Yet another impulse buy. Shops seriously need to stop selling stuff at half price.
So here, we have another magical girl to complement the previous (and superior) one. As one can infer from the title, she’s Hiiragi Chihaya. Apparently, Chihaya comes from the anime (and OVA/eroge), Magical Canan. Given that it’s from around 2004 (I started getting into fansubs around 2005~2006), I know nothing of the show except from what’s on Wikipedia; therefore, I can judge the figure based solely on its own, which I shall do after the jump.
First thing you’ll notice is that she’s on one leg tilted at around 15 degrees with most of her weight on the other side. Obviously not good. However, she came with her foot screwed into the base, so that will hopefully prevent any leaning.
Next is her pose – an energetic one fitting for a young girl like her. The face, while not too impressive, displays a huge smile. Her outfit, that of a magical girl, is, well, kinda normal looking, though I guess it’s not really the sculptor’s, nor MaxFactory’s fault. The hat, paired with her ahoge, and the aura of energy she exudes, makes her quite a cute girl to look at.
Now onto the technical stuff. While the screw will probably prevent leaning, I’m still not 100% sure as to how well it does so. It seems that no one else’s complained about screwed figures losing to gravity though, so I’ll assume that it will all be well and good.
In regards to paint, while pretty much everything was nicely and neatly done, there is a distinct lack of shading in a number of parts, such as the hair and skirt. While they look good enough, I cannot help but feel that MaxFac could’ve done better.
Finally, seamlines. Lots and lots of seamlines. On the arms, on the legs (particularly the socks), one or two on the shoes, and so on. Not noticeable enough from a bit of a distance (around 2 feet), but still irksome nonetheless.
Obligatory panty shot – it’s printed too. You can also see her bra if you looked up her uniform, but it was too tough to get a picture of it.
She also comes with a uh… something. Probably a familiar/mascot or whatever. I don’t really like it though.
All in all, however, she has good value for money (in my case at least – she cost me less than the equivalent of about 18 USD), an above-average sculpt, and a decent paint job. Worth getting, but only if she’s on sale.
On the shoot: This time, I used the same cabinet, but with a diffuser (many thanks to super rats for that tutorial from eons ago), which resulted in the softer lighting; therefore, less shadows, better light. Finally got to making custom actions for color correction, so it takes me just about half a minute per picture – not bad, for a huge improvement in colors. I played around with the saturation for some shots too (forgot which) with a simple S-curve in the curves adjustment layer, though it didn’t really make any difference. Any other suggestions as to what I can do asides from adding watermarks (which I should get to doing)?
Oh yes, and before I forget, here’s a .TIF of the first picture with the background removed. Go crazy or something.
Life in Quadrant 4 
You get figurines of characters you don’t know XD? Well, it was cheap I suppose.
nice buy for $18. I like her pose and that mascot is cute 😀
Nice picture.
Great deal on the figure too!!!
I hope your figure doesn’t break. It feels that one leg can’t support a whole figure.
Impulse buys are always cool…too bad around where I live impulse buys on anime girl figures isn’t possible. Glad that old tutorial helped out.