Following my last Cosplay Interview with reifes88 and his Iron Tager, I have another TIGER to introduce to everyone in the year of the METAL TIGER (Chinese horoscope) !!!!
Yes, its everyone male Otaku’s favourite animal girl; Taiga Aisaka !!
Blehhh I suck so much at interviewing. I promise I’ll do better next time T_T
I met KuroHoshi’s Taiga at the GCA event last year and she totally owned the crowd! Whenever she starts posing a wall of photographer appears xD
KuroHoshi was really cute and natural when I interacted with her, MOE much! Her love for the character shows through even though she didn’t make the costume herself but its clear she really loved Taiga and knew the character inside out.
How can anyone resist her???? Check out her wordpress if you wanna know more of her =)
Below is a JBF Behind the Scene Video I put together. Sadly, as Youtube only allowed 10minutes of airtime, I didn’t include day two of the filming into this video. Would you guys be keen on watching how we did all the flashback memories?
Couldn't embed and Show this video in the previous post about Post Production because Blogger doesn't allow video embeds to show on the top when you have an entry cut @_@
Hi Peeps! I’m back again with something related to JBF. I know you guys must be so tired of me/us with the same serie/song again. But please bear with me alright ^^?
So, I was very inspired by the Production Diaries Peter Jackson did for the KongisKing.net fansite and halfway through the post production of JBF. I decided to keep some simple sort of diary to chronicle this very long and arduous journey and started writing twitter style emails and blogs to myself and have complied them below. Click on the link to read more =)
The teal coloured words are written AFTERWARDS to fill in the blank period where I had forgotten to chronicle. And as can be seen from the start date, I did these diaries very late into production …much apologies ^^;; I have soooo much to say about the post production but…guess I’ll shut up for now. Let me know if you guys liked it!
17th Jan It is now 4.08am and I have just stepped out of bath. It has been a long and hard Saturday of non stop photos editing and animating. The TV was on almost the entire day and I’ve even watched reruns of the same show from the afternoon slots to the late night slots ahah. Yes, it had been a very long day. But on the bright side, I’ve completed almost all 60% of the second half of the song (I split the animation of the 2ong into 2 parts for easier handling). Finally got the audio and animation to synch reasonably….well at least it does so on my PC. When I sent the first swf file to reiko it didn’t worked for her =\ Okay, back to finish up as much stuffs as I can. Gotta do something about the ‘kissing paper plane’ scene. Sigh…didn’t managed to get any nice pics that day so…really need photoshop to help save the day =( Some pics that were manipulated today.
19th Jan Omg damn happy! Edging closer to the ending soon! Finally got pass the parts with their numerous memories photo. And got the sound to sync!!! Still a lot to be done though. Gotta sing the song and edit the swf in Ulead.
20th Jan Just went out for dinner with kns and cvy. While walking back, Cvy started pimping a nico singer's just be friend recording to us. Ballad male version.
Which got me slightly depressed about the massive delay in our own project.
22nd Jan Am very very very very upset and frustrated to the point of tears. I just lost my entire flash working file. Yes, lost it. The bloody system deleted it.
I was loading some photos into the Flash document when my mom who was mopping the floor accidentally knocked into the cables of my external HDD. And that jerk kinda broke the whole connection and caused flash to crash. I tried to save a copy of the document but it wouldn’t allow me.
What puzzles and bewilders me is how it deletes the entire file! I mean, it didn’t just not save the new changes. BUT it literally deleted everything! I can’t even find the file on my ext HDD! Very very upset. I’ve just installed a recovery program….hopefully it can find the file back. I’m not very hopeful but…sigh. I wish I have a better system and I wish the bloody connection between the Ext HDD and PC is not so fragile! ARGH!!!!
This just made the journey 1000 times more difficult. I’m already nearing the completion of the pv and this happens… totally can’t believe it.
23rd Jan – 4th Feb (unclear timeline)
Reiko and I spent the next few days searching online for free Data recovery programs. I tried out a few and the last one (Recuva) kindly recommended by Zeratul worked. But the FLA file recovered was corrupted and could not be used at all. We then realise the video editor wasn’t working with the SWF file. It wouldn’t load some scenes and showed red screens instead of photographs. Either that or the animation would be totally out of its designated path. I had initially wanted to do the animation in Flash and then export it as a AVI file. But ran into a lot of issue with that because the files were just too heavy and Flash kept crashing.
