Review: MAC Face and Body Foundation, Mineralize Concealer

A bottle of liquid Photoshop.

Recently I went on a bit of a makeup binge. Binge being a relative term - I don't like spending money on makeup. To give you some idea, my most expensive makeup purchase before this was probably ten whole pounds. I cried myself to sleep for a week.

So this was the first time I'd gone to a proper makeup store (MAC) instead of just Boots. There were two assistants on duty at the time, both wearing impeccable faces of makeup. One of them was ruining the effect slightly by giving me the most almighty stink eye, but luckily the other was really helpful and nice. She matched me to an N2 in foundation, and then promptly covered my face in it!

I loved it. Light and comfortable on the skin and blended perfectly. No SPF. Skinlike finish. The pricing scheme was a little less lovable - there are only two sizes of bottle, 50ml and 120ml, priced £21.50 and £27 respectively. Ouch. I would have preferred to have gone with 50ml until I was sure it was right for me, but at those prices, I chose the big bottle.

I was also looking for a concealer. I previously used MAC Select Moisturecover and was going to ask for that one again, but the assistant suggested MAC Mineralize. Another colour match to NW20, more makeup on the face - but this too looked really good, covering my dark circles well without being cakey. I couldn't see prices anywhere, and it's probably a good thing I couldn't, because the tiny 5ml tube cost £16.50. Eep.

And so I handed over £43.50 that day. *sob* At least while I was starving on the streets I'd have smooth skin, right?

I needed this stuff for a 'natural' look in a headshot photo. So this is the foundation with blush, concealer, mascara and eyeliner:

Photo credit to Matt

Looks pretty smooth! Beyond that, I'm happy to say that the stuff is long-wearing and hasn't broken me out or made me oily. Definitely my favourite foundation and concealer so far.

Review: G&G Shinny Green (Puffy 3 Tone) (+WataMote cosplay)

Tomoko Kuroki!

  Oh my god, it's been so long, I nearly forgot how to type. I did, however, manage to pull off a cosplay of Tomoko from WataMote (you don't want to know the full name. It means 'No matter how I look at it, it's you guys's fault I'm not popular!') She has green eyes, so off I trotted to buy some G&G Shinny Green (Puffy 3 Tone) circle lenses.

(No, that's not a typo. 'Shinny' makes me think of knobbly knees, and 'puffy' is my face in the morning if I accidentally sleep on it. :c)

Please note that the panda eyes are intentional and part of the cosplay! (Tomoko has too many late night playing otome games... :'D)

The green eyes of jealousy? (And two sets of eyelashes,
because whoever heard of curled eyelashes?)

GREEEEEEEN.

 The colour and design on the Shinny Green lenses is pretty great! I was a bit hesitant at first when trying to choose between these and Princess Mimi Apple Green, the other best-selling green circle lenses on PinkyParadise, but I was concerned that the limbal ring on the Princess Mimi ones was too wide, so not enough of the colour would be left. I'm glad I chose these. They have a pretty green colour, not too alien-like but definitely bright enough to show, and a little bit of brown round the pupil hole.

A comparison. I look a bit wall-eyed ('I SEE WHAT YOU DID
THERE. AND ALSO OVER THERE.' because I don't think my
right eye has its base curve quite right - lenses seem to slip...)

The enlargement is so-so. A little bit, but nothing too crazy and alienlike, just how I like it.

Comfort was great. I got a bit worried when it felt irritated when I first put them in, but they soon settled and I wore them for around eight hours, basically forgetting about them. Then again, the shoot was quite distracting, as it included making faces and mock screaming, dressed as a tired schoolgirl, while passing motorists laughed at me... .__.

Overall, fantastic. I would definitely recommend these for a green-eyed cosplay.

Whole costume! (minus blazer)

Review: Venus Eye Bright Red lenses from PinkyParadise

Lunatic Eyes?

 I needed some red lenses for my MCM Expo Spring 2013 cosplay of Reisen Udongein Inaba, Touhou's purple-haired bunny girl from the moon. Her special power is lunacy (Japan's moon rabbit? LUNA-cy? Geddit?!) and she has a pair of crazy looking red eyes to go with it. I own a pair of Venus Eye Aqua which I really liked and were comfortable, so I figured I'd give the red version a go.

 I bought Venus Eye Bright Red from PinkyParadise. The shot on the model were... very, very red. But then again, they're photoshopped to hell, so I do tend to take such things with a pinch of salt. Or an entire shaker of it.

