Circle lens review: EOS "ICE" Blue

Hello everyone!

Like I said in my last post I have a shitload of lenses to review - and this lovely pair is one of those lens pairs! Let me introduce you EOS "ICE" Blue.

Important note: I got these lenses from a friend who lost interest in wearing and reviewing circle lenses. These lenses had a wrong prescription for me and I think that these were close to their expiration date so thus I can not grade the comfort. However, I will say a few words about the comfort in general - pretty much my first impression of these. Remember: wearing lenses that are past their expiration date/broken/have the wrong prescription for you is a dangerous thing to do and it can damage your eyes for good so seriously, don't do it. I wore these lenses for half an hour and then threw them away so I had these on only for this review. Thank you. 

This circle lens review is non-sponsored.  

The lens vials.

The lenses in their vials.

Base curve: 8.8 mm/8.9 mm

Diameter: 14.8 mm

Water content: 38 %

Life span: 1 year

Inserting these was quite easy. Yes, they tried to curl around my finger every now and then but not too much, and in the end it only took me a couple of minutes per lens to get them into my eyes. So, I would say that quite easy yet far from the easiest lenses to insert (for example my sharingan lenses were a lot easier to insert). 

After opening the vials I let these soak in a new solution over the night since the original solution (in the vials) irritates my eyes a lot. I have no idea if it does the same to you but I definitely don't recommend testing it. 

And now, excuse me for a blurry picture. There are a couple of really blurry pictures in this post; I took those with my selfie camera without a proper eyesight so please forgive me. Those pictures still give the idea how these look like in certain lights etc.

One lens in.

This is one of the blurry ones but I think that one can still see the enlargement - which, by the way, surprised me positively. In the end the diameter doesn't promise too much but these were a lot more enlarging than I thought! Probably not the most enlarging lenses I've had but definitely not the least enlarging ones. 

Like I said, I can't actually grade the comfort but a couple of words about it. Even though these were expired and had the wrong prescription for me these still felt surprisingly comfy. At first I was really able to feel these in my eyes but then the feeling practically flew of the window. And that's all I can say about these lenses, I seriously didn't want to wear these for too long. However, I will buy these lenses for myself next year and probably then I can do a little update about the comfort! 

I seriously love the design of these lenses. The blue part seriously reminds me about frost and icicles so I think that these are what the name promises them to be: icy blue. There are also darker and lighter shades of blue which makes these lenses pretty lively and vivid. Usually I prefer a thick dark limbal ring but for these lenses that would've been a design failure - and luckily the (black) limbal ring was pretty thin.

There are also some black spike-looking lines attached to the the limbal ring which kind of highlight all those shades of blue. Those black "spikes" reach towards the middle but they don't go too near to it. For some reason these lenses made me think about mermaids...

Then some pictures!

The blurry picture among all the better ones © yours truly, all those better ones © Gure (thank you so much gurl! <3).

These pictures were taken on a sunny day in July.

Bathroom light.

Indoors, with a flash.

Indoors, under the fluorescent lamp. Yellow light.

Indoors, white-ish light.

Natural light, glacing through the window so sorry for the blur ;__;

Outdoors, facing the burning bright sun. I'm sorry about the position of my eyes but no can do, my photographer was 10+ cm taller than me and had she taken this photo like it should've been taken, she would've blocked the sun xD

Outdoors, back against the sun.

From the distance.

• The colour is 10/10. It's vivid and lively, and the most important thing is that it is actually icy blue as the name promises it to be.
   
• The design is 10/10, too. I just fell in love with these ones and I'm definitely buying these for myself - probably for my Luka Megurine costume.
   
• The opacity... I'm not too sure but I'd say 8,5/10. These don't let my own eye colour (blue/green/gray) get through them too much but I'd say that these still do that a little bit, escpecially in certain lights such as yellow light.
  
• I can't grade the comfort for reasons explained in the beginning of this post.
  
• The naturalness is 7/10. One can clearly see that I'm wearing circle lenses but the colour and the design make them look at least somewhat natural.
  
• The enlargement is 7/10 too. These aren't the most enlarging lenses but definitely not the least enlarging ones either.

So, here it is, yet another circle lens review! These are going to be this blog's main content for a while since, well, I still have a lot of circle lenses waiting for their turn to be reviewed. :'D

Got any questions? Ask in the comment box, contact me on the social media or send me an email!

