Sickness

Oh Man. I love the prospect of a new cosplay. I get obsessed with the images and want to look at them all the time. I show everybody I know. I do a bunch of research and the only thing that is stopping me from making the costume is all the other stuff I have planned. "What are you talking about?" you ask. Samurai warriors, Dynasty Warriors and (BAMBANANA!) GRIMGRIMOIRE. Oh dear. Let me tell the story. I was sitting reading about the plot of Odin Sphere on Wikipedia and I scrolled down and saw familiar and unfamiliar titles in the "See also" section. It read GrimGrimoire and Muramasa: the Demon Blade. Muramasa, blah blah blah katana and armor. BUT OH DEAR LORD GRIMGRIMOIRE. I had no idea this game existed. The costumes are BOMB! I might just have to wipe my cosplay schedule clean and do this beautiful pirate alchemist sexy man.

Then I can force Nathalie to be the most adorable character I have ever seen! Margarita Surprise! SO CUTE! I would put up the picture but blogger is acting up so I cant. In summary, I have no emotional attachment to this game or any of its characters. I just think the clothes are beautiful and I want to wear them. It like every time I see a pretty outfit I want to make it and wear it. I think I need to calm down. What costumes to I really really really want to do? Who knows. The question probably should be, what costumes CAN I do? I may be starting to doubt the possibility of doing Date Masamune from Samurai Warriors. Its beautiful but oh so difficult and Idk if I have the chops.

ON THE EVE OF AX!

Dude, I am so spent. I want to go back to being productive. Working on everybody else's stuff and seeing it unfinished is not as rewarding as sending my own babies out unfinished. As much as I love helping out other people I have been really inspired lately because I went to fabrics-r-us and also found out about Dynasty Warriors and Samurai Warriors. I wish I could be starting work on those costumes right now or just at AX. Being my first time at the con I don't even care what I wear but I brought 4 costumes anyway so I guess I am wearing those. Meh. At this point I will be fine just wearing Leeron for the contest.

Also, everyone was talking about why we cosplay when it is so stressful and the only product is a costume. It doesn't seem worth it at all. For some reason we all do it. Just something to think about in the near future I guess.

My thoughts leading up to Fanime.

Oh geez. It has been a crazy couple of days trying to get my stuff done and thinking about cosplay and everything. I just can't seem to get really excited about my costumes right now. I was really excited to remake parts of Leeron but now that its in progress and looking basically the same as how it did before I am getting really discouraged and feeling like its been in vain. I am only wearing Leeron for Friday of Fanime and I doubt I will wear it to a con ever again. It has been fun but its one of my most tiring costumes. The heels, the make up , the bodysuit. its so much work to wear and for what? Attention? I get plenty of attention already and I know I am one of the best Leeron cosplayers out there. Why do I feel the need to flaunt it for a second year in a row. Whatever. It still needs to get done.

Brera is agonizing right now. I am so afraid of it coming out something different than I want it to be. I am still having the problem with recreation of the same effect. Brera is supposed to be flawless cause he is a cyborg. I won't be flawless. I am just a cosplayer. I can't do everything perfectly with the funds and resources I have. grrr. I should not have decided to use spandex. I should have pulled a Jimmy and made the whole thing out of pleather. lol. then it would be cool.

Sousuke isn't started yet. I am excited to cosplay with Nathalie though and I probably won't wear this many times so it doesn't have to be that good. I have a great shoot lined up with Oscar C and I am confident the three of us will get some great photos if we work together.

I'm not stressed about Volbeat. It feels good to already have a costume done. I am mostly wearing it so I don't have to be in heels all day. =)

My child, Julia Wawawa, decided to shop me all of the pretty costumes from Dynasty Warriors yesterday and I think I almost have a cosplay type. Its a little harder with guys because the characters don't always fit into the roles that women do (i.e. the slutty one, the bubbly cute one, the diva, etc.). I really like a lot of costumes with bodysuits and like I said in my previous posts I am going for a magic/adventure/structure sort of feel. I think my newest additions to my planned cosplays demonstrates this well.



Isn't it kind of magical/adventure-y?

I feel the need...

I must blog. Its been too long (like 2 weeks lol). First I must say, I am relieved of schoolwork and stressed caused from my semester! I got all my grades and ended up with three As and two Bs!!! I was so glad because I expected the Bs to be Cs. =(

ANYWAY! I am in the middle of working on costumes for Fanime and things aren't going exactly as I planned. I am messing up and doing things wrong all over the place. I thought I would be able to do Brera better than anyone but it is just not happening like that. The flawlessness I imagined in my head just isn't there. Spandex and serging is not very forgiving under such a time constraint. However, I will finish it, and it will look hella tight. I am just nervous about the possibility of people seeing my penis. It is going to be very close to the edge of the garment. eep! lol.

Leeron needs to be finished tomorrow so I can stop thinking about it entirely. I really need to pack for home and finish myy not done costumes like Brera and not started costumes like Sousuke. *sigh* must continue working all day tomorrow! I will style a wig and finish 90% of sewing on Leeron!

Shine Bright, Shine Far...

I am supposed to be working on my research paper but all I can think about is star theory. My paper is about the Onnagata in Kabuki Theater - they are the males who specialize in playing female roles. One in particular that I am studying, Yoshizama Ayame (famous in the early 1700s), was well known for his roles of very strong females and his dramatic scenes rather than his dancing (as many other Onnagata were known for). This got me thinking more about my film theory class last semester, in which we studied star theory and auteur theory. All three of these things share one thing in common, and that is that people created a name for themselves by having a distinct style. Film stars even melded their character types into their real selves so they would become a single entity composed of their private life and their performance. This caused audiences to become more interested in their private lives, thus making stars ultra famous! Nowadays, stars don't exist in the same way because the amount of performance opportunities has been somewhat diminished. However, a modern example of this type of star would be someone like Ben Stiller. He is well know for being moral and intense in many comedy films.

WHY IS THIS ON YOUR COSPLAY BLOG TIM!?

I am so glad you asked. I have been thinking about fame in the cosplay community for a very long time (no doubt thanks to Rosie's obsession with it). I have come to realize that the acquisition of fame in the cosplay world happens in a very similar way to that of film stars. Take PikminLink for example. What is she well know for? Cosplay every single link costume ever, naturally. People, no doubt, began to associate her real self with the aesthetic of Link and now, when people see her as other costumes they are not nearly as satisfied (even if they are freaking amazing). PikminLink is also prominent at many conventions which allows people the opportunity to interact with her. This and the combination of the internet side of the cosplay community gave people the outlet to gossip and talk about her.

I want to address how this affects the average cosplayer. If you have a huge repertoire of costumes that are mostly unrelated to each other you are probably in no danger of becoming exceedingly famous in the cosplay community. However, if you intend to specialize a certain role and you execute it well, you might create a name for yourself. You must realize that the more attention you have the more people are going to associate your character with your real self. More specifically, if you are going to cosplay as an intense diva, people are going to begin to think you are an intense diva *COUGHSHERYLNOMECOUGH*.

I recently had a purge of my future cosplays album on facebook and I think I am going to have another and possibly add more to it. Not claiming to be famous, but I have skill and all the right things going for me to be a quazi cosplay celebrity. I need to make sure that the characters I want to cosplay don't clash with my personality and intended aesthetic too much. I think I am going with a few different aesthetics actually. These include, but are not limited to: magic, adventure, and structure. Those are the main ones but I am sure other things will creep in somewhere.