Circle lens review: VISKON Quartz Crystal Gray

Hello~!

Have you ever had the case in which you know that you need certain lenses, but you only need them once or twice? I'm having that case right now - and that's why I decided to try these gray monthly lenses, VISKON Quartz Crystal Gray.
Fun fact; I almost didn't buy these at all since my eyes are mostly gray (with hints of blue and green which means that I have light-colored eyes). Then I made an OC - I will talk more about him in a separate post since I'll cosplay him in Tylycon - and before I had noticed I had decided that his eyes are quite big... And noticeably gray.

I ordered these lenses from HoneyColor.

Let's roll!

This time I don't have a picture of the lenses in their vials but I have a good reason for that; they weren't actually delivered in vials and taking a good photo of those... Things, in which they were delivered, was impossible. But here is the product package (picture taken on HoneyColor's site, I brutally murdered the package when I received it):

Base curve: 8.6 mm

Diameter: 14,5 mm

Water content: 42 %

Life span: 1 month at maximum

Inserting these was quite easy but for some reason they felt a bit thicker than most of the lenses I've reviewed lately. These also kept curling around my finger... Not so nice. However, when I actually inserted these, there were no problems at all. They didn't feel scratchy or anything - well, there was a slight blur but nothing too annoying. And I had a bit bad eye day so it might have been because of that (my eyes have been tired and dry lately). 

After taking the lenses out of their package I let them soak in a new solution over the night since the original solution (in the package) irritates my eyes to no end, makes them water etc. I don't know if it does that to everyone's eyes but I definitely don't recommend testing it. 

One lens in to show you the enlargement.

These make my eyes look a bit bigger but not too much which is good - in my case these lenses are for a western character. 

At first I didn't feel anything but, probably because of the condition of my eyes, after 2-3 hours these begun to feel a bit dry. They didn't feel too scratchy or blur my vision too much but you know that irritating feeling when you're tired and can't see that well anymore? That's exactly what happened to me when I wore these lenses. Also my eyes were a bit more light sensitive than usually - I don't know why. I mentioned earlier that these felt a bit thicker than the other lenses I've worn lately but I'm not sure if these two things really have a connection. After 3,5 hours I took these off but I know that I could've worn these at least two more hours. 

The design is very natural. Instead of a black color the lens designer had decided to use gray color to the limbal ring - despite the ring being quite thick it looks pretty natural to me! The color blends nicely with my own eye color but in some lights one could see the iris quite clearly... Anyway, I could easily wear these on a normal day too - I don't think that they look too weird. The best thing is that these could be quite good  cosplay lenses too - I could wear these for western characters and for example Levi Ackerman from Shingeki no Kyojin no, I will not cosplay him again in the near future.

The minus thing is that these lenses aren't very pigmented and my own eye color shines through in some lights. The gray appears pretty much in one shade which give these a small "Paint effect". Not too badly though; the lens color blends with my own eye color quite well anyway. The black dots in the middle of the lens are probably there for the blending to look more natural and happen easier.

Lens photos, anyone~?
Pics © me. These were taken on a cloudy day in March. And yes, cloudy - I had the luck on my side for once and the sun decided to come from behind the clouds for five minutes so I was able to take the outdoor pictures too!

Indoors, yellowish light.

Indoors, with a flash.

Indoors, natural light (gazing through the window).

Indoors, under the fluorescent lamp.

Indoors, bathroom light.

Outdoors, facing the sun.

Outdoors, back against the sun. Sorry for the blurry picture, my hands were shaky af and because I had stared into the sun just a bit before I was practically half blind and didn't see what I was doing.

And a distance pic!

• The color is 7/10. A natural gray, basically, but I think that there could've been a couple of different shades of gray so these would've looked a bit more lively.
  
• The design is 7/10. Very basic design, nothing bad to say about it. I could wear these on a normal day too since these lenses are not too flashy. 

• The opacity... 5/10. My own eye color shines through in some lights, then again I might be the only one to notice it since these blend quite well with my own eye color. These really look gray though. Except when I face the sun, I have no idea since when my eyes have looked bright green in any lights. x__x
  
• The comfort was 5,5/10. Quite average. These felt a bit thick in my eyes and begun to dry out quite soon but these didn't cause a new episode of "The itchy and scratchy show". Do you get the reference? :D
  
• The naturalness is 9/10. These look very natural in my eyes - these make my eyes look just a big bigger, otherwise my eyes look pretty same than without lenses.
  
• The enlargement is 6/10. My eyes don't look super big but if one looks closely they'll notice that my eyes look a bit bigger. 

