Anastasiya Shpagina, "real-life anime girl"

The internet teaches us that there are many forms of cosplay, and many young women who identify as "human dolls." Some become viral-famous-overnight sensations by posting photos of themselves in unusual or provocative cosplay.

One of them is young Anastasiya Shpagina, who's receiving a lot of attention right now over her striking anime cosplay.

The 19-year-old Ukrainian spends hours applying make-up to transform herself into the sort of anime character you'd see in Japanese films. She says she's considering surgery on her eyes to make the transformation permanent.

Here's her Facebook page, and her YouTube channel.

(HT: @aileengraef, all photos from Anastasiya Shpagina.)

Boing Boing editor/partner and tech culture journalist Xeni Jardin hosts and produces Boing Boing's in-flight TV channel on Virgin America airlines (#10 on the dial), and writes about living with breast cancer. Diagnosed in 2011. @xeni on Twitter. email: xeni@boingboing.net.

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Iunnrais

Is this CGI’d or an elaborate mechanical mask? It’s honestly hard to tell.
- http://twitter.com/digitalArtform Joseph Francis
  
  It’s the lack of lower eyelashes that trips me out.
  - Boundegar
    
    The odd part is, in closeup you can see she’s drawn in epicanthic folds, while the anime esthetic is to look as UN-Japanese as possible.
    - Zhiva
      
      http://thesocietypages.org/socimages/2010/08/30/guest-post-why-do-the-japanese-draw-themselves-as-white/
- Judonerd
  
  Looks like photo/video editing to change the structure of her face, shrink mouth and nose, etc. I’m calling After Effects work here.
  
  I think the tracking points floated a little in the video and caused the shape of her face to warp a little at times. Also, do you notice that she covers her mouth a lot in the videos? I’d do that too, if I wanted to save myself a lot of work in editing the shape of her face frame by frame.
http://twitter.com/digitalArtform Joseph Francis

Her eyes?? What have you done to her eyes???
- http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001322015688 Stacy Norton
  
  Circle lenses + gyaru make-up techniques.
  
  Circle lenses are larger-than-normal contact lenses that make the iris of your eyes appear bigger. They’re quite popular in Korea & Japan youth fashion.
  
  Gyaru make-up is the basic technique she’s showing in the first video: using eyeliner to draw on a fake frame for your eyes that’s much larger (instead of lining along the edge of the eye, which is the conventional way of doing it). If you look closely, you can see that part of her “eye” is actually skin. She may pull out her lower lashes to keep them from breaking the illusion.
  - Ashen Victor
    
    Anyway, she it´s making it wrong… creepy wrong.
    If her objective was to look kawaii he missed it by a mile.
    Also, she paints her eyes so big she look like she suffers from strabismus..
    - EH
      
      Also: rap is not music.
    - andygates
      
      I dunno. The close-up faces are deeply uncanny, yes. The body-shots and carefully over-exposed faces work far too well (tactical under-corset, there, too) to creep: they’re some very effective work. ^^
- http://www.xradiograph.com/ OtherMichael
  
  eyeball hacks.
  
  Or, if this was on BoingBoing some years back “eye mods”
- http://twitter.com/MrAaronSwainEsq Aaron Swain
  
  She has her Father’s eyes.
  - Boundegar
    
    In a jar! Booga booga!
euansmith

Clever, but creepy as fudge. This gal has entered the Uncanny Valley from our side.
- howaboutthisdangit
  
  She’s crossed to the other side of the valley, passing several fembots along the way.
sarahnocal

Lately I have been feeling like an old fogie on Boing Boing as most of the articles interest me not at all and seem aimed at a much younger audience (not that there’s anything wrong with that, just sayin’)

I don’t even know what “cosplay” is. Is there a Boing Boing for seniors?
- pizzicato
  
  Awww…. Don’t be so sad, look you can dress up as an old man with an “old man kit”
  
  http://www.buzzfeed.com/copyranter/old-man-finds-halloween-costume-of-himself
- Robert Cruickshank
  
  BoingBoing for seniors is the one that used to come in the mail, on paper!
- http://egypt.urnash.com Egypt Urnash
  
  “cosplay”: “costumes + play”. It’s a Japanese portmanteau of two English words that has passed back to the West. Usually it refers to dressing up as a character from a comic/cartoon/TV show/movie: “Wow, check out that awesome Slave Leia cosplay”.
- Ian Anthony
  
  http://lmgtfy.com/?q=Cosplay
bolamig

Way more sexy than a tattoo. But I suspect I would grow old waiting for her to go out for a date.
- http://avarana.blogspot.com MarlboroTestMonkey7
  
  Consider she’s never meant to grow old.
Nadreck

Apollo Smile was as far down that road as I care to travel.
theophrastvs

ok, creeptastic but what’s the product? that is, how does this pay for her future ophthalmological bills?
- jorgenfleisterman
  
  I’m sure there are a large number of otaku of various nationalities who would love to sponsor her eccentricities and/or buy pieces of used clothing from her.
- cfuse
  
  Attention whores are their own product.
  
