St. James Infirmary

I have a really short and simple cosplay that I am going to start and maybe finnish this weekend. My hair has grown to the perfect length and its been really nice out! All I need is an old too-big plaid shirt and to catch a dove and I am set!!!

Its Tima from Metropolis.

Watch the first 1 minuet for the shot. Then watch the WHOLE movie because its heartbreakingly good. I got the OST a while back too.

I wonder where in Tokyo would be good to set up this shot?

Samurai Sword Workshop

Today I did a Samurai Sword workshop with Tetsuro Shimaguchi of KAMUI. He choreographed the fight scenes in Kill Bill I and was Crazy 88 #1, Miki. (He is the first one to die in the fight scene in Kill Bill - the one who Uma stabs and tosses into the water). He and his two assistants were wonderful! We learned how to bow, handle the sword (wooden ones to practice with) and 6 of the basic positions/cuts. We even did 100 repetitions of the cut exercise that real samurai do 2,000 of every morning. Then we sparred with the instructors, learned some choreography, and got to personally "kill" our instructor and then do the signature Uma pose and glare. I was the best at it! My evil eye really could kill. Because of my long background in dance, I was pretty good with all of the positions and body language. Its like dancing with a stick! The big thing was to keep your core straight and your body loose, which is my specialty. Especially because I did yoga today and was all warmed up from that. Speaking of yoga, my teacher calls me an X-man because of how flexible I am, lol. He keeps stopping the class to go "oh! Look everyone, look at what SHE can do! Why can you do that?" How embarrassing...

Eva iPhone case / charge pack

It's mine!!! Lol.
My love with the sun,
-Heather

Tokyu Hands, marry me!!!

On a whim today I went to Tokyu Hands in Ikebukuro today. Mostly because it was raining and I wanted rain boots, and because I wanted to get supplies for my sculpture project and some things to make a test pair of Asuka's interface clips. Easy peasy, right? I went into the home improvement / DIY section and the only thing that made me want to leave was how hungry I was. I found so much cool stuff all in one place that I would NEVER find at home!!!!! Now I know why Japanese Cosplay is so good... they have Tokyu Hands.

Wish List:

Mini Vacuform

Enormous bottles of Latex

Plasti Dip? I don't even know what I would use this for but I want it. It comes in other colours, too.

Really cheep low temp plastic beads

WTF VINYL SHEETS!? I have been looking for this crap for so long and you mean to tell me its RIGHT HERE in the exact colour I want!? And only 800 yen a meter?

We all know what I'm doing this weekend!!! And I do know what I would use the plasti dip for. I am going to use it to make the palms of the gloves:

I hope you can mix red and yellow easily, I didn't see an orange. The selection of high quality super clear resins and casting kits is enormous. I know of lots of sculpture majors who would give their left testicle/breast for this stuff at this price! Along with lots and lots of plastics, foam, metals, small cold and hot working tools, acrylics, PVC, plaster, and much much more.

EDIT:

Nevermind, I can make Orange.

Akihabara 3.0

Akihabara tour with the one and only John Hathaway! He was really fantastic, and took our group of Temple students around Akihabara and showed us all of the nifty hidden things that no one else could possibly have shown us. Like a secret fox shrine somewhere down an alley way that was 1 1/2 feet wide. We stopped at a maid cafe (but I liked the @Home cafe better). After the tour we broke off into groups to go cosplay hunting and geeking out. Among other things we stopped on all 7 (14 - each floor had two sides staggered) floors of the Akihabara Animate plus the basement. I found the prescription Mari Makinami glasses for sale!!! I really want them!!!

At Assist Wig, I bought my Asuka Shikinami wig. The ladies were fabulous there! They let you try on the wigs, and you get a free cap with your purchase. On top of that, because my friend and I got our wigs together we got one for 50% off. I bought a pop-up wig stand too.