Colour: 4/5
Colour-wise, yes, they're nowhere near as bright as on the model, but they are a pleasant, 'natural' looking red which is visible without looking like those weird Hallowe'en cheap ones.

Natural light. I really should get rid of that orange towel...

Indoor lighting.

Once again, it blends in well with my pupil hole and shows up fine.

Meanwhile, my special power seems to be
an inability to apply false lashes correctly.
Symmetry is for losers!

Comfort: 3/5 (4 after a while)
Not quite as comfortable as the Venus Eye Aqua, at first. When I first put them in, they shift around a little on my eyes and are slightly irritating, but it calms down after about half an hour of wear and then I don't notice them so much anymore.

When I first put them in, unlike with Venus Eye Aqua I can see a very slight tinge of red around my vision - I wonder if the pupil hole is smaller? Not really a worry though, it doesn't get in the way.

Overall rating: 4/5
Pretty colour, a little uncomfortable at first but otherwise fine.

Served me well at the Expo, thinking of doing a shoot for this costume soon...

I'm here to guard this door that totally
doesn't lead to Kaguya. Yes.

Review: Dolly Wink 02 'Sweet Girly' and 14 'Natural Cute' False Lashes

On the Grand List of Women who should be Disallowed from having a Makeup Blog, I'm pretty far up there. To put it politely, I am clumsy as fuck. :D

Behind the scenes last Friday night.

My number one problem is with the eyelashes. Put a tube of mascara in my hand and suddenly I'm like a toddler making a macaroni picture. Upper eyelid, below the eye, cheekbone, eyebrow... What can I say, I am just that amazing.

So false lashes sounded great! Instant romantic, long fluttery eyelashes. It would also fix one of my pet hates with mascara - the clumpiness. I do my best with the eyelash comb (usually getting mascara everywhere again) to avoid the fate of many women who walk around with what looks like six thick eyelashes in total. But still, it's all such a pain! Falsies would be better. Right? Right?

So for my first set of lashes, I bought two Koji Dolly Wink sets, No. 2 Sweet Girly for the upper lashes and  No. 14 Natural Cute for the lower set (available from PinkyParadise... see all the Dolly Wink eyelashes, they're all nice!) The packaging features a Japanese idol wearing various wigs and lashes who is officially Cuter And More Gyaru Than You. You get two pairs in each pack, which for me, was a pretty good thing.

Well, if I thought that this was going to be easier than mascara, I was horribly, horribly wrong.

How to apply false lashes

• Squeeze blob of glue onto back of hand.
• Draw lashes through glue to coat the lash band. And often the lashes themselves.
• Dry out the glue a little. Blow on it, or alternatively snap forearm from side to side in a sassy fashion.
• Hold lashes up to eyelid and attempt to press lashes into place above the lashline. One of the following will happen.
• You somehow manage to glue your eyelids together.
• You attach the false lashes to your real lashes, where they flop about uselessly.
• Everything falls off the second after you press it in place.
• When this happens, you must run a cotton bud through makeup remover, run it over the falsies (assuming they haven't fallen off already) and peel them off. 
• Clean all that glue off your real lashes, you klutz.
• Pull all the tiny sticky strings of glue off the lashes without mangling the lashes themselves or screaming in frustration.
• Repeat until victory! (To varying degrees.) 

I don't know whether I'm just clumsy or this process is always a pain in the ass, but over the course of an hour I poked myself in the eye countless times and got glue in my real lashes, on my eyelids, and even somehow in my hair.

And this wasn't even my first go. I'll just leave this here.

A moment of silence for their fallen, sticky comrades.

Those aren't dead spiders, it's what happened with a lack of patience, over-zealousness with the eyeliner and a lack of makeup remover while cosplaying at the London Expo. That's £10 worth of crusty eyeliner, lashes and glue right there.

Still... at some point, I made it!

Looking fairly solemn.

Still showing behind glasses!

I like these lashes! The top set, 'Sweet Girly' are long enough to open up the eye without being so crazy dense that each blink causes a breeze, and the bottom set... well, not quite so dramatic (because really long lower lashes are quite creepy!) but they give a nice effect too.

I think until I get better, I might buy some cheap lashes to practice with during downtime (I prefer my £5 to buy me several sets of cheap practice lashes instead of one pair which was once beautiful but is now mangled and lumpy.) Mascara in the meantime. But I look forward to trying out more of these!