5th - 7th Feb
With the original idea of using SWF animation out of the window now, I started doing the animation manually inside Ulead Video Studio.But the effects were less than desirable as the program blurred the photographs immensely.
8th Feb spent my whole waking day trying to fix the swf to work with ulead. Kinda found that maybe we can work around the swf problem and import bit by bit.
The funny thing is, its so temperamental even with my flash experience i cant diagnose why it isn't working when it should! One moment its working, i make some necessary changes and the next moment it jus blanks out ! Super frustrating!!
10th Feb This whole process of going from flash to ulead and occasionally jumping back to photoshop is getting so exhausting. Perhaps more mentally than physically. Even though my eyes feel really strained and tired.
But yeah, so tired of ulead not working with flash. Whyyyy??? My simple tweens are not working and i have not idea why. I've gone into photoshop to resize and compress the same pic at least 3times but its still not working.
Oh god! 10th Feb
This is seriously annoying. Spent the past 1 hour or so just troubleshooting this damn scene! I’m finally at the final stages where the screen zooms out and shows the stunned face of the emo boyfriend. After tediously Cging that photo out (we had forgotten to shoot it) and animating it in flash; Ulead refuses to load the animation properly. Instead of loading the middle portion of the photo, its loading the extreme side of it……screwed=_=
I’m gonna compress the photo again in Photoshop for one last time today before I go to bed. hopefully it’ll work…..because if it doesn’t, I don’t know what can. I’ve done all I can think of. Each time I recompress/edit the photo. I have to go through this process of re-importing the edited photo into Flash, replacing the old photo with the new, sometimes make a new layer, tween it, adjust the keyframes to fit the middle lovey dovey photo, export the swf , update the swf file in Ulead and then check if the animation is working.
I bet you got tired just reading about it=_=U
6:08am : YEAY! It worked! I’m off to bed!!!
10th Feb (PM) Omg 4 more days to stipulated deadline!! Still blogging via mobile because I don't wanna overwork my Pc. Really hope we wont miss this deadline yet again...especially since 14th feb is such a morbidly and ironically suitable date for this pv.
Am down to the credits page already wheeeee!!! Just jumping back and forth from flash and ulead to make sure everything is time perfect.
Really looking forward to completing it so I can dedicate more time to other stuffs. Still have not spring cleaned x.x
11th Feb
Okay...doing a check to make sure all the pics load properly. Which they didn't. I seriously need better work station sigh... But i think i don't care already...gonna go ahead and try exporting a trial video and see how things go. AAArgh! Export got truncated because Ulead just crashed =.=. Screw it. I'm exporting as mp4 this time!
12th Feb
Ahhhhhh its now the final exportinggggg ....just as i was hoping no red screen will appear... It did =_=. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!
Trying out all sorts of export settings now. Sigh. Really hating this red screen =.=
12th Feb (PM)
Oh yeahhhhhh coming to the reallll FINAL exporting and checking! Also managed to overcome the obstacle of the export video being stretched vertically. It was in the form of an optional tick. Family has been up and cleaning the house way before I woke up. Feeling quite guilty to see my mom running around the house cleaning while I continue to sit on my chair mending this=.= Alright the export is running by itself. I'm finally free to handle the other things in my life! Ciao!
12th Feb (PM) I have officially finished everything for the video. All the animations that could be done is done.But no celebrations yet because my bloody system and ulead can't export the video properly. The red screen just keeps appearing, sigh. I've restarted my pc countless times and the problem persists. Arghhhh i'm so losing my patience and interest in this! Why must this whole thing be so cumbersome??? Why can.t simple thing jus work wellll ????
Okay. so for the most part, I’m complaining hahaa. But you seriously can’t blame me! There was so much going against me and so much curves to overcome. Almost until the very last moment, I had thought I wasn’t gonna make it.
