Serah Farron Cosplay Tutorial (Manifest 2012)

For Manifest this year I cosplayed as Serah Farron from Final Fantasy XIII

See the rest of my photos here!

When I was searching for a blog post or Youtube video to help me create the costume, I couldn't find a complete video/post on how to do it. I found bits and pieces but I had to search for each thing separately, so what I hope to do is help anyone who wants to cosplay as Serah with a complete guide, or even just give some inspiration :)

Picture from the day:

The first thing I did was print out a full picture of Serah and the inspiration for each part of her costume and create a plan to follow when deciding how to create each part of the costume.

Wig

I bought my wig from ebay, it didn't take too long to be shipped to me and was a reasonable price ($29 AUD). The colour is pink and looks pale pink in sunlight but because it has orangey-pink highlights in it, it can look orangey inside with a flash.

Bought from here~

I changed the hair tie from a white one to a black one and tied on some beads with cotton. The only problem with this wig is I had to trim the fringe and back, but apart from that it was great.

Contacts

I bought my contacts online from Shoppingnspree, they arrived pretty quickly and are at a really good price ($6.50 USD per contact) and only cost about $2.50 to ship to Australia.

The ones I bought were CM904 Magic 3 Tone Blue, link here~

This was the first time I had ever bought and worn contacts so if you're like me please read this:

I didn't look after my contacts properly and on the day they burned my eyes so badly, they kept making my eyes water like crazy and they hurt so bad I couldn't wear them for the rest of the day. (I had them on for 2 hrs max). It felt like my costume was ruined.. but IN NO WAY DO I BLAME THE SITE!

 I was stupid and I didn't change the solution every day and I'm nearly 100% sure I went past the expiry date  of the contact solution. So if you haven't used contacts before learn from my mistakes, because unfortunately I had to learn the hard way.

Contact case I used; link here~ ($1.75AUD)

Make-Up

For make-up I followed Michelle Phan's 'Serah Final Fantasy XIII-2 Makeup Inspired Tutorial' 

I didn't follow it 100% I used it more of a close guide and tweaked it in a way that suited me, so I'll go through how I achieved Serah's look inspired by Michelle Phan.

Face

1. Put contacts in

2. BB cream (I used Garnier)

3. Concealer (I used Maybelline Dream Matte Mousse)

4. Powder to set (I used Nude By Nature mix of medium and light)

5. Use BB cream, concealer and powder to lighten your eyebrows

Eyebrows

6. Use a pink blush on your eyebrows to make them the same colour as the wig (I used Australias)

Eyeshadow

7. Use a primer on your eyelids (I used Australias)

8. Chic by Chelle pallette (CBCP): shimmery peach all over lids

9. CBCP: taupe above lids/in crease and bring out to sides, also line lower lash line

10. Use a vanilla colour to highlight inner corners and brow bone

Eyeliner

11. Use a black liquid or gel liner ( I used lancome Artliner) to line thin inner to thick outer with a slight wing

12. Use a black pencil or crayon eyeliner to line the other 3rd of your lower lash line (I used a Maybelline 

one)

Eyelashes

13. Curl lashes and apply mascara (I used Lancome Hypnose Dolly Eyes)

14. Apply fake eyelashes - I only applied top lashes, but apply bottom ones if you want to (I used The Face Shop #09 on the day, (picture below) but in these photos I used a thick criss-cross eyelash like this 

15. Fix your eyeliner and put mascara on lower lashes

Highlight and Contour

16. Use a silver eyeliner in the inner corners of the eye ( I used and Essence one)

17. Contour sides of nose and cheeks if you want to

18. Apply a pink blush to your cheeks

19. Highlight cheekbones, nose bridge and cupids bow with a shimmery white eyeshadow

Lips

20. Apply a pink lipstick to your lips (I used Rimmel no.12 'Guest List')

21. Apply a lipgloss (I used Rimmel Royal Gloss in 121 'Yummy')

Jewelry 

Earrings: Bought from here, these ones are out of stock now but if you search sliver cat earrings on Ebay or  Amazon, you can easily find a cheap pair. The reason I got earrings different to Serah's is because replicas are so expensive and I'm only going to wear them once. But if you search Serah Farron earrings on ebay or Etsy, you can find some. And the reason they look different to the ones in the link is because they broke before posting so the seller sent me this pair as well.

Necklace: I actually made this one and it wasn't that difficult, I'm not a good jewelry maker at all so this is actually all secured with cotton and it wasn't expensive. For the swirly bit I used an earring. If you want to buy a replica, Etsy has some nice ones.

Bracelet: I also made this one myself, and it was also inexpensive. I would explain how to do it, but I don't remember.. what I do remember is that there was alot of knots tied and the beads were tied on with cotton, which is a bad idea btw as my red bead fell off. Tip: if your beads arent the right colour, paint them with nail polish!

Armband: I cut 4 x 60cm pieces of cotton ribbon/string, tied them together at the top and braided a 4-strand braid, then tied it at the end, I then cut off 3 pieces at each end leaving one at each end to tie around my atm. Remember you might need a longer or shorter piece depending on how big your arms are. If you don't know how to 4-strand braid, click here.

Top

For the white shirt I bought a white work shirt, cut the sleeves off, changed the area where the buttons are to diagonal, changed the buttons to black buttons and added the see-through material to the bottom front part. I advise to not hem the edges unless you are pro at sewing, because it's folding from bigger to smaller so there is excess material and it looks messy (same with the diagonal area). Use a zig zag stitch over the raw edge instead. If you think you need to, buy the top in a size bigger than usual for extra material to work with, and if you end up not needing it, you can just take it in like I did. I got the top from a random cheap shop in the city.

For the pink cardigan/vest, I bought 1x1 M of pink sheer material from Spotlight in the dance section. I think it cost $8 per M. I used a cardigan of mine for a guide to get the right size pieces but adding on room for hemming.I hemmed the front side but on the back side I just zig zag stitched the edges and it was fine. It was very difficult to make without a pattern, but I got it done!

Skirt

The skirt I made by myself too. I used Secret Life of a Bio Nerd's video click here to make it as I could not find a red tartan skirt anywhere! After I followed her tutorial, I added the lace to the inside of the skirt. To add the gold detailing, I drew and cut out a piece of gold silk and zig zag stitched around the edges a few times so it wouldn't fray. Then I sewed that on the skirt with another zig zag stitch and hand-sewed on the gold buttons.

Shoes

I bought these shoes from Rivers click here when they were on sale for $22. All I modified was the laces, which I changed to black.

To see my Manifest haul click here~

I really hope I helped you!

If you have any questions or need some help or further explanations, comment below :)

- Beth :)