I've finally received my big package from Hobby Search for the end of July. All of these were released in July but I waited for all of them to be there first and combined into one shipping. I'm surprised they all fit into one box!
I picked up up the Goodsmile Company's Misaka Mikoto quite late actually. I ordered it just a couple of weeks before its release. I didn't know why I waited, really... The fan was also on a whim just because I liked To Aru Kagaku no Railgun a lot, but looking at it closely, it's not that great looking. At least it's small. I will post better pictures of the fan and the Mikoto figure at a later time.
I think Saber Alter was either released late June or delayed to early July. While everyone got theirs already, I didn't mind waiting as long as I can save money on shipping :P I think I'll do a group picture of all the Sabers again now that she's here.
Two K-ON Figmas and in numerical order! Pretty sure I'm going to have some fun with Mio's crying face and Mugi's yuri ecchi face for my 4koma. :D I ordered all five of the girls in Figma form, but not all the Nendoroids. Reason being that Nendoroids are more expensive and I sorta have more fun with the Figmas ^^;
And one more mysterious box... I was going to make a surprise post for this one this week. Unfortunately it didn't arrive safely. There's something broken when I opened it. I've send an email to Hobby Search, but they will be on holidays soon, so I won't get a response until at least Tuesday. T-T No fair! And so you'll have to be in the dark about it much more longer than I would've liked to keep you =P
If you're reading this at 10 AM on Friday, the seventh of May, that means I'm at the IMAX theatre watching Iron Man 2. When the first movie came out, it was a sure thing that I will watch it. The trailer just made it so damn cool and when I did see it, I regretted it... That I didn't watch it on the first day! I think it was even better than Dark Knight that came out in the same year, in my opinion :P
The horror! The horror!!! This is what happens when I'm trying to fit Drossel's pieces with Miku...
One of my favourite scenes was Tony Stark suiting up into the Iron Man armor. I remember Kodomut had Kagamiku suiting up as Drossel and that was before I thought about buying Drossel. I kept changing back and forth whether I want to get Drossel or not, but another post by Kodomut just confirmed my desire...
One of the deleted pictures from the video. I was intending to use this to armor up Miku's twin tails, but Miku end up blurry on Drossel's body, so I canceled this scene. It was an additional scene not in the original clip. Speaking of original clip...
The idea was similar, but since I don't have Kagamiku, I used the original Hatsune Miku instead. And instead of just pictures, I thought I'd do a stop motion movie featuring Hatsune Miku suiting up as Drossel!! But yea... I don't have time for that. So you get a slideshow instead :P
So yeah, somehow i managed to do most of this video in one night. I didn't edit a lot of the photos, so I apologize for some of the blurry pictures. I didn't feel like redoing some of those shots ^^;
Key, eat your heart out! This is Miku the Metal Idol!
I had lots of fun coming up with ideas to celebrate Iron Man 2's release in theatres this weekend (I noticed it was released first in Asia! Good news since they usually get their movies much, much later ^^). The picture above was one of them. I thought to myself... why stop there after making so much complications taking off Figma pieces here and there? Let's go make a 4koma too!
The Melancholy of Saber Lily Part 36
This was meant to be non-sequential except for the last two panels, but you can interpret it anyway you want. I was just having fun coming up with panels ^_^ In case you're looking for the references... The first panel refers to one of the earlier 4koma back in May of 2009! The last panel reference is not too far back from last week. You can read more at The Melancholy of Saber Lily site.
And yes, NenDorossel's twin tail fits into Nendo Miku's head! Kawaii ne?
Another deleted scene... This was a low-light photo anyway. It was meant to show up NenDorossel's shining eyes, but unfortunately I forgot to switch Miku's bodies with Drossel's...
Iron Miku in flight.
I'm surprised I finished this faster than I thought, but then again I wasn't doing any stop motion. I also just finished everything else after I went and see Video Games Live at Queen Elizabeth Theatre on Thursday night. That will be another post yet to come. It's been a very busy week for me ^^;
You can guess from the title and picture that this will be about the ending song from Durarara!! using Figma in the animation. Well you guessed right... Unless you guessed that I'm making a Saber Lily Can-can dance video, that is. Which I'm not.
But first let's get some things out of the way. Durarara!! is a new anime that started airing in January. I've only started watching it in the middle of February because of all the parody that has been made out of the ending animation. The anime is quite good actually. Different individuals with different background stories all live in the Ikebukuro district of Tokyo and somehow their lives are all connected in one way or another. The ending song, Trust Me, is done by Yuya Yamashita and a lot of parodies have been made out of this video.
