Pessi & Illusia

Not the Pessi & Illusia of course, but something of a similar nature. This is my entry to Summer Joust 2024 category Beast Master, which is about a beast and a master doing their task. Why Summer Joust entry in middle of all the Bio-Cup builds? No worries, I made it to the final round which ends 4th August (in some American time zone) and my build is already in the good shape. This one has been finished for some days - I made Illusia (the fairy) between 2nd and semifinal rounds in two days, and built Pessi (the toad) in a day after finishing Deinocheirus. The basket and the cloudberry stalks were built in the beginning of this current Cup final round. I wanted to make something for Summer Joust this year - I won the subterranean category two years ago - but I also aknowledged that it would be thigh with the Cup going on. Beast Masters is a designated character build category, so I focused on it. This was mostly a laid-back easygoing System play thing between those more challenging Bionicle builds.

A large part of the time used for this category went with the first idea, of which nothing remains in this model; I was going to build a Japanese giant salamander with a samurai, but I really couldn't capture the weird, minimalistic facial features of the damn salamander. This final build, on another hand, was more of a tablescrap fun with the sleeves and Elves Queen dragon head skirt. The wing are from the same dragon, four in total; I've had this fairy wing idea for years (I've bought two of those Queen dragons used locally) and it felt perfect with the head skirt. I also got to use some new Lugbulk parts (white ferns on the shoes) and recent Pick-a-Brick picks (light aqua petals on sleeves and shoes). 

I built the fairy first, leaving open what kind of beast would I make. The size of the animal was quite open, as fairies can vary from few centimeters to half a meter in size. I almost settled at a bumblebee, but I wanted to use some olive green and a toad formed such a nice contrast with the fabulous fairy. Toads are quite expressive creatures as well. I like to think that these two are friends despite their external differences.

The category brief asked for some story on what the beast and the master are doing. Picking berries was an obvious fairy activity; it's also something I do a lot this time of year (for example, one hour ago - my fingers are still purple of blueberries). I built several berries, but concentrated the most on cloudberries which are the most revered berries in the north. They were also a perfect combo with the very weird Belville fairy flower pieces I got from a friend some months ago. Thanks Piko!

-Eero.