I had just gotten so accustomed to failures I really started becoming very pessimistic. And almost every working moment I was asking myself “Why the HECK am I doing this?!”. I really wanted to give up but couldn’t bring myself to do that because I’ll be disappointing everyone in the team and not to mention, it would be an utter waste of all my previous effort.
I’m just really happy we managed to meet our deadline and successfully showed the world our effort. And when the video finally went live I was like OMFG ITS DONE!!!! LIKE FOR REAL! The hearty response was truly unexpected. Many thanks to all those who liked this PV. *kisses*
EDIT: The autostart video function was getting annoying so I took the embed out. Click on the above picture if you wanna watch the videos ^_^
Maid cafes once again, video pimped by Maria xD Look hard at the customers and see if there’s anyone you know ehhehee!! This is a 6 part video on RazorTV. I’m not embedding the other 5 videos because the video apparently autostarts and its annoying so go check out the side if you wanna see more.
Again, I am so late on this. Pals around me has been talking about it but it just flew past my head because I always seem to catch up on Dramus late. Much lates.
So a while ago, I was googling for some reviews on OTACOOL 1 and accidentally came upon this page (had wanted to find some example scans or reviews of OTACOOL 1 so I can decide whether I wanna buy OTACOOL 2 or not) Which I pimped to another friend on MSN and she in turn pimped me another blog entry of the same topic. Which then finally directed me to Mr. Danny Choo’s Q & A entry.
What a series of link @_@ ;;; How do I begin this *mutters to self*?
Well, as we all know. There has been a lot of dramas going on surrounding this OTACOOL project (as expected). And after reading the above 2 link, I just felt the urge/need to share my opinion. So, that brings me to the writing of this entry.
I think I’ll start with the cover first since that’s what sparked everything. Well, to be honest, It looks fine to me. Box gridded with a big bold title design that is easy to read and will appear visibly on magazine shelves. Pretty much how I expected it to be.
*Gets punched in the face*
(OH MANNNN This is sooooooooooo OOC!!! I really shouldn’t publish this but its too funny not to xDDDDD originally taken for this)
Okay fineeeeeee lahhh T_T!!!!! its not about the design *wipes blood*. I know everyone’s complaining about the selection of front cover cosplayer and the lack of ‘costumes’ in the cover design.
A friend was complaining to me that one of the front cover cosplayer’s (Linda Le) photos weredigitally manipulated. And she had in fact, only did her makeup, wore a wig and prolly a bikini and then had someone Photoshop a figurine’s costume to her body. Or at least, that’s the impression I am getting lah.
So in simple layman term, people are upset her lack of effort is being hailed as a ‘cosplay’ and feel it is unjustifiable for her to be on the cover.
To be honest when I was first posed with this issue, I wasn’t quite sure if I want to agree or disagree with it. After all, I’m a big fan of digital manipulation myself.
I did this cg 5 years ago and even uploaded it to Cosplay.com hahaa. In case you’re wondering, the entire costume was CGed on. Didn’t do a good job on the wonky thigh parts though =\
Anyway, back to the topic. I guess digital manipulations are alright. BUT in this situation where acknowledging those digitally manipulated (and VERY heavily manipulated in this case) photographs would be unfair to the majority of the applicants plus jeopardize the definition of “Cosplay”, then I guess I’d have to disagree with it. Especially having it on the cover is outright challenging the definition of “Cosplay” and what majority of the community fans believe in. Much like challenging a religion =X
I believe KOTOBUKIYA ought to look into it since this is a pretty legitimate concern and maybe if Linda really DID COSPLAY that Ayanami Rei, show us some proof. I’m sure there were some Work-In-Progress, behind-the-scenes or camwhore shots etc. That’ll return her the pride and dignity she deserved =) I’d feel damn upset if I was her and after all my hard work of putting that plastic costume together, some sour grapes eater goes around sprouting nonsense like this.
But of course, that’s only my suggestion. Sadly, I don’t think KOTOBUKIYA would do anything about it (even if the rumors were later proved correct) given the tight printing deadline and the fact that taking her out would only incur more logistic time and work hours. Not to mention, it’d be like admitting they were wrong. And no commercial organization would do that *SIGH* =\
Personally I’m fine with just showing the faces of the cosplayers on the cover. Lack of space is a very factual problem and nobody can fight that. In order to include more cosplayers into the limelight, everyone just had to squeeze a little. If everyone squeeze we can include more people into the cover, make sense?
