Please Vote Me! / Äänestä Mua, Jooko?

I got into the finals in the cosplay competition, I'm so proud! My feet are hurting after standing for hours in the stiletto heels and I think I have a bruise on my shoulder from the huge pauldron I wore, but I'm happy I did so well for my first cosplay contest ever :)

If you wish, you can vote for me! The winner of the competition is chosen based on votes, so I really need you help here! The voting is in Finnish behind this link. If you don't speak Finnish but would like to vote, just check the box of the costume you want to vote for. The first free non-mandatory field is for telling why you chose just that costume, but that can be left empty. The next two (Vastaajan nimi) ask for your first (Etunimi) and last name (Sukunimi), and the last field is for your email address (Vastaajan sähköpostiosoite).

Photo by Emilia Lahtinen (official picture from the contest)

Sama suomeksi! Eka cosplaykisani ikinä meni ihan loistavasti, erityisesti ottaen huomioon että se oli ensimmäinen kisani ja ensimmäinen cosplaypukuni koskaan :) Nyt on jalat kipeet korkokengistä ja olkapäässä mustelma jättiläisolkasuojasta, mutta oon tosi onnellinen ja ylpeä. Kisan voittaja valitaan äänestyksellä, joten jos haluat, voit auttaa tätä Demon Hunteria kohti voittoa! Tässä linkki Aamulehden äänestykseen, äänestäjienkin kesken arvotaan leffalippupalkintoja, eli voit itsekin voittaa :)

The Game

As some of my readers may know, I work as a game designer. I wanted to write a short post on the subject, because the latest project I have been working on has done super well and received lots of attention. If games are not your thing, just skip to the next post!

I'm the lead designer of Cities: Skylines, a brand new city builder game that just came out a few weeks ago. Things have been hectic the last days: the game came out, suddenly sold 250k copies during the first 24 hours and is still the third most sold game on Steam. Journalist have been calling, emailing and visiting the office, and the game's forums have been filled with excited players. Global game media writes articles and most of the reviews have been positive.

Making games is team work, and our whole team is extremely happy about how the game has been received! Due to the amount of articles, you might come across my face somewhere around the internet, but yes it is really me ;D

I've been working as a game designer for over four years now, but never on a game that has done so well. I love my work and am really exited that players have received the game so well and have a good time with it. It's been crazy and I still have a gazillion things to do, interviews and other publicity things and just plain old design work. So if it takes a while for me to answer comments, don't worry, I'm still here, just busy!

So all in all: Skylines is doing great and I'm deeply involved with it!

Demon Hunter!

Here's a progress picture of a tired but happy Demon Hunter! My smaller pauldron still doesn't sit like it should, but I'll try to fix that tomorrow or just roll with it. And the bigger one digs to my shoulder but that's life. One of the thigh pieces still needs some adjusting to the straps. Everything else looks good to me and I still have one evening to do emergency repairs!

If you see me at Tampere Kuplii come to say hi, but please come very close, the hood is made of such thick faux leather that I can mostly hear sounds that come from the front side ;P Cosplay sure is tricky!

This baby took 23 days (mostly full working days and weekends with photoshoots and other events), 3 XL sheets of Worbla, a pile of craft foam, 50 x 150 cm of faux leather, an old bedsheet, a red scarf, lots of heat gun work and soldering iron smoothing, black gesso, silver paint and wire from a coat hanger. Modified items and accessories are a pair of brown thigh high boots, a brown leather corset, black wig and two toy guns. This is the first cosplay costume I've ever made and my first time working with Worbla, aside from making a crown and two headbands.

Wish me luck for Saturday's cosplay contest!

Queen of Darkness New Collection!

Queen of Darkness just sent me a few pictures of their new collection that went live on Monday. I wanted to share a few of my favourites with you, I think they did a great job with choosing models that are edgy and work well for alternative styles, and the clothes are gorgeous, as always!

First up is the minidress decorated with zippers. Simple cut but the zipper details add just the right kind of roughness and edge! You can find the dress here.

I have a special place in my heart/wardrobe for boleros. This one is made of lace and has a little stand-up collar, which gives it a great silhouette. I think my lace tattoo would super cool with this one! Here's a link to the bolero.

My other half absolutely needs this. He's more muscular than the model in the picture and I think the vest will look even better on him! The vest has just the right amount of details, not too much to look costume-y, but enough to keep it interesting. You can find the vest here.

I like Queen of Darkness' style in general, the clothing generally has a neat, simple silhouette with some edgy details. The pieces are easy to wear as everyday wear, but there are some that are very flamboyant and great for clubbing. The everyday items are too club-worthy when combined with something flashier, so they double as work wear and club wear for me.