Aaaand there it is! ^__^
Got any questions? Ask in the comment box, contact me on social media or send me an email!

- Firith

The reason why I didn't attend Tampere Kuplii - Polish Military Camp 7!

...I can hear some people already asking "Why is this here since this has nothing to do with cosplay?". Let me explain that first. I know that there are people in the cosplay scene who are into different martial arts. This blog post deals with one of them: Krav Maga. I decided to post this here since I thought that some people would find this interesting and this camp is also the reason why I decided not to attend Tampere Kuplii.

Let's roll~!

Friday (pre-camp)

We - the instructors of Ronin Krav Maga Eura and I - left Eura to Helsinki in the Friday evening. I can tell you that I was pretty nervous; this would be the first Military Camp I had ever attended and probably my last one too which is VERY unfortunate.
During the trip I managed to relax a bit, mostly because of the jokes and (sometimes very bad) humour. When I told that I have never seen the Kill Bill movies, the reaction was pretty much like this:

Picture found on Google.

In a way it was hilarious (but I think that I seriously need to watch those movies though) xD

The drive took us a few hours but in the end we arrived to Helsinki.
I had decided to reserve a room from Radisson Aleksanteri - a very good hotel, I must say. The only minus: some parts of the building reminded me strongly about Stanley Hotel - also known as the hotel from The Shining...

Forgive me the poor quality, this picture was taken with my mobile phone.

After I had left my stuff in my hotel room I decided to go to the hotel's bar and just spend time there - for a couple of hours only though, I got tired quite early and decided to go to the bed. Probably one of my best decisions ever since I truly needed to rest before the camp begun.

Saturday - day 1 

The camp - which was held at Combat Academy of Finland - started at 10.30 a.m on Saturday. That meant that waking up early was quite necessary. I hadn't slept too well (I woke up at least seven times during the night so yeah) but the luck was still on my side: I managed to wake up and drag myself out of bed when I was supposed to, yay! 

After I had eaten my breakfast I went to fetch my training bag (which contains for example boxing gloves, my Maga belt and teeth protectors) from my room. When I was waiting for the elevator one of my instructors called me and told me that they would be in front of the hotel in no time. Let's just say that I stepped out of the front door when they arrived; perfect timing is perfect! :D I think that the clock was 09.45 a.m at this point so we had plenty of time to drive to the Academy. 

Once there I went to the dressing room to put on all the protectors (except the teeth protectors, I don't use them if it isn't obligatory); you see, Krav Maga is a contact sport. Even if the trainees are careful and don't rush the techniques, accidents can still happen. Better safe than sorry. 

I spotted some familiar faces in the crowd (instructors and trainees, mainly from Tampere and Helsinki but there were two more guys from Eura too) and went to say hi to those people - you see, at this point I felt very unsure about myself and my surroundings. I was nervous and didn't know almost anyone so... Yeah. Luckily the feeling decided to fade away quite soon.
Soon we were ordered to form three rows; our place in those rows depended on our belt grades. A few words were said (insert blackout here, I don't remember what they said) and then we started warming up our muscles by walking and running all around the training room.

And one wasn't allowed to touch anyone.
I can tell you that it was a challenge - the room was full of people! :DD

Quite soon we begun to train the techniques. I'm sorry but I won't go into details; I can't take the risk that someone would begin to practice those techniques at home without an instructor. It would be a bit too dangerous, especially with these kind of Krav Maga techniques.
As you can see from the title of this post, the camp was called Military Camp. Yep. Military-styled Krav Maga techniques, originally developed by the Israeli army.

I think that I'll cut this wall of text at this point and let you see some pictures, © Roni Tamminen. I've got the permission to use these pictures on this blog post, thank you so much! :)

The group photo! 

(Looks like I managed to avoid the camera pretty well on Saturday... :'D )

On Saturday we trained for 4,5 hours. During the training I didn't feel that exhausted but when I got into the car it felt like I had no strength left at all. No kidding.

In the Saturday evening some of the trainees & instructors had a dinner with the Polish instructors. The atmosphere was relaxed and everybody had fun. I think that the dinner was one of the best chances to get to know new people during the weekend; you can't speak when you're training. If you do that your concentration says goodbye and walks out of the door (and that's something you don't want to happen when you're about to get thrown to the ground or something similar to that).
After the dinner some of us - including me - decided to go to hang out in a bar for a while. I decided to leave to the hotel quite early though; I just didn't feel like staying awake anymore. And my feet had already died. My boots weren't made for walking, apparently. Demonia shoes ftw.