About it not showcasing enough of the costumes well, yes that’s true. But this is a cover page my dears. It’s only meant to be a teaser and the real deal is inside. You can’t expect your 30 second Movie trailer/teaser to include everything about the movie right? Unless you are Kenny Sia hahah!
The job of a cover page is to lure buyers/readers to the publication. The title should be easy to read and allow passerby to quickly grasp the concept/content of the book and decide whether they are interested in seeing what’s INSIDE. KOTOBUKIYA is not a charity organization, gotta understand that.
And about the queer ratio of females and males on the cover well… its just a sad prove of the fact that, sex sells =X haha. But honestly, despite that theory, you gotta admit that there’s a much bigger ratio of female cosplayers to male cosplayers anyway. So I guess this is fine with me too?
And yes, obviously Mr. Danny Choo’s cosplay is not epic enough to make the cover. But I think its only right for KOTOBUKIYA to place him there. After all, he did spin the idea of the book up and his site is the main channel of their book content. It’s only fair and gracious of KOTOBUKIYA to have him there as a symbol of goodwill and appreciation for their strategic partnership. Aiyah, don’t grumble liao la, don’t like his face, just marker it off after you get your own copy lor.
“There were a particularly a lot of entries from Singapore alone and we was thinking it was only fair to publish a Singapore version of OTACOOL2. However, it looks like many Singaporeans have already withdrew their entries because they didn't get on the cover and because of a misunderstanding that they could not credit their photographer - even though nobody said that photographers could not be credited! Tis a shame because a Singapore OTACOOL Ver. would have been (Ota)cool.”
- DannyChoo.com
Then I come to this *points above*
I don’t religiously follow Mr. Choo’s blog so I missed this entry until this journal brought it up.
How??!!!!…. ehhHEH?? …I mean…*scratch head*…what can I say ?
*breaths in slowly*
Alright, I don’t blame Mr. Choo for being upset with the withdrawals and the dramas over OTACOOL2 as heavily hinted in his entry. After all, it takes two hands to clap and I guess Singaporeans with our 99% nationwide internet penetration rate can be pretty daunting/irritating/annoying/cute/naive/refreshing/kawaii/sexy/spicy Oops =X
Yet at the same time, I just can’t deny how ………… amused I am by that overly simplistic comment and way of looking at things.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a Mr. Choo hater. In fact, I have always looked up to his entrepreneur spirit and ability to create something from nothing. He knows what makes people ticks and working on that, he is able to create one of the most famous and popular Japanese culture website; that alone proves a lot. But that comment by itself was very disappointing to hear from someone whom I had thought to be wise and has always been in the line of HR and marketing.
Firstly, generalizing is unfair and in this case, highly untrue. It’s a pity Mr. Choo choose to publish such comments without any basis. Because sad to say, the damage is done more on Mr. Choo’s up-till-now stellar reputation than on Singaporean Cosplayers *shakes head*
And no, from a corporate POV, NOT stating a disclaimer (or in this case, a rule/copyright statement etc ) is the negligence of the company. Yes, nobody said that the photographers could not be credited but the organisers didn’t say the photographer’s name could be included either. Same theory applies both ways yeah??
Once again. Like WUD?!
What’s the point of writing the Photographer’s name on my submission page if ultimately they are not going to be included it in the book?
To be honest, I had entertained the idea of withdrawing myself too. NOT because I wasn’t good enough to be on the front cover but because I too, had thought the lovely photographers I worked with won’t be credited. After reading this photographer’s journal and breakdown of the T & C, I felt guilty and unfair that only myself would be benefitting from appearing on the book.
But now that KOTOBUKIYA has confirmed that they are going to include the photographer’s name, I’m happy =) And thankful =)
Following what this blog has summarised, I too felt that once again, the corporate world have underestimated the power of Cosplayers. This is a community fuelled very strongly by passion and fans and failing to recognise that is sinking into failure itself.