Review: Princess Pinky Twilight Brown from PinkyParadise

GoldenEye!

 I have heard that Princess Pinky Twilight Brown is the circle lens for cosplay of a character with yellow eyes. Since I am intending to cosplay Chuunibyou's Rikka (who has a single yellow contact lens in her right eye), I figured I'd give a pair of these a shot. I bought them from PinkyParadise.

I bought these at the same time as my Venus Eye Aqua (here) in which I mentioned that I got a defective one which felt scratchy and painful (in the right eye no less!) But pinkyparadise were great about sending me a replacement, with a really quick turnaround too. <3 I'm glad to say the new lens was absolutely fine.

I've been Tango'ed! Nah, I was standing in natural light, in front of an orange towel.  Looks like the mother of all tans.

Indoor lighting. They look more yellow than gold like that.

   The colouring on these is great. Under natural light, they're a beautifully wild-looking gold colour, which added a nice touch of evil to my normal look without being those freaky, fluorescent yellow Hallowe'en types. They were great on my dark eyes, blending well with the pupil while being opaque where it counted.

Look how well they show up!

  I really wanted to love these, however! There was a downside. My eyes felt dry and uncomfortable after only an hour. I didn't use any eyedrops, true, but should I really have to resort to that after only an hour? This is only my second pair, so I'd like to hear more about it, but I wore the Venus Eye Aqua for three hours before any sort of dryness happened.

It is a shame that they are not very comfortable for long use, as the colour is nice! I think these might be good for a photoshoot, but too irritating for long wear.

Review: Venus Eye, Princess Pinky lenses from PinkyParadise

The alien-like baby blues I never had!

   I am a longtime daily contact lens wearer, but this was my first foray into circle lenses. These are lenses from Asia with a black 'limbal ring' round the edge, which is supposed to make your iris look bigger and thus make your eyes adorable and sparkly and anime-like. Or something.

And so the fashion bloggers and Korea fanatics weep as they
meet their overlord in the king of ridiculously huge irises,
Mr Burns.

They're very popular, and apparently addictive in the same way as makeup. But to be honest, this aspect didn't interest me much. My irises are fine without The Fly transformations. What I really wanted was to be able to colour my eyes for cosplay. My irises are deep, tar-black pools of hatred and despair. None of those pathetic 'fresh tint~', 'clear shade~' style English lenses would be able to make a dent on their utter darkness, but be CONSUMED into their murky depths. In other words, I needed something with a nice block of opaque colour.

I bought two prescription pairs from Malaysian vendor PinkyParadise. Title aside, I must give a warning for the Pink and Sparkly. Even a four-year-old in her 'fairy princess' stage might twist her mouth and say, 'That's a bit... much.' But they have a wonderful range of different colours at reasonable prices, many of which come in prescription.

It was very tempting to go nuts on the colours, but I held off and selected two pairs, blue and yellow, in my prescription of -2.75 on the left and -3.5 on the right. I got two cute little animal lens cases and two gifts, an eye mask and a Japanese pink... hair thing. It looks like Velcro and is very puzzling.

Venus Eye Aqua
'Venus Eye' sounds rather romantic and pretty, doesn't it? Anyway, here is a fairly dark and rubbish pic of my eyes with one on and one off.

Go go heterochromia!

See how dark my natural colour is? Yet it still shows up. Here's a better picture under daylight.

These were actually really comfortable. I didn't have any eye drops, so I only wore them for three hours, but I hardly felt them for that time, and I didn't experience any vision obstruction at all!

I then played with wigs and took some pics in indoor lighting. This is my chuu2wig for Rikka from Chuunibyou, and my orange wig for drunken oni Suika from Touhou.

Fear my completely average eye.

Watashi no Eyebrows ga Konna ni UNMATCHED Wake ga Nai!

The colour is always visible close up, and probably visible from the mid-distance in good light. Probably better under natural light though, as you can't see in much in the Chuunibyou picture. Yes, the orange wig one is lazy with black hair sticking out, I had a critical wig cap failure.

Overall, I liked these a lot. <3

Princess Pinky - Twilight Brown
I won't be reviewing these this time... the right one was scratchy and stung and moved around on my eyeball, not sitting correctly on it. Now, I'm pretty sure my eyes can handle contacts - they're the same base curve as my dailies and all. I also prepared it correctly, washing them with the proper solution and storing them in the right way. Also, when I tried the blues above, they worked fine. So I think the most likely cause is that the right eye's one was defective. A pity, since that's the one I need for Rikka!
I have contacted PinkyParadise, hopefully they can do something about it. :3

EDIT: PinkyParadise got back to me super quickly and are sending me a replacement for the defective lens! Very friendly and good service. Hopefully I can make a proper review for them later!

