Geeky Diaries: Toy Photography 2018

I haven’t showcased my Toy Photography portfolio in a very very long time. Truth of the matter is…well… I haven’t bought many toys or figurines in a while. Instead I’ve been busy going to events, pole dancing and socialising. Is this a sign that I’m growing up?!

Anyway.. I’m going to put THAT scary thought out of my mind because even though I haven’t bought any recently, I have tons and tons and TONS of figurines I still haven’t opened from the past two years. The Toy Photography portfolio of 2018 is off to a solid start with these first batch of images I took of a figurine I bought during my trip to Tokyo.

I’m willing to admit to being a little mainstream and confess that I have no idea who this character is or what anime she is from, or even if she is from an anime. I found her on one of my little shopping spree in Akihabara and I fell in love with her colours. She was also cheap, tiny and she could fit in my rucksack.

At this point my suitcase was already full of crap (that I still haven’t opened, it’s been nearly a year since I went there) but I wanted to bring home a figurine. Any figurine. This was the only one which didn’t tale up much space.

I decided to take the images outdoors and have some fun with them. It’s been such a long time since I’ve done any Toy Photography that I knew I would be slightly out of practice, so I wasn’t expected to take any masterpieces this time round.

The lighting wasn’t great and the sun was dead against us (always take outdoor images with a cloudy skyline) but it was fun to take photos again. I was trying to have this Kawaii-pastel feel to the images. The figurines itself is super kawaii enough but not as pastelesque as I would like.

Final Critique: Not bad for someone who hasn’t done this properly in months. Snaps to you Rhian!! You can only get better from here.

 

Geeky Diaries: My Living Dead Dolls Haul

It’s been so so soooo long since I’ve taken any images of my geek collection and figures but Monday I picked up my camera and decided to take some snaps of some of the geeky collectibles I have that you haven’t seen yet.

At the beginning of the year my goal was to become a Toy Photographer but I felt I was putting too much pressure on myself to take snaps and also collecting toys gets really really expensive. So I’ve decided to keep it as a hobby. On Monday I had a lot of fun taking these images without having to worry if they were good enough for the portfolio or not. It also put me in the mood to do some more unboxing images too which I will get on to soon!!

Even though I am not a die-hard fan I can see the appeal of Living Dead Dolls. Living Dead Dolls is a line of horror dolls first produced as handmades in 1998 in the United States by Ed Long and Damien Glonek, and commercially manufactured by Mezco Toyzsince 2001. Living Dead Dolls are ten inches tall, made of plastic, with fabric clothing, and come packed in coffin-shaped boxes with death certificates.

Each doll has a different cause of death, which is usually described in doggerel verse on the certificate.^[2] While the dolls are occasionally inspired by real people such as Lizzie Borden, they are described explicitly as dolls, not representations of actual dead children, and are aimed at an adult audience aged upwards of 15 years. I found two in my local comic book store that I couldn’t wait to buy!! They complimented each other well in terms of colourand they suited my aesthetic.

 

Little Bo Creep
‘Little Bo Creep devoured her sheep
And licked all of their bones clean
Because of this task, she was fitted with a mask
To keep her from dining on lamb cuisine.’

This was the first Living Dead Doll I bought out of the two I got and I fell in love with her little curls and her scary pink eyes!! She suited baby pink gothic aesthetic that I was really digging at the time. When I bought her I was loving my pastel pinks but still loving my black. She also had the exact same hair I had when I was much much younger. I still get natural ringlets but not to this degree anymore.

Little Bo Creep is part Living Dead Dolls Scary Tales Series, Volume Five. Other characters in the series include Little Miss Muffet. Bo Creep’s mask is also removable but I prefer to keep it on. She has this cute Hannibal Lecter vibe going for her!!

Milu
‘ Milu is the Goddess who ruled
over the land of the dead.
The face of this Polynesian diety
is hidden by the mask on her head’

I fell in love with her colour!! It’s such a vibrant lime/yellow (depending on your perspective). She comes from the region of Hawaii and she’s based on the legend of Lua-o-Milu which is the Land of the Dead. She also has the largest mask out of any of the masked dolls in the Living Dead Dolls franchise. I haven’t put the mask on her and I’m not going to either. I have taken her hair down though and popped her little flower further up her head. She is soo cool and I love her eyes too!!

