Shoujo S

Based on the illustration by Hanaharu Naruko, this little figure is delicately sculpted by Max Factory under Native Web.

I decided to take photos of it indoors, as taking it outdoors might be a little complicated…
Only issue is my indoor photography skills are lacking, considering I don’t have the right indoor equipment.

Also, thanks to Tokyo Hunter for helping me acquire this figure.

What? Where’s the rest?? Well, you can view the rest on my figure.fm post.
Why am I doing this? Well, I don’t really have a proper NSFW system implemented here so that’s why I’m using figure.fm for now~

Enjoy!

Stereoscopic images

3D vision, the new consumer sensation. You see it everywhere, from the big screen cinemas, to smallest hand held console, it seems to be everywhere all of a sudden.

Some of you may have encountered some images in the past that have two images side by side. These are more likely than not, stereograms. For this specific type of image, one needs to cross their eyes so that both images merge into a single image in the centre.

During my outdoor photoshoot of Arturia and Sakura (which will be posted soon!) I took a few photos of them together, with a slight shift in angle. Once I was at home processing the photos, I noticed that they had a similar quality to stereoscopic images I’ve seen, so I tested them out. To my surprise, they worked! I’ve created my first accidental stereogram!

If you’re new to all this, before you click on the image and try it for yourself, I’ll let you in on my little technique which seems to work for me. Here’s a few steps:

• Focus on centre of the image, it’s best to keep the image small so make it easier on your eyes if it’s your first time.
• Put a finger in front of your eyes, between you and the image.
• While still focused on the image, you’ll notice that your finger is out of focus and that there’s two of them.
• Align the out-of-focus fingers so that each finger is in the middle of both sides of the image.
• Now here comes the tricky part, focus on the finger.
• You’ll now notice that the now out-of-focus image has combined.
• You can now move the finger away, but try to keep your eyes slightly crossed so that the image is still combined.
• Focus on the image without un-crossing your eyes and enjoy 3D!

Hopefully that helps ^^;

Now onto the accidental image:

Now, I tried to reproduce this with a figure on my shelf. It was quite a challenge without any specialised gear, or a tripod…

Hope you’ll enjoy those images :3

Newish stuff

Figures everywhere!

Since this blog was inactive for quite some time, I think it’s a good idea to show off some of the new figure additions! This also gives me a chance to ask you guys which figures you would like to see featured in future photo shoots as well. Some of these figures can be classified as “old”, but I did receive them within the last few months ^^;;

Before I start I’d like to take this time to thank pp of Otakurean for sending me this lovely clearfile of Yoake Mae yori Ruriiro na (The bright blue light before the dawn). I know it’s been months since I actually got this prize, and it’s been a looooooooong time coming. So, thank you pp~ :3

Figure Acquisitions

Since I have some spare time, I decided to show you guys the new stuff I’ve gotten over the past few months. Surprisingly I’ve managed to keep the figure purchases steady, I had to cancel a few figures since I was running low on cash and not to mention the falling Aussie dollar =/

Mikumikumiku, I snagged the Max Factory and Volks figures of Miku, but in the end I parted with the Volks to a friend of mine. I still hope that Max Factory could make a Haku Yowane figure ;_;

Blanc Neige was kind of an impulse buy for me, but her hips are…are just so distracting! She accompanies the old Max Factory Kureha on my shelf. Seriously… look at those hips! *drools*

One of the most expensive and biggest figure in my collection, second only to my Dollfie. Asakura is part of the FREEing 1/4 scale bunny girl set of The Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi series. She was shipped, and subsequently paid for on the day that the Aussie dollar fell to 55 Japanese yen… ;_; paincakes were had.

Griffon figures can be hit and miss for me, so this Sasara was a pleasant surprise to me when she arrived in her school swimsuit and maid apron. Her delicious pose just makes my skin tingle with anticipation….of…something… o_O

Nekomimi Nono Nekomiya in mizugi. I just LOVE cats, and thus nekomimi has a special place in my heart, so I couldn’t resist this figure. Now, some of you may notice a school swimsuit trend, but I assure you it isn’t a huge fetish of mine XD

Shana’s first appearance in my figure collection! With this particular figure, they released a regular version, and two store exclusive versions. The regular was the black haired beauty, one was a pink haired and blue uniform with striped stockings which has a resemblance to Alice in Wonderland. This version you see is the Strawberry Version exclusive to the GEE! online store. Not sure why strawberry as it could prolly be more appropriately be called Cherry or Peach…. but oh well~

iDOLM@STER

Alter released the second half of the FA4 iM@S trading figures a while back, so now I managed to grab myself a full set of the girls! Well, at least the black version of the set ^^; These trading figures are quite the build, and I must say Alter has done an excellent job on these.

