fourseasonsfigs

[fourseasonsfigs]

Take a Sip by the Lake

This fig set was inspired by a behind-the-scenes video from the filming of Word of Honor's Episode 6.

We have a playful Gong Jun here making Zhehan laugh during the rehearsal for the poison sucking scene:

I laughed when I first saw this set! The exaggerated facial features are so silly and fun.

The seller originally designed the figs and planned to sell it with the rock they're sitting on:

However, when it came down to it in production, the seller cancelled the rock due to cost and told all the buyers to just make it ourselves out of ultra light clay. This plan didn't sound great to me, just given my lack of time and ability, but you get what you get.

Sure enough, these two figs arrived with no rock at all.

These arrived...and sat. For a long time! I've had these hanging out in my tray of "needs serious help" figs for, well, quite some time. This weekend, though, I decided it was time to start tackling that tray, and this seemed like the easiest one to start with. How difficult could a rock be? Famous last words, I know.

I downloaded a coupon for one of my local craft stores and headed out. Michaels had quite the array of Sculpey and Fimo clay packets. I ended up buying "grey granite" Sculpey clay, since I liked the idea of not having to paint the rock.

I probably spent 20-30 minutes putting a rock together - I made it too small at first, and then realized pretty quickly that not only did I need to make it bigger, but I needed a higher area in the back for Gong Jun to rest his hand on. I started gently arranging the figs on the rock as I worked, so that I'd have indents in the clay to go off on as I modeled.

Here's the finished rock. You can see the indents there for A-Xu's robe to slot into.

Gosh, I was happy with it when I finished it, but in the harsh light of my camera I have to admit it doesn't look as good as I thought it did.

Here's the top view. Looks a little better there, right?

I baked the rock for about 40 minutes. I'm not entirely sure if that was enough, but it seemed to be pretty well cooked.

Happily, all the little marks the figs made when I pressed them into the clay made them very easy to assemble on the rock. A little bit of glue, and they sat pretty solidly.

Not looking too bad, actually!

Oh no, I take it all back. I worked so hard at getting Gong Jun's hand to rest right on the rock...what happened??? I must have glued him a little bit too far up on the rock. Ugh.

UGH. It really is not resting on the rock! The crazy thing is, when I look at it just in my hand, it really looks like it's resting right on top.

I'd say it shrank during baking, but it didn't. I think this is just some poor eyesight. Well, you can see how I did design it to be a perfect resting place.

All I can see is the hand not touching the rock, but I will say the modeling the fig maker did on their hair is really nice. This whole set is really quite cute, if a little ridiculous! Which I'm enjoying, of course.

Here's a close up of the drugman bite.

This is a very small set - all the figs I have in this style run fairly small. You can see the size compared to a "regular" fig in most common style.

This clay actually has the faintest sparkle to it, just like actual granite. It's really hard to photograph it - I brought it out in the sunlight to try to capture it, but all you can see is some light spots that look like dust. It's actually quite subtle and pretty though.

I took some bottoms-up pics before I glued them to the rock. You can see their boots and pants quite well from this angle.

With how difficult a rock was to make, I can't even imagine modeling these. It's all computer driven I imagine, but still.

...not sure why I cut off the bottom of this pic when photographing! My goodness.

Well, at least from one angle I'm glad to see the hand looks firmly on the rock!

The fig maker included box card art and an even more exaggerated rendition of the art on a pin? Mirror? I can't recall now, it's been so long. You'll notice the fig maker even included the little kissy lips that were on the video as well.

Well, I get a good chuckle out of this fig set - Gong Jun and Zhang Zhehan had so much fun on set, and it's nice to see how lighthearted and happy this is!

Material: Resin

Fig Count: (+2) 531

Scene Count: 38

Rating: Mwah! 💋

[link to the Master Post Index]

[fourseasonsfigs]

Your Name - 7/18 Bench

Since I posted a fig set yesterday in honor of the 4th anniversary of the Hengdian Fanmeet, I'll keep the celebration going with yet another fig set!

I posted about the first fig set titled Your Name way back in September of 2022. That set celebrated this wonderful picture:

This picture is so beloved by the fandom that a different fig maker decided to render it again. This time, the 7/18 Bench has been crafted in the very popular style known as 胖胖, pàngpàng.

This is the newer fig style that has been all the rage - we've been lucky to have a lot of classic Junzhe and Wenzhou sets re-imagined in this style.

These two came with their signs pre-installed on their hands, thank goodness. The less to fiddle with, the better!

They were not, of course, pre-installed on their bench, just like the other set. And just like the other set, they balance pretty well by themselves on the grooves that had been carved out for them on the bench. However, I've learned a lot since September of 2022, and I have learned that I can't trust anything but professional grade cyanoacrylate glue to keep my figs in place.

Since I started gluing figs in place, I haven't had anymore incidents where I walk into my room and see a fig avalanche fallen down my display shelves, thank goodness. My heart can't stand the strain!

They are quite firmly fastened down, believe you me. The figs have proved pretty resilient, but my nerves are less so.

You can see here that Junjun's hair is a bit darker than Zhehan's, which is quite accurate to the time and the picture.

Junjun is also a little bit taller here, which is also quite accurate.

Their hairstyles are fairly similar, but Zhehan's bottom fringe is just a bit longer than Junjun's, which reflects his shaggy-haired style. Like yesterday's figs, the fig maker unfortunately opted to leave out his little ponytail, which continues to be a bummer. His long hair with the ponytail is my favorite look on him!

I like that they were wearing black and white for this shoot - the different but complementary colors look great.

I really love the original picture that this fig set is based off of, so I'm very happy to have another fig rendition of it. Them holding each other's name sign is extremely unusual for C-entertainment, which is usually characterized by intense competition. Yet another reason why I love these two so much.

Of course, as I mentioned yesterday, them holding each other's name and Zhehan posting pics with Junjun was so out of the ordinary it was a step too far for many of Zhehan's fans, who hammered his Weibo post with objections. This resulted in him deleting his original post:

...and re-posting another without the pictures with Gong Jun to make his fans happy:

But, the pictures live on. I think it says a lot about the beauty of Zhang Zhehan's character that he posted them to begin with, and it also says quite a bit about the state of C-ent.

Their little smiles are quite captivating - Junjun's is very sweet, and of course you know the wiggly little mouth that Zhehan has is one of my fig favorites!

These glued down pretty easily - some of them don't, but these ended up pretty solid.

I wanted to push them a little closer together on the bench so they looked a little more like the original pic, but their heads are so large that it's not really feasible. That's alright, they're still super sweet.

We haven't seen a big maker emphasize Zhehan's silhouette in a while, but here you can see a little more care given to his little fig tush. The man worked very hard for that figure, the fig makers are gonna show it off!

No box cards for this set, unfortunately. Not uncommon but it is super nice when I get them.

Material: Resin

Fig Count: (+2) 529

Scene Count: 38

Rating: Your name is as beautiful as a rose

[link to the Master Post Index]

[fourseasonsfigs]

Summer Together

In celebration of the 4th anniversary of the Hengdian Fanmeet on 7/18, we have this adorable pair!