I admit, the Cosplay community is criticizing a little too much, especially on the logistic areas. But I guess comments and criticisms is necessary for improvements.
Like most people, I give all my blessings to the publishing of the book and still, despite all these drama, look forward to the completion of it. At the end of it all, I’d still say “Omedetto and Otsukare” to both Danny Choo and KOTOBUKIYA. Because despite all the monetary gains and profile exposure both party gets, the publication of this book have definitely pushed the community to new heights.
I can’t believe I didn’t think of this earlier! We’re in the month of february and I think its time this blog pays tribute to the very power that makes the world goes round; Love.
Megurine Luka and Kagamine Len by Love-Squad and Yond
Absolutely love to this picture! The colours are so vibrant but it still carry that sombre and forbidden ambience! Probably due to the large area of ‘black’ and how the edit dimmed the edges and made your eyes focus on just the cosplayers. Lovely pose, great wig styling ( luka’s curls *_*) and of course pretty headphones!
Luka X Len is also a pretty unexpected pairing :D
“When first love ends” Hatsune Miku and KaitoAnima by Sakana and Xrystal
I like how they managed to turn tropical Singapore into a dreamy winter wonderland with their edit xD Lovely warm colours bring out the coziness of the scene. And great posing from both cosplayers =)
The white version! Sorry for the straight Vocaloid spams till now. I swear it was unintentional. Anyway, love the colours of this! Lovely photo quality that has a slightly overexposed effect yet retaining the the details and textures on the costume. Lovely framing and pose :D
Alright, I admit. This is here mostly because …I think the Ryuuji Cosplayer is very good looking ehehhee. But that aside, I love how size appropriate both cosplayer are! Size is something very difficult to change so its nice to see a Taiga and Ryuuji that both fit the bill =)
Love their poses and expressions too! But I think Miguel might be TOO good looking for Ryuuji. LOL!
I love the soft colours and glowy effect! I’m not sure if this is supposed to be *cough* romantic.but it sure looks so to me XD!!!! Heart shaped ice cubes anyone ??
Wow. Gotta agree with skye, the light rays are pwnage! Lovely locations wins half the battle. And of course, the gorgeous costumes the cosplayers are donning are blinding me too.
My favourite part has got to be how intense their ‘love’ for each other is showing through their pose and the backlight that highlights their silhouette.
Last but not least……………. I still wanna include this
I KNOW!!!!!!! They broke up yeah~ but but I can’t resist it!!!! Even though they broke up I still think there's a lot of love going on between them. In fact, I like to think they broke up because of love itself. *sighs*
Finished! Well, almost... but atleast it's wearable! We finished the costume eight hours before it was to be worn by Yoki. We dropped the backpack from this first version, but I think that Snowtrooper from Star Wars series is making an impact even without it. When we manage to finish my costume all the missing objects will be done... and also some adjustments for Yoki's armor. There were casualties. Yes, there were... Yoki might post about them, because I witnessed only some of them.
So this is the huge project we have been battling with three months. Some armor making changes occured during the construction. We planned doing the armor parts from fiberglass but ended up doing them from PETG plastic using vacuum forming method. It was new for us and a great learning experience. I will post more detailed information about this costume later on, possibly when we have both of them entirely done. We have also planned some shorts skits and hopefully we will be able to shoot them when we still have snow.
Ok, I've been seating on this long enough and the Chinese New Year mood is subsiding so time to write!
I'm sorry this might be somewhat a duplicate of reiko's entry. But I'll try my best to write about things she didn't mention.
Okay so, maybe a little about how the project started. Before this, I wasn't exactly a vocaloid fan. The songs I heard previously didn't quite impress me very much. One fine day, reiko was going about her usual 'vocaloid pimping' thing on msn (think she was trying to convince me to do kagamine rin with her xD).
And JBF was one of the songs she showed me, boy was I blown away. One of the things that can touch me the most is music. After watching the pv with the english translation I just felt I wanted to do something! So much love and effort was put into the storyboarding of the pv. And the simplistic art style conveyed such a beautiful sense of void that ties in seamlessly with the song.