Dress by Rogue

I have a games gala coming up, and last year I was super late in getting a dress and ended up going in a two-euro flea market dress. Which was fine and looked good on me, but just didn't feel luxurious! So this year I'm getting everything done early and asked if Tiina from Rogue would have the time to sew me a dress. We sat down to discuss it and came up fast with a design that we both liked, so the project was on.

The finished dress is designed to be worn together with the Moth necklace, has pleated detail panel in the front, tiny sleeves, is fitted and made of plum purple cotton mix. It's just what I wanted and will definitely see a lot of formal events in the future! It does show off my tattoo (sorry Mom) but still leaves room for the necklace to shine and could be worn with other necklaces too, or large earrings. All sorts of heels work and lace pantyhose doesn't look too busy with it, because the pleated detail in only in the top part of the dress. Thank you Tiina for making my dream dress come true :)

Dragon Lady Look

Here's what I did for the shoot with Sanni Saarenmaa. She suggested a red theme and some scales, so red scales it was! The black wig works very well with reds and my flowered horn headdress happened to be red also, so it was a perfect match.

My camera battery was running out and I was in a hurry to catch a bus, so there's only a few snaps. The eyes actually have both Asylum by Sugarpill and Candy Coated by Fyrinnae, and a touch of matte black to darken the crease. The scales are done with Candy Coated (and by pulling a fish net stocking over my head, then patting shadow on). The lips are a combination of a bright red lipstain, which was too bright for my taste, and Sephora metallic brown-red lipstain on top to mute the bright shade.

I applied black contact lenses later to complete the look, and during the photoshoot we added more scales to get them show better. You can see the first finished picture here.

Snow Queen, Second Try

In January I showed you my first try at Snow Queen make-up. It was pretty close to what I wanted, but not exactly. For the photoshoot with the finished outfit I did a second version of the look.

I used the same eyeshadows, but placed the outer wing higher up, used darker silver liner for brows (thank you Nina for bringing it for me all the way from Paris!) and different lashes. My main gripe with the first version were the lashes, but also the low wing made my eyes look a bit tired. For lips I decided to go for pink after browsing some inspiration pictures. The silver lips are cool, but take up too much attention. Light pink is natural and lets the eye make-up get the spotlight. I applied blush heavily to have a little frost bitten look and to have some more colour on the face.

There's also more white dots and I found my dotting tool so there are two sizes and they look very neat. I did some white markings because I felt like it, I think they work nicely! To compare, here's the first try:

First version

First version

 I'm very pleased with the shades, they make me think of ice and northern lights, just the type of elements this look should have! The little dots work nicely to add some crisp details and the lashes are a thousand times better than the ones I used for the first try.

I have no finished pictures yet, but you can see some behind the scenes snaps of the photoshoot here.

Upcoming Events!

Are you in Tampere or nearby? Here's a few things you might be interested in!

First there's the club Bella Morte. This time we have not one, not two but three bands playing, so prepare for an awesome night of dancing and good music! For more information, see Club Bella Morte Machineries of Joy Facebook event. I'm DJ'ing, but the night is mostly about live music :)

And to prepare for the night you can go shopping for new clothes, shoes and other gothy things! In the same venue, ravintola Laterna, but earlier in the day we have a gothic flea market event. I'm running this circus and so far things look really good. There's plenty of people coming and currently all of the tables for sellers are reserved. You can still get on the list to get a table in case someone cancels. For details, see the Facebook event.

This is the first live flea market event for Goottikirppis, which operates on Facebook, but we admins are interested in organizing more events if it seems to draw in many people and work well.

Other things to do are Tampere Kuplii comic convention on 25.-29.3. I'm participating in the cosplay competition on the 28th (if I just get my costume done, wish me luck! I did finish the breast plate yesterday) but there's lots of interesting things happening at the convention on all days.

The Forests of Nokia

Here's the first finished picture from last Saturday's photoshoot with Sanni Saarenmaa. She does awesome fairytale-like pictures, so I contacted her in December to ask if she would like to shoot with me when my scale mail corset was done. We were immediately on the same page, scale mail, horns and fantasy make-up are things we both enjoy!

I'm wearing a black, long wig, black contacts, a flower headdress with horns, the scale mail corset and the matching necklace I made. Sanni had the idea of making scales on my face by using fishnet stockings and padding eyeshadow on top, which fit the theme perfectly! She brought a bucketful of fake flowers to use as props and I came with ten meters of red tulle. That's all the makings for a great photoshoot ;D

I'm thrilled with the picture, it's just the type of fantasy-fairytale style I love by Sanni, and all the elements go together perfectly.

