has now been like that the whole day. It's ridiculous and awesome at the same time...

Sayonara!

Falkner's mini hakama pt.2

 Guess what guys?

There's only 5 days left to finish my Falkner cosplay before Skecon. Ouch.
Decided to sew on his hakama style pants most of the day. I won't explain so much what I did because I'm lazy but I'll show some photos of the process at least. It's pretty simple.

I started with doing the pleats. Remember, this is not the authentic way to make hakama. Two back (overlap) and two in front. I'm fully aware that hakama normally have 5 pleats in the front but Falkner's hakama doesn't really look like your typical hakama... and I kinda interpret those two "folds" on the front like pleats soooo... *shrugs* Besides I need to make pleats or I'd have those humongous granny pants which I do not want. lol

Making front pleats..

... and back pleats.

I went ahead and ironed the pleats and after that I needed to cut out the last missing parts.. the ties. I used most of the last bits of the fabric I had left. I cut out 4 about 165 cm long and 7,5 cm wide strips of fabric. I would have made them wider if I wasn't so short on fabric.

 Ties cut out

Zigzaged all around and sewed them together at one end so I had 2 long ones

Ironed to get a middle fold

Sew the ties into a long "tube" so that the zigzag is folded inside...

Sew a straight seam across the pleats to secure them
(front piece on photo, of course do same to back piece)

Pin the ties in place and sew them on

At this point I was done except for heming the pant legs. I tried them on very sloppily and noticed that they were waaaaaay too long. My typical mistake. ._. Oh well, it's much easier to shorten than to lengthen..

They were supposed to end at my knees. lol

Gonna cut off some excess length next time and hem them. *yawns* I don't feel like doing anymore for today. Next time I'll finish these so that I can start working on Falkner's jacket.

Bye for now!

~Autumn's Last Breath~ Hajime Saitou photoshoot

Yesterday me and my twin Jäätynyt Enkeli decided to have a cosplay photoshoot outside in our yard and in the area nearby. Almost all leaves have fallen and the first snow came a few days ago but it melted away; we had morning frost on some parts of the ground yesterday. It was around 0 ºC outside but we managed.. somehow.. although during the last 15 minutes something I couldn't feel my fingers.. but what won't you do for cosplay?

So I decided to cosplay Hajime Saitou from Hakuouki because I feel I don't have so many decent photos of that cosplay.. also he is one of my favorite characters to cosplay because we have so very similar personalities.

Cosplayer: Valkoinen Samurai
Photographer: Jäätynyt Enkeli

 

(I took this photo)

 And then two photos on which I played with some light effects~

OH WHYYYYY is my fav photo always blurry? *tableflip*

And lastly some photos I took myself at the rowanberry trees; my photographer couldn't get a good angle because I was standing on a higher surface than he was and he is shorter than me.

And that's the end of the Saitou photospam for now. We had a lot of fun even though it was so cold after the sun had set, aka during the later half of the photoshoot. I REGRET NOTHING! Of course at one point we went inside to get some stuff and to warm up and mom came and raged. "Oh no you two don't go out again, don't you have enough photos already? You're gonna get sick!" lolnope~ We ignored her warnings coming from the kitchen and ninja'd our way outside. U MAD MOM?

Falkner's mini hakama pt.1

I was bored and decided to start sewing on Falkner's hakama-ish pants to get some progress done, after all Skecon is slowly closing in; I have only 17 days left to get everything done, heuheuheuheu...

Last weekend mom helped me cut out the parts for my pants. We were lucky, the fabric we had at home was just enough for Falkner's kimono style shirt and mini hakama. Phew~

Oh, and before I start. This is not the authentic way to make hakama, just for costume purposes. The patterns are just originally these huge pant's patterns which I shortened and modified later on. The modifications I just did what my brain told me to do.

Front and back pieces cut out, two of each obviously

I started with zigzaging around all four pieces. I decided to save the blue thread so I used white thread for this.. it doesn't matter anyway because the zigzag won't be seen on the outside. After I had zigzaged all pieces I took both back pieces and started folding in at the sides to get these hakama style openings.

Impromptu folding (both back pieces)

I tried to get both of them the same size and depth. After I had got both back side opening folds like I wanted them I put away one of the back pieces, took one front piece and copied the back piece's folding over. Must try to get them as similar as possible. Repeat for the other front piece and then just iron the opening folds flat and stitch them in place.

After ironing and sewing it in place
(I folded in the edge closest to the opening so that the zigzag won't peek out)

But upon closer inspection I noticed something...

SKIPPED STITCHES. WHYYYYYYYYYYY

I tried re-threading the sewing machine at least thrice and switching the sewing needle but nope, the problem didn't go away...
I find it weird how I didn't get skipped stitches at all when I made Falkner's shirt earlier, it's the exact same fabric and I used the same needle...

I see you little troll...

I decided to screw it and sew anyway. I just want this thing done, if it bothers me in the future I can just undo the seams and remake those failed parts...

Next thing to do was to sew the outer side seams closed and after that sew the inseam/inner-pant-leg-whatever seams closed.

Outer side seams sewed, obviously one front and one back piece

Inseam sewed closed

Next thing to do was to align the crotch, right sides together of course, and then sew along the curve.

Crotch aligned, before sewing

 Now I had something that resembled pants... or not. Instead of mini hakama I now had these humongous ultra XXXL sized granny pants! I don't see anything "mini" about them right now... Aren't they sexy?

Ihan helevetin maukasta..

Errr, maybe not so...

Oh well, it's not like this sucker will stay like this forever. I have yet to pleat it, add the ties and hem the pant legs. I'll fix that another time.

This is good progress for tonight. *yawns*