Umi was manufacturered by ALTER and released in August 2017. As her other School Idol Festival friends she is scaled 1/7 and 20 cm in height. Nearly every of those figures was made by a different sculptor, Umi was sculpted by Sai.

Umi’s character is relatively complex, she is a level headed girl with a quite conservative and demure view on everything. Nevertheless at heart she is a pure maiden with sweet natured behaviour. Umi has problems with showing her legs in public, she feels quite embarrased about it and don’t want to wear the skimpy idol outfit, that Kotori desinged. The regular school uniform also features a quite short skirt, so it is kind of weird that Umi isn’t bothered by that.

Another funny thing about her is that the level headed attitude often leads to her bossing around her less level headed friends, which often lets Umi appear a bit too strict for her age. In the idol group Umi has 2 different tasks, in the first place Umi is in charge of choreography and the regular fitness training, but also is the main lyricist for the songs.

An distinctive feature of the Love Live! anime(s) is the beautiful character design, the characters have very detailed, sweet faces and sparkling eyes. In these Love Live! School Idol Festival figures this particular style has been adapted faithfully. Umi looks quite happy in her idol performance, her winking eye is quite charming. The open amber colored eye on the other hand is so beautiful and shining, these is a gorgeous eye decal there. Furthermore eyebrows and other details as well as blushmarks are also really nice. Something I really appreciate on her face are the lightly painted lips.

Umi has dark blueish hair, the front hair is pretty and sculpted after her appearance in the anime, the hair at the backside is quite long, it is sculpted in a flowing backwards style, at the sides she has two strands separated by frilly ribbons, it looks like narrow twintails. On the left side she wears a pretty orange flower and ribbons as decorations.

The outfit of the figure is so pretty, the yukata combines a traditional look with a mordern design. The dress consists of a top, a skirt with transparent underskirt, as well as separate sleeves and loose “socks”, around the waist she is wearing a cute belt, The details on it look really elaborate. The light blue dress has a lovely flower pattern with blue, purple and violet and orange flowers. The geta shoes fit to the overall design, although they might no be too practical for dynamic dancing. Everything looks really nice together. The Love Live! School Idol Festival figures have all different outfits which is nice, if I would have to decide for one outfit for all 9 members, this yukata would be my favorite choice.

At her back Umi has a fancy fan with her name printed on it, unfortunately to my discontent it can’t be taken off.

Umi is articulated in a cheerful and quite dynamic pose based on one of her Love Live! School Idol Festival cards; with the right hand she is pointing at the audience while holding up the vintage microphone with the other hand she is holding the cable, so that she is not stepping on it accidently. Haha while assembling the figure getting that cable into place as it was shown on the box was quite a challenge. The pose also accentuates her pretty legs, behind the separated sleeves, the figure shows a bit of her bare shoulders and you can also take a peak at her nice armpits.

About the setup, because of a change of the figures release date, the setup was planned a bit more in advance, I had the idea of Umi performing at the beach. So at first I made a pier matching the figures sïze, painted it and added weathering effects. Flower chains of different colors were wrapped around a wooden bow, at the end I also added LED lights to the low cost construction. For the figure shooting Umi was put on a transparent base. For a complete look sand and a background were added, scrunched transparent gift paper works great to create a realistic water surface.

Final Words

On summary I’m very happy to have this sweet figure of Umi – chan, she looks very lively and I’m impressed by how elaborately made this figure is. The lovely face and her stunning yukata are so nice with ALTER’s Sonoda Umi you would have a extremely beautiful and also adorable Love Live! School Idol Festival figure at home. Before sitting down to write this review and taking another look at Love Live!, I actually did not have a real liking to Umi, but now I have grown fond of her. I might have ordered this figure just for the looks, but now I’m even happier that it’s a great figure of Umi.

related posts

Nico – Love Live! School Idol Festival – ALTER

Nozomi – Love Live! School Idol Festival – ALTER

I normally write these posts, that focus on the recently available figures on the market like every 3 months. After part 31 in early June, the figure manufacturers decide to launch an impressive number of quite desireable preorder items near the end of this month.

Ordered Items

Shortly before my remaining preorder number was close to drop below 4 I could not resist anymore. For starters I placed my order for the new Sora and ALTER’s Nozomi.