Max Factory has also released Miki Hoshii in two versions, the blonde in green, and the brunette in blue. I opted for the blonde since I’m a sucker for Miki in blonde. The friend who has been supplying me with most of these figures went for the brunette, so if we ever get bored we could always trade XD

Kaiyodo’s latest iM@S Fraulein girl to take the stage is also Miki Hoshii. I had to grab her to produce the various poses I had imagined. She comes with an additional head for those who love the brown, and since they are using the Revoltech joints I used a spare Saber Alter body XD

Nanoha StrikerS

Reinforce Zwei! I love this lil figure and it’s mini-ness. It’s like a 1/1 scale of her XD I’m not a huge fan of the StrikerS season, but Reinforce is so cute!

Hayate has recently come out as a figure as well, and in my opinion she’s aged the best >.> She also comes with a mini-mini-boss! Reinforce is even smaller now. Alter has done a nice job of sculpting and painting the really tiny figure, it’s about the same size of those Warhammer miniatures! Hayate’s box is also a force to be reckoned with. It’s even bigger than the massive Fate Testarossa box!! Now where to find space to put the box…

Alice in ???

Alter has been doing the 3D incarnations of the POP Wonderland series, and I decided to pick one up! The photo is a lil bland so it does little to bring out the wonder~

Alice from Queen’s Blade was love at first sight, I remember picking up the Hobby Japan magazine…or was it Dengeki Hobby… and seeing the first unpainted prototype. That point on I was watching the pre-order scene with the eyes of an eagle. And here she is.

Queen’s Figures

Speaking of Queen’s Blade, Ymir has been released as a black coloured princess now. I couldn’t resist at the time, so I had to pay for her presence. As like the regular version, she can undress nearly everything, even her pantsu! o_o

Next up is the Hobby Japan magazine exclusive Queen’s Gate Ink-tan from Moetan! I had to cut a tiny lil stamp out from the Hobby Japan magazine and send it to a friend of mine in Japan….express…since the cut off date was approaching. Which means that huge envelope in the background with ALL THOSE STAMPS was used to deliver a stamp the size of my thumb…

Queen’s Gate Ink-tan is awesome! Lots of her armour is cast off and it shows, her armour was practically falling off when I try to get her to grip those button batons. It’s highly distracting trying to do something when you get constant mune flashes @_@

Mecha Musume

Aaah, how I love Mecha Musume~ I just had to buy these two figures when I saw them, not to mention they’re both based on Shimada Fumikane’s artwork of Sky Girls/Strike Witches fame.

The M4A1 Early Type Sherman “Elizabeth” has a lot of accessories, you can even de-mechanise her but…why would I do that? o_O Her nonchalant expression is big boon for me :3

The Kawasaki Ki-100 Type 5 Fighter, the main appeal was admittedly the cast off feature >.> BUT her fierce gaze was also appealing for me :3

Blackout

A few months ago my apartment had a blackout and I had nothing to do… so I decided to take a few photos for the hell of it. My room has changed a bit since then…more figures…less ceiling space for posters… I also took a few photos of Saber, and it turned out somewhat ok, so I decided to share it here too~

Photo shoot choice

With all these bland photos, I was wondering which of these figures you people would really like to see in a photo shoot, mind you, I tend to do outdoor ones XD
I’ve updated the poll which should appear shortly on the blog as well, so please have your say :3
I’ll see which figures on the poll have a higher demand so I’ll place a higher priority on them when I decide to go on a photo shoot~

Again, thanks to those who visit regularly too~ :3

Old Package

Smoked Cheese?

