Uptaded 2011 Convention and Cosplay Plans

As usual, things happen such as financial issues thus causing some previously planned cosplays not to happen.


The definite list, however, is out!


Cosplays

• Hatsune Miku/Kurama, Vocaloid/Yu Yu Hakusho [I will be wearing the costumes belonging to my friend since she will be bringing them with her in case I am unable to complete a third costume in time for AnimeNEXT]
• Princess Garnet, Final Fantasy IX
• Rikku, Final Fantasy X-2
• Sailor Cosmos, Sailor Moon

Conventions

• AnimeNEXT
• Japan Day
• Otakon
• Sakura Matsuri
• 
  

*THESE ARE SUBJECT TO CHANGE!!!

Rikku and Sailor Cosmos Wig Review

**To view the wig from the seller, please click on the title above the picture**

Rikku Wig

Cosmos Extensions

Cosmos Wig

Wig review for my Rikku and Cosmos wigs!

As always, I was very hesitant about purchasing wigs from an e-bay seller whom I have never purchased from and before and whom no one I know has purchased from as well.  The reviews on the seller were wonderful and the wigs I wanted were on sale and said free shipping.

You ALWAYS have to be extra careful when sellers say "free shipping" because sometimes they will include the shipping into the wig price to make it look like a nice, expensive wig.  So again I returned to the reviews and comments from other buyers.

There was a promotion going on that ended at the end of March where if you spend over 80 USD, you get free EMS shipping and a free wig cap.  Altogether, my base wig with two clips, 52" white wig with bangs and two 20" 8pc extensions cost around $114.  The seller, however, gave me 10% off and somehow everything totaled $98 and free EMS shipping.  This was a pretty good deal since the wigs themselves were around $40-45 and the extensions were $15 each (when normally a single extension of 20" is around $5 lets say).  So I really got Two wigs, one set of extensions, one set of extensions free and free EMS shipping.

When my wigs arrived, I was worried because I had never purchased from this seller before.  When I opened the box, everything was inside, including the free wig cap.

Since today is a rather icky and cloudy day, Rikku's wig looked considerably dark compared to the photo the seller provided, but when I stepped into the sunlight (since my kitchen is poorly lit), the wig was considerably lighter and closer to the provided picture and it looks much more blond (probably because of the highlights that are hard to see in unnatural light).

My overall experience with this seller?  Excellent!

Pros:

+ Great communication and fast replies.  I had questions and they were answered within 24 hours or less of sending them.

+ Free, fast EMS shipping

+ Wig fibers are soft and similar to the wigs of Ayanamisatoru on ebay

+ Everything I ordered, I received.  No mistakes.

+ Free wig cap

Cons:

- Rikku's wig looks dark in poor lighting, but then again all wigs usually do!  However, I must say that this is because of the highlights in the wig and natural sunlight brings them out, thus making it blonder and lighter!

*I will upload pictures of the wigs I received later!  It is very rainy outside today and I'd rather not take photos inside because it is equally as icky!

** Took some photos!


Left is in natural sunlight and not edited.  Right is slightly edited.

The Memoir of a Cosplayer

I know for a fact that I am not the only person in the world who has struggled to become a successful cosplayers.  I may not be widely recognized as others and I hope one day I can make a name for myself in the cosplay community, and I thought I would start by, not only sharing my cosplays, but by sharing my experience growing up as a cosplayers.

I guess a good place to start would be at the very beginning, not at the beginning of cosplaying, but at the very roots in which my love for Japanese culture, animation and games began.  Growing up as a toddler, I always played “Super Mario World”, “The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past”, “Donkey Kong Country” and others for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System.  Even though I had no idea what I was doing, it was always a joy and entertaining for me to play these games.  As I grew older and watched the television more, I watched shows such as Sailor Moon and Dragonball and I was extremely devastated when they were no longer aired on the television, in which, I would always play my SNES.  A few years went by and I was in middle school when my love for anime resurfaced with Yu Yu Hakusho, Rurouni Kenshin, Yu-Gi-Oh!, Inuyasha, Fushigi Yuugi and others.  This was where my passion for cosplaying comes in. 