The inspiration for these figs is of course the photoshoot with Zhehan in his Fendi outfit:

The beautiful rose. Zhehan posted all the shots from the photoshoot on his Weibo account:

And then later deleted it, because some of his fans were fussing about Gong Jun being in his picture, but other fans saved it! The translation (MTL) says,

Goodnight Hengdian It's him, the boy wearing the flower

Of course, in this photoshoot, Gong Jun is not wearing a matching Fendi outfit, he's wearing this black outfit.

However, we do have a picture of him wearing the same type of Fendi outfit, which is what the fig maker used to model his fig:

In order to celebrate the anniversary, lets also have a video from the fanmeet:

They look so happy - I love their smiles.

I got lucky with these figs sailing through their voyage from China to the US - you'll see later how delicate Zhehan's rose is.

Since the boys are wearing white, I decided to take pictures on a tan background for the best contrast.

So cute. This is a nice shot of the similarities and differences in their Fendi outfits. I like that they're not wearing the exact same outfit, but the same style.

You can see here how delicate Zhehan's rose stem here! I was so glad this arrived intact. I didn't even bother trying to see if these two would stand on their own - as soon as I saw that rose I immediately glued Zhehan to the base. No falling down and damaging the rose!

The fig maker did a nice subtle job modeling the different head shapes of the two of them - we get Zhehan's more rounded head and the slight slope of Junjun's. You can see it a little more clearly in this photo of them:

Gong Jun's head is actually not quite this sloped, his hair cut and styling is exaggerating it here, but they definitely have different physiognomy. As two different people would! Interestingly enough, this head shaping is not actually uncommon to see in figs of the two of them together. I don't think I've mentioned it in my posts before, but you'll certainly see this head modeling on Junjun fairly frequently.

Of course, Zhehan's often longer hair tends towards all kinds of different (and fun) fig stylings!

Yeesh that flower stem. Still a miracle it made it through.

Their heads look great! The fig maker really brought out the long shaggy look of Zhehan's hair. I wish we had gotten his little tiny ponytail, only because his ponytails are a favorite of mine, but honestly his ponytail is really only visible for a few seconds in the videos from the fanmeet.

Junjun's pose here is so cute!

I really love their brown and amber eyes, they look beautiful and warm.

Well, you know I was so nervous about Zhehan's delicate rose (keep in mind, I photographed this set right after I accidentally snapped off Gong Jun's feather quill from yesterday's Breaking Dawn fig), that I immediately rushed to glue them to their stands. I completely forgot to take my regular bottoms-up pic before the glue. So, you're unfortunately getting the pics through the prism of China's finest acrylic rounds.

Gosh. Better late and poor quality than never (no one ever said)!

The quality on these figs is stellar - sharp details on the clothing, the beautiful rose, really nice posing, and well rendered faces.

So much care taken, even on the parts of their hair!

So nice to get box cards! We have Zhehan and Gong Jun's name on each of their cards, respectively, and the name of the figs, Summer Together.

Material: Resin and a rose

Fig Count: (+2) 527

Scene Count: 38

Rating: Happy 4th Anniversary!

[link to the Master Post Index]

[fourseasonsfigs]

Breaking Dawn

You're invited to a party with the world's cutest creature of the night!

The inspiration for this fig is of course Gong Jun's delightful vampire-themed photoshoot from November 28, 2023:

And of course, because how could we resist, the video:

His slow blink is so beautiful they had to show it twice.

I'm zooming in and cropping the second picture so you can see a close up of the crown.

Alright, on to the fig!

And what a fig it is. He is fabulous. He has both the most adorable face and he's gorgeously detailed. A jewel in my collection indeed! I was a little worried about him arriving safely because he's so ornate, but there was no problem at all.

If you zoom in you can see the same style of script on this invite as from the one Gong Jun is holding in the photoshoot. This invitation says, You're invited to my party.

The fig maker rendered his suit in this beautiful glossy paint - it looks even better in real life. The little stars almost seem to sparkle.

Look at how beautiful that crown is. I am delighted by it!

This is actually a pretty good shot of the quasi-sparkly effect from the star design in the glossy paint. The contrast of the textures is really nice for this fig.

Ok, maybe this is this the best shot yet of the true glossiness of the paint! The light changed a little while photographing, so it's now pouring in through my upstairs window. This is much closer to how it looks in real life.

The quill is very delicate. You might wonder how I know that. Well, the same way I seem to learn a lot of things - the hard way. In picking up this figure to take back to my display shelf, I placed my thumb right on the quill and it snapped right off. I almost had a heart attack!

Luckily, it was a fairly straightforward, if extremely fiddly fix. The hardest part was just making sure such a tiny piece went back on straight and in the correct way, and then staying very very still with the glue and tweezers for long enough to make sure the glue bond took. But eventually it I got it, and it looks as good as new.

I really like the choice by the fig maker not to make his eyes too bright red - this is subtle and perfect.

Back around to the front! I wanted to get a pic of our little vampire prince at night with a dark background for you. Unfortunately, my phone didn't seem to want to focus well in the low light, but that's ok, it gives him a slightly dreamy appearance. His crown looks gorgeous.

Back to the harsh light of day for the bottoms-up and top-down pics! This is the best view yet of the tiny script on his invitation.

As you can see, this cape is shorter than his outfit, so it's not one of those that will help stabilize the fig. I didn't even waste time with this fig trying to get him to stand for pictures - I immediately glued him on a base. I wasn't going to take any chances with him toppling over and breaking that beautiful crown.

Speaking of the crown, here you go. The silver paint there around the front star really does look like pearls in real life. If you scroll back up to the night time pic you can see how it normally looks either night or day.

I love this fig! I know I say each fig is my favorite, but he's definitely on the top of the list.

That's the cutest little vampire lair I've ever seen in my life!

The back of the fig card with the name, Breaking Dawn. As you can see, I did not come up with this name - I personally had him down a little more generically on my spreadsheet as "Vampire Jun", but turns out that's not quite accurate.

As a bonus, the fig maker threw in some cute little transparent cards, in the style of Gong Jun's Instagram page. I love them, they're so cute! The top one, from his runway walk on Paris Fashion Week, is my favorite.

Material: Resin

Fig Count: (+1) 525

Scene Count: 38

Rating: We'll RSVP to this party for sure!

[link to the Master Post Index]

[fourseasonsfigs]

Painting Plum Blossoms

We're jumping from yesterday's Episode 36 Armory figures all the way back to Episode 1.

You'll recall this striking scene:

Here we have Zhou Zishu before he was A-Xu, painting his last fallen brother out of his generation's picture.

This scene is so visually stunning. We have the immaculate profile of the jianghu's most jaded civil servant, dressed in a gorgeously rich, weighty imperial uniform, painting what is quite literally one step away from the last nail for his coffin.

The almost tangible aura of heartsick despair in this scene as he drops his brush is so well done.

I missed this fig entirely. It wasn't even that my hand speed was too slow to snatch it up on release day - I had no idea this figure even existed. I saw it one day when browsing Xianyu and was like, what the what is going on here. The fig maker apparently released this and another one, Flying Aspara Wen, at the same time:

PRETTY cute, don't you think (she says, not bitterly at all)? I have not managed to track this one down yet, but I'm gonna, mark my words.