Something that I would really like to get / might need is a traveling trunk. All the kids who are into J-Rock here have these really neat old traveling trunks which I love. I am planning on getting one to bring home all the things I bought here in. That way my suitcases will weigh the same...

I had another unfortunate loosing-of-store moment when I was looking for CosPatio to buy a school bathing suit. I couldn't remember where it was!!! But I WILL RETURN now that I found the website. It figures - I passed it hundreds of times.

Sapporo

I just got back from Sapporo and I am beat... The weekend was fantastic! I will elaborate later... but for now here are all of my pictures on Flickr!

Test Type

Because this is a cosplay blog, I feel that it is only right that I make a post today about some of the advances I have made on a cosplay idea that I have been entertaining... (I know, I have too many for being in Tokyo without a sewing machine or anything but as soon as I get home I have been doing so much planning that I can just jump right into it!!!)

After searching the far reaches of the internet in some of the strangest, most deviant corners, I finally found clear vinyl fabric sold by the yard. And its in the colour I need, too!

*warning: potentially graphic* The site is not "bad", they just cater to a very specific crowd, and its called Blackstyle. They sell pvc, vinyl, and rubber fabrics in lots of colours. I usually use Spandex World for all of my stretchy needs, but finding clear orange/yellow material that wasn't just a plastic-bag-thin rain poncho was REALLY hard!

The outfit I am working on is one that is featured in Evangelion 2.0, which has not premiered in the US yet, so I have included spoiler alerts for the rest of the post.

Click me to read spoilers

In Rebuild 2.0, Asuka gets a new Test Type Plugsuit. I have no concept of modesty, so you can see why I would love to make it!

When I am planning out a new outfit, I draw it first to imagine how the pattern will look/be altered. I use this stage to figure out some of those impossible moments that work really well in imagination land of animating cells and manga pages, but not at all in real life! Its a great help. Also, a human body never ever looks like the drawn body, so I alter some of the proportions to either bring to costume down to earth, or create the illusion that my body looks like the impossible animated one.

lol, ok so they dont translate well in photographs... But you get the idea! Its all in my head! Anyway, Ill leave all this be for now because there is simply nothing I can do here to get started... Maybe I can get my wig tho! I need to find another series to cosplay...

**Foreshadowing: code name Pretty Soldier might make her first appearance in 6 years!

The Disappearing Mall

I found the disappearing mall! It's not really a disappearing mall, but it is one that Quinn and I couldn't find for a few weeks. Basically we found it one day, LOVED everything in it, but forgot where it was when we went to go back... fail... But today it has been re-discovered!

It is the Lumine Est above the East Exit of the Shinjuku JR line station. On the 6th floor there are stores like Hanjiro and Zoff, which sell the most fantastic new and used (but re constructed) clothes that are KAWAIIIIII!

Everything there is frothy white and cream lace and fluff, leather, denims, stars, and LO! glass vials and jars and crystal chandeliers with animal skulls!!! Pocket watches on long necklace chains, cracked leather purses with roses and gnomes embossed on them. Real graphic tees and soccer shirts that some little kid somewhere in Japan wore after school, shoes that you couldn't find anywhere else, lots and lots of hats, and real animal fur wraps.

The other floors have equally neat stuff like the skirt I got today at ValenTines's High. There is a stationary shop that has refurbished 35mm cameras and old 16mm video cameras. It has all the ink pens Quinn could ever want, and scented pen ink! I want the green colour that is apple flavored or the pink one that smells like roses.

It seems like my early morning self somehow knew I would find this place today and contrived for me to forget all of my money at home, so I didn't get to buy anything other than a crepe and my skirt. I plan on going back soon with every intention of buying everything I lay my hands on!!!

This weekend I am going on a trip to the Sapporo Snow Festival with school, and I am going to take lots of pictures and post them. It actuially snowed in Tokyo a few days ago! The big, fluffy, sticky kind of snow, that we used to make slushy snowballs and toss at eachother.