I couldn’t blog about this the day I got it since I was really busy with an assessment (which was due today!), so here it is. Received this on the 13th, which is a while since it was released before then. You may of heard I had some troubles with HLJ’s shipping as it was supposed to be shipped with another figure for a friend of mine, but it was sold out =/

Where’s Tsuruya??
Well, she’s here, being played with Evelyn (the Yuki Dollfie…yes, I named her…yes, I scare myself sometimes)

Tsuruya by Max Factory is quite nice, it even comes with cat ears, tail and a extra hand. I’ll talk about this figure in detail with the photo shoot, which I may be a while with the way my workload is at the moment >.<

Here’s a comparison shot with the Alter version of Tsuruya:

So ya, I’m sorry about the slow updates, especially since the updates aren’t even outdoor photo shoots ^^;
Hopefully I can do something about it over the coming weeks, I’ll try to squeeze in time for it. I do however, have some photos of Evelyn, tho they are somewhat….ecchi , but not that ecchi. Here’s a preview anyway:

I dunno if I should do this like a glamour photo shoot, the original photos aren’t too great since they’re taken indoors, and knowing my horrible indoor lighting it isn’t a surprise ^^; But I think I might be overdoing it a lil…. any comments?

Other news, there’s going to be TWO new iDOLM@STER releases for Ace Combat 6, Mirage 2000-5 “Yayoi” and F-22 “Haruka“….there goes 800 M$ points >.<

Magical? Poka~n

Pachira is Vampire

DELICIOUS FLAT CHEST!!
There, I said it, she has one of the most drool-inducing chest in the anime world (in my opinion).

Now, this post won’t actually consist of any bare chest as mentioned… (there goes the majority of my viewers…)
BUT for those armpit lovers, stay seated!

This will be the last set of the photos taken last year as I decided not to post the Himekuri moda noel, there was just not enough good photos in the set I took =/
Oh well, onto the photos!

Location

This, as mentioned, is the last photo set from the two days at Melbourne University. Pachira here is standing just outside the old quad area thingy on the steps. The place was a nice place for elegant gothloli enthusiasts to do some photo shoots. It was pretty out of the way as well, so no busy bodies prying into my fetish…

Setup

I compromised, with no mini-tripod I used the figure boxes to rest the camera on ^^;
It was pretty much a simple affair, set camera up, point and shoot. With the next set of photos, I opted for the stylish feel, now I understand some of you may not like it, just bear with me for this batch and leave a comment that bites my head off so that I’ll know better next time I try to do something new…

Figure

Oh how I love Pachira. This figure has captured her sexy seductive “innocence”, Hiroaki Tokunaga has done an excellent job of sculpting this. Pachira is one of the first few models from Max Factory to incorporate their cast off Polo System and it’s my first experience with it. Unfortunately I don’t have any reference pictures for you folk =/ While it’s nice awesome to be able to take her top and skirt off, there are problems that most figure collectors encounter. Rubbing of the plastics when taking or putting the clothes back on is quite worrisome, and can leave some streaks on the paint ;_;

Talking about paint, Pachira’s paint job is also very nicely done. Her hair is shaded nicely, and the blushing of her skin is impeccable. Pachira’s leathery parts are also done with a nice glossy look, but not so glossy that the shine will blind you.

Thoughts

Hopefully this stylised approach is ok with you folk, I felt like making the photos a lil more, oh what’s the word, arty?
I like this photo shoot set, I can stare at Pachira forever…

Summary

HIGHLY RECCOMENDED
But then again, this Pachira figure pushes all my right buttons. From her arched back, to her thigh high boots and garter, to her twin tails, to her bare armpits, to…ok, I think I’m starting to scare myself a lil.
In all seriousness, this is a figure that would most likely be an excellent addition to anyone’s collection.

Details – Photo shoot

Camera
Nikon Coolpix P2
Date
16th September 2007
Location
Near the Old Arts Building – Melbourne University

Details – Figure

Name
Pachira (パキラ – Pakira)
Series
Alchemy 3rd Grade: Magical? Poka~n (錬金３級　まじかる？ぽか～ん)
Maker
Max Factory
Sculptor
Hiroaki Tokunaga
Scale
1/7
Release date
April 2007
Place of purchase
HobbyLink Japan
Retail price
5,238 yen
Bought it for
$58.20 AU
Availability – HLJ (at time of writing)
Discontinued :(
Links
HappySoda’s entry ENG
mukyaa~’s entry ENG
Otadesho’s entry ENG

Original animation illustration of Pachira

Magical? Poka~n

Uma is Witch

This is my first indoor shoot that I’m posting on Moe Idolatry, using Uma, or Yuuma, as the subject. The series, 錬金３級　まじかる？ぽか～ん, or Magipoka for short is a fairly out there anime, four girls from different walks of life, from an android to a vampire, live peacefully together. Uma is the witch, an energetic, flat chested, somewhat qualified witch. Uma is really pronounced Yuuma indicated by the Japanese spelling, but is written as Uma in English, if also spelt Uma instead of Yuuma in Japanese you’d get Horse…

Being the first indoor photo shoot with props and all, I didn’t really know what to expect. Here goes, photos for your witch burning party~

1200×1600

Location

My room… not much to say really =/
It’s a nice room, somewhat, if you like anime posters everywhere.