EDIT 2 - Revenge of the Edit: I made a review for the Princess Pinky Twilight Browns!

A health warning
Two days after my extremely brief try with the yellows and one day after the blues, my eyes seemed to react oddly to my normal daily contact lenses, going dry very easily, and things seemed a bit blurrier than usual. This was greatly worrying to me, as I hadn't even worn the lenses for long. I hope that this was unrelated and just bad timing, but if it's not, I will take a trip to the optician's.

Obligatory link to this blog post about possible permanent damage resulting from circle lenses. If you wear lenses, it is worth a read - these things can be pretty and interesting, but stay safe and use a good supplier!

Kitty hat, and a sewing machine!

Nyaa!

I got a kitty hat! It has little ears and is soft. OwO It's based on Asuka's hat from the third Evangelion Rebuild film, which won't be here for a looong time. But yes, it keeps my head warm and makes me look like a weirdo when running around London.

In other news, I have started using my sewing machine, a Brother CS6000i, which I imported from the US a month or so ago. I am merrily making an array of wonky lines of stitches on some waste cloth in bizarre thread colours. It's all computerised, so the machine also beeps angrily at me when I try and do something stupid! It's pretty good fun. My first project with it will be Suika Ibuki from Touhou, a drunken, flat-chested oni. I have my wig now, so I will get cracking on the horns fairly soon.

...

I swear to god I didn't mean for that pic to come out like some terrible attempt at being gangsta.

Review: Garnier B.B. Creams - a miracle?

Looks like the typical tall and skinny,
short and squat pair...

Well, not only have I pretty much missed the boat on this one, it's had the chance to do a trip of the world before I so much as got to the pier. But I have tried out BB cream!

BB cream stands for 'blemish balm', originating from Asia. There, it is touted as an idol's secret, a superb miracle of skincare, skin-smoothening, soothing and sun protecting all in one! Sssss. Well, that's Asia, and whether these claims are true or not, Western ones are said to be a rather different beast, with fewer features but more of a 'baby foundation', maybe. No-makeup makeup.

I've not tried foundation before as my skin is fairly well behaved. I usually have maybe one or two spots and they are more likely to be little pimples (or ex-pimples...) than 'I AM CYST, DESTROYER OF WORLDS' type pustules. But England has been going through a cold snap (thanks, Siberia) and my usually oily skin has gone combination, drying out in random areas. Not much I could do about flaky eyebrows short of massaging half a bottle of Head and Shoulders into it, but I figured maybe I could give BB cream a go to cover up dryness on my cheekbones.

In a giveaway, I got a free bottle of Garnier BB Miracle Skin Perfector cream in 'light' and 'age-defying'. Age defying isn't what I really go for, but if it's free... Still, can I sue Garnier if I don't look 12 afterwards?

The colour was good (though surprising - I am not 'light' by most standards) but I wasn't terribly happy with the look - it was shiny! So shiny. But I dusted some translucent powder over it (incidentally, half the bathroom too) and soon both me and the sink had a lovely matte complexion. That is, until the next day, when I broke out. :/ And that never happens!

But it seemed like a pity. I bought a bottle in 'light' and 'oil-free' instead. The oil-free version was a lot more runny (more a liquid than a cream) and less pink. Also smelled more strongly of alcohol. However, it seemed that light actually was now light. Too light for me! :c I wanted the colour of the old one but the properties of the new... so I put blobs of both on my face! Science.

HELP, HELP, SKIN DISEASE

Aaaaand we're done! Just kidding. The next step is to blend it all in. I tie my hair back to do makeup, so... forehead warning.

FOREHEAD

The mix is pretty good! It helped conceal the remnants of spots past on my forehead. I'm not too fond of the SPF 25, because that would cause a cast in photos, but I'm sure for people who want to just wear it every day instead of foundation it would be useful. Using mostly the oil-free version prevented me from breaking out too, so I'd definitely recommend that for oily skin type.

All done!

So that's that. Pretty good for everyday wear, but I need something a bit better for cosplaying. I have a MAC concealer and really like it, so perhaps I will take a trip down to the store and get colour matched for some proper foundation sometime.

