Happy 2019!

Hey everyone, hope you all had a fun and safe time ringing in the new year! Since I still have minimal new projects progress to share (but I will soon, I promise!) I thought I’d take a look back at my 2018 cosplays. This was a big year for me for a couple of reasons, I definitely expanded my horizons this year and I’ve grown a lot as a crafter. 2018 also marked my 10-year cosplay anniversary! That’s right folks, I’ve officially been cosplaying for a whole decade! It’s amazing that you can be doing something for that long and still be learning and growing in your craft.

My first cosplay of the year really highlights that. I’m referring to my favorite member of the Fire Emblem A**hole Archer Squad: Innes.

I really need to do an actual photoshoot in this cosplay because this is the only good photo I have of him where I’m not hunting dinosaurs *facepalm*

Ohayocon has become kind of a weird convention for me cosplay-wise, because my usual folks who I tend to cosplay with don’t always make many plans for Ohayo, it tends to be our chill con and I’m perfectly happy with that, because it usually means I can work on something personal over the winter that doesn’t rely on anyone else (because we all know how much of a whore I am for cosgroups). Innes was that personal project this year and I have to say, it is probably my most well-made cosplay to date. The amount of time and effort that went into the elaborate applique, the trim that I had to attach entirely by hand, the gold filigree on the belts and breastplate, and of course the construction of Nidhogg, made for a lot of work but I am so pleased with the result. Innes has been a favorite character of mine since playing FE:SS and when he was released in FEH with an even more foppish design I decided it was finally time to make this cosplay a reality. It’s also surprisingly comfy with is great because I can hang out at con in it all day without wanting to die (a sentiment that is not shared with my two other major cosplays from this year).

My second project was a good bit simpler but was also a blast to make and wear: Mordred from Fate/Apocrypha. This cosplay came together kinda last minute when I discovered RiteoftheFrozen was coming up for Colossal and wanted to cosplay Astolfo. Since they don’t live in the area any more I seized my chance to make a good excuse to hang out with them a bunch at the con by making Mordred (who I already kinda wanted to cosplay anyway because a Fate cosplay was way overdue).

RiteoftheFrozen is the Astolfo we all need in our lives

The cosplay itself was super simple, and I thrifted everything but the jacket which I had to order online. I even got a prestyled wig because I really don’t enjoy styling wigs and it turned out great! I did have to do some work but I’m gonna do that whenever I can now, assuming I ever pick another character that’s mainstream enough to find one.

The major build for Mordred was of course the sword: Clarent Blodod Arthur. I have a lot of fun making swords, they’re one of my favorite type of prop to make and this one turned out beautifully. I even had the fortune of meeting Erica Lindbeck, who voices Mordred, at Matsuricon later in the year and had her sign the sword! She was super cool and as I was leaving she said Mordred’s opening line from the show and I just about died because I was not at all prepared for it.

Matsuricon was also a debut for another major cosplay project: Vaida from FE:BS. This was my first attempt at sculpting a breastplate out of EVA foam and it worked out surprisingly well!

The best part of this was having our huge Blazing Sword Group and getting to work with Cosplay In Black and White, who as you can see take beautiful photos!

Priscilla: ollyodd_cosplay
Eliwood: kobblecosplay
Lloyd: vmcosplay
Hector: ?
Lyn: dia.dove
Serra: nekoyasha
Erk: kazeninja
Florina: mecchan_chan
Nino: mint_amethyst
Lucius: styleshinjuku

This photoshoot was insanely fun and I got to meet a bunch of awesome people who I will hopefully get to cosplay with again in the future!

My last big project for the year was for another big group and it was definitely something different than I’ve constructed in the past. I’m talking about Frankenstein’s Monster from Fate/Apocrypha.
The wedding dress was definitely a first for me but it came out surprisingly well! A lot of trial and error went into the pattern, the crinoline, the giant mace, and pretty much every other aspect of the cosplay, but it came together and I am super happy with the result! This was another great time to hang out with other awesome cosplayers and work with a fantastic photographer (Robert Tate photography)

I still can’t get over how beautiful this photo is

Mordred: candlewaxcosplay
Jack: holy.grail
Shiro Amakusa: emma_the_fantastic 
Semiramis: nekoyasha
Seig: tomoyoichijouji 
Astolfo: nihopalaoa 
Seigfried: fang_soul 

2018 really was a great year for cosgroups, between the ones involving my new cosplays, and even a few involving older cosplays! Tekko had another great FE: Blazing Sword group where I got to dust off Guy and get some lovely photos with the talented Cosfame - Cosplay Photographer.