So after seeing so many parodies on YouTube and NicoNicoDouga, I decided to make one of my own. Since I can't draw to save my life I use what I have available; my Figma (and one Revoltech). I needed 15 of them which I do have, but I decided to use one Revoltech because I wanted to use Rei and the Figma isn't out yet. Also, the purpose of making this video is to make a promo video for The Melancholy of Saber Lily comics, lol. So the characters that are in this video is either in the comics or will be there eventually.
Yes, I keep all my Figmas in their original boxes... Which was quite a hassle for this project. Anyway, enough talk... I'll show you the video first.
The Melancholy of Saber Lililily
I started this last Thursday and it took a few hours just to get all the characters off the original background. Taking the pictures took a couple of hours as well. And then I wanted to time the pictures to the song as well. Quite a pain, I tell you. I added the pictures in the beginning instead of the scenery ones in the original video. I also had to change Rei's hands position so it fits properly so that it looks like she's holding Ryomou's legs.
I used this Maria-sama ga Miteru parody art as a basis for my sizing and template for the pictures. I changed the colour a little bit in my version to fit Nanoha and Fate's colours ^^
This is an unused picture for Cute. She's one of the new Figmas that I have to open for this project. She'll be in the comics soon. I have quite the plan for her... Mwahahaha! Oh the MEIKO was supposed to be a size reference, but I didn't really use the reference point, lol.
Nanoha gave me the most trouble! First... I couldn't find her at all! I searched high and low and I decided to give up and created a new roster for the video. It would've worked too, but I think a lot of people made me look for it and I finally found it. Then when I started to pose her, her shoulder started to stiffen up... Seriously, what a pain. I took off her arm to "massage" the shoulder joint.
Another thing I have to add is that even though I thought about making this video on my own, there was already a Durarara video made with Figmas. Ah well... I made it according to my storylines, lol. But anyway, to be fair to MrKammy, here is his version:
Anyway that's it for me... I'm really tired and this project really wiped me out! "Trust Me!"
Can you believe I've been doing this 4koma comic series for a year now? Once again I started this out of wanting to do something fun and stupid with my special edition Figmas. I thought it'd be cool to have Saber Lily fighting an RPG-based warrior Haruhi. They had the appropriate gears and both have a sword. With more ideas and demands popping up, I couldn't resist creating more and more!
So this time, as you can see in the first picture, Drossel will appear in the pages of Melancholy of Saber Lily. I've been holding off on using Drossel because a lot of people were still using her and I didn't want to flood the internet with more of Drossel. I think I waited long enough to make Drossel stand out and for me to have an idea (and to actually execute it).
Yes, I realize it's a busy weekend, especially with what's going on in Vancouver. We have the Olympics starting, Valentine's Day and the Lunar New Year on Sunday. Yet, the most important for me in this weekend was to finish the first year anniversary post of The Melancholy of Saber Lily ^^;
It didn't help that my friend wanted to go see a new movie on Friday, the day of the Winter Olympic Opening Ceremony... He wanted to see "Percy Jackson and the Olympians" instead of the real Olympics. I ended up spending 4 hours away from doing these 4koma. It was surprisingly good though. Since it was based on a series of books for young teenagers, I expected it to be corny. It had a somewhat convenient and rushed ending, but the rest of it was good. ANYHOW... Rants aside, let's get to the comics!
Oh but first... I'll be having references to Drossel's original series, Fireball, so it might be good for you to see at least the first episode to get the gist of it.
The Melancholy of Saber Lily Part 33
(Virtual) Cookies to anyone who can guess the reference to the first two panels. I made these 4koma to look like the series, so I stole a few screenshots to get Gedächtnis in there ^^; I thought it might make the crossover between Haruhi and Drossel more believable. Yep, so a new crossover begins... But I honestly don't have a lot of ideas for this, so I may not go with it too far. It will have to go back and forth.
And it seems like I do have a regular schedule for my 4koma comics... Once a month, lol! I hope to do it more frequently, but if I get busy with other things, I just won't have time to make these...
The Melancholy of Saber Lily Part 34
Yeah, I like to play with Drossel's innocence just a little bit. I can at least keep it innocent for two panels, right? I'll recently read this volume of original English language manga drawn by Adam Warren that featured a superheroine who gets stuck in bondage a lot... So I thought I'd include some of that stuff with Saber Lily, lol!