1600×1200

Setup

During my years of edumacation, I conjured up a few ring-bind folders from my imposition & binding classes. A large black A3 folder was used as the base and backing for this shoot.
The silver rope and gold starry ribbon was borrowed from my mother’s various fabrics and materials. The red ribbon was leftovers from my ooollldd 2003 cosplay costume.
The light source is the sun, shining through my windows. It was mid afternoon so I had ample light… I think. I didn’t have the right artificial light to produce a nice lightbox for the figure, so I opted for natural light.

1200×1600

Figure

Fabulous~ Can I say that? Anyway, Uma is a pretty figure, perfect for those who like a loli magical girl on a magic wand with a nice base. The sculpt is great, capturing the anime counterpart was done masterfully by Max Factory again. I only noticed a somewhat unpleasant seamline on her right leg but is out of the normal viewing angle.
Awesome paintjob work on this figure as well, I didn’t notice any mishaps or such, gloss paint was used for the wand, base, shoes and her bag which looks great, everything else is done a nice matte finish.

1200×1600

Thoughts

Photos were ok for a first try I guess. Some parts were overexposed while other photos looked too dark, a delicate balance to get with indoor shooting. I hope they’re ok, it’s getting hard to judge my own work sometimes… or it could be the fact that it’s 1AM and I’m tired as hell from working all day, I’m squinting as I type =_=

1200×1600

Summary

A MUST buy in my book, but that’s my book, not yours :P In all honesty, I love this figure to bits, be it the awesome base, the fine detail, or just the fact that it’s a flat chested loli witch who forgets to wear panties occasionally and…what was I talking about again?

1200×1600

1200×1600

Details – Photo shoot

Camera
Nikon Coolpix P2
Date
20th December 2006
Location
My room!

Details – Figure

Name
Uma (ゆうま)
Series
Alchemy 3rd Grade: Magical? Poka~n (錬金３級　まじかる？ぽか～ん)
Maker
Max Factory
Sculptor
Ageta Yukiwo
Scale
1/7
Release date
October 2006
Place of purchase
HobbyLink Japan
Retail price
5,500 yen
Bought it for
$61.60 AU
Availability – HLJ (at time of writing)
In Stock – AND ON SALE (30%)

Original animation illustration of Uma

Preview

Pachira & Saber

Well, I collected my package today :3 In it was my 1/7 Pachira from 錬金３級　まじかる？ぽか～ん (Magipoka for short) by Max Factory and four Saber Revoltech 2G by Kaiyodo. Four!? you ask? 3 of them are ordered by my friends, and there’s another on the way (cause he ordered late…).

Anyway, I intend to eventually get a photo shoot with Pachira as she’s definitely one of my favs, I’ll prolly take Yuuma along with her on the future photo shoot. So this post is just my thoughts on the figures and a preview of future photo shoots…I guess preview is a lil misleading as I don’t actually take photos of the place, think of this as a “Hey! I got these awesome figures, wanna see them when I take photos of them in broad daylight~!?”

Pachira, absolutely fantastic, I couldn’t of dreamed of a better pose and sculpt. Everything is magnificent except for a few things, one being a very slight under/overpaint of the lingerie lines on one area, and also the roughened up part where you insert her clothes, I can see it rubbing off the paint should I get too fidgety with taking off and on her clothes…which is hard to resist (´・ω・)つ|・ ・

600×800 – There’s your delicious panty shot teaser~

Saber is a good poseable figure, the face and head is nice but she seems to stick her neck out front quite a bit, makes it a lil odd when standing still, unless you like the whole hunchback thing. Poseability is great tho, she’s my first Revoltech so I’m still quite amazed at how flexible they are compared to traditional action figures. Comes with two swords, Caliburn and Excalibur with Invisible Air Noble Phantasm, which is pretty cool I guess.

600×800

I’ll post details of these when I get around to the photo shoot, until then, feast your eyes on the crappy preview pics I posted :3