Right. Anyway, I did manage to find this Painting Plum Blossoms one on Xianyu, and I was really happy about it.

This little man is letting the weight of the world drag him down - his boots were a bit uneven and made him tilt quite a bit to the back.

The brush fit beautifully in his hand - I literally just slid it between his fingers. I didn't even have to glue it or anything, and it didn't move around at all as I moved the fig around to take pics. I was quite surprised.

You can see he's leaning quite a bit to the back. This is a nice angle to see some of the detailing on his Tianchuang uniform, which really is a gorgeous costume. It's actually my second favorite Zhou Zishu costume, after his pale lavender Four Seasons Manor one.

My goodness, what a backwards lean! It makes me laugh. Sorry Zhehan, your gorgeously regal perfect posture is not being well represented in resin here!

I love the detailing on the back of his leather guan here, as well as the strings of his hair tie. I know it looks in the picture like the hair tie is part of his head, but it's actually a totally separate piece. It can move a little back and forth.

I like that the fig maker did some pleating on the back of the outfit. It's a very nice touch. I also like how they did his painting arm, with the wider blue sleeves, the detailing on his bracer, and the modeling on the hand. Look at that delicate blushing on the fingers! Proportions can easily get skewed on the limbs for these figs, but this works beautifully.

Oops, this isn't quite the full side view, I over-rotated him a bit. Anyway, this is a great view of that delicately modeled hand.

Even the brush is well done. This is a good angle to see all the pleating on the front of his uniform and the detail on his belt. I'm really happy with this fig.

I love the detail on the bracers, it looks so good. The guan is rendered well too.

The shadows are a little too thick here, but you can barely see he has blue pants tucked into his black boots. This is a great angle to see all the pleating around the entire outfit.

You'll notice the brush is still being held in his hand! It slid back a bit, but it's still hanging in there.

Similarly, the brush slid out a bit to park against the paper, but it didn't fall right out when I turned him over. You can see a little more (blurry though) of the texture in his hair ties.

The modeling is quite nice on the guan here. I'll also just take a moment to say how grateful I am that the paintbrush was so easy and painless to slide into his hand. I know I always call back to my travails with Han Ye with Sword, but that fig is always in my mind when I see a small piece that needs assembly!

More of the lacing on the guan. So nice! You can see a little bit of the groove in his hair on the bottom right of his head there, where the hair tie piece rests in.

I'm always happy when I get a box card, especially when I have to buy a fig on the secondary market. It got a little bent in shipping but otherwise is in great shape.

Material: Resin and a whole lot of despair

Fig Count: (+1) 524

Scene Count: 38

Rating: Only 35.5 more episodes to go until happiness!

[link to the Master Post Index]

[fourseasonsfigs]

Combined Six Harmonies Cultivation Method

I've been busy celebrating the end of my intensive Chinese class by binge-watching my way through Fox Spirit Matchmaker. I had planned to go back to posting about my figs right afterwards... but... during a big block of work travel fell into watching Mysterious Lotus Casebook (as excellent as everyone says and then some, highly recommend). After that, I figured I'd be back to posting about my figs. And THEN - well, then Gong Jun started showing up in some absolutely incredible behind-the-scenes-pics in his new role as Su Muyu. Dear reader, I had no choice (none! zero!) but to immediately binge-watch my way through all existing episodes of the Tales of Dark River donghua*, as well as start working my way through Blood of Youth. You understand. I know you do!**

BUT, in the meantime, I've also been slowly and steadily working my way through photographing my figs that continue to arrive in shipment after shipment. I have built up quite the backlog, so I'd better get to posting them!

Today we have Armory figs, from episode 36. These cute chonks commemorate this moment:

We've seen this armory scene before in fig form - quite a long time ago here and much more recently, in a building block version.

I remember watching this scene in shock - I had no idea what was coming. What a gut-wrenching, gorgeous scene. I love every bit of it.

These figs arrived safe and sound in their protective polystyrene box. I have to say I've had (crossing fingers, knock on wood) very good luck with this packing so far. Most figs I've gotten have arrived perfectly intact.

The figs came with the platform base and the figs themselves.

The paper cover peeled off from what turned out to be a sticker. I had thought it was going to be a magnet or something, so I was a bit surprised. The sticker ended up VERY securely sticking to the metal disk - I tried pulling it off to better reposition the top part, but no luck. It was on to stay for good.

As you can see, the metal disk makes it spin. The resin disk isn't perfectly round - it's a little more handmade than precision made, and I didn't stick the sticker on in the most optimal position, so it doesn't spin quite as easily or freely as it might. Which is fine! I'm not going to be playing with it, it's just in my display case.

Here they are! These two little cuties are just finished performing the ritual, and Zhou Zishu has just opened his eyes to see that something very strange has happened to his zhiji's hair...

This is a pretty good angle to see Lao Wen's face - these figs are so tiny and they are so close to each other that it's difficult to actually get their faces in the picture.

We see A-Xu's hair bun here, minus the hairpin of course. I must say I really hoped they managed to pull it out of the door when they left the armory, assuming the avalanche didn't shatter it into a hundred pieces.

This is a nice shot of Lao Wen's guan - very stylized as you can see.

I like how they included the Yin Yang book under their hands.

A-Xu's little shocked face is just too cute. Sorry A-Xu, I know this is a heartbreaking moment for you!

All that white hair. I think everyone will agree with me that no other show has managed to have a white wig quite as beautiful as post-ritual Wen Kexing. They did a gorgeous job of layering a slightly darker grey at the roots and pale grey/white in the rest of it, to give it the most natural looking effect. All the stark white wigs I've been seeing (yes, particularly as I've been watching Blood of Youth) tend to look pretty fake.

You can see the grey disk the figs are on isn't quite perfectly circular. It's not as off-balance as it looks here, some of this is the angle and the shadows, but it's definitely different from the perfect circle of the base.

And we're back around to the front again. These are really tiny figures - I think the fig maker decided to make them a bit smaller so that when you add the podium the entire thing isn't too big.

Here's a comparison between a normal sized fig - our poor A-Xu after he's been rescued from the Tianchuang prison (have I posted about this one? I'll have to check). As you can see, even the combined podium + figs is quite a bit smaller height wise from a regular fig.

Here's the closest I could get my camera to Lao Wen's face - not much of a close-up, but it's the best I could do! You can see his rosy little cheeks. You can also see Gong Jun's beauty mark there right under his eye.

Sheesh it was hard to get a close up of A-Xu's little face. I think the shot we got earlier as I rotated the fig around was better than this one. You can barely see one of Zhang Zhehan's beauty marks - the other one is definitely there, just blurred out due to my phone's inability to focus in.

There's no text on the Yin Yang Book, but it does have some nice fold lines to show where it would fold back up.

Ah, here's the best angle to show the almost-a-perfect-circle-but-not-quite of the top disk.

No fig card or box art for this one, which is too bad, it would have been awfully cute!

Material: Resin

Fig Count: (+2) 523

Scene Count: (+1) 37

Rating: It's ok guys, it's all going to be alright!!!