This is the said "manga", though it's closer to comic book... Actually I don't know, it's quite a hybrid. It's drawn in manga style, but it's in a comic book format and it involves superheroes. Even the author was concerned about the hybrid because people who like manga doesn't like superheroes comic books and people who like superheroes comic books doesn't like manga. Me, I like both, so this was the ideal comic!
It didn't hurt that the comic had a lot of... mature situations, and the main character's costume tends to get ripped a lot (like Ikki Tousen). I've read volume 5 recently and wow... it was quite a tear-jerker. It even had some yuri moments in it. I might write about this comic/manga hybrid again one day. It's a great series for people who like both manga and superheroes.
But I digress... I didn't have time to work on a new banner for the comic site unfortunately... but you can visit The Melancholy of Saber Lily's site to read the previous installments and read it all without this nosy commentaries ^^;
Of course before I go, I can't leave you without the bigger version of Saber Lily bound and gagged, can I?
Gokigenyou! I can't believe I've been saying that for a year now! Yes, it has been a year since I started these yuri posts on my blog. Though it was never been a regular thing here, the Weekly Lily series that started at dannychoo.com and now figure.fm has been going on regularly without missing a beat, even if I've posted near midnight (PST) on Sunday. ^^;
I believe I haven't fully explained what yuri is when I started this, I had assume a lot of you know already and instead I just leave a quick link form Wikipedia to make the story short... But I should really fully explain it, from my point of view at least. Basically it's a genre in anime, manga & other media that involves a romantic relationship between two or more girls. Yuri can also be called shoujo-ai or girls love. In North America, the two terms indicate whether the story involves sexual relationship or not. Shoujo-ai is the more common stories that come out in North America and on Japanese television, such as Maria-sama ga Miteru (Maria Watches Over Us), Kashimashi and Strawberry Panic. A lot of what I post ranges from the innocent love of shoujo-ai to the most extreme yuri... However, to make it easier, I put everything into one easy category, "Yuri"; since it is the term more people are used to and it's shorter & easier to say.
Now "yuri" can also mean the flower "lily". So a lot of my own yuri 4koma comics have smatters of lilies in them. It's a great wordplay for other series too, such as Hidamari Sketch. So remember that yuri = lily ^^
For a while now I've always replaced a lot of the risque scenes with the infamous lily panels, but since this is a special occasion, I shall do something special...
The Melancholy of Saber Lily Part 31
If you've browsed my blog well enough I'm sure you've encounted Aldora... If you know her then you know why Saber Lily's got a shocked face in the end there ^^; All in all it was quite fun positioning Haruhi and Saber Lily in those compromising position... But sure was hard to put them in said positions... I was considering putting a transparent lily over these panels, like the first picture of this post, but I think it looks better this way. I asked a few people about the transparent lily on Twitter, but I think I didn't make it clear enough. Thanks for the opinion though! This is one of the only times I will do this, lol.
These two 4koma were actually something I came up real quick... Though perhaps this next one may have a lasting effect throughout the whole series...
The Melancholy of Saber Lily Part 32
Dun-dun-dunnnnn! Evil is afoot! Ok, I'm pretty sure a lot of you can guess who this is, lol. So we shall see where this takes us... A new storyline is born! Stay tuned!
After a convention there must be merchandise abound, right? This is pretty much everything. I spent quite a bit less than a month ago at AnimeBoston, so I practiced self-restraint. I also got a few things that I've wanted too out of it instead of impulsive purchases ^^;
But first... there's a pile of loot that I didn't take a picture of. It's a pile of SAM or Suddenly Acquired Manga. On the Thursday when we were lining up to pick up our badges, some of the staff were running trivia for people in the line. A lot of manga were given away that day. When the question came up, "Which 3 brothers who are voice actors are appearing at Anime Evolution 2009?" I knew the answer right away. There was only one other person besides me who raised his/her hand, but didn't know the answer. I knew it was the Dobson brothers, but I wasn't really enthusiastic about answering trivia really... It's just because I knew the answer. I did get it right but the person who was about to give me the manga asked for my ID first since it's for mature readers ^^; So what did I get?
The complete Basilisk series, volumes one through five. I didn't bring a camera, but as you've heard from my Anime Evolution post, Chun from DannyChoo.com was actually there and we were waiting in line together. She took these two pictures for me ^^
She commented on how lucky I am on giveaways, lol. These manga were big so I couldn't handle them properly ^^; And yes, I do look like Shirou from Fate/stay night... and that's the Excalibur shirt I'm wearing.
