Cosplay year 2014

I’ve pretty much skipped all convention reports since… fall 2013 and I feel kind of bad about it. This past year have been the busiest we’ve had since we started cosplaying, so you’d think that there should be lot to tell! I never had any intentions to have this kind of hiatus, but… yeah.

After creating a Tumblr account for our cosplay photos, it has felt somewhat overwhelming to actually type and publish anything. Convention reports have always been difficult for me, even if this past year we did more than just attend conventions.

As EuroCosplay representative I’ve had a great pleasure to be invited as a judge in multiple events, one of the recent ones being Närcon in Sweden. Yoki took another type of challenge and have now hosted cosplay competitions at Desucon and Tracon. We’ve also gotten more familiar with people we’ve known but never had courage to actually approach. In all, we’ve had a great convention year, great experiences and you people we’ve met this past year… you are great! I just want to say that and thank you all!

This year we’ve made our personal record with five conventions we went to together; Desucon Frostbite, Desucon, Animecon, Närcon and Tracon. And that’s not all! We also went separately to Cosvision and Kawacon! That is a whole lot of cons for one year.

At Desucon Frostbite I wore Death from The Sandman on Saturday and was sharing my thoughts about international cosplay competitions in the evening in a panel with Rimppu, Majo and two Danish beauties. Yoki went as civilian and acted as one of the judges in Hall cosplay competition on Saturday. On Sunday we had a pair cosplay from Otoyomegatari; Amira and Karluk.

Photographer: Esa Ala-Petäys

Before Desucon I was really fortunate to be asked to sit behind the judging table for show cosplay category at Cosvision, one of the year’s new comers on convention front. I was over the moon with the event and set a record of panels and lectures during one con. I made to costumes for the occasion; Deidara from Naruto and Kofuku from Noragami.

Photographer: Hanna Hyttinen

Desucon was an exciting con for us as I was judging the EuroCosplay preliminaries and Yoki was hosting the show! Luckily, we are somewhat the same size, so I borrowed my Lady Doctor costume for Yoki. I made a new costume and cosplayed Zakuro from Otome Youkai Zakuro. On Satuday we recycled Snufkin and Alicia. We only made a fishing rod and a broomstick to match the characters.

Photographer: Mira Strengell

Kawacon was held in June two weeks after Desucon. Yoki was working as a supervisor at the cloakroom and didn’t take any costumes with her to the event.

We didn’t have intentions of attending all of the cons we eventually visited, like Animecon and Närcon, but some surprising events and opportunities changed our minds, like Kaoru Mori being announced as quest of honor at Animecon. Seriously, I screamed five minutes after reading the announcement and I don’t regret begging my boss to give me a free weekend. Totally worth it.

At Animecon we naturally wore Amira and Karluk. We went to see all the programs featuring Mori and also queued almost two hours for her autograph. It was amazing to chat with other Mori fans at the queue. More amazing was when it was our turn and we politely asked, if Mori- sensei could sign our hats. She did! And we changed few words about our costumes and she wanted to shake hands with us. She really seemed to appreciate cosplayers, who crafted costumes inspired by her art.

Photographer: Jesmo

On Sunday I had a new costume, Saya from Blood: The Last Vampire. Yoki recycled Fuyu Jaw’re from her original story, Varjella. We had awesome photoshoots during the weekend.

Photographer: YumiKoyuki

Next we travelled to Närcon, Sweden with our representatives who were going to compete at Nordic Cosplay Championships. Närcon was our second convention abroad and totally different experience compared to MCM London ComicCon. It was more like a festival if you think how and where Finnish conventions are organized. But truly a great experience! I’m really proud of our team and their assistants. And of course we're really happy that our team member Päivi won the final!

I really don’t remember which day we wore our costumes, but we had Snufkin and Alicia and Amira and Karluk with us. We also ended up on the stage with our Moomin costumes at the opening ceremony.

Last event of the year was Tracon. On Saturday we wore Lumiere and Cogsworth and were both working backstage that day. I was a judge in the Hall Cosplay competition and Yoki was hosting the competition. On Sunday we cosplayed characters from Yoki’s Varjella; Matriach Vaira Kirlain and Kalma Kirlain. We also had a mind blowing photoshoot… with a smoke machine!