  Paris Hilton, Kim Kardashian, hell even Honey Boo Boo Child – they all make their money from being as big a spectacle as possible. I don’t see why this woman can’t monetise herself in the same fashion, albeit on a far smaller scale.
- EH
  
  Comedy Central should hire her for “Archer” advertisements starring Krieger’s girlfriend.
ifriit

“surgery on her eyes to make the transformation permanent”
I almost want to know how the hell that would even be possible, but I suspect the answer might make me queasy.
knoxblox

Okay, so when she gets old, she’s gonna look like the witch from Howl’s Moving Castle, right?
- http://avarana.blogspot.com MarlboroTestMonkey7
  
  Or the one from Spirited Away. I for one, am waiting for my Totoro fur.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Tay-Oleson/1038819308 Tay Oleson

Getting older is going to break her brain.
- EH
  
  Yes, because anybody who would make themselves look like this is obviously an idiot with no concept of reality or the future.
Daemonworks

I’ve been an anime fan for creeping up on two decades (longer if you count starblazers and the like, I suppose) and have been intrigued by cosplayers for many years, but this really doesn’t work for me.

That said, as long as she’s happy with it, it’s all good I suppose.
- EH
  
  That’s cool you gave her your permission. I bet she appreciates it.
absimiliard

That’s creepy, no doubt. But her eye-make-up is pretty cool.

-abs appreciates the technical proficiency displayed with make-up, but man that crosses the uncanny valley (which I didn’t realize actual humans could do, so “kudos” for educating me)
http://twitter.com/MrAaronSwainEsq Aaron Swain

It’s funny that everyone is focused on her eyes (and understandably so) while no one has mentioned her disturbingly corseted waistline. Maybe funny is not the right term…
- knoxblox
  
  Or the ridiculously streamlined nose. I have a very narrow nose as far as noses go, and she looks like she might need straws in her nostrils just to sleep soundly at night.
- Monkey_pants
  
  I think that’s more than just corseted. It looks like she had some ribs removed.
  - EH
    
    BZZT!
    
    http://www.snopes.com/horrors/vanities/ribs.asp
sata blank

creepy or not, the contouring shes done with the makeup is excellent.
http://profiles.google.com/steve.nordquist Steve Nordquist

Definitely a more picaresque shoujo manga; besides the distinct lack of tentacles among the foliage (so…it -must- have been Pinta-shopped, then,) Saiunkoku Monogatari does this, but then focuses on guys. I guess the hard-shadowed (with harsh light) double nose is more for athletic scene foreshadowing.
http://www.tavie.com Tavie

Those eyes give her a really sad and empty and confused look.

These pictures make me a little sad. I guess if an emotional response is the desired result, her project is successful?
- EH
  
  LOL, yes I’m sure she’s doing it just to be manipulative, even mean!
  
  What’s that old quote? “People are disturbed not by things, but by the views they take of them.”
http://avarana.blogspot.com MarlboroTestMonkey7

O god, now I can’t blink! Help
blueelm

Her make up techniques are good. Her corseting is what is really impressive here. There was a time in my life where I could tie in to 17 inches or so… but man what a human looking waist I have these days. I don’t see the creep factor here. How is this different from other types of body mod/expression? Or even just from theatrical make-up?
- Ian Anthony
  
  Because it is different, so we must hate it.
- EH
  
  The English-speaking world isn’t really big on theatrical makeup as a subculture.
grimatongueworm

I am strumstrumstrumstrum doll parts…
Cowicide

Just seems like another example of females with low self-esteem conforming to what some mentally underdeveloped teenage boys desire after they masturbate to too many manga comics.
- Ian Anthony
  
  Emphasis on “seems like.”
Ashley Yakeley

I think this is completely awesome. Being seriously into something and being successful at it is entirely the purpose of life.
- Ian Anthony
  
  I know, right?
mrtut

R U?
Ian Anthony

Yeah, how dare she try to look like a thing that she likes! Right? Is that why we’re upset?
EH

Wow, I just watched the second video. I’m a little shocked at the humor! I have never seen anything like that come from Japan.
- Boundegar
  
  It’s Chinese, and yea, offensive even if you don’t speak the language. I guess it’s Chinese Tosh.0 or something.
  - EH
    
    Whoa, I totally did not pick up on the Chinese. Whoops!
donovan acree

Some of us have seen the end results of making a fad fashion a permanent part of your body. Me, I’ve never seen it work out very well.
http://clintjcl.tumblr.com/ ClintJCL

I guess I’m the only one who thinks this is kinda awesome.
- EH
  
  There are several commenters defending it.