Hi todays review is about a figure which I hadn’t on my agenda until recently, it is Itou Noemi.
I mentioned her in my last New Preorder post. It was a mere impulse buy, I noticed this figure as I was scrolling through the sale section of HobbyLinkJapan, she looked pretty cute in the preview pictures and I couldn’t resist. The discount at HobbyLinkJapan was also pretty good, something about 5700yen but to save shipping cost and customs I bought her at a local shop.
Itou Noemi was manufactured by Kotobukya and released in November 2008 for a price of 7140 Yen at that time. Her scale is 1/8 and her height is about 19,5 cm.
The origin of this figure is a visual novel game called With You –Mutsumetai from 1998!
It was published by NEC Interchannel, Ltd. for Pc, Sega Saturn and WonderSwan Color
There was also an Ova adaption from the year 2000, but the ratings say it’s pretty bad.
So Kotobukiya made this figure nearly 12 years after the origin was made, that’s interesting.
I haven’t played the game, watched the Ova, or found any CGs, so aside from a few artworks, I can’t give you such background information’s like in my Buddy review. Maybe I’ll be able to edit a few infos after I’ve watched the Ova.
Hair & Face
Noemi has long dark purple colored hair, it has no shading and paintjob on it, but the nicely sculpted strands create good looking shadows on it so I can’t really complain about the missing paintjob, the hair looks quite good without it. At her huge ponytail a big yellow ribbon is attached. The face of her looks very cute, she has beautiful purple colored eyes and some blushmarks on her cheeks. Her wide open mouth is also done very well.
“Kyaaaa!, don’t look at me!”
The morning sun floods Noemi’s room while she is changing into her working dress.
She already took the clothes out of the closet and placed them neatly on her bed before putting them on. From the Hallway silent steps can be heard followed by a cheerful piping song. Suddenly the door opens and as soon as Noemi realizes who enters her room carelessly, she thrusts out a sharp scream “Kyaaaa!, don’t look at me!” from the shock while quickly pulling her uniform close to her body to cover her embarrassment.
Pose & Expression
It looks so cute how Noemi grabs her uniform and pulls her arms towards her face.
The sculptor captured her expression and body language from such scenes we know from many animes shows very well and gave the whole figure a very dynamic appearance. Also the flow of her clothes looks very nice, like the little bit transparent shimmy has nice wrinkles and shading effects. The maid uniform which is probably made of heavier cloth and shows are different kind of drapery than the pink shimmy, the twisted sleeves do look very interesting and are giving the final touch to the flow of her clothes and the pose.
Body & Outfit
The first thing I’ve noticed, was that the figure appears very petite, in the description it is said that Noemi is scaled 1/8, I thought, wait that can’t be 1/8, but in comparison with another 1/8 scaled figure of mine her size appeared reasonable. Neomi is just more petite, she has a small butt, the thin long legs and her small feet; the implied toes are a cute detail. Her upper body is mainly covered by the shimmy, but because of its sculpting you can see some skin here and there. The round base is nothing special, it shows a timber flooring like texture and looks good.
Her outfit consists of a pink shimmy, stockings and panties, the long white stockings are pretty nice. The panties have a small ribbon at the front, at the backside there are funny looking quillings. There are no cast off options and the maid uniform can’t be separated from her.
Overall the sculpting looks quite good only from her backside I’ve noticed that her arms are connected in a strange looking way the lower part is bigger than the upper part and it looks quite ugly, another smaller flaw I’ve noticed is a small gap between her leg and her butt on the right side, this second flaw isn’t that noticeable.
Final Words
I’m happy that I bought this Noemi Itou figure, as said the body language of her pose and the face has a very strong expression , the dynamic flow of her poses also done very well. This figure is a little bit on the sexy side, but it’s not very daring and so Noemi is mainly a very cute figure also my mum said that she’s totally cute ^^
Sorry if I made water your mouth, because she’s now sold out at HobbyLinkJapan.
Good points
– cute characterdesign
– dynamic pose with a nice flow
– good sculpting and painting
Bad Points
– connection of her arms at the backside
Kyle
She is very cute. She looks younger compared to the artworks you posted, but still very nice. I love the pose and facial expression it is quite cute. You take great photos ^^ keep it up!
wieselhead
the artworks are a bit different that’s true, unfortunately I couldn’t find a picture of her in the game, so I can’t really say if she resembles her.
thx a lot Kyle I really appreciate that =)
tabetaiii
a very nice and detailed review!
wow, she certainly looks lovely! especially for a figure released in 2008. Now when I look at her, the dress she’s holding, especially the sleeves, look really strange for me^^” or are they suppose to look that?
And that particular pose/scene they chose was really captured well as you said!
Anyways, lovely photos as usual and the background used for this, really suited this figure
wieselhead
hehe thank you
Yeah she looks quite nice for beeing released 3 years ago.
I think they should look that twisted, maybe they need some ironing ^^
tabetaiii
no problem~
yes, definitely!
Oh really? But both sides seem kind of unrealistic to me^^”
wieselhead
I get your point it look as if the sleeves are rotating in the air, I guess that could look very funny in an anime ^o^
Ashlotte
Can always count on Koto to make random figures of stuff that nobody would think to even bother with haha.
Certainly a unique looking figure though.
wieselhead
Yeah sometimes it’s interesting which characters the companys choose for their production line. she was a nice get for me ;D
Zai
I love her socks.. a lot! I would like some figures without shoes on..
Her embarrassed face is adorable too and I think she looks a lot nicer in figure form than in the artwork.