Photographer: Emilia "AG" Lahtinen

One special event during last summer that I just have to mention is our photoshoot weekend with AG and Biitti. They came over for three days and we were able to shoot six costumes in different locations. The most challenging one was a field with blazing sun and uncooperative sheep!

Photographer: Emilia "AG" Lahtinen

Next year I’m going to start our convention season with Yukicon 2.0 and in February we are heading to Desucon Frostbite. We both have been crafting new costumes and we are going to debut them one by one in upcoming conventions. I’m pushing myself with two new outfits and the first one I’ll hopefully wear at Yukicon.

We wish everyone inspiring and productive year 2015!

Have fun!

Amira and Karluk at Desucon Frostbite

Desucon Frostbite was held last weekend at Sibeliustalo, Lahti. It was a three day convention, but as we both had certain obligations towards work and school we only left to Lahti on Friday evening. As I wrote earlier, I crafted a costume for myself from Sandman for Saturday. I also made another costume for the weekend, but it was not for me. It was for Yoki.

On Sunday I dressed as Amira and Yoki draped herself in the multiple layers of Karluk’s outfit. When I look at the photos of us, I’m really happy how the costumes fit together; they have somewhat the same vibe, but are still totally different.

I’m truly grateful to everyone who came to talk to us, complimented the costumes or changed few words about last year’s competition. And the cuteness overload reactions were just priceless!

The photos in this post were taken by Emilia Lahtinen at Frostbite’s photobooth. I’m always so happy to get photographed by her, because it’s certain that I will love the outcome! Thank you yet again!

Photographer: Emilia Lahtinen
Costumes: Hiron/ Casualty Cosplay
Models: Yoki as Karluk, Hiron as Amira

Bride-to-be

I’m almost there! Kind of… If I mildly understate the amount of stitches that still need to be stitched and the rehearsals to be rehearsed. But nonetheless, I will at least have something on when it’s time to step on stage at Desucon!

Last Sunday I asked Yoki to company me for a small photoshoot trip to our nearby meadow. I thought that having a trial run for Amir’s underclothes wouldn’t be such a bad idea. I also got the opportunity to test how the wig works in action. It was worth the trouble, because now I know that such a heavy wig needs more sturdy fastenings than just regular hairpins. I ordered wig clips and should receive them early next week. The wig problems should be solved with that.

For the photoshoot I was also able to test the make-up for Amir. I tried to keep the look natural and didn’t wear fake lashes. I probably won’t wear them at the competition either, because I’m worried that they might be bit too much with dark contact lenses. But we’ll see about that… quite soon I’m afraid.

The costume itself or the lower layer of it looks good. I’ll probably add some hooks to the shirt so that I won’t be pulling and twitching it after every time I lift my arms. The wig also needs some attention with the fastenings and a lot of hairspray.

Now I think I will take off to our workshop and try to shorten the list of unfinished costume pieces. I have high hopes that today I might be able to finish the jacket, which is the most laborious part of this costume. But also the prettiest one too!

The credit for the photos and big thanks goes to Yoki, who took some really nice shots and has been a great sport during my costume construction!

Until next time!

Saya Otonashi from Blood+ at Tracon 7

I actually do have proper entries under construction. I really do!  As soon as I get an opportunity I will write about contact lenses. I recently bought ones with prescription and did the whole optician routine by the book. I have worn cosmetic contacts as long as I have cosplayed, but it took me this long to go to optician and check if my eyes are even compatible with lenses. But since I can't wrap the experience up just yet, I just keep spamming photos for now.

Saya is actually the only costume we both have worn. We are pretty much the same size, so I didn’t have to alter the costume to fit me. I only had to turn the skirts waistband over, so that the skirt “shortened” a little; my torso is taller than Yoki’s so the height proportions of the skirt and the jacket didn’t mach. It was an easy fix.

I really don’t have much more to say about the costume. It was effortless costume to wear on the second day of the convention, regular make-up after the troll blueness and perfect for changeable weather conditions, since its water- and windproof.

