If any of you guys living in Melbourne have a few hours to spare, I recommend spending them at Game On!. Unlike many gaming conventions I’ve been to, this has the largest range of games on offer to play. Ranging from the original Pong to some of the latest games, including those with “future technology”.

And since it’s at Fed Square, if you go now you can always hop over to Moomba as well

I hope everyone has had a great Chinese New Year, whether you celebrate or not Since most of my relatives do not live in Australia I don’t get to celebrate very often, but this year I was invited to the Chinese New Year party at Louis Vuitton, which was a lot of fun! Photos below:

In cosplay news, I had originally planned to do quite a number of costumes this year, but due to semi-sudden obligations I may have to reduce the number extensively. But hopefully the costumes I do have in mind will be worth the wait

And with my piano, I’ve decided to officially postpone my AmusA exam indefinately. I’m sure I will do it eventually, but with eveything going on, it isn’t a priority anymore. But I will still be in training to do more performances instead, so hopefully I can get a recording or something similar so I can finally let you all listen to my pieces Oh and keep an eye out, I will be selling off all my manga, DVDs and merchandise soon and will give you guys the chance to get first pick!

Happy New Year! Here are some photos of Melbourne’s fireworks last night Photos taken by the very talented Toby, his photography skills just keep getting better each time *_*

P.S: Happy 8th Birthday to SuzakuNU!! ^_^

Despite the extra odds mounted against me, through sheer luck and help from Toby I managed to get Xiaoyu Ling to a reasonable level. Reasonable enough to wear, for it to be recognisable, but not reasonable enough for me to do a photo shoot with yet. I still need to redo the hair and wrist bands (I threw together some quick ones for the day), add the shoulder feathers, add the extra designs to the back and shorts and finish adding trim to the shoes. Once I’ve done all that, I will definitely be having a proper photo shoot at a far more appropriate location than Egames hehe. But here’s a preview shot for you guys anyways Don’t know if anyone notices the difference in quality with this photo since it’s small, but there is a huge difference now that Toby is using his own DSLR camera, which is just full of awesome!

As for Egames Expo, not as great as last year I reckon. There were more games to play, but you just couldn’t play anything without standing around for a good 30mins to 1 hr and I feel a lot of the stuff was very “beginner” gamer, stuff any gamer would know On the plus side, Toby was featured in an interview about MMORPGs that will/was on radio and will be featured online! And I got approached by a couple of models helping advertise some of the games, asking me to contact them about some modelling opportunities. I’m no model, but if what they meant was more along the lines of, model cosplay for advertising or something, that would be all kinds of awesome! Will have to look more into it Awesome!

Back from Armageddon! Can’t say I had the best time but it sure was interesting As you can see the costume I made was Eureka from Eureka Seven! No real photos yet, I’m really not that happy with the costume >_< I lost my wig cap so I went without it, terrible mistake! And the side box on her left leg kept slipping off that I eventually took it off all together~ I think the only thing I actually liked were my shoes! They were actually old black shoes to begin with, but with a lot of luck I was able to turn them into white boots!

Not to worry tho, I intend to fix everything up, and do a proper photoshoot on a much sunnier day with Toby’s new SLR camera

But no time for that yet, starting my Egames Expo costume tomorrow since it’s a little more complex and I don’t want to take any last minute short cuts, which is what I always do, which leads to a lot of simple mistakes @_@

Lol, the convention centre car park was full, so I had to park at Crown. Silly me didn’t bring a coat, so I had to walk through Crown wearing my Eureka costume. Oh the stares and comments ahaha, all good though! Nothing negative Aside from that I had a good day, I even bought a Family Guy show bag! XD

Me (as Mint) – *stares*

Sonic – *stares*

Me – DDD!!!

Sonic – *walks over, pats Flipper on the head and touches ears*

Me – *_______* *reaches up to touch Sonic’s ears*

Sonic – *walks off to take photos with other screaming gamers*

Me – *explodes*

Kidding! Though I was more like, “Sonic touched my ears!! I’ll never wash these ears again!!! *____*”. Argh, too bad we forgot to bring a camera in otherwise I would have taken a photo with Sonic ;_; When I heard there would be a Sonic mascot there I was all excited, and then when I actually saw him I crawled into a corner because I was SOOOO shy and nervous! Eventually I just stood there with puppy eyes and Sonic noticed me D And I could to touch his ears XDD

For those who don’t know, Sonic has been my No.1 favourite gaming character, was also the first ever console game I played back when I was like 8 or something. I LOVE him, and HATE Mario ever since I saw an image of mario pan-frying poor Sonic! ;_; Death to you Mario, Love for Sonic!! I met Sonic, my gaming life is happy!!! Yayayay~