Sunday - day 2

In the Sunday morning I packed up my stuff and gave back the key card of my hotel room at the reception. Quite soon after that my instructors came to pick me up and we begun our journey to the Academy once again. 

On Sunday we trained for 5 hours. In my opinion the Sunday training was even more interesting - it was so different when compared to the "normal" Maga techniques & training! I think that the pictures will tell you more than thousand words since it's very hard to actually explain these techniques without going into detail and, like I said, that's not something I'd do. Pics © Roni Tamminen. :)

Thanks Heidi for training with me! :D ...and if it's unclear, I'm the one with the yellow belt.

Looks a bit like an awkward hug, huh? I can tell you that it's definitely not a hug...

From right to left: Piotr, Ari, Wlodek and Soili. The Finnish people in this pic are instructors at the Academy.

Oh! During the break on Sunday I decided to ask the Polish instructors, Piotr and Wlodek, a couple of questions! 

It seemed like they had enjoyed being here in Finland - this was Wlodek's 7th and Piotr's 5th time here. They said that being with us Finns felt like being with family. I don't wonder why; the Krav Maga people are basically "the family I have chosen" so I understand what our Polish friends meant. They also told me that they have been into Krav Maga for 21 years. Respect, honestly! 

During that break we - the trainees and instructors of Ronin Krav Maga Eura - also took a pic with the Polish guys~!

...I have no memory who took this pic though. Oopsie-daisy.

From right to left: Torsti, Piotr, Kaitsu, Wlodek, Hanski, Marko & I.

When the clock was 4 p.m it was time to stop the training. The camp was over way too fast - well, physically I was very exhausted (walking was quite of a task to do) but still! ;__; This was one of the most amazing weekends of my life and an experience I will never forget. So, yeah, I'm very happy that I decided to go to Helsinki instead of Tampere. 5/5, would do it again if it was possible for me... ;__; 

This camp taught me a lot; not only the techniques, mind you. During the weekend I learnt a lot about myself, how to control my body and how to control my nerves. Especially when one of the instructors wants to show a technique to everybody and suddenly it's you who is asked to be the uke in the situation... Shock therapy for panic/anxiety disorder, definitely. :'D
A big thank you to everyone with whom I trained and spent time with - and even more big thank you to the ones who made this camp possible! <3

See you next time (I have a lot of stuff to post, sleepless nights here I come)~!

-Firith

Euran Mangapäivä - ensimmäistä kertaa sitten vuoden 2013!

(As you can see from the title, this blog post is in Finnish. A short tl;dr in English can be found in the end of this blog post.)

(Heräs yhtäkkinen halu cossata Battle B-Damanista, hnnggghh.)

Vuonna 2013 Eurassa järjestettiin ensimmäinen Mangapäivä (tuolloin kirjoitusmuodossa Euran manga-päivä). Valitettavasti tapahtumasta ei tullut vuosittaista, ja pitkälti se on euralaisten sekä lähikuntalaisten mielistä jo tainnut vaipua unholaan.
Tuolloin tapahtuma järjestettiin Euran pääkirjastolla.

Sattumoisin samainen kirjasto on nykyinen työkokeilupaikkani - ja kun minulta kysyttiin, olisiko minulla joitain hieman suurempia visioita suunniteltuna, vastaus oli aika lailla selvä...

Eli tervetuloa viettämään Euran Mangapäivää 22.4.2017!

Leikin myös graafista suunnittelijaa, ja väkersin tällaisen. Koulutuksen puute havaittavissa.

Tuosta flyerista näkeekin jo pitkälti aikataulun sekä ohjelmat, jotka tapahtumaan sisällytetään. Tämä blogipostaus onkin lähinnä juuri noita lisätietoja varten käsittäen lähinnä säännöt sekä nippelitietoinformaatiot.

