Totally Minnie

The 4th challenge in Instagram's Next Top BJD was Disney themed - we had to choose a character and put together an outfit inspired by it! You might already guess from the title which character I chose for Carmen ;D Yup, Minnie Mouse! This might seem like a bit surprising choice since Minnie is a pretty cute character and Carmen is more of a badass (or at least she likes to think so...), but Carmen also loves pin-up style and I thought that a red polkadot dress would fit the style perfectly~ At first I was tempted to go for something more dramatic (like Once Upon A Time inspired Evil Queen), but then again, I wanted to stay true to Carmen's character and think of something that she would actually wear and be able to use more than once. She'd ditch the ears though, unless it was a Halloween party or something XD

Unfortunately we were eliminated this round and didn't make it through to the finals. But I'm not sad or anything, just glad that I got even this far (top 30) and it was a really fun experience :) Sarg's Terra is in the Final 10, so let's cheer for her in the last challenge! ♥ Terra was channeling Hades in this challenge and ended up being the winner~ I helped Sarg by sewing the basic dress and she accessorized it :)

Previous challenges:
#1 A pop of color
#2 Day & Night
#3 Jungle

The dress and jewelry are made by me~ I also made the bow and ears, Sarg made sure that I don't ruin the whole thing and helped me by gluing them to the hairband base XD As a funny fact: the hem of that dress actually ate 5 meters of lace...

I submitted this photo to the challenge. It was my favorite pose from these shots - a bit flirty and playful, just like Minnie XD 

Now that the contest is over for me, I'll try to take photos of my other big BJDs for change XD Though I'm also hoping to take a photoshoot of Carmen with her husband ♥ I have many sewing ideas for my dolls too and hopefully I'll have the time to work on them little by little~

In the jungle

The third challenge of Instagram's Next Top BJD is now over! I was quite worried about this challenge, but looks like the judges liked Carmen enough to let her through to the next round ^^ There are only 34 contestants remaining, 11 were eliminated this round. The competition is definitely getting tougher!

The theme for this challenge was "Jungle"- we had to create an outfit that our doll would wear for a jungle adventure! I found this challenge to be the most difficult one so far, since Carmen is a city girl to the bone and it's so hard to think of her in the jungle XD She hates bugs, would never wear cargo pants or other non-feminine clothes, and would probably die out there without her makeup and hair care products... But I had to come up with something. I think this contest is such a great inspiration and gets us to use our imagination to the fullest! I decided to go the Lara Croft route, since I thought it would suit Carmen's character best. Who knows, maybe she'll even go on an adventure with her husband now, dressed like this XD

Previous challenges:
#1 A pop of color
#2 Day & Night

This was my photo for the challenge. It was a bit windy and Carmen's hair was all over the place most of the time, but I managed to get one shot where her hair was flowing quite nicely! At first I only took full-body shots, but in the end I decided to go with this half-body photo since I wasn't completely happy with the shoes XD

I don't have any combat boots or similar shoes for my Iple girls, so finding shoes to match this outfit was the hardest thing. I actually borrowed these from Sarg, hahah XD

The next challenge's theme is "Disney" and I'm super excited about it! XD I've already picked out the character inspiration for Carmen's outfit and I think I also have the needed materials for making it. I'm not going to reveal the character yet, but the outfit is going to be something that fits Carmen's own style so she can wear it outside the contest challenge as well!

From day to night

The results for the second challenge of Instagram's Next Top BJD have been announced and Carmen made it through to the next round~ ^3^ There are currently 70 contestants remaining, I think about 20 were eliminated this round.

The theme for this challenge was "Day & Night", we were supposed to put together two outfits: one for day-time work and one for a party in the evening. There had to be at least one same piece of clothing in both outfits, while the other clothes and accessories changed. I loved this challenge, though it was definitely challenging as well! The hardest part was trying to stay true to Carmen's character and coming up with outfits that she would actually wear.

