The behind the scenes from this Xi'an photo shoot are finally organized! Let's start by sharing a few raw, unedited photos to give everyone a look at the authentic state. We prepared two completely different stylistic looks for this session: one is a deep blue-toned classical dress, and the other is an elaborate white lace Lolita.
Let's talk about the blue-toned look first. The main body of the costume features a velvety texture, embedded with massive amounts of silver-white floral embroidery, showcasing exquisite detail. To match this outfit, I chose a highly translucent pair of colored contacts sharing the model "Galaxy Bagel"—once worn, they not only make the eyes look bright and expressive, but also exude a watery luster under cool lighting. The wig is straight black hair paired with blunt bangs; due to the heavy volume, combing and styling took a considerable amount of time before the shoot. To guarantee raw photo quality, I specifically wore a blue floral headpiece with beaded tassels. The flower-adorned prop in my hand actually carries some weight, requiring me to maintain posture while managing facial expressions simultaneously. Set against a black bamboo screen and tatami flooring, the overall lighting leaned towards cool white; the pose of lifting the skirt hem while holding floral branches possessed fantastic chiaroscuro texture under rim lighting.
The other two sets are in the white Lolita style, shifting the entire aura instantly upon putting them on. This dress features excessive lace—the layered ruffles and oversized puff sleeves are gorgeous, but genuinely stuffy to wear. Especially the wide-brimmed lace hat; while its sun-shading efficacy is stellar, it places heavy pressure on the neck. To match this elegant vintage ambiance, I switched to black wavy curls, holding a bouquet containing roses, green foliage, and oranges. The set here shifted to warm-yellow antique furniture, with soft warm lighting forming a sharp contrast against the previous cool tones.
Mentioning sharing unedited raw photos, the goal is precisely to display straight-out-of-camera conditions. As many cosplay enthusiasts know, early-stage makeup styling and pre-shoot communication with the photographer are crucial. Because both costumes in this shoot were quite complex, getting dressed and organized required assistance from my assistant. The set design at the Xi'an venue was exceptionally solid; whether the screens or vintage wooden cabinets, it significantly reduced the burden of post-processing.
When shooting the white dress set, to display the layering of the skirt, the photographer had me sit on a chair or lean sideways—postures that perfectly reveal the dress's silhouette. In fact, skin texture and eye expressions are clear right from the raw files, where the blending degree of the colored contacts played a decisive role. Regarding common questions from beginners about wig and colored contacts sharing and wearing, my advice is to keep the base makeup as clean and translucent as possible to highlight the lens color, make sure to tuck natural hair securely into a hairnet before putting on the wig, and trim the bangs length between eyebrows and eyes to ensure facial contour dimension from any shooting angle. Although this dual-style attempt involved some exhausting moments, seeing the lighting effects and costume details rendered in the raw photos made all the preliminary preparation completely worthwhile.