It was just so touching!
I've always loved music and I've always loved singing. So when I first fell in love with the pv I had wanted to sing the song! Yes, the project started because I wanted to do a simple cosplay slideshow with my cover of the song. But reiko thought since we're at it, might as well go all the way. And that's how it started.
What a simple beginning to a very complicated project o.o
So started the mad rush of gathering the props and costumes. Of course, we couldn't get everything accurate but we tried to be as close as we could. Much much loves to ying who lent reiko her gakuran and xrystal for lending me her sailormoon seifuku plus selling her pink wig to me. Much thanks to both these pretties!!!
I feel so pampered xD This is maria helping to tidy my hair
I had to buy an additional short pink wig for the 'younger days' look and I hate that wig !!!! The bob cutting was so....bob! I only bought the wig the night before our shoot and tried to trim/save it as much as I could but.... It still sucked =.=
Reiko folding paper planes
Once we reached the studio we went into a mad rush of changing and makeuping. Totally frantic x.x. After that it was the balloon blowing and paper planes folding xD so much to be done!
To be honest, memories of the studio shoot itself is pretty fuzzy already. I only remember rushing, rushing and more rushing ahaha. It was a wild chase from one costume to another, making sure we utilized the studio as well as we can.
And it definitely wasn’t the best period to have a photoshoot *sigh* . My skin was (still veryyyyyy slowly) recovering from some unknown skincare product reaction during that period (wrong cleanser made things worse T_T) plus all the late nights preparing for the shoot turned it super dry and unhealthy *big sigh*. Even the heavy makeup couldn’t cover it *even bigger sigh*.
But that aside, I’m really thankful to have reiko and maria around to help during the shoot T.T Its impossible to arrange myself when I'm posing.
The studio shoot was very PV focused. We took a lot effort to make sure everything looked just like the pv. But that also meant there wasn't much room for creativity. So sadly, we didn’t managed to have as much ‘off shots’ as we’d like to have.
I think for each shot that was used in the PV, we prolly have 10 - 20 takes of the exact same thing.
And yes, we photo manipulated the pictures. I made sure I CGed EVERY SINGLE FREAKIN PHOTO TO ITS PRETTIEST!!!!!! So no…. I’m not half as good looking as the photos =_=;;; But I’m upfront about it so….don’t call me a liar okay haha! We just wanted to make sure the photos we presented will help piece the lovely story together and not have the viewers be too distracted by flaws. Call me a perfectionist, whatever!
We started shooting from maybe 2pm till 7pm (loosely based on my unreliable memory). Took a cab to town and have our late dinner there. We sat and rested at our dining area for quite some time before we finally went out to our last shoot location. By the time we ended, the malls have all closed. It’s that late X_X
And the 2nd day was another mad rush. If I had thought day 1 was tiring, day 2 was worse. Had to change into 7 different set of costumes just to take the flashbacks. Although I admit, we cut a lot of corners here and if something could not be seen by the camera, we won’t change it xD
Maria introducing the food to the camera xD . The other hand belongs to Peggy.
Reiko’s Dad bought us delicious stir fried lunch! NOMS!!!!
Another tiring factor was the physical walking, jumping, twirling and travelling around to get the shots needed. We took 3 of the flashback pictures at Reiko’s very hospitable home then went around the neighbourhood to shoot 3 more. After that, we took a cab down to the beach… Just for that damned Bicycle scene.
On the way to the Beach. Peggy and Reiko looks so cute here XD!!!Maria and Peggy ding some solo shots of reiko
We kinda took too long so by the time we did this picture, the sun was already gone beyond sight. Think it was probably 8pm when we finally took a cab back to reiko’s place.
The huge group of people on our right were having fun staring at us.
Random comments: I’m wearing the skirt from the seifuku, Reiko looks very manly here and peggy’s pose looked like some top model hahaa
We had dinner around the area. And after dinner, it was…..2 more shoots in 2 sets of clothes! *DIES* We did it at the dining area so as to get the ‘realistic daily life’ feeling that the original PV wanted to portray.