New glasses! ~ A tale of Japan and customs fees

じーっ

I got some new glasses! Some cheap half-price frames from Japan, by glasses company JINS. Unfortunately, it also became a cautionary tale about proxy delivery and customs charges.

The proxy - Tenso
Company doesn't deliver outside of Japan? Got no Japanese friends? Now you do, because this is where proxy delivery services like Tenso come in. The product is shipped to this company's address within Japan, and they forward it on to you. Their site was in clear English and within a few minutes I had my own address in Tokyo to send mail to. Very fast and cool service.

The problem - Parcelforce
It was when it hit England that things went wrong. For future reference, here's how you calculate customs and taxes when importing goods into the UK.

• Customs Duty - Only charged on items worth over £270 at 2.5%. If your total duties come to less than £9, though, this is waived.
• Excise Duty - Only if you're bringing in alcohol or cigarettes. Excise duty rates here. 
• VAT - Charged on the cost of item, shipping and duties at 20%.
• Handling fee by carrier - THIS IS THE KICKER. I had no idea about this one. You see, my parcel was picked up by Parcelforce. And Parcelforce 'kindly' pay your fees to customs for you to release your parcel, then hold it hostage themselves and demand a flat £13.50 for the pleasure. This nearly tripled my border fees.

Another thing to note about Parcelforce is though you may see 'Awaiting payment of charges' through their online tracking, you cannot immediately pay online. You either ring them up and give them your credit card details over the phone (not an option for me when I'm at work) or you have to wait a day or two for them to send you a letter with a reference code, and then you can pay online. Just... what?

I tried to speed it up by ringing up the depot to get my code over the phone, but the operator stubbornly maintained that she was not allowed to release it as 'We wouldn't know if you are who you say you are.' Seriously? Why does it matter who pays it, if it gets paid? Is there some problem with reverse-bandits paying people's customs fees?

Being unable to wait around at home for a parcel, I went up to Camden myself and reluctantly coughed up the fees. I noticed there were multiple signs and leaflets by the window proclaiming the handling fee as 'legal', and 'very reasonable' - it seems that quite a few complaints had been made in the past. Personally, I too cannot even begin to imagine the amount of arduous labour which justifies £13.50 in a single parcel's handling fee. I expect it to be along the lines of at least three postal workers breaking their fingers while punching numbers into a calculator.

But at least that saga is over. If these are okay, I might get prescription lenses fitted.

Happy Chinese New Year! (And a step by step art)

In which Hong Meiling teaches English and not Chinese,
due to lack of skill in the artist...

Step-by-step, how I make my art!

Believe it or not, I'm supposed to be Chinese. I'm just exceptionally bad at it!

My parents are from Hong Kong, but I'm British-born. Apparently when I was a toddler I spoke Cantonese, but my father thought I'd end up continuing this at school, so decreed that no-one was allowed to speak to me in anything other than English at home.

I never regained Cantonese, and I'm slightly disappointed in this. I think my father's worries were misplaced - like anyone pays attention to what a four-year-old says matters anyway. I could have been jabbering away in Urdu and the Reception teachers would have probably have just smiled and nodded and handed me a tub of Play-doh.

But here I am today! A splendid specimen of a banana ('yellow on the outside, white on the inside') and probably the least-Chinese Chinese person you'd know.

Anyway, I drew the above art in celebration, of Hong Meiling from Touhou, perhaps the only Chinese thing which is even more unconvincingly Chinese than me. It was a relatively quick piece, for me. Originally, I intended her to say 'Happy New Year', so I just scribbled it down as the direct translation.

Then I remembered something. Don't we usually say 'Kung hei fat choi' for Chinese New Year? Eep. Do all people say that? Or maybe... it's just the thing I am obligated to say before I receive my red paper packet (my yearly 'Congratulations, you did not get married' bonus). What do other people say? Would it be weird to write that here?

I tried to Google it, but alas, trying to read the debates on this was like wading into some kind of grammatical, Mandarin VS Cantonese shitstorm where people were hurling Chinese dictionaries, anecdotes and accusations of being culturally insensitive everywhere.

So I just chickened out and wrote 'Happy Chinese New Year'.  ;__; I am sorry, ancestors, I bring great dishonour to famiry.

Les Misérables - 'If you're poor in France, you're gonna have a bad time.'

Do you Hear the People Sing?