Lyn: chattyanzud
Hector: marjolycookie
Eliwood & Ninian: Raptors in Rhythm
Nils Light Inheritor
Florina: mecchan_chan

I also got to bust out my favorite lazy reaper for a partner duo with SMZeldaRules and do a great photoshoot with Headphone Studios

And last, but certainly not least, I was involved in yet more Fire Emblem shenanigans with a return of King Ashnard to Youma 2018.

So all in all I had a lot of fun this year and I hope all of you did too. I’m going to be doing some updating this week, particularly with my con schedule for the year, and I might put together a 2019 cosplans post soon too… not to mention that Ohayocon is next weekend and I have no idea what I’m doing for it yet x_x

Anyway, may your 2019 be blessed, love you all and Happy New Year!!!

SHAKA-LA-LA-LA-LA-LA-LA-LA

I hope everyone has been having a lovely holiday season! Sonce Christmas is this week I wanted to share some fun holiday photos with all of you!

I’ve made it a bit of a tradition over the last few years to try to do some sort of holiday cosplay photos and things keep getting more serious as I get better ideas and more elaborate with it. Let’s take a quick stroll through the last two years…

Phoenix, what are you doing?
WRIGHT GIVE ME THE CAMERA!

2016 was kind of a last-minute decision so I had to use stuff I already had lying around. If my Phoenix didn’t live a couple states away you can be sure we would have taken some beautiful photos together but alas. The next time he comes to visit, however, I might just make him do it, regardless of what time of year it is.

2017 took a bit more setup than just putting a santa hat on an existing cosplay and taking a selfie. Since last year was The Year of the Magical Creature for me, it seemed appropriate to let them all help with the decorating,. I also co-opted Ashnard’s cape that fits the holiday aesthetic perfectly without the spiky shoulder pauldrons on it. And voila, we have a beastly magical christmas.

Now most of you already know this, but I play the flute in a volunteer christmas concert every year in Peninsula, so I’m used to dressing up for this sort of thing anyway. We always perform as elves and I finally got off my lazy butt and made my own costume pieces for it. I also finally got to use the ears I initially bought for a certain Hylian that I have yet to cosplay…

Featuring Deb & Kathie, two of my fellow musical elves.

The top half has become my standard christmas attire, regardless of wheather I’m trying to look overly elfish or not.

And at last that brings us to MDC 2018, which I’m sure many of you already have some idea just from the title of today’s post…

SHAKALA! Koroks love to celebrate the seasons too! And I heard humans decorate a tree with lights and ornaments for their winter festivities. Since I’m related to trees I thought it would be fun to decorate myself! Sometimes the ornaments fall off when I dance around though…

From my family to yours, I hope everyone has a very merry Christmas, happy holidays, and a fantastic start to the new year!
Cheers!

30 Cosplay Questions

So since I don’t have a ton of updates to work on, and I forgot to answer these on Twitter, I’ll just do them here and pretend like it’s a legit blog post…

1) Favorite Cosplay - Wow starting out with a tough one. My favorite at any given moment is usually whichever one I’ve just finished, and does kinda hold true at the moment with Fran. I love that cosplay to death and I love the character and I really really want to find flat silver shoes so I can wear her around at con without my feet feeling like they’re gonna fall off.

Photo by Eric Cosino

In the long term though, I have to go with Hestu. It’s such a fun and comfy cosplay, and plenty of people recognize it, and even the ones who don’t usually laugh or smile because I’m wearing a giant broccoli on my head.

2) Least Favorite Cosplay - That’s another hard one because I like pretty much all of my cosplays but it’s probably Roxas. I’m not a huge KH fan, though I have enjoyed playing 1 & 2, and I put a lot of work into the keyblades and the cosplay itself but I was never super happy with how any of it turned out. I was also lazy and didn’t have a wig and by the time I got a wig I wasn’t cosplaying him any more so yeah.
Perhaps, with KH3 coming out I might be inspired to make a new Roxas that I’m actually happy with (it was a super early cosplay so I didn’t really know what I was going in the first place)… but we’ll see cause I already have too long a list of prospective cosplays lol

3) Make or Buy - I generally make most of my stuff or alter things I find at the thrift store. But as a general philosophy I think making and buying are both great! There’s a lot of stigma in the cosplay community about buying cosplays but seriously, that’s dumb. We all just want to have fun cosplaying whatever characters we want so why does it matter where the costume comes from?