And after we went back to reiko’s place where they bundled me in a lovely pink yukata (OH YES! Yukata belongs to Decadence!) and it was finally the end! Much loves to Reiko for doing the Obi for me. She was really fast with it !
Reiko helping me to wear my red hearts earrings which you can’t see in 90% of the pics=_= FML
Maria’s magical hands doing wonders on my wig.
Her wig styling has been SUCH a great help to me. All the transformations would not have been successful if not for her help in styling my hair. And she did such a great job with them. *HUGS maria bb tighttttt*. I think this picture was taken by either peggy or reiko using maria’s cam.
Thank goodness Reiko’s dad helped us took this. We were so busy we forgot to take any pics with adrian and Shiroin =\
And this final group photo marks the end of our 2 day shoot. I hope you had fun reading =) The behind the scenes video should be coming up soon =)
Reiko (my lovely ex-bf) and myself, along with our fabulous photographers and helpers shot this last year 12th - 13th September. We had so much fun and so much to share but for now, I’m handing this entry over to my bishie ex-boyfriend (Reiko). She’s gonna share a part of our journey with you guys!
If you are here reading this, I'm assuming that you have already watched the "Just Be Friends" cosplay video! :) If you haven't, please watch! xD (Link here)
... Otsukaresamadeshita~! Thank you for viewing^^!! I hope you enjoyed it! Hopefully our cosplays were good enough to evoke some form of emotion in the viewers;;; Despite it being an up-tempo song, the lyrics and PV are very heartbreaking. Quoting what the song creator put in his description:
愛し合ってここまで歩いて来た二人。 Two lovers who have come thus far together.
そんなお互いが進む道がいつからか違(たが)ってしまっていた事に気づいた時。 Before they realised it, the path they both treaded together, had diverted.
あなたならどうしますか？
What would you do if it were you?
Liking someone doesn't mean you have to be together, and breaking up doesn't necessarily mean you each other. The song moved us so much that we wanted to, as cosplayers, do a tribute to it. Since we are at it, we thought we might as well go all the way to recreate the PV;; I must say I am really lucky to be part of this project! It was towards the end of my stay in Singapore last September, when Kaika and I decided to go ahead with cosplaying "Just Be Friends"(hereon referred to as JBF).
It was a rush to co-ordinate the shoot because we only had one weekend left to shoot before I left the country! It so happened that Shiroin, who loves JBF as well, was stopping over in Singapore that weekend, so we asked Shiroin and Adrian to help in the shooting! Thanks for agreeing to assist on such short notice!!! Also, we tried to keep this project as secret as possible without involving too many people.
But as most cosplayers will know, not having any helpers for a shoot is just crazy x.x So I would like to hereby thank Maria and Peggy for helping us with the shoot, and for keeping it secret for so long too!!! :) But the one who worked the hardest and longest, sacrificing precious private time from her busy schedule, battling long nights of retouching, data losses and video-technical woes to make this cosplay video happen, is ☆Kaika☆!!!
I feel bad that I couldn't be of much help in the technical aspects, but at the same time I am sooo proud of her for not giving up in the face of adversity and hanging on till the end of the project!!
It was our first time at the studio, and the photogs helped a lot in coming up with ideas as to how we should use the studio space!
A peek into the rather cramped preparation room!
Inflating balloons for the first set of pictures!
We didn't expect to finish the whole packet of balloons, and it was pretty insane to have just 4 persons inflating 50+ balloons manually! *lung collapses* x.x We didn't have helium gas for the red balloon that had to be floating..
Shiroin climbing the dangerous ladders to get the red balloon up.
Tada~a~ah!
Can I say that it was hell trying to prep the balloons for the first take alone?! Some of the balloons started losing air and shrinking even before we started, and they just wouldn't stay put on the floor!
Kaika and I running after balloons.
It amuses me that we've both got pictures of us in that same position LOL. We had thought of taping the balloons down to the floor, but that would mean time-loss preparing and cleaning them up, so we tried to gather them as much as possible and went ahead with the shooting.
Luka's and ex's feet were shown in the PV, but we couldn't tame the balloons enough to get that shot.