I didn't take an individual picture of the poster, so I'll describe it quickly. I won the poster of Cybersix from the Charity Auction on Saturday. I didn't get a chance to pick up the free copy they were giving out from the Cybersix 10th Anniversary panel, but at least this one is signed by the main character's voice, Cathy Weseluck, Andrew Francis and Brian Drummond. A bit pricey but it was for charity.
So here are some of the closeups of my purchases. I didn't really open anything yet, so box pictures will have to do for now.
Kotobukiya 1/7 Gothic Lolita Ayanami Rei (Crimson Version). I wasn't planning on buying any figures during this convention at all, but on the last day one booth had 50% off on whatever they have on some of their shelves... Well how can I resist? So I finally got this version of Rei for $35, half price from $70.
The other figure I got was this Ryomou Shimei figure in the nurse outfit. I've kinda wanted this for a while, but wasn't sure about the quality until I checked the back of the box... "Good Smile Company". GETTO! She's originally $50, so I got her for $25. Funny how the figures I got for 50% off have blue hair, eh? ^^;
Ok this Hatsune Miku figma wasn't really from the convention but it's somehow related. I got it from my comic shop. It was supposed to be saved for me but that was in April. They put it on their shelves since I haven't picked my comics in a while. At first I changed my mind about this figma, but I think I may have a potential for her. So when I saw her still on the shelf I picked it up since she is rare. I did pick this up before I picked up my convention badge, so it works out :P
One of the ones that I've wanted... the Revoltech Danboard. Unfortunately this is the mini version. Fortunately it's the Amazon version! It still lights up. I've given up on getting this until I saw Anthony Poon's review of it. Good thing I saw one at the convention. I picked up several things from the booth that was selling this too. They've come all the way from Halifax, Nova Scotia! They're online only usually so it was nice of BigPfeiffer.com to drop by at Anime Evolution ^_^ Also from the same booth are these Macross Frontier trading figures. At last I've finally got a Ranka figure that's doing the *kira* pose, even if it is small... There were two versions of this Ranka, but only the colour of the dress is different. Whereas the Sheryl Nome have two different heads and outfit... which is why I have two of Sheryl here ^^;
A couple of keychain/cell phone strap thingy? Saber Lily and shimpanchira Miku! Even if I don't attach these to anything I can still use them for figma pillows/cushion ^_^
This is the Ranka towel you saw from the group picture up there. It's not a big towel, but a good size for something like a poster. Not sure what all these other text are for ^^;
No-pan Ranka??
The vendor had all these towels shown above, but I couldn't resist the Ranka one!
Another good deal was this copy of Replicant, Winter 2009 issue. Saber Lily shows prominently ^^ I checked the original price tag which was $32, but I got it for $10!
Saber Lily, Distant Avalon poster inside... I might post this on my wall.
This issue of Replicant also have a calendar included. Nice bonus! This Asuka figure pictured is still my favourite Asuka figure... except it's a garage kit. I guess I'll just have to enjoy it in picture form. Kawaii, ne?
The calendar goes up to March 2010 with Saber as the last month. I have this thing about anime girls with toast or some kind of pastry in their mouth...
The two months that I missed since I bought this in June... I would love to have Komugi visible for a month or two ^_^
And this is the current two pages that the calendar is on... And I placed this calendar at my workplace......
Yay! Nyan-Type volume 1! Ever since Optic reviewed this magazine I just had to get it. I'm so glad I found it. It was listed for $17, but I got it for $5. Bonus!
This is the reason why I wanted this magazine... Will be using this as my door poster.
A cute poster of Kiss X Sis. Very naughty anime... anyone saw the second OVA yet?
I've been hearing about Sexy Voice and Robo for a while now... who was it that pointed it to me? Belgarion from DC.com, I think. I bought this for $10 and saw that the original retail price was $27.50. Got pretty good deals here. And lastly I ventured through the Artist Alley. I didn't get too much, but I found a few nice items. When I first saw these Gurren Lagann's Yoko and Nia cutouts they looked familiar. I kept walking and thought where did I see this kind of design. Then I realize it was from that smooooch･∀･ × VOCALOID video! So I went back and picked them up. The Ayanami Rei card is something I could not resist... And I love these two buttons. I finally have something with Meiko on it! Sheryl Nome in her concert outfit looks great too!
I really didn't want to spend too much at this convention, but I think the damage was somewhere in the $200 range. Good thing there weren't too many things I wanted... and there were many bootlegs as well; really prevented me from buying too much. Phew so now I'm free from another spree event... Time to pay the bills T-T
Uh-oh... somebody's pissed... Time to jet! See you next time folks! Gokigenyou!