New cosplay and photoshoot- Alicia from Moomin

Even if I thought to have a break from costume making after Tracon, I just couldn’t. This year has been our most productive year this far and there seems to be no end to it. The main point for constructing Alicia/Aliisa costume was to make a mash-up revolving around a theme of Zombies at Moominvalley for Halloween. Instead I fell in love with the regular costume so bad that I had to have a photoshoot starring Alicia. The location was our neighboring forest. Yoki acted as the photographer.

 The costume wasn’t complex to build. I borrowed Yoki’s patterns for Snufkin as a base for the shirt and dress. The tights I found from local department store and the shoes are drifted ages ago for unidentified costume purposes. They were so cheap that I had to buy them… Thank you, my inner cosplay hoarder. The pendant is left over Fimo, gessoed and painted pink.

The wig is from a Finnish masquerade store and I used it for Lumiere earlier this year. Its bit thin to be worn loose, but I have solution ready.  Again thanks to my hoarding spirit, I found a pack of straight kanelon fiber from my closet in the exact color of the wig! So if I ever wear Alicia to conventions, I’ll be making wefts for some thickness.

Tracon, trolls and toddlers

Maybe it’s about time to write something about last weekend, which we successfully spent at Tracon with a party of seven. Seven! We overcame all obstacles and were victorious!

Tracon is an annual convention held traditionally at Tampere. This year’s convention was the seventh of its kind and the third one held at Tampere Hall, conference and concert hall near the center of the city. So alongside shops and grocery stores, accommodation is near. We literally had to take only few steps and we were at the convention area. We liked it, with the troll feet especially. Tracon’s program covers pretty much everything from role-playing games to anime and manga, with huge amount of cosplay from various sources. The quests of honor this year were Sandy Petersen (Cthulhu!) and Yasuhiro Nakura(Moomin!). For us, Tracon 7 was our fifth Tracon on a row, if I remember correctly.

This Tracon was bit different compared to the previous ones. We didn’t cosplay from the same series with Yoki, we had three generations attending to the convention; including me, Yoki, Thalla, his wife and two children and the Mom/Grandmom and I acted as a judge for the costume competition on Saturday. Also, Yoki participated on a demonstration for original costume designs on Sunday, for which I give two thumbs up! I hope that this kind of show will continue as a part of the cosplay program, so that those creative people, who give a form to their imagination by constructing a costume, usually sparing no effort, can have some well earned stage time. I don’t know if alternative or unofficial forms of characters could be integrated to this class somehow. Or would there be too many participants… Pre-selection maybe?

Over all the whole convention was a great experience. Loads of cosplay, great competitions and polite people, which really was nice since we had younglings with us. I have to admit that I was bit worried that a convention might be overwhelming with pram and lively two year old, but I was so wrong! Our two year old was so exited from all the life-sized stuffed toys that she wanted to hug each and every one. So big thank you to all the furries around! I bet you will not be forgotten.

Since I started to thank people, next big thank you goes to Iris, the person charge of the Tracon’s cosplay competitions and competitors and judges and… well, cosplay-everything. Thank you! For a first timer, the judging was a positive and a memorable experience. Also I could not have better mates to judge with. I, Lilian and Kizzy had weirdly enough really similar perspective to cosplay and I hope that we made the judging situation pleasant to the contestants, which was one of our goals. And if anyone wishes feedback from their costumes, just sent me e-mail on our address and I will reply from my personal account.

Part of the gratitude goes to the participants and everyone at the cosplay backstage. The competitions held at Tracon from the costume and show competition to the World Cosplay Summit preliminaries have been praised a lot, but not for nothing. Congratulations for all the ranked cosplayers!

I almost forgot our costumes! On Saturday we were troll siblings from World of Warcraft with Thalla. 

Yoki wore a costume from her original story, portraying Sio Imano both Saturday and Sunday. On Sunday I strolled as Saya Otonashi from Blood+.

On Saturday, the kids were introduced to the world of cosplay in form of cute animal over-alls. I don’t know what kind of presents can be expected from the costume crazy auntie. Sadly, I don’t have a good photo of us all in costumes. We were standing in a rather dark corridor when we had the opportunity for group photos.

I’ll write a post about our troll costumes in more detail later on and spam some photos from the costumes. Also Yoki promised to write about her adventures in the field of costume construction.