And a first blog post in forever, apparently - I haven't had much to post during these couple of years and I'm likely to vanish into the abyss once again after this blog post, the photoshoot picture post and a few circle lens reviews.
But yeah, a while ago me, Shiro Samurai and Sallukka noticed that Kummacon (27.-28.11.2021) was on its way and, of course, decided to attend it! It took a bit of traveling for me (I still live in the south) but what wouldn't one do to spend time with their friends and attend a con after a loooong hiatus (thank you covid-19 for this)? I spent a little bit of time in the north before the con since traveling there just for a couple of days... To be honest, financially not worth it student life ftw. At first I was like "nah I'm not going to cosplay anything" but ended up attacking my friend's wardrobe and borrowing a black dress from her for Magnet!Luka Megurine. I had neither time or money to actually make the costume myself but I plan on re-making it in the future!
Our journey towards Oulu begun the day before the con. Shiro Samurai and I had been spending time at Sallukka and her boyfriend's place for a couple of days (mainly because I needed a stabile internet connection for my school work, didn't want to fight with Teams too much) so we all left from the same location for Oulu. Sallukka had booked an Airbnb for them and Shiro Samurai had managed to get a permission from his aunt that the two of us could sleep over at her place. Still thankful for that! <3
After a random road rage (which I understand more than well, I hate driving in cities and it's no wonder that Sallukka almost lost her mind when driving in the center of Oulu - learn to drive, people!) we arrived at said aunt's place and spent the rest of the evening gaming and chatting. We also looked for a few photoshoot locations and decided to visit at least one of them, namely Ainolan puisto (Ainola Park).
On Saturday morning I woke up around nine o' clock and immediately ran into shower because I knew that doing my make-up would take at least on hour (disclaimer: it took 2,5 hours). And, because I'm known for my oh-so-good-memory I realized that I had forgotten to take my eyeliner and contour brush with me and I had also forgotten my foundation in the south, had a speed run in Tornio's Prisma before we left for Oulu and thank some greater powers I found a perfect one... Great. Just... Great. Well, I did some compromises and decided to make my eye shadow game strong - I literally had no options at that point. At least I didn't glue my false eyelashes to my eyeballs, I've done it once before and it hurts like hell. Can't recommend that experience.
After a couple of cups of coffee I didn't feel like an ameba anymore and we were ready to leave for photoshooting my cosplay! Shiro Samurai didn't cosplay anything but had promised me to take some pictures of my costume - thank you so much! <3
We ended up checking out a few more locations and I couldn't be happier with how these pics turned out! To be honest I haven't posed for a camera in years because well, I've gained quite a lot of weight (thank you fucked up metabolism) and thus thought that if someone tries to photograph me the camera would break or something lol. Didn't happen.
Shiro Samurai's aunt (who kindly drove us around the city, thank you so much!! <3) also took some pictures - mostly "behind the scenes" material but she also took one pic that I like A LOT. It's so nice to work with talented photographers!
...I'd also like to say that I don't normally dress like this in the winter. It was -12 Celsius degrees outside if I remember correctly but surprisingly I didn't freeze that badly. Remember: if you're going to take pictures of a "summer costume" in winter, take a hoodie and a jacket with you and overall protect your skin from freezing. You'll thank yourself even though it'd feel like a nuisance instead of a safety measure at the time.
I'll post the photoshoot pictures in a separate blog post!
After the photoshoot we drove back to Shiro Samurai's aunt's place and I changed out of cosplay since I really just wanted pics of it, not to wear it to a con - especially when it was missing some pieces, namely the white belt... Thing, whatever it's really called. I'll make it when I remake the costume anyway.
We had been keeping contact with Sallukka for the whole day and when we had eaten our dinner I texted her that we were ready to go to the con. Turned out that she and her boyfriend had come into the center already (mainly to check out some game stores) and had left the car at the bus station. After a quick conversation Shiro Samurai and I decided to walk to the store they were at - it wasn't too long of a walk anyway and the weather wasn't unbearable. We found them in no time and quite soon begun our journey towards Hiukkavaaratalo - the convention place. Sallukka and her boyfriend had already visited the con but wanted to go to the artist's alley again meanwhile me and Shiro Samurai hadn't even visited the con yet.
It's quite strange how things change - ten years ago it would have been a world-ending catastrophe if I wasn't at the convention place the minute the doors were opened but now... I guess I just want to concentrate more on photoshoots etc. Also, there's still a certain virus out there so we didn't want to hang in the masses of people for too long...
Because pictures are worth a thousand words, here's a spam (the photographer is Shiro Samurai since I didn't bother to take my camera to the north with me) :D
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Sallukka and I were also supposed to sing some karaoke but in the end we didn't.
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There were signs like this ("wear a mask") reminding the con goers about the safety measures.
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Sallukka and her boyfriend enjoying a cup of coffee (yeah, Shiro Samurai decided to be a paparazzi lol).
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Sneks <3
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Those doughnuts were so good!
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Last but not least, Sallukka and I. Thank you Shiro Samurai for this wonderful shot, it truly brings out our best sides xD Selkeesti Sörsselssön ja Hartikainen, päättäkää itte kumpi on kumpi.
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We checked out Artist's Alley and did a quick tour in the merchandise hall but like I said we didn't want to hang out there for too long.
On Sunday we went back to the con to pick up some commissioned stuff from Artist's Alley (and me and Sacchan wanted that elixir of life, also known as coffee). To be honest we didn't do much else at the con - at least I don't recall anything else tbh. After an hour or so we gathered together and left for Kemi.
Kummacon, in my opinion, was a small yet comfy con and I'm likely to attend it in the future too (and write a more detailed summary when it's possible to explore conventions better without fearing a certain virus)!
- Firith