After a convention there must be merchandise abound, right? This is pretty much everything. I spent quite a bit less than a month ago at AnimeBoston, so I practiced self-restraint. I also got a few things that I've wanted too out of it instead of impulsive purchases ^^;
The complete Basilisk series, volumes one through five. I didn't bring a camera, but as you've heard from my Anime Evolution post, Chun from DannyChoo.com was actually there and we were waiting in line together. She took these two pictures for me ^^
She commented on how lucky I am on giveaways, lol. These manga were big so I couldn't handle them properly ^^; And yes, I do look like Shirou from Fate/stay night... and that's the Excalibur shirt I'm wearing.
Kotobukiya 1/7 Gothic Lolita Ayanami Rei (Crimson Version). I wasn't planning on buying any figures during this convention at all, but on the last day one booth had 50% off on whatever they have on some of their shelves... Well how can I resist? So I finally got this version of Rei for $35, half price from $70.
The other figure I got was this Ryomou Shimei figure in the nurse outfit. I've kinda wanted this for a while, but wasn't sure about the quality until I checked the back of the box... "Good Smile Company". GETTO! She's originally $50, so I got her for $25. Funny how the figures I got for 50% off have blue hair, eh? ^^;
Ok this Hatsune Miku figma wasn't really from the convention but it's somehow related. I got it from my comic shop. It was supposed to be saved for me but that was in April. They put it on their shelves since I haven't picked my comics in a while. At first I changed my mind about this figma, but I think I may have a potential for her. So when I saw her still on the shelf I picked it up since she is rare. I did pick this up before I picked up my convention badge, so it works out :P
One of the ones that I've wanted... the Revoltech Danboard. Unfortunately this is the mini version. Fortunately it's the Amazon version! It still lights up. I've given up on getting this until I saw Anthony Poon's review of it. Good thing I saw one at the convention. I picked up several things from the booth that was selling this too. They've come all the way from Halifax, Nova Scotia! They're online only usually so it was nice of BigPfeiffer.com to drop by at Anime Evolution ^_^
Also from the same booth are these Macross Frontier trading figures. At last I've finally got a Ranka figure that's doing the *kira* pose, even if it is small... There were two versions of this Ranka, but only the colour of the dress is different. Whereas the Sheryl Nome have two different heads and outfit... which is why I have two of Sheryl here ^^;
A couple of keychain/cell phone strap thingy? Saber Lily and shimpanchira Miku! Even if I don't attach these to anything I can still use them for figma pillows/cushion ^_^
This is the Ranka towel you saw from the group picture up there. It's not a big towel, but a good size for something like a poster. Not sure what all these other text are for ^^;
No-pan Ranka??
The vendor had all these towels shown above, but I couldn't resist the Ranka one!
Another good deal was this copy of Replicant, Winter 2009 issue. Saber Lily shows prominently ^^ I checked the original price tag which was $32, but I got it for $10!
Saber Lily, Distant Avalon poster inside... I might post this on my wall.
This issue of Replicant also have a calendar included. Nice bonus! This Asuka figure pictured is still my favourite Asuka figure... except it's a garage kit. I guess I'll just have to enjoy it in picture form. Kawaii, ne?
The calendar goes up to March 2010 with Saber as the last month. I have this thing about anime girls with toast or some kind of pastry in their mouth...
The two months that I missed since I bought this in June... I would love to have Komugi visible for a month or two ^_^
And this is the current two pages that the calendar is on... And I placed this calendar at my workplace......
Yay! Nyan-Type volume 1! Ever since Optic reviewed this magazine I just had to get it. I'm so glad I found it. It was listed for $17, but I got it for $5. Bonus!
This is the reason why I wanted this magazine... Will be using this as my door poster.
A cute poster of Kiss X Sis. Very naughty anime... anyone saw the second OVA yet?
I've been hearing about Sexy Voice and Robo for a while now... who was it that pointed it to me? Belgarion from DC.com, I think. I bought this for $10 and saw that the original retail price was $27.50. Got pretty good deals here.
And lastly I ventured through the Artist Alley. I didn't get too much, but I found a few nice items. When I first saw these Gurren Lagann's Yoko and Nia cutouts they looked familiar. I kept walking and thought where did I see this kind of design. Then I realize it was from that smooooch･∀･ × VOCALOID video! So I went back and picked them up. The Ayanami Rei card is something I could not resist... And I love these two buttons. I finally have something with Meiko on it! Sheryl Nome in her concert outfit looks great too!