[Kumiko Omae Cosplay] Kitauji High School Daily Life: Setting Off with Asuka-senpai

This set of photos has finally been fully edited. Preparation before the shoot took quite some time, mainly because I wanted to find a location that carried both everyday realism and the tailored crispness of a sailor uniform for this season. The outfit today is Kitauji High School's summer uniform—a white top trimmed with blue stripes paired with a pleated skirt. It looks simple at first glance, but the tailoring is actually quite unforgiving; in particular, the blue stripes along the collar and cuffs had to remain crisp and structured to evoke that authentic campus aura.

Cosplaying Kumiko Omae this time, I deliberately picked the look with red-framed glasses, and managing the long straight black hair took considerable effort—especially the bangs, which needed to flow with the breeze to achieve a natural, airy volume. My partner's Asuka sported reddish-brown wavy short hair, a style that can easily look frizzy in the wind without a bit of styling pomade. The two chest bows—one dark blue and the other light pink—formed a well-considered color contrast, demanding precise attention to detail.

The suitcase and the euphonium were truly the soul props of these photos. Only after cradling that heavy euphonium in my arms while posing did I realize how demanding things are for everyone in the concert band club—it is genuinely hard physical work. Because the suitcase was relatively large and we wanted to convey the feeling of strolling down the road pulling luggage, we chose a quiet stretch of asphalt road backed by blue skies, white clouds, and wild grass, deeply evoking that sensation of youth stepping forward into the world.

The sunlight was blazing during the shoot, so we found shaded spots for close-up portraits. In particular, the head-pat gesture in the third frame took multiple angles to capture that natural, gentle warmth. Pairing black Stockings and over-the-knee socks was also deliberately matched to the outfits; to flatter leg lines, plenty of body language was guided throughout—such as how to arrange our legs when sitting side-by-side on the stone ground without looking stiff, while minding the pleated drape of the skirts so the garments never appeared messy. In the standing shot, the handle height and standing angles were finely adjusted so the suitcase wouldn't obscure too much of the body.

During color grading, I deliberately cooled down the overall palette slightly to accentuate the blue sky and water surface, lending the frames a stronger Japanese cinematic feel. This outdoor shoot was undeniably exhausting—walking under the sun for hours while hauling that bulky case—but seeing the final 2D-inspired frames made every bit of effort feel worthwhile. Throughout the shoot, we kept tuning our emotions, thinking about how to convey that subtle distance and emotional bond between senpai and kouhai through camera language. Delivering such a clean, refreshing photo set feels like the finest tribute to this beloved Sound! Euphonium cosplay.