 

-Firith 

Circle lens review: Geo "Crazy" Red/Black Vampire CR04

Yo, dropping another circle lens review - this time Geo "Crazy" Red/Black Vampire CR04!

These lenses were ordered from Circle Lenses Europe , also know as Cirkellinser (Swedish website, basically the same as European one). My friend ordered these for a cosplay but in the end didn't end up wearing them at all so I bought them from her.
I didn't have any cosplays in mind when I bought these; pretty much just wanted to review them. To be honest I still don't have any cosplay in mind but maybe someone else has. 

This is a non-sponsored circle lens review. However, I have a discount code for Circle Lenses Europe. The code can be found under their ad picture on the right sidebar of my blog.   

All photos are taken by yours truly. I seriously apologize if the quality fails or something; I took most of these with my phone's selfie camera since it was easier than it would've been with my Canon since now I was actually able to see what kind of pictures I got. They looked good on my phone when I edited them but when I saw them on my computer screen (great resolution) some of them didn't look that good... But, well, I've had the same problem every time I've taken review pictures myself. 

One lens in its vial. I managed to slaughter the other vial before I remembered that I should take this photo too...

The lens vial.

Base curve: 8,6 mm

Diameter: 14.2 mm

Water content: 40 %

Life span: 1 year

Inserting these was one hell of a task to do, not going to lie about it. Even though these lenses aren't that big they didn't want to get into my eyes; they curled around my finger and it took me 7-12 times to get these into my eyes. Even though I haven't wore circle lenses in over a year I don't think it was because of that. But, when I finally got these into my eyes I didn't feel them almost at all - but more of that later.

After opening the vials I let these soak in a new solution over the night since the original solution (in the vials) irritates my eyes a lot. I have no idea if it does the same to you but I definitely don't recommend testing it. 

One lens in.

As you can see these aren't the most enlarging lenses which can kinda be expected when looking at the measures. However, the enlargement effect is still there - I could probably recommend wearing these for an anime character whose eyes don't scream "moe" or for a western character, for example a vampire. 

The comfort of these lenses was okay. Almost all the time I saw a glimpse of red but that's probably the only "bad" thing - and I don't even know can it be considered as a bad thing since that only means that your natural eye color doesn't show up so much from the lens hole. These seemed to dry quite fast though; I don't know if my eyes were dry or something but normally even then lenses don't feel dry as fast as these ones did. They weren't expired yet either so I don't know why they felt dry so fast. I wore these for approximately 3 hours and then took these off but I could've wore them probably 2-3 more hours had I had time. So, the comfort is quite okay.

To be honest I'm not a sucker for crazy lenses and these didn't change my opinion of them too much either. However these looked better than most of the crazy lenses I've wore in the past and that's totally because of the design. As you can see, the red is quite "in your face" but well, that's the point of them. There are also small black stripes reaching towards the middle of the lens but sadly they seem to disappear a bit when wearing these lenses. However I like the thick black outer ring; some crazy lenses don't have it and the effect then... Well, you know the "Photoshop" effect. With these it doesn't happen. These lenses have kind of basic design which surely goes for certain characters quite well - we need "the basic design lenses" too. :) And, as you can see, the red is so strong in these that their opacity is very good - props for that! <3 

Then...

The pictures.

These were taken on a semi cloudy day in June. 

Note: the house I live in nowadays doesn't have all the light conditions, for example white light is almost impossible to find in this house. I know, it sucks but it can't be helped. Thank you for understanding.

Very bad bathroom light.

White/yellowish light. Yeah, a hybrid, yippee.

Natural light, gazing through the window.

Indoors, with a flash.

Outdoors, looking into the sun. Excuse me the position of my eyes, I had to focus on quite many things at the same time.

Outdoors, back against the sun.

From the distance.

• The colour is 8/10. It's very red as you can see; however I was hoping for a more vivid red. These have a little bit of that "Paint effect" going on but luckily not too much.
   
• The design is 7/10. Perfect for some characters but I found it a bit... Boring, perhaps? Don't get me wrong, we need these kind of lenses too! Had the black stripes showed a bit more I could've given these 8/10 but now I stick to the 7/10.
   
• The opacity is 10/10. I don't think that this one needs to be explained in any way. :'D
   
• The comfort is... I'd say 8/10. Not the most comfortable lenses I've had but definitely not the worst either. Average comfort, I'd say.
   
• The naturalness is 1/10. I don't think that this one needs to be explained either xD
   
• The enlargement is around 5/10. If you're looking for red lenses for example for a western character I definitely recommend these. However, if you plan on cosplaying a character with moe eyes I don't think that these are the right choice. 