Photo: Sanni Saarenmaa Photography

Model, make-up, styling: Me

Demon Hunter Armor Progress

I've been spending all my free time lately by working on my cosplay costume for the Tampere Kuplii competition at the end of the month. I chose to attend as female Demon Hunter from Diablo 3, partly because I love the game and have been playing the character ever since the game came out, and partly because I'm a crazy person for thinking that an armor project would be a nice way to learn how to work with Worbla. It's so much work! But I think I'm doing well, I've got all the base pieces and they just need to be decorated, primed and painted. And I need to sew a hood and a cloak, but those are super easy.

This is how things are looking! I'm super proud of the huge pauldron, I think it came out great!

Shiniest Pants Ever

I just got the first finished picture from last Sunday's photoshoot with Leena, she's super fast at editing! We made a great team and got lots of usable pictures in just half an hour. The location was an old factory that will soon be demolished. And my pants are the shiniest ever, just look at them. Look at the shiny pants. Shiny!

Photo by Leena Flinck Photography

Model, hair and styling: Me

Outfit of the Day

This is me trying out the Juunappa pants last week! I'm wearing an asymmetric peplum top I bought from H&M recently and a Queen of Darkness bolero which is one of my favourites. The boots are from Stockholm. An easy look for a day at the office, nothing too special!

Schatten Look

This look was done for the Club Schatten Reunion party which was super fun! I really like how the look came out :)

I used:

Sugarpill Tako (matte white, inner corners and brow bones)

Sugarpill Darling (shimmery turquoise, inner part of the lid)

Femme Fatale Deepmoss (shimmery moss green, on outer part of the lid)

Sugarpill Stella (black with tons of microglitter, in the crease and on lower lid)

Red Cherry false lashes

IsaDora Volume & Curl mascara in black

Moth Jewellery Available!

And they are out! Visit Rogue's store to take a look at the finished pieces (necklace and earrings) :) If you wish to order, use the form on the page.

To shop via Etsy, here are the Yöperhonen necklace and the Yöperhonen earrings! The price is the same no matter where you buy. A necklace OR a pair of earrings is 42 euros plus shipping. For example, shipping to the UK is 3,30 euros, so that shouldn't set you back too much. The jewellery comes packed in silk paper, in a sturdy cardboard box, with a pretty label on top (hand-placed by me ;P). You can use the box to store the jewellery to avoid scratches and dust.

If you live in Tampere or near to it, you can also buy the jewellery directly from Ateljeekatu in Kehräsaari.

Now, I'm off to do a photoshoot with the scale mail corset. So excited!

Jewellery Teaser!

The laser cut jewellery finally arrived so me and Tiina posed for some awesome pictures that can be used for the listings. My other half took pictures, he's so skilled!

Tiina is wearing the Moth necklace and I have the Moth earrings on. The earrings are quite big, but very light!

This one turned out gorgeous! The goth staple Ikea frame was a perfect prop, being black, shiny
and made of plastic.

I curled my hair for a photographer taking pictures for a local newspaper writing an article on the game I designed. Luckily I had also arranged to meet with Tiina and we turned the meeting into a photoshoot when the jewellery suddenly arrived yesterday! Two shoots with one hairdo, I call that a great success ;D

Sugarpill Look

Here's a look I did with Sugarpill shadows for the photoshoot last Saturday! I've been meaning to try the Sparkle Baby palette together with Cold Chemistry, but now finally got the chance.

Subterranean and Elemental Chaos are from the Cold Chemistry palette, Hotsy Totsy and Frostine from the Sparkle Baby palette.

Hotsy Totsy is a bright pink, used on the lid. Elemental Chaos is a metallic purple, which I used to make the wing. There's a touch of Soot & Stars, a shimmery black, in the crease. The lower lid is done with Subterranean, a super awesome metallic green/teal. There's a touch of Frostine, a matte lavender, in the inner corner.

Lips are Raven by Top Shop and brows are done with Obsession by Aromaleigh, a matte pink that's darker than Hotsy Totsy.

Moth Necklace

I'm super excited for the jewellery collaboration with Rogue! I've been wearing a prototype necklace to see how it performs, and worked on boxes the jewellery will be sold in.

The prototype is a little bit smaller than what the finished pieces will be. We wanted to have nice packaging,
so the necklaces and earring come in black, sturdy cardboard boxes with a velvet cushion inside and
a nice label on the lid. I personally keep the necklace in the box, like I do with other jewellery that comes
with something to store it in.

Labels being carefully glued on boxes. I put the boxes back into plastic bags they came in
to keep the labels pristine.

The label has the word "moth" in Finnish also. The Finnish version is monster: "yöperhonen" ;D
The literal translation would be "night butterfly".

Here's a snap of me wearing the prototype and a dressing gown ;D I was doing my
make-up for a photoshoot.

Necklace in action.

And a close-up!

I can't wait for my pair of earrings that will match the necklace. They have the same moth design, but the triangle is pointing up, and they are smaller than the necklace so that they are not so heavy.