Cosplay-kisan säännöt & yleinen informaatio

• Voi osallistua niin aasialaisella kuin länsimaalaisellakin piirretty-, peli- yms. hahmolla. Oma design ei sallittu (tätä varten on design-piirustuskilpailu). Ilmoittautumisen yhteydessä kerro hahmon nimi, lähdeteos ja oma nimesi/nimimerkkisi.
• Puvun ei tarvitse olla itsetehty, kekseliäisyys kunniaan!
• ÄLÄ OTA ITSEÄSI ISOMPIA TAI (TURHAN) REALISTISIA PROPPEJA (esim. asereplicat ja pesäpallomailat tulee jättää kotiin)!! Propilla tarkoitetaan siis asuun kuuluvia "lisukkeita", useimmiten aseet, taikasauvat yms.
• Kisa on yksilökisa, eli parin kanssa valitettavasti ei voi tällä kertaa astella lavalle. Omalla vuorollaan voi halutessaan kertoa parilla lauseella siitä, miksi halusi pukeutua juuri valitsemakseen hahmoksi, sekä tehdään pari hahmouskollista poseerausta.
• Kyseessä on koko perheen tapahtuma; asu on vapaa, mutta pakollinen - eikä ole myöskään suotavaa tulla paikalle puolialasti.
• Aikavälillä 10-11.30 pidetään kisaajien valokuvaus. Kisaajan tulee ilmoittaa itsensä läsnäolleeksi paikalla olevalle tuomarille (eli minulle) tapahtumaan saapuessaan, ja tällöin hän saa myös vuoronumeronsa. Cosplay-kisassa sarjat eivät päde, vaan yhteensä 10 osallistujaa otetaan mukaan (alaikäraja on kuitenkin 7 vuotta). Huom! Kisaajan tulee ilmoittautua läsnäolevaksi VIIM. 11.20 tuomarille, jotta valokuvat ennätetään ottaa ennen luennon alkamista!
• Palkintojenjako tapahtuu välittömästi kisan jälkeen, ei siis kannata poistua paikalta oman lavavuoron loputtua!

Piirustuskisan ohjeet/säännöt & yleinen informaatio

• Tässä kisassa kisataan mainoksessa mainituissa sarjoissa - kerrothan/pyydäthän huoltajaasi kertomaan ikäsi ilmoittautumisen yhteydessä! Kisaan ilmoittaudutaan pajan pitäjälle, ei siis sähköpostilla. Huom! Sarjan toteutumiseen vaaditaan väh. 4 osallistujaa. Jos tämä ei toteudu, sarjoja liitetään toisiinsa tilanteen mukaan. Kisaajan ikä ja taso huomioidaan tuomaroinnissa.
• Piirustukset laitetaan näytteille, paitsi jos erikseen kielletään - kerrothan siis, saako teostasi laittaa näytille.
• OMA NIMI PAPERIIN!
• Teema: piirrä unelmiesi naamiaisasu (tai cosplay-/nuuttipukki-/Halloween-asu, millä nimellä sitä ikinä tahdotkaan kutsua)! Teokset tulee piirtää A4-kokoiselle paperille.
• Kisaan voi osallistua vain yhdellä teoksella/henkilö - muuten saa kyllä piirtää!
• Mielikuvitus liikkeelle!

En itse tuomaroi piirustuskisaa, vaan olen pyytänyt ystäväni Sandra Lehtosen avuksi siihen hommaan.

Itse hoidan cosplay-tuomaroinnin, ja kriteerini ovat seuraavanlaiset:  hahmon tunnistettavuus, eläytyminen sekä kekseliäisyys asun toteutuksessa. Referenssikuvat hahmoista etsin itse. Hoidan myös kisaajien valokuvaamisen - jos olet ala-asteikäinen, tarvitsen huoltajasi suostumuksen siihen, että kuvia saa laittaa esimerkiksi Euran pääkirjaston sivuille. 

Ilmoittautuminen on auki 20.4 asti, jos kisaajamäärät eivät täyty ennen sitä. Sikäli mikäli kisaajamäärät menevät aikaisemmin täyteen, ilmoitetaan siitä niin kirjaston some-kanavilla kuin omillanikin! 

Euran pääkirjaston some-kanavat: 

FB-sivut
Instagram

Omat some-kanavani ovat löydettävissä blogin välilehdeltä "How to contact me?".

Ja jotta tunnistaisitte minut conipaikalla, tässäpä cosplay-suunnitelmani Mangapäivälle!

Ayame Sohma sarjasta Fruits Basket. Kuva © Shiro Samurai.

Eli Ayamea ajattelin cossata - jälleen kerran. Nuo piilolinssit menevät vielä tuon kerran, ja sen jälkeen onkin aika sanoa niille hyvästit. Ayamen cossaaminen jääkin siis hetkeksi varmaan tauolle, sillä itsessään asu siirtyy myös Mangapäivän jälkeen muokkaus-/korjauspöydälle. Ehkä jo aikakin, onhan tuo ollut varsin aktiivisessa käytössä vuodesta 2013...

Cosplay ei Mangapäivänä muutenkaan ole missään nimessä kiellettyä - löytyyhän Eurasta noita photoshoot-ympäristöjäkin jonkin verran (vaikka en niitä itse olekaan kovin paljon hyödyntänyt)! (:

Jos jokin jää ihmetyttämään tai tahdotte tarkempaa tietoa tapahtumasta, kysymyksiä voi osoittaa suoraan minulle osoitteeseen firithcosplay@luukku.com.