XD Back to normal, I’ll write a real report over at Extreme Motion later, since we weren’t allow cameras IN the gaming area (despite almost everyone bringing them) I don’t have photos ;_; Though I did do a quick shoot of my Mint costume outside the MEC which I’ll upload later

Anyone else going to EGE this year? Come to think of it, I don’t have many online gaming friends to begin with o_o;

Anyways, I’ll probably be there with some friends and family My other cousin (who is the most obsessed gamer I know) is coming to visit us, and his visit just so happens to land during EGE! I reckon Nils might be there since he’s the top student in his degree and our Uni is advertising the degree, so maybe? But let me know if you’re coming ^_^

Yay! More things to look forward to, I can’t wait to finish Uni! *dances*

Yeah, I’ve been slow with photos and such this year! I’m usually really fast, but you know~ Extreme Motion has been updated with all the photos Toby took at Manifest 2006 (minus a few more I still haven’t had time to re-size etc). Also I managed to create two new-ish costumes!

and

Kozue is brand new, and Mint is a remake of the old~ I’m really happy with how Mint turned out, especially when compared to the old! As for Kozue, I wish I had choosen better fabric for the pants, too many wrinkles in it :/ And the wig after three dye jobs still didn’t hold it’s colour well! Something I’ll have to keep working on when I have time.

PS: sunseenli! You are more than welcome to use my Kozue images for your website if you like I’m not at home at the moment so I can’t email them to you Email me if you have any questions! *^^*

I think this is something all photographers, especially those in the cosplay world should keep in mind! When you ask a cosplayer if you can take her photo, and she/he tells you “Can you give me a second? I’m on the phone at the moment”. Then DON’T for freakin sake take a photo of her while she’s talking on the phone and trying to organise other things.

I told the guy NO, and he still went and took one (this was on Sunday btw, after all Friday’s thing and Saturday’s drama), after ALL the crap that went on the previous two days I couldn’t help it and yelled, “Dude! I WAS ON THE PHONE”, and couldn’t stop cursing with my friend after that >_< How is it that this year out of all years I’ve come across so many rude people? Why!? Is it just me!?!?

Oh, and I’m so annoyed at all the photographers who wouldn’t even give me a chance to pose! Seriously, I’m putting my bag down, I doubt that means I’m ready to have my photo taken. Oh, what about those photographers who don’t even ask? I’m standing there, holding everyone’s bags because they are in the bathroom and photographers will just hop alot, look at me *SNAP* their camera and walk off. Err… what!? Thanks for asking, giving me time to pose, and generally being so rude to the point I wonder whether you’be ever heard of “manners”?

Omogosh, seriously, I will snap at people next year if this sort of thing happens again. I’m So Tired Of It All! (And it doesn’t help that Uni, work and my grad job are putting tons of pressure on me >_<)

Setsuna, you wanna know why I looked so stressed? Because I have met so many rude and inconsiderate people this weekend I’m tempted to bring massive weapons next year to beat the crap out of them T______________T Attending Manifest this year, BAD MEDICINE!

After a lot of thought, I’ve decided to completely tone down the costumes I had in mind for Manifest this year. Though I think only 4-5 people had any idea as to what I was planning anyways.

The original plan was to do three completely new costumes for this year, with some relatively complex props. But ever since I received my graduate offer, I’ve had to reconsider how I would be finishing out the year. My contract will dissolve if I do not perform relatively well this semester at Uni. As a result, I want Uni to be my only concern till graduation. Cutting back on work is not an option, not just because of the money but I learn so much from work alone in regards to IT, it would just be silly to give it up. Piano can’t go either, since my AMusA exam is mid next year. So cosplay needs to suffer a big cut back.

And by cut back, I hoping I will still be able to manage maybe two very simple costumes, but worse comes to worse I can always just wear some of my old costumes. (Or… *gasp* not wear a costume at all?) I’m terribly sorry if I’ve let anyone down by this decision, but I promise to completely make it up next year ^_~ I’ve already planned the three costumes for myself next year, none I would consider simple at all Plus 2-3 more for some cosplay-keen friends!

To be honest it saddens me just a little that I can’t create all the costumes I had in mind, but I know this is the right decision for me Hehe, this year at Manifest instead of being so cosplay focused I can instead spend it taking loads of photos, and be in complete awe of my fellow cosplaying friends since I already know most of them have some very impress costumes lined up this year! =D

Hehe, final note! I sent off my contract yesterday~ So now all I need to do is put 110% of my effort into finishing Uni off ^_^