[link to the Master Post Index]

*I have been enjoying the Tales of Dark River donghua quite a bit. After I post this, I'm going to watch the Tuesday night drop of episode 26, tantalizingly tension-titled Trouble Brewing. Bring it on!

**I mean, you can totally understand why I got distracted from my blog posts:

I like this pic a lot, I've definitely seen this sword formation in the donghua many times!

Alright, alright, I'll stop. I love the costuming in this. I'm so excited!

[fourseasonsfigs]

Junbaobao's Plog: A Day at the Beach 🏖️

Today, we spent the day at Castaway Cay, Disney's island in the Bahamas. Unlike our stop at Cozumel a couple days earlier, we didn't have to take a bus to the beach - we just walked off the boat and we were here!

Well, there was a tram we could ride, but Mamama decided to stroll down to our cabana to get some walking in.

She said we'd be relaxing most of today, so might as well stretch our legs while we could.

The cabana was like a little house on the beach! We could look out over the ocean and see the blue water 🌊

We went right down to the water. There were shells everywhere! Hanbao wanted to pick them ALL up, but Mamama could only carry so many.

Aren't the shells pretty? We played around with them for a while, and then we had to put them back. Mamama says people aren't allowed to take shells from the beach here 😮

After we got back from dropping the shells off, Hanbao said he had a secret to tell me!

A mini dragon lizard! This one was tiny, and not at all like the BIG DRAGON we saw on Cozumel! Hanbao said shhhhh! not to tell Papa since he might not let us play with it. 🦎

But Papa saw it! He said this one was ok to get close to since it was just a small lizard. But when Hanbao ran over to play with it, it darted away 😯

So, we just decided to relax.

And relax some more.

It was getting so hot though, we had to cool off in the refrigerator 🥵

Later in the afternoon, though, it started to rain! We had to gather all our things and dash back to the boat!

We sure had fun though! 🌦️

Tonight we set sail back to Florida, and then we leave the boat to fly back home. Mamama said she had a fun time with Papa's family, and of course with us! 🥳

<- Yesterday's plog

[fourseasonsfigs]

Junbaobao's Plog: A Royal Evening 👑

Last night Mamama said we could wear our fanciest outfits for a grand promenade around the cruise ship!

Mamama had ordered two prince outfits for us from Taobao overseas. She bought a Prince of Hearts outfit for me and a Blue Duke outfit for Hanbao. She didn't like the circular plain cape the Blue Duke outfit came with, so she ordered a separate one. Except, she bought an entire outfit, not just the cape! 😮

When she was packing for our trip, she grabbed this set instead of the Blue Duke. 🤭 But that's ok, Mamama says that Hanbao can certainly pull this off in style!

And of course he can. He looks so fancy!

Here's the front of my fancy pants outfit.

And the back!

Mamama said the sleeves are a bit long, but that's ok since they should be a bit puffy. She said I was extra, extra cute, and snuggled my ears! Teehee! 🤭

I like my fancy hat too.

Mamama says long coats with tails are the best.

Hanbao's outfit is so very fancy!

Did you see he has a magic wand?

Mamama snuggled Hanbao's kitty ears too!

The crown is even fancier than my hat!

You can see why Mamama liked the cape, can't you? It matches my outfit! It would be very regal for a Blue Duke.

Now that we are all dressed up, off we go! 🎩👑

We decided to stop by Rapunzel's Royal Table. It was pretty busy because of everyone eating dinner there, but they were happy to let us take a few pictures.

This cake looked tasty! Hanbao says the cakes I make are his favorite though 🍰

We stopped at Lumiere's restaurant next. Mamama ate here a couple times - she said it was her favorite.

This was a huge ocean scene made out of paper! Can you imagine how long that took to make??? 😵‍ Hanbao said he was tired just thinking about it.

We saw there was a very shiny and pretty piano under the staircase! I can't play the piano, but Hanbao can. 🎶 He said this was too big of a piano, though!

Mamama said if we wanted to listen to music, we could stop at the Keys Lounge to listen to the piano player there (and get a drink for Mamama) 🍸 The piano player was really good! 🎹

We went down the long staircase. The clock struck midnight, and Hanbao dashed off! He left one of his shoes behind. I wonder where he's going?

Oh, just to see a picture of a pirate! I brought him his shoe back. But he had lost the other one too! Luckily Mamama had it in her pocket, and she could put it back on for him.

Speaking of pirates, when we went back to the stateroom, we saw that the butler had made a pirate octopus out of a blanket and some towels 🐙 He's very clever!

What a fun night! We were a bit tuckered out from running all over the ship, so we just sat back and relaxed.

Tomorrow is another big day for us! We are going to another island in the Bahamas. This one is called Castaway Cay. We're so excited!

<-Yesterday's Plog

Tomorrow's Plog->

[fourseasonsfigs]

Junbaobao's Plog: Hanbao Meets a Dragon 🐲

Today we spent a sunshiny day at a beautiful island! It very hot and very pretty.

We left the ship early in the morning, and got in a bus to head to a resort. It was far down at the other end of the island.

Mamama forgot our sunglasses, but that was ok! 😎 Hanbao said they might get in the way if we decided to jump in the water.

After about a half an hour on the bus, we got to the resort. There was a big entryway with a grass roof that was dark and cool. Or cool-er, since it was all open to the outside! Birds flew through the air when Mamama was taking this picture. 🦜

From there we walked on a long path across a lot of bridges. There were flamingos in the water under the bridges! 🦩

Hanbao told me that I'd get a better picture if I jumped in the pool to be closer to the flamingos, but Mamama said NO WAY.

I'm glad I brought my camera so I could take pictures! 📷

Isn't this a good picture of Hanbao?? 😍🥰

One we crossed the flamingo pools, there was a long path between brightly colored buildings. It was very pretty!

Finally we got to the beach! It was so sunny and bright ☀️

Mamama was so hot from the walk she stopped to get a frosty drink. 🍹

She said this kind of drink wasn't for baos, but she would get us ice cream later! 🍨 Yay!!

It was too hot to be out in the sun for very long, so we relaxed in the shade. ⛱️

There's shade under the palm trees, too! 🌴

Right before we left, we saw a giant swing! This swing is so big, that Hanbao said if we swung really hard, we would go flying up and over the ocean! He thought we'd be able to land back on the ship from here. That would be a fast way to get back to the ship, that's for sure! Hanbao is so smart.

For some reason, Mamama said no. 🤔

So instead of the fast way, we had to go back on the path, walk back by the pretty houses, over the flamingo pools, back through the big grass-roof building, climb on the bus, and then walk through the shopping mall to get back to the dock to walk onto the ship. So much walking! 🤪

BUT, on the way back, Hanbao saw a DRAGON on the path! I know it's the Year of the Dragon, but wow! 🐲

I quickly took a picture with my camera. It was so exciting!

Hanbao wanted to get a better look though.

Papa said to come away quick! He said not to get too close to big lizards 😮

Mamama was sure it was good luck to see a dragon in the Year of the Dragon, but Papa didn't seem very convinced.