Yosuga no Sora – Kasugano Sora – Bunny Style

I preordered this one, because she looks amazing, I already was sure that bunny style Sora would look nice with some paint on her as her notice her during the previous Wonderfestival, but ordering the figure wasn’t really planned. Her face is beautiful and the seductive direction is a nice extra, too. I also like the overall presentation, the attracive and nicely dressed figure sitting on this high stool while her extra long twintails are hanging down. I’m not really interested in these kinds o bunny costumes, but Sora looks so nice in one. Good that it is a December release, so it might become a christmas present I might not need to pay by myself.

manufacturer: ALTER – scale: 1/7 – release: December 2016

Love Live! School Idol Festival – Toujou Nozomi

It took a little longer for me to finally order this fabulous Idol. At first I was a little upset that Nozomi only had one open eye, she looked awesome for sure, but it slightly bothered me. Nevertheless I never lost interest, her release was initionally sheduled for June and my June was already a nightmare, I had to pass. “fortunately” Nozomi’s release was changed to July, my birthday month and fortunately she was still available. While ALTER’s Love Live! School Idol Festival cost a fortune, all girls have amazingly detailed outfits and look wonderful.

manufacturer: ALTER – scale: 1/7 – release: July 2016

Original Character – Magic Bullets – Pin-Up Girl

It’s no secret that I love curvy swimsuit figures, I like to buy those and having them around. The figure named Pin-Up Girl is art based on an illustration by Sasaoka Gungu, this explains the unique but beautiful style of her facial features. She also is what I would call a dynamic bikini figure, she has this elaborately articulated pose. I admit she also is of course sexy with the detailed buxom body and attractive tan lining. Unfortunately, the “bikini figure of my dreams” is sheduled for the busy month October. After some calculations I ordered her now.

manufacturer: Kalmia Project – scale: 1/6 – release: October 2016

Interesting figures

I haven’t ordered these figures, but at least I find them overly interesting and like to list them. Tell me which one you like or which not, or which figure you would like to see in a review

Kantai Collection ~Kan Colle~ – Kouwan Seiki – Wonderful Hobby Selection

Kouwan Seiki or Harbour Princess is one of the cuter Abyssal characters in Kancolle, she is not evil, she just wants a hug :D. Max Factory created a nice figure based on her design, I really think she is adorable and the body is dynamit. The figure has the WHS tag, figures tagged with WHS (Wonderful Hobby Selection) are always very expensive, not really because they are much nicer than normal figures. I bought a WHS figure recently, I was very exited since I really liked the concept, mine unfortunately arrived slightly damaged, fortunately the GSC support was very understanding and helped me very fast. But after that experience I’m not willing to spend 20,000 Yen + for a figure again, maybe if I would buy figures less regulary.

manufacturer: Max Factory – scale: 1/8 – release: April 2017

Kantai Collection ~Kan Colle~ – Prinz Eugen

“einen schönen Tag” Ahh the Germans! Haha, all right a cheaper but not less attractive Kancolle figures is Prinz Eugen, the petite and sporty looking heavy cruiser girl. Prinz Eugen is a very cute character, I really like her hair and the pretty face. Her machine parts are nicely compact and create a slender appearance. But I hope there is no swastika somewhere.

manufacturer: GSC – scale: 1/8 – release: January 2017

Oshiete! Galko-chan – Galko-chan

It’s Galko! I hope you are all familiar with the short anime, big girl Galko might dress like a broad, but she is a good girl and has a heart of gold. Of course I like her buxom appearance and additional volume. Max Factory even went the extra mile and made her 1/6 scale size. In the casual school uniform Galko looks very nice, well her skirt is short and fickle, you might see something while the figure climbs the stairs of her base.

manufacturer: Max Factory – scale: 1/6 – release: January 2017

Kyonyuu Fantasy Gaiden – Isis Petrovna Elenskaya

One first glimpse you’ll that this pretty woman named Isis is based on a hentai game, long hair, big boobs and a nice big butt XD The boobs might be bit much, but I like her face and the detailed front hair and won’t deny a purchase by default.

That might be too much info for my innocent readers ^^ The breast armor can be taken off seperately and also the top part of the suit can be removed to expose her nude balcony. She will have inverted nipples underneath, which often looks very pretty in “anime related media” I will have to see additional pictures before making a fix decision about ordering or not.

manufacturer: Lechery – scale: 1/6 – release: September 2016

Upcoming figures I’m interested in

Love Live! School Idol Festival – Sonoda Umi

I will repeat myself ALTER’s Love Live! School Idol Festival are extremely alluring, just look at this amazing Yukata outfit, even Umi turns into a moeblob Lv 9000 in this announced figure prototype. The “drill instructor” Umi  was turned into a beautifuly, cuddly cute Idol, she’s just perfect in my eyes. With her, Nozomi and Nico I would have three of these cuties, yay!

manufacturer: ALTER – scale: 1/7 – release: …

This sums up the “emergency” New Preorder Post. Lets wait for the next pretty figure Avalanche. Was there anything interesting for you in the last few weeks? Or is there something you are looking forward to? Let me know in the comments, see you ^^.