On another note, in these photos Carmen is wearing her new wig that I got in the mail just a few days before taking the photos for the challenge. This is finally the right wig for her, the one that I'm 100% happy with! I had been having some bonding issues with Carmen due to the lack of a perfect wig, but now she's looking just the way I've always wanted and that makes me super happy! ♥

There are three things that remain the same in her day and night outfits: the white tank top, necklace and handbag. In this day outfit she's also wearing a pair of denim shorts, matching denim shoes and a simple black blouse. The wrist clock was shamelessly stolen borrowed from Sarg's Eemil :'D As Carmen works in an office, I tried to create an office-like environment with the few SD sized furniture that we have... In our story Xymox offices are definitely much more stylish than this, but oh well XD

Oh and it just occurred to me as I'm writing this post that I should've replaced that Apple logo on the laptop with a Xymox logo, it would've been such a nice little detail D:

As for the night look, unfortunately I only have this one photo ^^; The leather on the jacket is so thick and stiff that she can't really bend her arms much, which makes it harder to pose her and that didn't inspire me to take more photos of this outfit... I tried to make it look like she's walking in a night club or something, not sure if I succeeded at that at all hahah XD I'm happy with the outfit itself though!

The next challenge is already up and this time it's jungle-themed! I honestly have no idea what to do for that challenge yet, but hopefully I'll figure out something~ The deadline for submitting the challenge photo is May 15th, so there's still a lot of time to think :)

She will be loved

Carmen is currently participating in a light-hearted BJD fashion contest, Instagram's Next Top BJD :D It was not hard for me to choose which one of my dolls to enter as most of my dolls have their own specific styles and color themes, but Carmen can wear multiple different styles and colors.

The first challenge was "Neutral plus a pop of color", so basically an outfit consisting of a neutral-colored piece and something colorful. I had just finished sewing simple nightwear for Carmen and thought that the colors fit the theme quite nicely ^^

Besides taking one photo for the challenge, I took some other photos just for fun to have a complete photoshoot for this blog :3 I'm having so much fun with the contest so far, this challenge gave me so much inspiration and I'm sure the future challenges will do just the same!

Unexpected admirer

In my previous post I was talking about taking some BJD photos during the weekend, but I was occupied with other things and didn't have the time for photography in the end u_u However, I did manage to snag a few photos on Monday, when I got home from school a bit earlier than expected... Thanks to the teacher that didn't arrive for our last class of the day after we'd waited for him for over 20 minutes ^^;

First I was just planning to take portraits of Carmen (Iplehouse EID Doria), but then I got the idea of a cute series of photos featuring one of Sarg's dolls, Ronya (Iplehouse EID Rebecca)! These two have quite an interesting background... Carmen is happily married with her husband Kenzo and Rony is in a relationship as well, but for some reason she can't stop thinking about Carmen and is obsessed with her, even in a bit unhealthy way ^^;; Rony tends to stalk Carmen and collect any stuff she leaves behind, like used napkins or a lipstick she may have dropped. At home she has this scary-looking little shrine for her "Carmen collection" XD All this might sound like straight from a horror story, but Rony is actually not evil or anything, just a little bit weird and hard to understand... Once you get past her creepiness, you'll find out that she's actually a very good friend :) She doesn't want anything bad to happen to Carmen, she's sort of like a guardian angel... With a twist, hahah :'D

Oh and yes, Rony is a she X''D

*thumbs up* Mission completed! ♥ (Carmen doesn't seem to appreciate though XD)

Also, here are the portrait shots that I took of Carmen!

I've been wanting to do more tattoos on Carmen... She has a full sleeve on her right arm, but I'd love her to have even more ^^;; Maybe on her stomach and/or chest? I need to come up with some ideas for pictures that would suit her character~

On another note, I've changed the colors of the blog layout (background and navigation bar) a little bit, since I was getting bored with the blue. Hope these new purple/pink-ish shades look okay on everyone's screen and are not too bright or anything :3

Sewing update!

I've been sewing a lot during this week!
First, I made a bunch of simple shirts for Sarg's EID girls :3 At first I thought that Carmen wouldn't be too happy about modelling these since none of these are really her style, but looks like I could put anything on her and she still looks good :'D She's definitely one of my most photogenic dolls, I don't think I've ever managed to get a bad photo of her...

I kinda fell in love with that first fabric though... I think I need to make something for Carmen from it, maybe a tight sport bra thing or something like that! The second fabric is really nice too ;___;

Little Chici got a new casual outfit as well, hahah look at that attitude~ "We small ones can pose like models too!" XDD The visible stitches on the shirt are all over the place, but at least the sewing machine didn't eat the whole damn thing, it's sooo tiny XD I'd love to make some long-sleeves for Chici as well, but her winged arms make it quite challenging... I guess I just need to make huge sleeves or something XD But next I definitely want to make a her a cute dress!