It was a long way back, but we finally made it!

Tonight Mamama says she'll dress up Hanbao and me and take us around the ship. Oooh, we haven't worn fancy pants in a long time!

<-Yesterday's Plog

Tomorrow's Plog->

[fourseasonsfigs]

Junbaobao’s Plog: A Ship on the Sea

Mamama is taking Hanbao and me on a cruise ship adventure! 🛳️ We’re going to see the world! 🌎

What’s that? Oh, Mamama says we’re just going to two different islands. Well, that sounds like fun too!

We flew on a big airplane to Florida. ✈️ We’ve never been there before! There were big beautiful sailboats on sparkling blue water. It was very hot though. Mamama said it's called "muggy", which Hanbao said was the funniest word!

The cruise ship we got on was SO BIG! 😮

Everyone was very friendly. We stopped by our stateroom to drop off our luggage. It was really nice! They were Mickey Mouse designs everywhere.

We had a little balcony to see the pretty blue sea 🌊

Once we got unpacked, Mamama gave us all clippy mouse ears to wear! The mouse ears fit fine on my ears, but Hanbao’s cat ears are pretty small! Mamama has to really wiggle them on. Hanbao giggled and giggled! 🤭 She had a set too! We all matched.

Afterwards we took a grand tour of the big boat! Everyone thought we were the cutest! One nice jiejie asked Mamama what our names were because she thought we looked so good with our clippy mouse ears 😄

The ship was very fancy. And very busy! Lots of people had mouse ears on, so we were in good company.

The boat started moving at some point! We had barely noticed. They had big portholes on some of the floors that had big padded surrounds so you could sit inside them and watch the ocean go past. It was very relaxing and peaceful.

Mamama said she was coming back here later tonight to have some grown up drinks with Papa.

There were so many outdoor areas! It was a little windy since we were sailing, and our mouse ears flapped in the wind. Hanbao thought we might be able to fly over the pool if they flapped hard enough, but Mamama seemed to not like the idea.

We went back inside, and looked at all the nice pictures on the walls! This was one of my favorites. Can you imagine if you lived all the way up in that cozy house on the top of the tower?

Hanbao said he'd rather be riding on a fish!

When we were done touring, we stopped into the spa and relaxed on the heated stone loungers. It was so nice. ⛲️ The music was peaceful and the trickling of water from the fountain would have made me fall asleep, but Hanbao was telling me a story and I didn't want to miss it!

When we got back to the room, someone had made a towel elephant! 🐘 They also left us all chocolates! 🍫

Tomorrow we arrive in a place called Cozumel. Mamama says there's a beach there. We're so excited! 🏝️

->Tomorrow's Plog

[fourseasonsfigs]

Hello, So just wanted to say that Fox Spirit Matchmaker: Red Moon Pact officially announced its premier on May 23... Just wanted to give you a heads-up that's all since I noticed you're a big fan of Gong Jun...

:))

Oh thank you! I appreciate that ... I've been anxiously waiting for it to air and counting down the days! I'm only up to episode 8 due to work being crazy, but have downloaded the rest and am ready to binge them ALL on my upcoming vacation. I can't wait!

Thank you for thinking of me 🥰❤️ hope you're enjoying it so far!

[fourseasonsfigs]

Yuechu with Peach

I'm back! I had to take some time off from posting due to an intensive Intro Chinese class I was taking, combined with a truly crazy work schedule that does not seem interested in slowing down. But, with Gong Jun's new Xianxia show Fox Spirit Matchmaker: Red Moon Pact finally airing, it's time to celebrate with a Dongfang Yuechu fig!

This fig is based off this short preview video:

I've been so excited for this show - the costumes looked absolutely gorgeous in the previews, and of course I always want to support Gong Jun. I've watched 8 episodes so far, and the visuals have not disappointed! The costumer seems to really like asymmetrical designs, which adds a lot of interest and creativity to the outfits.

This little Daoist arrived in perfect condition - no harm to his peach or to his tall and beautifully ornate guan.

The outfit he has on in the preview is one of many absolutely gorgeous ones. I was wondering how all the asymmetrical patterns were going to be rendered into fig form, but I think they did a nice job. There are a lot of swirly designs in the costumes in general so far, I think to evoke all the magic.

You can really see the height they achived on the guan here. In keeping with the beautifully ornate designs, he has a lot of very tall and intricate hair crowns on this show.

You can see a bit of the ribbon hanging down in back from the guan...you'll see it better as we rotate around the fig.

There we go! I also love ribbons, so really the costuming is made for me on this show. You can see the swirly designs showing up on the robe here.

I'm not going to lie, I'd have loved his hair to be doing all kinds of dramatic swirls here instead of just falling down his back, but to be fair he's just standing there with the peach in the preview!

I'm very grateful the peach is pre-attached to his hand. My fingers have proven pretty clumsy attaching little tiny pieces to figs!

Little bit of paint overspray - err overpaint, I guess, since all the peaches here are hand-painted. I can't complain one bit - if I was painting this it would be a lot worst than this!

He's so cute. I really like how the fig maker rendered his face here, and the mark on his forehead is kind of perfect - the right size to highlight his face but not be too obtrusive.

He's got pants on, which you know I love as that extra styling detail. It's hard to see from this angle, so let's do the backside...

There we go. Looking good!

A nice shot of that very fancy guan.

And another! This has got to have been a hassle to assemble (says the person currently trying to assemble fig horse reins for a JZEU set that are long and thin like the ribbons here. So fiddly!)

And our box cards! The actual name of this fig is something like (per machine translation, I learned a lot in my Intro Chinese intensive, but not enough to be able to translate things like this) Pink Little Daoist Priest. Normally I use the titles directly from the figs cards/maker, but I knew I'd never remember what fig this was if I called it that. I don't think of this fig as overwhelmingly (or even very much) pink.

Material: Resin

Fig Count: 521

Scene Count: 37

Rating: Congratulations to Gong Jun on the show's airing!

[link to the Master Post Index]

[fourseasonsfigs]

Building Block Figs - Armory

Following up on the recent sets of building block figs I've been posting, comes one of my absolute favorites!

As I mentioned with the earlier fig sets (Building Block Figs - Beautiful Fight Scene in the Middle of the Lake (Part One, Two, and Coda); Basking in the Sun, Catching Light, and Two Devils), I missed these sets when they first came out, so I've had to pick them all up on Xianyu. With the exception of this set! This one I couldn't get on Xianyu, despite my best efforts. I have only seen it for sale exactly once, and when I tried to buy it, it turned out the listing was only up to draw traffic, and the seller just had one other (vaguely related) set. I was resigned to just keep watching and searching for it and hoping for the best, which was a real pity, because just from the small sales picture I really, really had to have it.

Thankfully! Qilin, the merch wrangler extraordinaire (@88Qilin on Twitter), had bought this set way back in the day, and when she heard I was on the search for more of these sets, was kind enough to check in with me to see if I needed it. AND BOY DID I. She immediately sent it off, and it arrived in record time! She even included some wonderful little extras, that I took a picture of immediately, but for some reason can no longer find. I'll take another pic and add it! In the meantime, I'll add a placeholder:

[Qilin's extra goodies pic goes here]

I was so excited to get this set, I can't even tell you. I feel super, super lucky.