Characteristics include punishing the souls of the wicked by feeding them to flies and beetles (lovely) then devouring them after cooking them in her eternally burning oven. Sounds like my kind of gal. She’s part of a series of demon dolls from around the world. Other dolls include Hopping Vampire (China), Banshee (Ireland), Spring Heeled Chicken (England) and Mephistopheles (Germany).

Will I purchase more?
No. I do not want anymore I’m not going to start collecting any time soon. I really wanted these two. I got these two and I am happy. None of other Living Dead Dolls have really caught my attention but you never know maybe in a years time I might add another one, but they’ll have to be outstanding!!

You can purchase Living Dead Dolls here

London Comic Con 2017

On the 28th of October I headed all the way to London to attend MCM London Comic Con and had an amazing time!! This year it was even bigger and better than ever!!! The attendance was huge and cosplaying was second to none!!

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Rick and Morty Cosplay
Last year Deadpool dominated the cosplay scene but this year it was all about our favourite Grandpa/Grandson duo. There was even a pickle rick in the crowd as well as Bird Person!! We also spotted a few Mario and Luigi’s as well as my favourite Gintoki Sakata. Of course there were many other characters but to many for me to name or remember.

Comics
I also went over to the comic section to have a look what artists had their work on display. I didn’t purchase any but I did spot a few Cardiff artists which was seriously cool!! It’s nice to see welsh artists touring the UK with their work. There were many genres on hand ranging from LGBT comic to horror and to the downright weird. All artwork was exceptional though!!

Food
The food, as always was top notch!!! You could get Chicken Karage, Pumpkin Katsu, Chicken Katsu Curry, Marshmallow and Chocolate, Hotdogs the list of food goes on and on!!!Many of the stalls were selling food products from Japan and decided to purchase Kit Kats. Flavours included Almond, Sake, Sweet Potato and Apple as well as Wasabi (it’s grim). When I was out in Tokyo I bought soo many different flavours and now I’ve run out so I needed to taste them again!!

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Stalls
Stalls ranged from Independent retails and designers to big companies such as CEX and Maoam sweets. You could purachse a range of items from full on figurines to Dakimakura’s (there was a Harley Quinn Dakimakura that I regret not purchasing) as well as plushies. Funko Pop had their own stall in the Comic Con which looked amazing. I was on a budget on this trip to I dared not venture!

What did I purchase
I purchasd a harness from the independent boutique 8th Sin. That’s right I went to the geekiest event in the UK and instead of purchasing badass figurines or plushies or anything geek related I came back with S&M gear and Kit Kats. To be honest we do not have any room in our tiny little bedroom to cater more figurines and also we have soo many figurines we haven’t unboxed yet, maybe it was the wisest decision not to purchase any more for a while!!

Toy Photography: Metatron

Puzzle & Dragons
Puzzle & Dragons  is a puzzle video game with role-playing and strategy elements, developed by GungHo Online Entertainment for the iOS, Android, and Kindle Fire platforms.

Puzzle & Dragons is a match-three puzzle game, requiring players to move and match colored orbs arranged in a grid. The amount and type of matches determine which of the six monsters on the player’s team attack the waves of enemy monsters and how much damage they do. An additional layer of challenge is the acquisition, selection, and improvement of a team of monsters from among thousands ranging from standard fantasy fare, to deities from several religions and mythologies and characters from popular entertainment franchises.

Puzzle & Dragons X  is a spinoff of the mobile game Puzzle & Dragons for the Nintendo 3DS by GungHo Online Entertainment. It was released in two versions simultaneously on July 28, 2016, named the Gods Chapter and the Dragons Chapter. An anime adaptation by the studio Pierrot began airing on July 4, 2016.

Metatron
Archangel Metatron is one of the characters from Puzzle and Dragons X. She is the keeper of the sacred texts. Yes, that’s right she represents a biblical character and even I thought ‘I wonder how my Christian friends would feel about her outfit.

The Figurine
I fell in love with this figurine the moment I set eyes upon it. I’ll be honest when I say I didn’t know where this character originated from, we just fell in love with it’s colour and detail.

The wings look absolutely amazing and so much detail has gone into them. I adore her outfit too and black compliments the pink quite nicely and I love that they used the sacred texts too to complete the overall look of the figurine.