Well, here it is, yet another circle lens review~!

...and believe me, I have a shitload of these to write. I have 20+ pairs of lenses I should review. Well, at least it means some content for this blog xD I'll also start to make a new cosplay as soon as I get some money for the fabrics and the wig - especially the wig since it's going to be my first lace front wig and those aren't cheap, you know. 

Got any questions? Ask in the comment box, contact me on the social media or send me an email!

-Firith

Female cosplays I'm likely to make in the future ( + some costumes I will re-make)!

Hello~!

I've been infected with the cosplay hype once again and this time decided to post a list of female characters I'm likely to cosplay in the future. As many of you know I've cosplayed mostly men because of some gender identity issues. Now I've managed to make myself clear who I am and now there's a place for female characters on my cosplay list too~!
(And, well, one of the simplest reasons is that I rarely find a female character I actually like so much that I'd like to cosplay her.)

But, let's go~! All pictures are from Google.

Belle French from Once Upon a Time

The first character on this list is Belle French/Gold from Once Upon a Time. My friend told me that she had begun to watch this series and suggested that I'd watch it too. At first I was quite skeptic - would I actually like a TV series based on childhood bedtime stories?
...well, I was skeptic for nothing. I fell in love with OUAT and especially with Belle who is also one of my favourite Disney princesses ever. A girl who likes books, is smart (smarter than me but anyway) and ambitious - who wouldn't like a character like that? In OUAT her character is a bit more naive but I let it pass, she's still wonderful. And my friend might have said that she'd like to cosplay Rumplestiltskin so... Yeah. :D

Rachel Amber from Life is Strange: Before the Storm

I've played over 50 % of LiS: Before the Storm now and I've begun to like Rachel even more. I've spoken about her earlier so I don't know if there's nothing more to say about her, just wanted to say that she's still on my cosplay list.

Zelena from Once Upon a Time

Khm. Yeah. The Wizard of Oz was one of my favourite stories when I was a child yet I could never bring myself actually like the main character, Dorothy Gale. Yes, she's totally a hero of the story but I've always liked the villains more and this was no exception.

Let me present you the wicked witch of the West: Zelena. She was one of my favourite characters the instant I saw her on my TV screen - who wouldn't like a jealous wicked witch who still has some values and right priorities? As you can see it may take me some time to make this costume - the greatest reason being the money.

Kanata Shinonome from AKB0048

Kanata has been on my cosplay list for ages but I haven't managed to bring myself to make her costume and I doubt that I'll make it in a long time. But yes, I'm definitely making this yellow costume of hers! Kanata's personality is kinda likable - yet she can be very difficult person if she wants to/the situation requires it.
I'm not likely to make any other of her costumes since, well, I don't like their designs that much. Too cute for me. :'D

Chikane Himemiya from Kannazuki no Miko

Yes, she's still hanging there. I just need to figure out some things with this costume. And probably re-make the parts I've already made but we'll see about that. She's still a dear character to me and I'll definitely cosplay her in the future.
When I started making her back in 201...5 (I guess) I made some parts horribly wrong. They still looked good on me but trust me, if I even try to wear it the way it is now it'll be quite painful. So yeah, this will take some time. Still.

Joyce Price from Life is Strange

Life is Strange is kind of familiar to pretty much everyone nowadays - or at least its name is. Many cosplayers have cosplayed the main characters - Chloe Price, Max Caulfield, Rachel Amber - but there's one character who deserves a lot more love than she's getting right now. And that character is Joyce Price, Chloe's mother.
I love her personality so much - even though she appears to be very stern she has a heart of gold. She's always caring about Chloe and always thinks what would be best for her even though she sometimes fails - but hey, everybody fails at life sometimes. Anyway I just love her personality and that's why she found her way on my cosplay list. Her diner uniform might not be the most pretty costume but at least it'll be quite easy to make and comfortable to wear (I'll be skipping the high heels because I cause dangerous situations whenever I try to wear those devils).
...the real challenge with this character is how I'll make myself look like a middle-aged woman. Then again, when I was 14 some people thought I was 20 and when I was 19 some people thought I was 28. So... Maybe I can make myself pass as a middle-aged mother character.