(Fun fact, Qilin is the reason I originally found out about fan made figs in the first place! I saw her post on Twitter (also way back in the day) about the New Year's series of 6 figs, and I absolutely had to have them. I had just reactivated my long-dormant Twitter account to keep up with the fandom, and I was super nervous to message her, thinking she would be like, "who is this total rando messaging me out of nowhere?!" But no, she was super nice, and very helpful, and it was entirely thanks to her I was able to buy the whole set. A minor miracle at the time, trust me, considering how green I was at navigating Weidian back then. If you ever want to buy figs directly, definitely check out her pinned post walkthrough on her Twitter page, it's invaluable information.)

The set came sealed and as usual, in a plain box. Inside there was the same set up as the other sets in this series - a double bagged bag of bricks, the card with the QR code for the online 3-D instructions, and a handy little tool to separate bricks.

The full name of this set is Lao Wen Sacrificed his Life to Save Ah Xu. It measures 8.0 x 5.6 x 12.1 cm, and is rated 10 hours to complete. The "hours to complete" ratings have been extremely accurate to date. But, I was determined to get this set done over this holiday weekend, so hoped that my prior experience on these would serve me well to get it done in record time. So I timed myself!

Here I am getting ready to start. Not a lot of colors, which is typical for these sets. Not too bad looking, huh? You'll notice that unlike the other sets, I didn't carefully pre-sort out all the pieces by size and shape. I simply sorted by color and left them in big piles like this, in a bid to shave off even more time. I was a bit curious if it would be faster to hunt-and-peck through each pile for the right bricks, or if sorting them was about the same. Given that it took about an hour to sort through the larger sets, I decided to roll the dice here.

The directions informed me there were 184 steps in this set. Not too bad! I sat down, put on my headphones, cranked up some music, and got started.

I finished the first little block just as fast as could be. I was flying! I was so proud of myself. It was a holiday weekend, the morning was bright and sunny, and I was having a grand old time.

The next step was to add a second base square in, and then a third and fourth. I added in the second base and kept on flying through it. And then...I ran out of a white brick in the largest size.

Which is kind of impossible. Each of these sets has extras of all the bricks - quite a few, actually. So I searched through the white pile a couple extra times, and sat there and wondered what was going on. As you know, I have lots of spare bricks from the previous sets, so it would be easy enough to pull the right one out, but this shouldn't be happening.

So I was like, wait a minute. I looked back at the phone directions for the step I was on, and said, hold on, I don’t see the character 白 for white anywhere. Uh oh. I Google Translated the characters that were there and sure enough, 透明 meant transparent.

I had just been going off the colors on the phone screen, and I mean, come on! The bricks looked white! If you scroll up and look at it, don't you think so too?

Anyway.

So, I pulled off all the white bricks, and replaced them with transparent bricks, and hey, what do you know, I had plenty of them.

Alright, alright, so this happens when you don't speak the language. Never fear, I'm back on track!

Dear friends, I was not back on track.

Sometime in all this confusion, I had spun around my little base square around, so when I attached it to the other base squares, I started filling in the top bricks the wrong way around. Luckily, I realized what I was doing after a few steps in, and I didn't have to totally reassemble it like I did with the Not White But Transparent Brick Debacle of early 2024. I just gently disconnected the base squares from each other, turned them around, and kept going.

So! I finished the first layer 1 hour, 46 minutes in. This, of course, includes the one major mistake and the one minor mistake. It's pretty big, isn't it? The other fig sets only had max 2 base squares, so I was pretty excited to see how nice and big this was. The transparent bricks look nice, huh?

I took a bit of a break. Made a little bit of lunch, tidied up a bit, and then came back excited to tackle the next round.

I was paying attention to the names of the brick colors at this point, believe me.

I finished the next layer 2 hours and 54 minutes in. Pretty cool looking, isn't it? It looks like some kind of disk in an alien language. I must admit when I got here, I was both quite happy and also a little concerned. Only layer 2? Still 138 layers to go, and it's been about 3 hours?

Well, no big deal if it took me longer, really. I was having a good time, and there was no actual rush. I will say that at this point, my finger tips were certainly feeling the constant pressing and snapping of the bricks. They had actually toughened up back when I was doing set after set after set, but it had been some time, and my fingertips were back to their usual soft selves.

Luckily for my fingers, I had errands to run and other things to do, so my sore little fingertips got a needed break.

The next morning, I was up and back at it!

The third layer was starting to look like the actual base of the platform from the show. I was pretty excited to finish this layer, I have to say. I took little breaks here and there, but I was pretty determined to make some real progress.

By that evening, I had gotten pretty far. I stopped here at 6 hours and 3 minutes.

I was inordinately pleased by getting to this step. I could see the robes carefully spread out here, just like the show, and their hands out there. There was also a little bit of white where I was starting Lao Wen's new hair color.

You can tell the passage of time by how the light keeps changing in each of these pictures! I always end with the bricks for the step I'm on laid out in front of me, so I always know where I am when I pick the set back up. My memory is just too bad otherwise, I'll forget what I'm doing.

Well, 3-day holiday weekends don't last forever, so I woke up this morning determined to finish this. There was a little bit of race against the clock today, since I had appointments I had to take care of, and I needed to have enough light left to take final pictures. So, I sat down, and started going as fast as I could.

At 7 hours and 6 minutes, I had built up the bodies, and was on to the heads. I hurried through my afternoon errands and got back around 3:10 pm. The sun sets here around 4:20, so I didn't have much time. Tomorrow I get on a plane, so it really was up against the clock! I didn't even put my headphones on this time, I just sat down and focused.

But, it turns out that I didn't need that much time. 45 minutes later, I was done!

Total hours clocked in at 7 hours and 51 minutes. I will tell you, I was indeed flying through this set - all those other fig sets that I made mistakes on definitely helped me. I knew what I was doing, and I went fast. If this had been my first set, or even my second (ok, let's be real, even my third), it would 100% have taken me at least the full 10 hours. It also helped that other than Big Error 1 and Small Error 1, I didn't make any other mistakes.

You can see how many bricks are left (which is why I knew something was up when I ran out of that white brick earlier). I will say that not pre-sorting the bricks is definitely the way to go - it's pretty easy to pick out the right ones, and certainly saves a lot of time just organizing them into piles.

Alright! Let's do some beauty shots, shall we? As you know, the light wasn't super great, but it was good enough!

Oops, I see I need to press down a little on Lao Wen's head to get the bricks firmly squeezed together. I'll admit my aching fingertips were not pressing down super hard at this point!

I really love the 3-D effect of the icicles ringing the platform. This set is just fantastic!

It's a little hard to see A-Xu's luxurious mane of hair here with the black on black, but it's quite nice.

Lao Wen's closed eyes! Please also note the little white underlayer on his robes here at his neck. So cute.

This is a nice angle to see A-Xu's married hair bun (minus one hairpin, of course) and Lao Wen's loop of hair.