This may seem like an easy pose, but trust us, it wasn't XD. We had to use alternative chairs too because we couldn't find similar ones to those in the PV, and it just so happened that the ones in the studio were springy :/
Kaika had a hard time trying to get into position because the seat sinks downwards, so we experimented by letting her seat on some things to lift her up. Then came the inhumane positioning of the hands, face and posture. We kept checking and adjusting her, even having to stretch her behind-arm to bring it to the front ala. Luka in the PV, just to get this single shot!
Double checking the shots to take.
Another obstacle: Luka's flying hair scenes x.x Whether you get good shots for scenes like these really depends on luck!
Despite having the studio keeper help us with directing wind from a strong fan, which threatened to blow off Luka's fake lashes, we still needed help with bringing the hair up!
It was even more time-consuming when rose petals were introduced x.x
They get blown away very quickly and how they move can't be controlled x.x I daresay this is one shot we spent most time on, testing different ways of releasing the petals and gathering them up over and over again. Thank goodness Maria had come by this time to help us!!! Our savior! T_T
One scene I had the most fun doing was the part where tears rolled down the ex's cheek!
If anyone had been observing the shoot, this must have been the most LOL moment. I had to apply eyedrops so many times, it wasn't easy trying to keep myself from laughing! But yes, thanks to burst shots and superb skills, Shiroin managed to get a number of shots with the eyedrop solution trickling down x.x
We had planned for 4 hours in the studio, but ended up paying for 7 hours instead x.x We decided to have dinner before continuing with the Christmas lighting scenes. It was a pity Adrian had to leave us for another appointment, but thanks again for helping us with the studio shoot!!! :D We had dinner at our next location in our fullgear x.x It was one of the times I felt thankful that SG doesn't send the police after cosplayers who walk about in public (not as if our get-up was an eyesore to the public).
Luka's ex in girly clothes(insert pukage here) enjoying Shiina Ringo stuff on Shiroin's iphone.
Got a photo at this eatery to include in the flashbacks!! Did you manage to catch it? :D
Last scene of Day Primo!!!
There is an escalator just behind us so we had to keep trying to get shots when there was no one coming up or going down XD I trampled Shiroin's luggage just to get more height for this shot... I'm soooo sorry dude T_T
Protecting mah girl, yo >D Don't ask why I even posed that way please =_= We swapped jackets because I thought the colour was closer to the PV this way. Day 2 started at my house, where we focused on the non-studio and flashback shots. We kinda exhausted Shiroin from Day 1 so we couldn't have him with us, but Maria and Peggy kindly came down to help us!
One of the photos we took of Luka strumming by the window side. Another photo was used in the PV, but Kaika looks angelic here so I'm posting it *________*
No fan to get the wind-in-hair effects? Let the hands do the work! Our next location was the beach, to shoot that beautiful scene of the two lovers cycling back from school.
Here we tried to be creative and take a few more shots which we could use as flashback photos. Unfortunately, most were left out of the final product XD
Kaika had to hop on to the back wheel even though it had no foothold D:
Another lovey-dovey scene for the couple. I personally like this out-take because Luka is arranging my hair and I feel LOVED ROFL. Lukaaaaa!!!! <3<3<3 Yes this shot was taken in the dark, with a lamp post to provide us with the light we needed. The reason it looks like daytime in the video? Photoshop :P Don't believe all that you see~ *wriggles eyebrows and does squinty eyes*
That kind of wraps up our photo-taking session, but we were far from the end of the project. There was a lot (still an understatement) of post-processing to be done, a bulk of which was single-handedly done by Kaika >.<> In the process of collating pictures and producing the video, we came to realise that there were shots which we forgot to take, thus the discrepancies in the cosplay video oTL We're really sorry about that;;; Thanks for patiently reading all the way up till the end!! Hope you like what we did!!!
Much thankies to Reiko for doing up this entry. Yeap, the whole ride was a very crazy one, I still find it hard to believe we have finally come to the official premiering stage!
I'll be coming up with my own Post Editing journal and some Behind The Scenes video footage soon. So stay tuned yeah! If you liked our hardwork, please leave me a comment below nao!!!
OH BTW! Happy Valentine's Day and Happy Chinese New Year!!!!!!!!1