Ah, Les Mis. The story of a convict who breaks parole, adopts a little girl and gets swept up in a revolution. I must confess that I'm still too afraid to pick up the book (it is of impressive size and would probably result in broken toes on the first attempt to lift it) but I enjoyed the stage show, so I was looking forward to seeing what the film had made of it.

The first thing that became clear was that the song style is a lot more conversational and less operatic, characters sometimes reverting to flat-out speaking their lines. All the performances were recorded live, with the actors and actresses singing to each other at their own pace while some poor fellow on the piano played into their earpieces, trying to keep up with their irregular tempo changes. Less grandeur maybe, but a more natural style.

Touching of faces.

Hugh Jackman, playing man-on-the-run Jean Valjean, put in an energetic (if occasionally slightly Aussie) performance, managing to pull off both 'dangerous convict' and 'protective father'. Co-star Anne Hathaway's performance as self-sacrificing mother Fantine was far from the rousing musical version of 'I Dreamed a Dream', which is oddly placed before everything really goes to pot. The film's version is an utterly crushed, defeated, lonely rendition, complete with voice cracking and sobbing.

Amongst the post-timeskip cast, Marius, played by Eddie Redmayne, was fairly endearing with his quavering, tremulous delivery. The object of his affections, Amanda Seyfried as stock ingénue Cosette, is stuck with a character with all the depth and fieriness of wet cardboard, but pipes her lines in a sweet little hummingbird voice. Meanwhile, Samantha Barks puts in a heartbreaking performance as poor friendzoned Éponine.

Years on, more touching of faces.

But none for you, Éponine.

Russell Crowe has been getting a lot of flak for his turn as the relentless Inspector Javert (or 'LAWBOT 2.0 *bzzt*' as my friends put it). I can see where the criticism stems from - compared to Philip Quast's steely, fierce rendition of Stars, Crowe crooned it out in a less convincing, yet oddly soothing monotone. That was a little disappointing, but I loved the escalating counterpoint of 'The Confrontation'.

'Damn, I wish I could read French.'

It was very enjoyable experience, seeing all these songs played out with the benefit of real backdrops and closer-up than would ever have been possible on stage. Very close, in fact, due to a very... er, personal filming style which bordered on claustrophobic at times, introducing the audience to the dubious pleasure of being able to count nose hairs as a grubby peasant snarls about his poverty.

My highlights were probably 'One Day More', 'On My Own' and 'Empty Chairs at Empty Tables'. I don't really know what it would be like for someone who wasn't already familiar with the material, but anyone who liked the musical should give this a go. :D

The mute button. :x

'....'

 I am currently mute! I think some wizard stole into my apartment in the middle of the night, and now I cannot cast magic or clear my name if anyone says 'So I heard Jenny sucks, what do you have to say against these accusations?'

In honour of this, some half-arsed cosplay of the deaf-mute Shizune, from Katawa Shoujo. Man, my hair is long, I would have done better as Hanako.

(In fact, can this even be called half-arsed? It probably doesn't deserve even half an arse. Maybe a quarter, if I am lucky. I would happily settle for 'more arsed than white-top-and-jeans-L or ninja-headband-and-normal-clothes-Naruto.')

Anyway, apart from that, I have been resting, making weird, inhuman noises in an effort to regain speech, eating leftover chicken-and-sweetcorn soup and taking far too many Strepsils. Why do they taste so good? ;w;

Cosplay Diary: Bra top!

References for EVA 01's chest armour, and the final thing!

More work on my Evangelion Unit 01 cosplay, which has been on the backburner a while. Eva 01 has a few layers of armour plating over its chest, and my idea was to convert this into a bra top. 

For a base, I used some kind of cotton training bra meant for 12-year-olds to cover up their new mosquito bites with.

Cups covered with blue PVC (bottom half.)

Blue PVC, red PVC and some black rubber washers were used to cover up the cups.

Somehow my covering of the cups appeared to have eaten half the centre gore, because I have no idea what I'm doing. However, a little still remained, so I covered that too, and glued on a red glass cabochon to act as the Eva's 'core'. It's not very noticeably red - think the damage counters from Pokemon. But the intention was there...

An uncovered armour plate, made from interfacing, Rigilene boning
and definitely not my neatest stitches...

Finally, the external armour panels. I created a framework from interfacing and Rigilene boning. I then covered this with black cloth, then purple and green PVC, and attached them.

