Utena-photoshoot pt. 1

Trying to be productive, so have another update! I've been meaning to write this entry for about two months and I finally managed to kick myself up to do this.
..or I might just confess I'm just sick and there's little I can do in this condition, so I'll just post some photos.

Utena and Dios (Adolescence of Utena) are one set of our WCS-costumes (not quite sure if we'll go with press or parade, but we'll see), and we hope to have a photoshoot at Desucon Frostbite in a few weeks so that we finally manage to get some photos of both of us. It's a damn lot harder than you'd think!

These were taken at the beginning of November and there was a lot of teeth rattling and laying frozen on the ground involved due to lovely weather conditions of Finland (more moments when I truly did not love this hobby). Photos were taken by YumiKoyuki.













So there! More photos coming in a few weeks with both of us in them. I hope. :D

-Maiju

Gaala tiems!

Cosplay Gaala is this coming Sunday and we are, of course, attending. Maiju as a masquerade judge and Elina as an investigative reporter (whatever that means).

We'll be gliding around as Utena (Maiju) and Dios (Elina) from the film Adolescence of Utena. We'll hopefully have time for a brief photoshoot at some point, so that we can finally have presentable pics of our team. Fingers crossed and all that.

And, as you probably guessed, we'll (most likely) be taking these costumes with us to Japan.



Design for Utena


Design for Dios


If you are in Finland (and you probably are), coming to Gaala (you totally should) and you see two incredibly attractive people who look something like, come say hi!

Who is who: Maiju

Hello!

I'm the other half of the team representing Finland at World Cosplay Summit 2012. Self introductions might come in handy now that the preliminaries have began, so here goes! My character in our performance was Okuninushi from Shin Megami Tensei games.

Photo (C) YumiKoyuki

My name is Maiju. It's pronounced the same way you say the words "my" and "you" and put them together. Kind of. Online I mostly use my nick Majo, which is supposed to be pronounced like the Japanese name Mayo. Welcome to the world of illogical language & pronounciation of Finnish!

I've been cosplaying since 2003, and I've always loved taking part in cosplay contests. Nowadays I'm more prone to sitting behind the judges' table or being a panelist/hosting panels, but I still love competing, so I always somehow find myself signing up for cosplay contests every now and then.

Balthier (Final Fantasy XII), EuroCosplay final 2010. Photo (C) David Cooper


In 2010 I took part in EuroCosplay -finals at London MCM Expo with my Balthier from Final Fantasy XII. It was my first cosplay-centered trip aboard (and an awesome one), the next one being obviously WCS next summer of which I'm insanely thrilled.

Berserker!Paine @ Desucon, Finland 2011. Photo (C) YumiKoyuki

I love making armor/weapons/etc., props are almost always my favourite part of the costume. My sewing skills could use some work since my main focus always seems to go to sanding the armor pieces and other relevant stuff. Though I admit that I do fear for my poor lungs being exposed to massive amounts of Paperclay dust. One healthy hobby this is.

Most of the characters I cosplay tend to be from video games, but this year I hope to finish at least 2 costumes which are actually from anime. We'll see how long my resolve lasts.

I'm a 5th year student in art education and I have also qualification in crafts education, or will have one day when I finally graduate. Hopefully soon. Aside from cosplay my hobbies are videogames, going to hiphop dance classes and fooling around with my dog Halla, who is a Finnish Lapphund. I'm a huge Star Wars-nerd and I love pretty much everything Range Murata has laid his hands on.

I have more or less active cosplay blog called Serious Business (do notice the sarcasm) which, unfortunately, is only in Finnish at the time. Lots of nifty photos there though! Most of my photoshoot material goes either to my deviantArt or Cosplay.com, of which the former is the more active one.

And that's about that. Hopefully lots of active WCS-related blogging ahead!