This angle is the coup de grâce of this whole set for me. For the longest time, I thought the single bricks was his eyes and the marks down his cheeks were tears, but in reality I think the larger bricks are his eyes, and the smaller bricks are his eyebrows going up in shock and horror. But all I can see are (non canonically accurate) tears free flowing down his cheeks!

I did waste several minutes at the point I was building this just contemplating his face, and I was THIS close to subbing in the light blue for to make tears after all, because (sorry A-Xu) I find it delightfully hilarious. Little Lego tears! I can't even. But, I decided to go with the actual design for this so you could see it (and go back and replace them afterwards).

Ahem. Anyway. This is also a beautiful shot to see Lao Wen's long white hair draping over his shoulders.

More of the snow and icicles all the way around. It looks great.

Seriously, don't you think they look like tears? Right, anyway. This actually isn't a bad angle to admire the modeling on the clothing.

And we're back around. The modeling really is beautiful on this, with their robes carefully spread out behind them and to the sides of them.

Time for some closeups:

Aww, Lao Wen.

Aww, A-Xu, honey.

The bottoms-up angle was really hard to get on this set, since the base was so large.

The top down angle looks great I think. This is actually the first time that I'm noticing they have the scroll underneath them.

Honestly, I'm so impressed with this set. With only 9 colors, and some very basic building block shapes, they did a gorgeous job rendering this scene.

With my last picture, in the last of my fading light, here's my two sets of armory figs re-enacting this scene. The closest set is actually from the New Year's set of of 6 that Qilin helped me buy back in the day, so this really is full circle!

I couldn't quite get my camera to focus on both sets, but you can see the relative size difference at least. It's a big set!

Alright, these are the last of these sets for a while - there's two more sets of two single figures each, but I have not been able to locate them on Xianyu either. I'm ok with it though - this is the last of the big scene sets, and one I really, really wanted. The others are nice but not quite as special as the sets.

Thanks for the figthusiasts friends that have accompanied me on these building block fig posts! They're all quite long, so I appreciate you reading all my thoughts and experiences with these. I absolutely love them - they were a ton of fun, and I only wish I had more! I'd love to enact out the entire series with building block scenes - can you imagine?

Material: Plastic building blocks

Fig Count: 520

Scene Count: 37

Rating: Pure love

[link to the Master Post Index]

[fourseasonsfigs]

Goodbye Jianghu

As you can tell from the title, these figs represent some of the last moments of filming for Word of Honor for Gong Jun and Zhang Zhehan.

The inspiration for and the name of this set comes from Zhang Zhehan's Weibo post from March 23, 2021, marking the airing of the final episode of Word of Honor. His post is simply titled, Goodbye Jianghu:

It's such a beautiful picture of Zhehan - walking back in his white immortal A-Xu robes.

I had this picture in mind as the matching photo inspiration of Gong Jun, white haired and ethereal looking:

...but when I went to upload it, this clearly isn't it, after all. Did the fig maker just make a complementary fig to Zhehan's picture? I have no idea? I searched through every pic in my Behind the Scenes photo folder, and I could not come up with a pic that matched this fig. Let me know if you know!

On a side note, I recently bought a little lighted box to take pictures in, so I wouldn't be quite so dependent on the few daylight hours in my photography area. I tried it out with these figs, and we'll see how it goes.

Hmm, there's quite a bit of texture in the backdrop, isn't there? Well, we'll keep going!

Yes, those are some little tears welling up in Zhehan's eyes. Like Zhou Zishu, he is also tough on the outside but soft at heart!

I really, really love that Gong Jun's hand is tucked behind his back in his signature pose. Also, his big chunky white hair bangs are fantastically modeled here.

These figs stand up beautifully. So much so that I didn't put them on stands at all, which is extremely rare for my figs, if only because I like them to generally have a uniform look. But, in this case, I wanted to preserve Zhehan's pose just like this.

The robes help quite a bit in keeping them standing tall.

The slight motion modeled into these figs is great. Not overdone, just enough to make it interesting.

The little hands are adorable.

Aww, this is the clearest shot of the tears in Zhehan's eyes! Don't cry, little fig.

Here's a non-box background set of photos for contrast. In retrospect I probably should have picked a non-white clothed set of figs to try this out, since they're all slightly blending into (whichever) background. The LED light of the photo box is a little golden tinted, I see.

I really like how fig Gong Jun is very correctly wearing his black pants with this costume. I love this level of detail!

You can see them a little better here. Sorry for the reflection of the background underneath their hair, I have no idea how that happened! I see I definitely need to replace this little backdrop in the lightbox.

Zhehan's face is just so sweet in this set!

I love A-Xu's little married hair bun. Both of their hairstyles in the epilogue are A+ for sure.

The art on the boxes are very, very cute. We have the background with Zhehan's Weibo post and what I imagine is the background on the green-screen mountaintop from Gong Jun's pose for this fig. I'll keep looking around for it!

Material: PVC

Fig Count: 518

Scene Count: 36

Rating: 后会有期 - I'm sure we'll meet again someday

[link to the Master Post Index]

[fourseasonsfigs]

Longines Han

I missed this fig when it was first sold, but had been keeping my eye out for it for a long time. As far as I can tell, this fig maker only sold this one figure. I'd been waiting for her to sell any remainders (holding out hope that she had some), but when I saw this little guy on Xianyu I had to grab him!

This inspiration for this fig is this picture from Zhehan's appearance on January 4, 2018 for the opening ceremony of the 8th Longines Beijing International Equestrian Masters.

You may recognize this outfit, as it is a much beloved outfit by the fans!

Zhehan looks tall, sleek, and elegant in his riding wear.

I think everyone that follows me knows that I am Team Long Hair for Zhehan, but I admit that he looks amazing no matter how long or short his hair is!

Here's a video of this event. The videographer on this has pretty singular focus, it's true!

The seller I bought this figure from just sold it as is, already stuck to a stand, without the box or any of the cards or anything with it. That's not my favorite, but this fig doesn't come up very often, so I took what I could get. Can't afford to be too picky!

Luckily, he arrived safe and sound. I had the warehouse wrap him in some bubble wrap packaging, and it turned out he was only attached to his standee stand with fig stickers, so it was easy to pull him off. One soapy bath later, all the travel had been washed off of him and he was fresh and clean!

Longines, if you did not know, is a luxury Swiss watch brand. I did not know that (I had mixed it up with Longchamps, the French purse brand). But, this is why he's modeling the watch!

I love his long boots - the fig proportions are so small that even tall boots look tiny (and adorable)!

The fig maker made sure that fig Zhehan filled out his riding breeches just as well as the real Zhehan.

This fig maker is a Junzhe fan, so we have a cute looking Samoyed on the back of Zhehan's jacket!

The short buzz cut is so pebbly looking here! It makes me giggle, it's very cute. It's a smart way to render it - you get all the texture but none of the difficulties (and breakage concerns) of spikes.

As you can see, this fig stands perfectly. The boots may help, but they're not particularly large or anything. It's just a well modeled fig.

Speaking of good modeling, the pose is beautifully done!

The fig maker also did a great job on the shape of the eyes, not to mention the hearts in them. This is really a great fig all the way around.

