Aim_v_Here won $60 in Gear Store credit to be used for Bloodborne and selected the Saw Cleaver hoodie.  This hoodie indicates it comes in “black.”  It does, but we’ll come back to this concept in the next tab.  Ooooh…foreshadowing! And before anything else, a disclaimer.  The Gear Store shows off the items with far better staging, lighting and most importantly “photographers” than what I had.  I had my cell phone (Sony Xperia Z3v) and my house.  I did have a few good models though, so that was nice.  Except for a crop or two, all photos are completely untouched.  This amateur style photography was embraced throughout the process as I think it shows the items as they appear in the non-studio world.  Do they still look good?

You tell me.  This is the logo from the hoodie.  I didn’t zoom in as much as I could but you can easily note the tiny trademark symbol.  Up close it’s easily legible.  The designs on this (and all items) are printed on, no stitching or embroidering.  All things considered, the level of detail is pretty high on this item.

The back sports the Saw Cleaver and the detail of the print remains high.  With the chosen art work, there’s a lot of little things to take in and the cleaver holds up as well as, probably better than, the logo on the front.  I’m more of an art nut than a clothing nut, and I came away quite happy with the design.

Speaking of it being clothes though, as much of a fashion expert as I’m not, it’s even worse with hoodies. My idea of “winter gear” is shorts and a shirt. The outfit I’ve described is rated to 20 below (Fahrenheit) in case you’re wondering what my standards are regarding winter.  From my best guess at this, the material seems pretty heavy, and enough to be somewhat toasty.  I felt I needed to to bring in someone else to weigh in and here he is trying on the hoodie and giving his impressions (note how deep in thought he is).

After some thought, he agreed that it seemed like it’d keep people decently warm.  The fabric is soft, and the inside especially so. Overall, seems comfy.

For people who are into this type of clothing, it’s certainly a way to show your fandom and keep the driving wind and snow off your arms and ears. Again, if you’re into that sorta thing.

Kenkkoshi also won $60 in Gear Store credit and elected to go with a trifecta of T-Shirts (note:  He did not win my kitchen floor though).

Now T-Shirts!  Those I know.  Without having put them on I can’t say exactly, but these again seem to be of the “comfy” kind. The material is thin (but not sheer or flimsy) and flexible.  I said the hoodie comes in black and that’s still true.  The shirts also come in black but as they’re a different fabric it’s a deeper black.  This is not a knock on the hoodie at all. The fabric needs to be heavier and as such it seems natural that the really deep black might be harder to achieve.  Also, the exterior is naturally a coarser fabric (leading to more difficulty in adding designs, kinda like it having bigger pixels to work with).  Let’s examine this…

Here’s the Logo shirt. The first thing to note is that this was taken in the exact same light as the hoodie.  The only pictures that aren’t are on the next tab actually.  When I’m looking at the pictures side by side with the apparel, I gotta say the camera kept things pretty true to color.  Now obviously the screen you’re using to look at them with will make a difference, but what I’m getting at is the VERY deep black of the shirt.  That logo “pops” big time.

Of all the designs, the one I was most skeptical on was the Box art shirt. Even the official studio picture on the gear site shows the result of slapping a detailed picture on clothing.  I was pleasantly surprised with the real world version, though.  Yes, if you jam your nose into the shirt you’ll see the fact that it’s on a shirt and not the steelbox of the game or a poster, etc.  Think of printed clothing like pointillism. If you get close enough you’ll see the dots.  Make an especially complex design (like cobblestones, buildings, blunderbuss) and things usually get exacerbated.  So the box art shirt does end up with the “worst” result from this effect. However, even the “worst” of the shirts is still really well done.

But there’s just gotta be a star of the show and the Saw Cleaver shirt is it.  Just like the logo shirt, the deep black really makes the design jump off the shirt. I noted with the hoodie (same design) that the chosen art for this is incredibly detailed.  The shirt does an even better job at showing this (again, the hoodie looks great, the shirt just shows the design off even better). Open that pic up in new tab and zoom in.  I’ll wait a minute.

Yeah…that’s a cool shirt.

Alkaiser was our big winner, getting to spend $100 of store credit!

He chose the Messenger Bag aaaaaaaand…something that ran out before we could get our hands on it.  I’m not going to go into any more details than this sentence, but we’re anticipating an update to this article once we have the other thing he wanted.

The good news is that he should be pretty pleased with the bag.  This is another item where my amateur photo shoot pays off.  Before I talk about why, let’s do a brief rundown.  The bag is pretty spacious, and would be good for a whole lotta travelin’ needs.  The flap actually closes via hook and loop fasteners (what most people call “Velcro” but that’s a brand name and I don’t know if they used that brand).  This adds some easy functionality to the bag, but if you were hoping the leather straps were more than cosmetic, they’re not.  The color of both the canvas and the leather was lighter than pictured, but that’s hardly a shock.  The feel is likely more important and the canvas feels durable.  The leather, while for aesthetics only, doesn’t feel like a cheap tack on and adds a lot of charm.  Where the coarser fabric of the hoodie led to a slight change in print quality (compared to the T-Shirts), the bag takes that a step further.  I don’t believe this is avoidable with the chosen materials, and I wouldn’t call this a drawback by any means.  But just like the box art tee, anyone expecting the same detail as a steel book game case is going to be disappointed.  Note: Don’t expect that

See what I mean? You can tell it’s canvas.  Big whoop.  Still looks nice.  So the reason I say the amateur photos are a blessing, is because they show off a charm that I feel the studio pics missed.  I wouldn’t go so far as to use the term “distressed” as we’ve seen in jeans or other items which usually means “beat to s**t.”  I would say that there’s a look that it’s slightly “worn.”  The metal accents aren’t high lustre, and subtle coloration in the leather and canvas give the appearance that, while it’s avoided the inferno of Old Yharnam, perhaps this bag still made a couple short trips into Byrgenwerth or something.

But most importantly, it’s a bag.  So what can it hold?  Lots of stuff actually.  Here it is with tons of cool things (that Alkaiser isn’t getting) and it’s still able to close.  It would have closed even better, had I placed the objects all the way in the bag, and not clearly halfway in to stage a gimmick shot. Speaking of that gimmick shot, what exactly is this bag holding?

Perhaps the greatest assembly of cool stuff ever.  From left to right, we have: a sandwich, a Mogwai, an actual message since it’s a messenger bag, a graphic novel, and a clear dinosaur filled with bioluminescent dinoflagellates.  You know, the normal affair.

IMPORTANT!  The Mogwai was not allowed to eat the sandwich after midnight.  It was close though, 11:55pm.

Don’t forget to try your hand at making your own chain mail.   This is mine. You can’t have it!

 

HOLY S***, it’s finally here!  Alkaiser may, or may not be receiving his long awaited lithograph soon.  It very well may end up a focal piece on a wall at the Ol’ Skare Homestead.  Alright, alright…I’ll be shipping it out ASAP.

First of all I want to assure Alkaiser and anyone watching that I tried to handle this with the utmost care.  I can’t guarantee I managed zero fingerprints but I did my best.  As you’ll see in a couple pics, I tore off some of the excess wax paper the lithograph was packaged in and tried to use that for any contact.  Since I’m such a nice guy I even packaged those scrap pieces back in for Alkaiser.

One more thing to note, it’s pretty glossy so photography was difficult.  I worked with a couple light sources to do it justice.  Despite my best efforts I’d say the colors are slightly off to the tune of “more vibrant” in the pics than in real life.  This is not a bad thing as regardless of color the detail in the print is unaffected.  And I think most people would agree that a little darker tone is better anyway (and that’s the reality of the print).  Here we go!