And the final result looks like this! Gratuitous filth incoming.

Bra on.

Bra off.

I'll be making a cropped jacket of some sort so the straps and underbust strap (which are all uncovered at the moment) won't be visible on the final cosplay.

I'm pretty happy with this though! My only worry is that the bra is a little small. This means I can't really jump around excessively or I will risk a nipple cheerfully poking out over the top, which would be pretty disastrous. I think I might wear plasters over them like last time I cosplayed, just in case of such wardrobe malfunctions - it would still be pretty bad, but less so than the alternative.

New Year's Eve

The only time of the
year that one can wear
a dress that appears to
have been patterned
on an ostrich and get
away with it.

Hooray! Against incredible odds, we all survived the Mayans. And that means we get to ring in the new year!

This year, I was spending it with my English friends. Slightly dubious about the idea of a pub crawl when the divines fortold rain, I flexed my Google-fu and found a whole bunch of modestly-priced, well-dressed events. These ranged from the bizarre (supperclub - a fairly arty experience seeming to involve pole dancing, fire breathing and latex gear) to certain disaster (Casino at the Empire - because who needs money anyway?). We settled on Zebrano's on Carnaby Street.

My outfit was easily the most excessive I have ever worn - the dress's skirt was a frothy mass of gradiented netting, paired with white tights. I spent a good while debating whether it was a good idea to step out of the door looking like a fairy reject, but I failed to realise that the dress would actually be the least of my worries.

When I left for pre-drinks, I was experiencing a little discomfort in my toes. I waved it away - beauty is pain, right? Unfortunately things only got worse. The little discomfort turned into a sharp sting every other step, and then the feeling of blood seeping into my tights by the time I was on the Tube to Holborn.

And so I became that typical woman you see hobbling away from a club at night, wincing and gritting her teeth with each tiny, mincing step... except it was about 7PM and I hadn't even made it to the party yet.

I chose not to admit defeat, but to advance in the opposite direction. Upon my arrival at Holborn I informed my comrades of my crushing defeat in the battle of womanhood, and took the Tube straight back home. Upon removing my tights, I was greeted with the discovery that the skin on each of my fourth toe knuckles had regretfully parted ways with the rest of my feet. Ah, and we used to be so close...

It was a short battle, but I still bear the scars.

After performing toe surgery, disinfecting the wounds and slapping a plaster on each, I slipped on a pair of flats. They were not quite so elegant, more on the functional side, but man, I only have ten toes to give.

Back on track, I joined up with the others at Zebrano's. It was a pretty cool place - non-sticky floor and nice decor. Everything was relatively quiet at the time - it was about 8PM, so not a lot of activity yet.

In order to avoid drinking on an empty stomach (which went really well last time) I'd managed to grab a McChicken Sandwich on the way there, but it turned out I didn't actually have much to fear on the food side. The ticket included a glass of champagne and canapes, which were actually delicious! Duck pancake rolls, breaded chicken on sticks, mini spring rolls and some little pieces of steak.

I stuck mostly to Asahi over the night, but did try a few new things. Paid a little more to try cocktails - Strawberry Kiss was sweet, fruity and creamy, tasting very similar to Baileys, if it came in a fruit flavour. I also tasted a little of an Espresso Martini, which tasted like coffee, to no-one's great surprise. Tim didn't manage to finish his spiced rum and Red Bull, so was passing it around - it didn't really taste of alcohol at all and more like the blood of Jelly Babies. I must have more of this delicious, cruel mixture!

As far as music went, they started off with more sort of... background music, which was nice to listen to without being intrusive, and then evolved into more danceable stuff as the night went on, causing the creation of dancefloors. It was a mix of newer things like Gangnam Style, and the sort of thing I had dim memories of hearing on the radio when I was about twelve. (Ten years later, I am finally In Da Club, who could have guessed?) 

We also discovered a DDRX2 machine at roughly 4:30 a.m. on the way to Leicester Square while passing Las Vegas (the amusements, not the city), so Matt and I had a go. The panels were pretty terrible and unresponsive, requiring very rough handling to register a hit, but we still passed everything. I am not entirely sure what the mainly tracksuited locals thought of a group of guys in suits hanging around watching a fellow in a tux and a girl in a fluffy dress violently slamming panels on a dance machine, but it must have looked hilarious.

I had fun! I hope everyone else did. And a happy new year to all! :3

Some kind of... multi-person selfshot, because we're just that cool.