Is that a bokeh brush you used on some photos? Whatever you did, it looks really great! 😀
wieselhead
these little feets are a nice and cute detail I think.
I guess the artwork I’ve posted looks a bit lame *cough*, it is not easy to find images of an not very popular and old game:(
You guessed right and the brush is called SS-bokeh, I have no brush skills at all so I just placed some bokeh dots here and there ;p
thankyou
Aya
Lovely, the white socks really great on her 😀 is the uniform can be removed from her hands ?
wieselhead
Yeah lovely white socks.
No, unfortunately not, only the figures and the base can be seperated, though ^^
Yi
The flow is very lovely indeed. She’s a very pretty figure.
Her expression gave me a slightly different vibe from being caught undressing. To me, it feels more like she’s happy to have gotten a new dress and is eagerly checking it out! Wonderful!
wieselhead
Hi, glad you like her.
I like her quite a lot 🙂
Oh thats an different but interesting way to interpret this pose. Now it looks like I watch too much ecchi comedy anime ^o^
Fabrice
Come on, you said that for Mayoi young schoolgirl look in combination with this seductive pose isnt your thing.. im looking at this figure and now im confuse…
What really makes this figure interesting is its originality, i mean you dont get much figure with a pose like this one where shes holding the colthes actually i think its the only one. Im also liking the effects you added into the pictures, very good.
wieselhead
Hi Fabrice
Ah sorry for being confusing, I think Noemi is older as Mayoi. Well, I looked at the Mayoi figure again and it doesn’t look as pedo as I remembered, so forget what. I said on twitter 🙂
But I would have prefered a different pose for this Mayoi.
The pose is really great it has such a strong and lively expression
thank you =)
Nopy
With You was a pretty popular title way back then, so I’m not surprised that they decided to make a figure based on one of its characters.
I love the way her hair and clothing flow around her. It looks natural and the shot you took of her in Noemi_Itou%20-%2039.jpg emphasizes that point.
wieselhead
Oh really, thx for the hint someone mentioned this in the youtube comments as well.
I only asked myself how koto get the idea for making her. well I guess at the time the game was popular the figure industry wasn’t able to make such a figure.
The flow of this figure is really, really nice^^
thanky you I also like this picture a lot
Tier
This is a really cute figure, and I like how she she shows off a lot of personality. I’ve taken pictures of a lot of figures recently that don’t have much personality and I somtimes find myself not liking them as much as those that show more emotion.
I like the bright backdrop that you used, it makes Noemi look like an angel.
I’ve found a lot of Kotobukiya’s 1/8 scale stuff runs a bit small. The Marvel Bishoujo figures were definitely undersized, and Kotonoha and their old Blanc Neige figure were a bit smaller than I expected them to be, too.
wieselhead
Oh nie Im glad you like her 😉
I think personality is important even for a figure made of plastic, there are pretty figures which are just pretty and popular for some reason, without showing much emotions.
Thx for your praise ^_^, I worked with natural sunlight and used some cloth to make it diffuse. Yeah my little angel hehe :p
Noemi appears really a bit small, but it already grow on me in her case, on the other hand my 1/8 Hachikuji Mayoi figure from Koto is , too big, which is somehow more annoying.I can’t put her next to 1/8 scaled figures because of her big head 🙁
softwerkz
Lovely! I like your “Kyaaaa!, don’t look at me!”. It’s very creative 🙂
I think the two flaws can be neglected when you look at it overall. Figures seldom come out with perfect figure I guess. There sure bound to be some flaws in the figures. I like the little white dot effects you put in the photos. As usual, you never fail to bring out the figure with your photos.. Great job, Fabienne!
Like I said, I’ve missed out a lot from your blog. Since, I’m gonna eat-in in my office, I’ll spend some time browse thru’ your previous post to see what I’ve missed so far.
I hope my project will be announced to the public soon.. then I’ll be able to share with you guys too 🙂 Currently, it’s still under non-disclosure terms.
wieselhead
Hi softz nice that you found the time in your quite busy situation, I hope you are fine 😉 Im curious about your project.
haha thank you.
“Kyaa” is a funny word in anime, I always have to laugh in these scenes, even though its random XD
These are really no big flaws, but I wanted to mention them for the sake of my readers.
ah thank you, I appreciate your kind words, I always try my best t least I think so 🙂
Ah don’t mention it, you don’t have to force yourself when you are in a busy situation. 🙂
Miette-chan
I like this figure, the pose is almost if someone took a frame straight our from an anime episode.
I’m surprised by two things the first is that a VN would get a figure made 10 years later after it’s release. The second is that you can remove the dress, in my opinion even without it I think the pose and figure would look nice.
wieselhead
Yep it is really enchanting how realistic and lively her pose looks.
Haha a bit late but I would say better late then never.
Unfortunately the dress is fixed to her arms, I guess it would have a been nice option =p
anonymous_object
So… I have no idea who this character is or anything about the source, but I completely understand why you bought her. She’s really cute! Cute dress, cute pose, cute pantsu, and cute camisole. I really like the camisole. If you could display her without the maid outfit, that would be most excellent :3
Anyway, nice find on the figure and nice photos! Thanks ^^
wieselhead
hehe, same here, I know nothing about her character :p in summary she’s super cute
Ah camisole is the right term instead of shimmy
thank you very much for the kind words ^_^
duqs
There is something alluring about the innocence of a camisole here XD
Really cute figure!
wieselhead
Yep she has a very innocent look in her outfit
I highly agree :p
duqs
I dont think i saw this in the review nor in the comments but is the dress removable? XD
wieselhead
no, unfortunately not 🙁