Anne von Blyssen from Star Stable Online

Yeah, I know. I just cursed Alex's riding pants to Hell and back and with this costume I'm going to enter that Hell once again.
But yes, this is Anne von Blyssen's new design. I must admit that at first I was... Well, let's just say, I wasn't very pleased with it but when they actually brought Anne into SSO I was surprised how good her new design looks in the game itself. Plus someone might have asked me to make this costume - and I totally will since I like challenges! This one will be challenging, both the costume and the make-up; I still haven't figured out how to make those Pandoric scars. Well, I have time to figure it out. I have no idea when I'll make Anne but probably quite soon - I think I might have just the right fabric for her riding pants already.

Elizabeth Sunbeam from Star Stable Online

Yes, I have SSO hype going on right now, don't judge me :'D
I've always liked Elizabeth's personality and when it was revealed that she was "The Sun of Pandoria" in the last sisterhood I fell in love with her character even more. The costume itself looks simple. LOOKS. I know I'm going to lose the last of my sanity with this but... Well, it's going to be worth it. :'D

Alex Cloudmill's ancestress from Starshine Legacy: The Secret of Pine Hill Mansion

Thanks Merezone for letting me take a screenshot! <3
You see, there aren't many pictures of this costume going around and at first I thought that I wouldn't even publish this plan just yet. Then I got a permission to take screenshot and well, here we are :D But yes, Alex's ancestress has been on my cosplay list for the longest of times and I'm definitely making this in the future! Also makes me very determined to lose weight.

There are also some 'maybe' characters so I won't add them on my list just yet. Let's see what I decide to do.


Then the costumes I'm going to re-make. Note: some of the characters are male.

Ayame Sohma from Fruits Basket

Yup, my "trademark cosplay".
I threw the original one away since it was about to break in pieces and was beyond repairable. It actually kind of stung to throw that costume away but hey, that only means that I can make it again even better!
I'm probably going to re-make the blue coat version since I still can't bring myself to like the red coat version. Aaaand I should order a new wig for him. The old one... Let's just say I should throw it into the rubbish bin too.  But yes, I'm definitely going to re-make this costume!

Alex Cloudmill from Starshine Legacy

Yeah, I know, I know. I just made her new design version but I still feel the urge to make her Starshine Legacy version too. Reason one: I was never too happy with the first version of my cosplay. Reason two: her new design version is comfortable to wear but it's probably only for winter conventions since it's very warm costume too.
I'll re-make the pants and the shirts. I still have that beanie (and I'm still proud of it!) and I managed to find the shoes I made for her back in the days. Still kind of happy with them too.

Avalon from Star Stable Online

This costume isn't very old yet I still have the urge to re-make it already. The main reason is that I was never happy with the materials I used for his costume because I just KNOW that it could look so much better!
This time I'll add the last details too since I've finally managed to figure out what they're supposed to be - or at least I think so. The details on his sleeves are still causing me some headache but I think that they're supposed to represent Aideen's harp. So yeah, I'm going to bring the druid boy back at some point probably when I have money since wool isn't actually the cheapest material you know.

Luka Megurine, version Magnet

I threw this costume away years ago (or at least seems like it since I haven't seen it in ages). Back in the days I actually managed to make this costume quite well - especially considering that it was my first cosplay I made without any help or advice from anyone.
Even if I still had this costume I think that I'd re-make it though. There were minor mistakes in the costume so... Yeah. I guess I'll be even happier with it this time! I'm thinking about making this version of Luka next year. Any other Magnet cosplayers out there? Join me!

I'm also going to repair some parts of my Itachi Uchiha cosplay. It's mostly in good shape which makes me happy since that's one of the costumes I've wore a lot in the past.

So, that's all for now folks! I'm going to publish a circle lens review post in the near future so stay tuned! ;)

-Firith

Finnish cosplay blog scene - is it actually dying?

This is what I've been thinking for a while now.

NOTE: this blog post is likely to become a huge text wall since I don't think that this is one of those posts that would need pictures. Read if you want to, but don't expect seeing pictures. Thank you.

As many of you know, I'm one of those "I'm active when I feel like it but then I truly am active" kind of bloggers. I've had this blog a bit over six years now and even during that short period of time I feel like the cosplay blog scene has changed quite a lot.

When I started blogging there were dozens of active cosplay blogs and the blogger community was... I don't know, it had this warm and welcoming feeling to it. I'm not saying that it wouldn't have it now but back then there were a lot of bloggers, professionals, amateurs and everything in between. But now... Now I feel like there aren't that many blog writers anymore. Some of the blogs I used to follow and actively read during the past few years don't even exist anymore. That makes me sad.

