Fables in Fashion

For Supanova this year my original intentions was to actually cosplay Stitch from Lilo & Stitch, with Sefie as my Lilo. However a few weeks before the con the lovely Jess & Tess contacted me asking if I could be Snow White for their disGlee group. Given that I already have a Snow White costume, this wasn’t a difficult decision to make, especially since work as usual was picking up and demanding some stressful long hours of me

Turns out it was the perfect decision because we had such a blast on the day, and I met some of the most amazing people ever!

Whilst rehearsing our skit in the exhibitor car park we were approached by Simon Pegg and Nick Frost for photographs. Sadly I have to admit I didn’t know who they were at the time, but the rest of the girls seemed to because they were screaming the minute they saw them! I will upload images as soon as I have them <3

After that, the Herald Sun asked if we would consider chasing Captain Jack Sparrow for a photo, which was a no brainer We ended up appearing both on the Herald Sun's printed newspaper and online website!

And yet despite all this, my favourite and most cherish memory of the day is just meeting so many lovely new cosplayers, both local and interstate. Cosplay is such a unique hobby, and it’s even harder finding friends who are as committed as I am to it, so I want to give thanks to Tess and Jess (who btw will be representing Australia in the World Cosplay Summit this year!!) for bringing us all together~

You can watch our skit here if you are interested~

To the disGlee girls, thanks so much for the lovely day! I hope we can do many more cosplays together and am looking forward to our official photo shoot <3

2011 has been a surprisingly amazing year for me in terms of print media, and to be honest, ask me this a year ago and I would have never ever dreamed that anyone would ever want me to appear in any print media. I’m nobody! The experience has really been a dream come true, and with all the recently media publications, I couldn’t feel more blessed and honoured.

After my appearance in The Age, I was contacted by RMIT to do some promotional shots for their Japanese Exhibition to appear on their website and on Melbourne Metro’s MX newspaper (which finishes up on the 17th of March, entry is free so be sure to check it out if you have the time!!).

Check out the title placement, my friends had a good laugh over that!

They specifically requested for my Hikaru costume, and of course I couldn’t say no! It makes me insanely happy to know that the hours of intense labour and pain that went into creating my Hikaru costume is in a way really paying off! (Even though just the creation of the costume and shooting with my friends alone is payment enough and always has been~ This extra stuff is just cake.)

The MX newspaper is distributed within the Melbourne CBD only, which is where my day job (for the most part) is, and whilst I’ve never sought for approval from my co-workers, it was amazing to learn that the great majority of them are so supportive of my crazy costuming life~ (there are always bad eggs in every basket). I feel so blessed for the incredibly opportunities I’ve been given, I am truly a very lucky person <3 Thank you so much to RMIT and MX for the opportunity!

Two weeks ago Illamasqua kindly invited the MBBE girls and I to come along and celebrate the opening of the Chadstone counter whilst also getting ourselves made over! The night was a fantastic opportunity to spend time with the girls whom I’ve grown very close to, these girls get me when it comes to makeup Not surprisingly! I thought I’d share some photos

The girls (and guy) listening to Daniel speaking

Illamasqua’s Makeup Amnesty! Graveyard of makeup!

Daniel about to make over the lovely Mel.

Violet getting her make over!

I’ve never seen Violet so scary before :_:

I look so tiny ahaha, why wasn’t I born with longer legs!?

This is our serious face, though I can tell Stef is struggling just a bit ;D

Happy face! Maddy, Val, Jess, Violet, me and Stef <3

Special thanks to Jimmy America for the last three photos Click here to see many more photos taken by the talented Jimmy.

Overall fantastic night even though I didn’t get a makeover this time, I’m sure there will be plenty of opportunities in the future Thanks so much to Christabel for the invite <3

Last week I posted about being featured in The Summer Age where I did my best to represent the hobby of cosplay I had been asked earlier to come in for a quick photo shoot!

Thankfully work kindly gave me the morning off and Surfaced was lovely to come and support me and take a bunch of behind the scene photos~ Apologises for the poor quality, we were using my old crappy but highly portable point and shoot

You can see how dark and tight the studio was this time! Which shows you that just cause a photo looks glamourous and amazing, doesn’t mean that’s what it really looks like “behind the scenes” And omg, I know I look like a midget in these photos! I swear I’m not~ I know like…. 3 other people who are shorter than me, seriously!

_{I saw these guys outside bathing / playing…. if you know me, you know I love to watch birds}

It happened again and I couldn’t believe how lucky and fortunate I was! This time I felt so much more prepared as I had a costume I truly felt proud of to show off (I was Xiao Qiao from Dynasty Warriors 6) I was recently interviewed and did a photo shoot for a small article on cosplay for The Summer Age (a Melbourne newspaper). After the interview I did for The Age last time, I didn’t think an opportunity like this would come around again so I was absolutely thrilled when it did.

My article was finally published last Saturday and I wanted to share some scans with my readers, especially those who don’t live in Melbourne and were keen to read the article. Be warned, they misspelt my name Which seems to happen a lot! Always Celine, not Celina~

Click the image above for a much larger version that should be readable

I even got them to mention Fables in the article Which I’m extremely happy about since I’ve found it is pretty hard to get any sort of blog publicity in print (even if it’s only a tiny mention hehe). I will be posting about the behind the scenes shoot for this article next week

So if you follow photography in the cosplay scene, or you read the Digital Photography School then you may have heard of my friend Neil Creek~ A talented photographer who I first met many years ago at Manifest (I forget which year).

Neil is honestly one of the hardest working and most passionate people I’ve ever met, we recently did a shoot (I’ll post photos soon!) and to see him in action made me respect his work all the more. He really went all out to ensure the models were comfortable, and was incredibly professional and warm This guy works hard for and deserves every cent he gets, a rare thing today!

So when he asked whether he could feature me on the cover of his second book, how could I say no!?

If you have an invested interest in photography, then I’d recommend checking out both of Neil’s books. Not only are his books informative, but if you need additional support, via email or twitter he is very approachable and always willing to answer anyone’s questions regarding photography!

I know that every time I do have a question, both he and Elias are my go to photographers and I can see the sheer passion for photography each time I talk to them. (How motivating is it to be surrounded with positive and passionate people?) Not only that, but as friends, these two are always encouraging me to pursue new heights Thank you for the constant support <3

Check out Neil's new book at Digital Photography School, I’ve already had a quick read through and it’s a very useful book! They have an early bird special running at the moment where you get 25% off too!

Last Sunday the MBBE crew and I were invited to attend a bloggers event to celebrate the opening of Illamasqua‘s new counter opening at Myer Melbourne I’ve seen reviews here and there regarding the Illamasqua brand from UK and Aussie bloggers, but have never personally tried out the products for myself till that Sunday.

We all started the day together with Yum Cha, and Christabel from Illamasqua was our special guest of honour After quickly dropping by Mecca Maxima it was off to the new Illamasqua counter, and it was one seriously impressive counter~

And behind the counters hid five gorgeous mannequins, drinks, lollies and goodie bags galore!

Each blogger was given a quick make over or in my case a colour match Check out Celeste‘s look!

I also ninja-ed one of Violet getting her makeup done >:D

Illamasqua was kind enough to give each blogger a tube of lipstick and a medium pencil, which I will be putting to go use soon! I couldn’t help myself and bought a new foundation and quad cream eyeshadow, which I am sure will come in handy for future Book of Fables chapters.

All in all, it was a wonderful day, though any days with my MBBE girl is sure to be a great one!