4) Favorite part of cosplaying - Making a connection with another nerd over whatever nerdy thing we’re sharing. Cosplay is a great way of broadcasting “hey I love this thing that I’m dressed up as” so I always have fun chatting with people at cons who enjoy the character or series I’m cosplaying from.

5) What order do you put makeup on - What a weird question. I honestly don’t know how to answer this so moving right along…

6) Most comfortable cosplay - Banjo-Kazooie. It’s literally some fleece leggings, yellow shorts and a hoodie. I even get to wear slippers with it!

7) Most uncomfortable cosplay - Well the last two new cosplays I’ve done have involved stilettos which make my feet want to die but besides the shoes the cosplays themselves aren’t that unfcomfortable. So I have to go with Thanatos because suspending a bunch of coffins around me was a terrible idea. The whole reason I wore it once and then threw most of it away was because it was horrendously uncomfortable.

8) Best memory in cosplay - Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Probably meeting all my TWEWY friends for the first time? Also the tiny airbender that was at the ATLA photoshoot the first time I wore Tenzin.

9) Dream Cosplay - HOO BOY I HAVE A LOT. But most of the things on my “dream cosplay” list are fairly achievable for me at this point. THIS ONE, HOWEVER, remains the pinnacle of the list because I still have neither the skills necessary, nor the money with which to purchase, HIM HEAD

10) Someone you’d never cosplay - That’s a super broad question. There’s a lot of characters I wouldn’t cosplay for a variety of reasons and I don’t feel like explaining all of them for the next hour so we’ll pick a rando from the list. How about this douchebag:

11) First cosplay - Davy Jones, featuring my mother as Tia Dalma

12) Most recent cosplay - Fran from Fate!Apocrypha. You’ve already seen the only real photo I have of her in Q1.

13) Full cosplay or costest - I don’t know what this means exactly but I try on all the pieces as I make them so probably costest?

14) Selfie or shoot - Yes, please. Next question.

15) Friends or solo - Also both, but I definitely have more fun when I can cosplay with friends. I’ll still solo the random characters none of my friends know anyway.

16) Cute or mature characters - Also both. Sometimes at the same time.

17) How many cosplays have you done - If you include Newt Scamander who I’ve kind of cosplayed but really it was an OC who also loves magical creatures, then I believe the count is up to 46. And you can see all of them (besides Newt) in my Character Compendium.

18) How long have you been cosplaying - I believe this is my 10 year cosplay anniversary cause it should be 2008 when we had the pirate party… OH SNAP I FORGOT ABOUT NABOORU. THIS HAPPENED IN 2007 you can ignore the whole Davy Jones was my first cosplay thing…
So that makes it 11 years as of Halloween.

19) How many conventions have you been to - I’ve been to maybe 8 or 9 different cons? If we’re counting each individual time I’ve been to a convention I don’t have the patience to sit here and figure that out.

20) Form fitting or flowing garments - Yes please

21) Colored contacts or natural eye color/editing - I’ve worn contacts once for a cosplay and I’m not motivated to do it ever again really. The only exceptions I’d make would be for characters with heterochromia. I’d love to get a close-up of Fran with her different-colored eyes but I’d probably edit > contacts

22) Why’d you start cosplaying - I’m a huge nerd and I like dressing up…

23) Perfectionist or not - I tend to be a perfectionist but I cut corners like nobody’s business

24) Embarrassing cosplay moments - Ripping the entire crotch out of Zelos’s pants. As a bonus I was wearing dark underwear and Zelos wears white pants. You do the math.

25) AU or canon - I’m a fan of both but I usually stick to canon designs.

26) Dream photoshoot - getting the entire Valuan armada together

27) How do you choose your character - a) Whoever I’m really feeling from whatever media I’m consuming in that moment, b) whoever fits in well with a group y friends are doing, or c) some super-obscure character from an obscure/old fandom that I’ve loved forever

28) Secret cosplay or tell everyone - I did a secret cosplay once and I got too excited so I gave some people too many hints XD

29) Character you’ve worn most - Hmmm, honestly I’m not sure. Probably either Junpei or Edgeworth because they’re more comfy cosplays that I’ve had for a long time and have worn for lots of groups and stuff

30) Favorite prop - GURGURANT