There have been a few new writers during these years but now I feel like they've pretty much disappeared. I get it if someone just doesn't feel like writing a blog anymore - I think that it's wise to have a break of it, at least, if it starts to feel like "Ugh, I have to make a blog post again". Seriously, I get it.

But it doesn't prevent me from wishing that there were more blog writers in cosplay scene too.

Of course there are still a few active blogs which I still follow and read, and I'm very happy that these people have kept to it. I myself try to become active again (I just need to make some content for this blog) since I don't actually want the blogger scene to fade away like I could actually prevent that, pfffff.
But well, I guess that most people are nowadays using other social medias, for example Instagram which seems to be one of the most popular platforms for publishing pictures etc. No wonder, it was made for it wow, such Sherlock. And I guess TikTok is quite popular nowadays too, at least I see a lot of TikTok videos on people's IG accounts.

Is cosplay blogging actually out of fashion?

Right now it is a bit, I think. A few years ago there was this "If I don't have a cosplay page on FB I'm not a real cosplayer" mindset going around but I guess that the FB page hype has lessened a little bit. Nowadays I see more people talking about IG, TikTok and, of course, Twitter. Are those platforms more fashionable now than blogging? Might be.
And I'd like to point out that I'm also on IG, Twitter (not so active but still) and FB too so I'm not attacking anyone who has an account on those platforms. I've thought about joining TikTok too but in the end it wouldn't be my cup of tea, at least I think so.

What does blogging mean to me, then?

Well, like I said, I started writing this blog in 2012. Back then it was quite easy to hop on the bandwagon since there were a lot of cosplay blogs back then; by reading them I slowly learnt who I am as a blog writer and what kind of content I want to publish. I know that my earliest blog posts are... How to put it? Well, I cringe at them a little bit nowadays since there ain't pretty much any logic, I published a lot but I might have not had anything to say actually. Nowadays I mostly write con summaries, circle lens reviews and publish cosplay photos on my blog. Back then I wrote about pretty much everything that had something to do with cosplaying, even if that 'something' was just a small mention about buying a new wig etc.

Blogging means quite a lot to me anyway. Had I not had this blog for these years I wouldn't have seen my cosplayer progression. Well, I'm still far from being a professional and I doubt that I'd ever get there anyway, I'm not THAT passionate with this hobby... But you get the point, right?
I've seen myself grow as a cosplayer and as a human being during these years. I was a teenager when I begun to write this blog. Nowadays I'm an adult, at least by law, and I think that it shows at least a little bit on my writing style too. I could say that I've improved my blog writing skills..?

I've documented many of my cosplay projects on this blog. Some of those projects are now buried, some are still somehow on my mind and some of those I'm still planning to (re-)make. On those "documentations" I've written about how I've made a costume and posted WIP pics. By browsing my blog every now and then and looking at those pics... It actually teaches me. "Do this but definitely don't do anything like that anymore".

But I haven't learnt just from my own blog posts. I've learnt from my mistakes, of course, but that's pretty much everything I've learnt from myself.

Most terms, techniques etc. I've learnt by reading other cosplayers' blogs. And I'm quite sure that those blog posts haven't helped just me but many other cosplayers out there too.
That's one of the biggest reasons why it makes me so sad to see the amount of cosplay blogs becoming smaller and smaller.
And it's not just Finnish cosplay blog scene dying; most foreign-to-me cosplay blogs I've followed have slowly died too.

But everything has its time, I guess. Or then I'm completely on a wrong blogging platform. Wouldn't be surprised.
Some people whose blogs I used to follow... Well, I haven't seen them in conventions in years so it kind of makes sense that they haven't been blogging anymore. People have other priorities. So do I - that's why I'm not too active anymore. Some people who have or have had a blog are quite active on Instagram - maybe they don't have the urge to make larger WIP posts of their costumes anymore? Maybe everything they want to say about the convention can be said in the photo caption? I guess I'll never get an answer to those questions and it's perfectly okay.

So, summa summarum; I'm quite sad about the cosplay blog scene slowly disappearing into the cosmos but in the end that might be the beginning of the new era. And I'm looking forward to whatever that era will bring to us. Everything changes around us anyway, technology improves all the time - we will see what will happen in the future.
If you're still there reading/writing cosplay blog(s) ; what is the reason you still do so? Tell me in the comments. I repeat myself: I'm not here to attack anyone, I'm just very curious about this topic.

Until next time.

-Firith