She proved to be a slight pain to put together because her wings were quite stiff and the poles are a bit wonky but after a while she balances quite steadily.

The Photography
I haven’t done much Toy Photography for a while and it clearly shows in these images. This is not my best work and I’m slightly disappointed with myself. I do love I managed to get the background pink but I was definitely in a rush to take them.

I’m definitely going to do another shoot with this figurine since she is soo pretty! I feel like I was forcing myself to take these images because I haven’t been in the mood recently to do any Toy Photography. However I shouldn’t have forced myself since you shouldn’t force creativity in the first place. Hopefully I’ll start taking more Toy Photography soon.

You can buy Metatron here

 

‘Get Even’ Press Event + Review

 

Formats: Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC
Publisher: Bandai Namco
Developer: The Farm 51
Release Date: 23rd June 2017

Last week I was very very lucky to be invited to the ‘Get Even’ press event in London Pinewood Studios. Get Even is a first-person perspective thriller video game developed by the Polish studio The Farm 51 and published by Bandai Namco Entertainment.

The game centres around Mr Black,  an ice-cold mercenary and hired gun who awakes in a mysterious old asylum with no memory of his past. Under the guidance of his anonymous captor, ‘Red’, Black embarks on a form of treatment, facilitated by a unique technology – a headset that allows the user to relive their memories and experience them again in the present. And so Black tries to remember. With the help of the ‘Pandora’ headset, he travels into the depths of his own mind to explore the truth behind the only thing he can remember: the rescue attempt of a teenage girl with a bomb strapped to her chest.

During the event we had many speakers including Olivier Deriviere who was the games composer and writers Iain Sharkey and Stephen Long, whose have previously worked with the likes of Derren Brown.

‘Get Even’ is highly influenced by such films as Memento, Oldboy, Saw and Inception and once you start playing the game you can see these influences clearly!!! The music sound exactly as if it came out of Oldboy and it’s absolutely beautiful!! Deriviere states that the some of the music is based on real time and reality, in other words it’s based in within the world for example in the basement the music is composed by the sounds you hear such as a ticking clock which of course adds to the tension to the game. Then it’ll be joined by a pipes leaking and it’ll sync with that of the ticking clock and so on and so forth. They’ve added incredible detail to the audio play and it applies to every level. The music adds so much so the story and sets the tone for each level. They went above and beyond in terms of music for this game and it stands out amongst the crowd.

They were all brutally honest when talking about the game when it was in it’s early development. Deriviere said the vision was difficult to share at the beginning and the were slightly lost a year ago. He also went on to say that as a game is grounded to our own reality and their main focus was on experience rather than gameplay;

“As a gamer I’m happy, as a creative I’m thrilled” – Oliver Deriviere

When talking about the game itself he gave us a little snippet about certain situations and that the game, well, doesn’t help you at all!! He said you’ll have situations where you won’t know what to do and guess what…there is no one and nothing to help you and that to me, it’s pretty awesome!! So as an example you might find yourself in a room with another character, there is nothing to tell you whether to shoot them so it’s all up to you!! But be warned even though you have freedom to do whatever you want, it’ll have some consequence!!

‘Kitchen Sink Science Fiction Mind Fuck’ – this was one of the descriptions made of the game by writers Iain Sharkey and Stephen. They explained some of the main themes of the game are loss, grief and regret which plays heavily on some of the levels I saw. They told us your playing within Mr Blacks memory and sometimes that memory can change. Everything about the game is deep and multilayered. They also noted that even though many people believe it to be horror game – it’s not, and once you start playing it you realise it certainly isn’t.

One thing I gathered myself during the press event was that this was definitely a passion project. Everyone seemed so proud to be part of the game and to be part of the team. They spoke of the game with such excitement and enthusiasm that I honestly couldn’t wait to play it myself!!

 

The Game Itself
The game itself is exciting!! It’s an edge-of-your-seat psychological thriller and one hell of a ride. Piecing together the events are all part of the fun and there is something for everyone to enjoy. I love how much focus there is on the plot which makes the game enjoyable for those who just want to observe rather than play it themselves.
It’s a very clever game, very well thought out and I can see why it must have taken some for it to finish.
I do recommend this game even for those who are weak to the horror genre. It’s fun with full of twists and turns. For a single shooter game this tops it’s piers!!