Long story short; I'll organize the next "Manga Day of Eura" event on 22nd of April. In this blog post there are the rules of the cosplay contest & drawing contest and some information about this event in general. I'll also be the judge of the cosplay competition & I'll also be the photographer of this event. 
The Manga Day will be held at the library of Eura - my current working place no, I'm not a librarian. 
And I will cosplay Ayame Sohma. Does this surprise anyone anymore? 

-Firith

Among the snow shines the rising sun - Japan photoshoot #2!

Hello~!

A while ago I - once again - traveled to the north and more specifically to Shiro Samurai's place. You may remember that he borrowed the Japan cosplay to me for Skecon but the costume wasn't complete back then (it was missing the lenses and it bothered me to no end tbh). That's why I wanted to photoshoot that cosplay again - and Shiro Samurai was willing to photograph me~!

And here are the pictures!
...I just noticed that my hands are in the same position in almost every pic - even though it wasn't very cold my fingers were freezing. Oops.

Character: Japan
Series: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Cosplayer: yours truly
Photos & photo edit: Shiro Samurai

Fun fact: I still need help with dressing up in this costume... I'm not very used to wearing these kind of clothes wish I had money to do so though.

Of course there's the bonus pic... xD Also known as "don't be aware that you're being photographed before your photographer mentions that your face actually looks decent even though you're not even trying to look clever" :'D

Don't start smoking, kids. Says the one who is trying to quit it. :I

But yeah, there you go~!
I'd also like to cosplay 2p!Japan (also known as Kuro Honda) at some point... I'm really starting to like this character! <3

That's all for now - but there are many blog posts to come quite soon~!

-Firith

I'm awesome! (Teutonic Knights!Prussia WIP)

It was pretty hard to decide which version of Prussia I would make first; man, I love all those designs! In the end I decided to begin to make his Teutonic Knights version - it isn't so popular and it's pretty easy to make. I will make at least one of his uniforms in the future though (when I have more money and time, that is).

The challenge #1 was to find some reference pictures of this version.
...guess if there were any?

Nope.

I decided to take a couple of screenshots of the anime episode in which Prussia appears in this certain outfit it took me an eternity to find out which episode it was.
The quality is quite... Well, hideous, but at least I was able to figure out the parts of this costume!

As you can see the costume is almost completely white, excluding those black cross details. A tunic, trousers and a cape ( + shoes of course) - seems quite easy, doesn't it?

Let's get into business~!

The trousers and the shoes

I didn't really bother to make anything new; my Levi cosplay provided me both of these! Since one can't see the shoes clearly I'll just roll with what I have and those boots are the best option - at least at the moment.
Oh, the Levi costume provides me the belt also, I didn't have to worry about sewing it either! 
I might make new trousers and shoes for Prussia in the future, I don't know yet.

The tunic

You know that feeling when you think that you don't have any of those fabrics which you would need left and then you find a shitload of that fabric?
Happened to me with this costume - I thought that I didn't have much left of the white fabric I wanted to use for this costume but then I found something like two meters of it o__O I'm not complaining, I don't have to use extra money on this now (since that Avalon guy from StarStable Online pretty much ate half of my cosplay budget for this spring)!

This was easy one to make - as you can see from the pictures (it's been such a long time since I've actually taken WIP pictures)! 

I used the patterns of a sleeveless top... 

The tunique without sleeves. I decided to attach the cross to the shirt by zigzagging it.

A close-up of the zigzag. Guess if I really want the new sewing machine and new threads? -__-"

Aaaaand then happened this...

The zigzag killed the needle... :<

Luckily I had more needles left but guess if I cried a bit when I understood that there would be two more crosses left (I attached them to the cape)? Aaagh!

Making the sleeves. They were too wide at first so I had to make a quick decision about how to continue making them and the result is worth a cringe... But hey, it worked!

After the sleeve width problem I just attached the sleeves to the tunic - and here's the final product!

Not ironed in the pic though.

The cape

 For some reason I didn't take any WIP pictures of the cape... x__x Well, I made it in a hurry and didn't have time to think about taking pictures, sorry!
I'm likely to re-make the cape in the future so you'll get the WIP pictures then!

And why am I already considering re-making it?
...let's just say that this is the new episode of "Firith and the random materials" show. This cape is made out of enstex.
Enstex.
Well, it isn't too bad... It'll work for now.

Make-up test~!

Without lenses though... .__. Pic (c) Shiro Samurai.

I will phostoshoot this costume quite soon actually - and I have a lot material to post so stay tuned~!

-Firith