Monthly Archives: June 2013

Dakimakura Review – Momoka from Suteki na Imouto (NSFW)

Momoka dakimakura from Evening Call

It’s dakimakura cover show-and-tell time. This particular pillowcase comes from Evening Call and is part of their “Puredise” line, which I think is their series of dakimakura covers featuring original characters. The girl presented here is Momoka and she’s listed as coming from “Suteki na Imouto,” which means something like “Wonderful Little Sister.” The artist goes by the name Chikura; I don’t know if he (I’m assuming it’s a he) has a website, and his Pixiv site is sparsely-populated. I wasn’t at all familiar with the artist before seeing his work here, but it didn’t take too long for me to decide I liked the art on this pillowcase.
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Shot Breakdown – Tomo Asama

It’s been a while since I’ve done one of these. That’s partly due to me not being satisfied with a lot of my photos, and it’s also because I’ve used a lot of the same techniques over and over and I didn’t think the shoots were interesting enough to write about. However, I used a new set for Tomo Asama and I figure that even a basic setup can be interesting to talk about. Here’s how I shot Tomo.
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Nymph from Sora no Otoshimono (Swimsuit Version)

Nymph swimsuit figure by Plum

In anime, certain physical attributes are frequently associated with particular character archetypes. Female American characters are often blonde, blue-eyed and buxom; quiet or smart characters often wear eyeglasses (or in Rei Ayanami’s case, have an attachment to spectacles). Another common juxtaposition involves the loli tsundere personality type. Being a loli implies certain physical qualities, of course: it necessitates short stature and an undeveloped chest, for a certainty, but many such characters also wear twintails, to the point that if I see any loli-looking character with twintails, I usually assume that she is a tsundere type. (Though I would have been better served had I made that presumption while watching Date-A-Live’s first episode, whose cheerful, frisky little sister character swiftly turned into a repugnant, poisonous little bitch.)

Sora no Otoshimono’s Nymph checks all those marks, but this particular figure breaks from orthodoxy in an unusual manner: loli characters are generally not known for the magnitude of their backsides but this figure gives Nymph a sizeable ass. It’s an unusual decision, one that doesn’t really respect the usual forms, but regardless, it looks great.
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Kuroko Shirai from A Certain Scientific Railgun (Bunny Version)

Kuroko Shirai figure by FREEing

Last time, we looked at some monstrously large breasts; today, we’ll flip it one hundred and eighty degrees and look at a far more modest rack. However, while the previous character exemplified purity, grace, and tact, Kuroko Shirai embodies … well, none of those things.
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Tomo Asama from Horizon in the Middle of Nowhere

Tomo Asama figure by Max Factory

Over a year after Horizon on the Middle of Nowhere (or Horizon in the Middle of Nowhere, if you prefer the more-grammatically-correct American title) concluded its two-season run, figures have been slow to trickle out. The few that are available have come from a variety of manufacturers; Wave has released a few figures in its Beach Queens series, as well as an anomalous figure of lead girl Horizon Ariadust, which we looked at a while back. Alter, as is their wont, is going with a minor character in an action pose. (I previously expressed some trepidation regarding the figure’s price tag and size but lately I’ve been thinking she’d look pretty cool battling my Yamato 1/48-scale VF-1 Valkyries, and that could also make for some pretty cool photo ops.) Volks’s figures show a lot of promise but nothing yet substantive. Kotobukiya has a few in the pipeline, including an action-oriented one of Tomo Asama, who is who we’re looking at here. This figure, by Max Factory, is decidedly not action-oriented; instead, it is pretty obvious what attributes they wished to emphasize.
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