This is a particularly cute angle of his smiling mouth!

I'm glad to have finally gotten this fig. I wish the fig maker had made more, since she did such a nice job on this one!

One last shot of our short-haired cutie.

And that's all - again, sorry for no box cards or any special bonuses, but happy to have him at all. Actually, I do have a bonus, of a different kind! I'll leave you with this extra picture - of Zhehan for Longines in this gorgeous suit. I love it - he's still looking so tall and slim and elegant, just with a gorgeous velvet blazer and some very cool matching shoes.

Material: Resin

Fig Count: 516

Scene Count: 36

Rating: Dashing!

[link to the Master Post Index]

[fourseasonsfigs]

Happy Camp Dolls

There's few things cuter than figs holding dolls! This set in particular is super, super adorable.

The inspiration for this is the interview for Zhang Zhehan and Gong Jun's joint Happy Camp appearance to promote Word of Honor.

They're checking out their character's official Rua 10cm dolls!

These two, I swear. I love everything to do with Happy Camp so much!

...and so does everyone else, based on my entire shelf of Happy Camp figs! And more are still on the way.

These two cuddled their dolls all the way across the ocean, arriving safe and sound.

And here they are! Looking super, super cute. I absolutely love the poses here, with Junjun holding his doll in both hands (like the picture) and Zhehan holding his out in his palms.

I was able to prop up these figs to take the first pics, but there was no way these two were going to be able to stand up on their own. These figs are heavy! Since they are unbalanced they would definitely fall over. They got glued down immediately.

I was trying to think of the best way to say, there's a lot going on with Zhehan's pants, but I can't quite figure it out. I think we need a pic of what Zhehan is wearing.

Ah yes, these ones! I swear they almost look like overalls. Anyway, the fig maker did a great job adding in the extra design elements of these jeans (that's a good way to say it!).

I like the detail in the shoes too, which we now can compare to the full-length pics (sorry they're not better quality).

I will tell you that until these figs, I never realized either of them had anything on the backs of their shirts. In fact, looking at the pictures and various videos I still don't see the image on the back of Gong Jun's shirt except for this one video:

And there it is, sure enough. Ahaha, hearing Junjun mutter, Wo de tian never fails to put a smile on my face!

The slightly stockier "fat body" style is super cute - makes these already adorable figures even more so!

The fig maker did such a nice job here with the tiniest of details, like the colors on the shirts.

I love how they did Zhehan's spiky short hair here!

Too, too cute! I'll get a close up in there of the dolls for you:

The scale on these dolls are tiny. They did a good job making them look like the Rua dolls - I'm impressed they got the detail they did!

These figs look like they should stand up well with those nice wide feet.

Zhehan being a little bit shorter makes him even cuter!

I'm really happy the dolls are attached to their hands and I did not have to try to wrangle the dolls into their hands. Zhehan's doll would have been ok but I do not even want to try to imagine trying to wedge Junjun's doll in his hands.

A+ for these figs! I am just so charmed by them. I have another set of figs with dolls on order, but they are still in production. Still, I'm looking forward to them!

Material: Resin

Fig Count: 515

Scene Count: 36

Rating: The happiest!

[link to the Master Post Index]

[fourseasonsfigs]

Coda - Beautiful Fight Scene in the Middle of the Lake

What's this? Yet another post on this fig set? Yes indeed! This is a follow up to Building Block Figs - Beautiful Fight Scene in the Middle of the Lake (Part One and Two). It won't make a lot of sense if you haven't read those first, so if you have time, check those out!

For those of you who have read those posts, you may recall that I wasn't really happy with the original design of the lake raft being blue and green, and that you could see the cream colored base:

So, my plan was that when I finished the rest of my building block figs, I'd see what I could do with the leftover bricks. That time has come!

I pulled this fig set back out and took off the figs. I dismantled the base down to the very beginnings, and counted the bricks for the raft. I compared them to my remaining brown bricks, and it seemed like I would just have barely enough, if I was thoughtful about how I used the sizes.

I seemed to have enough blue bricks to use for the base, so I went ahead and made that, expanding the water to cover all sides.

Part of the base is not blue but brown, so I went ahead and started using what I could. You see that this is all the bricks that are left! I wanted to use black in the raft as well for a little more detail, but I didn't have nearly enough black bricks. I also didn't have enough grey bricks to use for further contrast either.

You can also see I have a few transparent bricks for water splashing. The original design used about 2/3 of them, but I liked the look, and figured the more the merrier! I decided to use all of them. There's not a lot of them anyway - those there you can see are all there are.

As you may recall, the original raft used green for the raft and dark blue for the contrast. Maybe to show the water through the bamboo? I'm not sure. I followed the instructions as carefully as I could, substituting the colors, and then trying to add on more clear bricks towards the elevated top to show the froth of the water as the raft came up out of the water.

I meant to take more progress shots, but I have never been a good multi-tasker. It took all my brain power to figure this out! I had to adjust a little bit for the extended base, translate the colors (which was harder in my brain than it should have been) and I had to conserve brown bricks more than I thought I would have to. It was a little more difficult than I expected, but I'm really happy with it! As you can see, I did in fact, go to town with the transparent bricks. I added on some water drips that were most definitely not in the original design.

Here's another view. I really had liked the horizontal lines going through the raft in the original, but I didn't have enough grey bricks in the right shapes to add them. I'm hoping when the next sets arrive that I'll have enough to add them in. In the meantime, I still like this better.

I'll let you be the judge!

I did pull off one of the two cream colored bases (I was like, why did I have two stacked up on each other?), but I realize now it's to elevate the back of the raft up a bit more off the ground. I'm going to put it back.

You can really see where I went to down on the water droplets here. Too much? Maybe! I still kind of like it.

Yeah, having another base underneath won't be visible but will give the elevation back for sure.

The raft is fairly stable - in one area I only had small brown bricks, so it's a little weaker in that area. I tried to reinforce it as much as possible, but rough treatment would probably make one of those back brown pieces fall off. However, this is going right into my fig case, so that's not a concern.

Oops, looks like I need to push down that right side there a bit in the water.

This is really such a cute set. I continue to be charmed by their flying hair!

Ahh, a little more of the water effect! I'm really very pleased with it. Hmm, I also see I'll be pressing down a little bit on that upraised blue brick there in the middle.

You're definitely getting a little more fig detail in these second round of shots!

The transparent bits don't look too overdone from this angle, I think.

Hobo-Xu's goatee here continues to make me giggle. It's so funny!

Oh, I really like the transparent bricks.

Here's the revised underside. Luckily I had a bunch of those long dark blue bricks left.

As you can see, the raft is a little plain now. Which I think is ok, since it puts the attention on the figs themselves. Still, I think it'll be nicer when I finally do revise it a bit with the lateral grey pieces.

Alright, I think 3 posts for one fig set is enough! Thank you for hanging in there with me on this building brick adventure. I'm really looking forward to the next set I get. Unfortunately, it'll just be one...the other two I had ordered off Xianyu both fell through. I'll keep looking though - eventually someone will sell them.

No updated fig counts on this, since this is just a do-over, but if anyone wants to see non-brick figs, the master index is here.