I remember searching on the internet for these different anime shows or even specific characters and finding people dressed up as them.  I became curious and then stumbled across the term “cosplay”.  Not knowing what it was, I looked it up and that’s where it began.  Looking at all of the wonderful, extravagant costumes that people made started to get me dreaming of one day being as great as them.  At first I thought they only did it for fun or Halloween, but then I came to realize that these people attended Anime Conventions.  I had dreamt of going to conventions and cosplaying but I knew that would never happen.  Or so I thought…

Two classmates in my acting classes during middle school were also into anime.  We shared manga and talked about what shows we liked and then they told me about an anime convention they were attending that was nearly an hour away from where we lived.  I looked it up on the website and asked my mom about it.  She was extremely hesitant, but I eventually was able to break her into saying “yes”.  She helped me make my very first cosplay ever, Nuriko from Fushigi Yuugi being that I would not attend the convention unless I was cosplaying.  My mom had very little sewing skill, so the costume wasn’t remotely good at all, but I really appreciate what she did for me between taking care of my sisters, myself and working.  She took me to the convention as well and it was an experience like never before.  It is something I will never forget and always hold dear for me.

Every year after that, I would attend the same convention and either my mother or father would take me.  They hated it though, claiming that there was nothing for them to do there except take pictures, but they signed up for this the day they decided to be parents.  They would have to and will continue to have to do things for their children that they themselves may not like, and I always used this against them and it always worked.  One year, however, my parents couldn’t take me and I couldn’t find anyone to go with and that was the worst year of my cosplaying life.  I didn’t make any costumes that year, I stayed home and was extremely depressed when my friends who were at the convention called me, asking me where I was.  And after that, I stood up for myself and made it a ritual to attend at least one convention a year, mostly because they are very expensive when you make costumes.

For two year in a row, I went with my friends (no parents – this was very difficult for my dad to accept, but my mother was fine with it).  I had a blast with them and then the next year I went with some different friends because neither of my friends from the previous years could make it to the convention.

Putting aside conventions for a moment, I would like to talk about my cosplay experience.  Excluding the costume my mother made for me (which was the last time she ever helped me with a costume as well), I tried learning to sew by myself from books, online tutorials and videos and nothing seemed to work for me.  I looked around for sewing classes (which were very expensive) and I eventually had to settle making my costumes with whatever means I could – hotglue.  Though I would like to say these costumes never existed, I can’t because they do, and because of these horribly made costumes, I have strengthened from them.

Around Halloween 2009, I found out that one of my neighbors sews.  She sewed my little sister’s friend’s costume (she lives across the street!  I wish my friends lived that close…) and I approached her about teaching me how to sew, read patterns and other things.  She was more than happy to.  In January 2010, we started working on my Princess Garnet cosplay.  The most sewing she did on the costume was to show me how to do a stitch, she helped me read the pattern I purchased for it, how to alter the pattern and she taught me how to embroider.  Because of this wonderful woman, I am now able to create works of art I never have been able to.  I participated in the Masquerade at the convention I attended that year, I simply did a walk on, but I won Best Craftsmanship Novice Division and it was all because of that wonderful woman who taught me so much.

I didn’t write this mini-memoir simply to share my experience with everyone, but because I know a lot of people who are making their first steps into the cosplay community have a lot to deal with, especially with their parents.  I wrote this to tell those future cosplayers to never give up hope, keep pushing yourself and you can do wondrous things with your life.  If you cannot find any places that give sewing lessons, ask neighbors, friends and family members because you will probably be able to find someone to help you.  If you cannot, I will try my best to help those who need it.  I know I am not the best cosplayers and I never will be, there will always be those who are greater than I, but I try to do my very best and I will continue to do so.

I hope this mini-memoir will inspire those cosplayers who struggle with themselves and with their family to go to conventions or simply cosplay.  If you have any questions, I will answer them to the best of my ability.

Show the world and yourself what you can do, and always look on the bright side of life.

I love you all and good luck!

Love,

Euphoria

Sailor Cosmos Staff Tutorial

Materials

·         ¾” x 5’ CPVC pipe

·         Darice 100mm plastic ball

·         Darice 60mm plastic ball

·         Two 11/4”/31.8mm Doll Head/Knob [Wood Ball]

·         One 11/2”/38.1mm Doll Head/Knob [Wood Ball]

·         One Wood Ball [larger than 11/2”/38.1mm, size is your preference]

·         One bag of Metallic Crinkle

·         Merry Mini’s 3D Star Ornament [I bought four, three to be used on the costume itself]

·         Two Bead Landing 8”/20.3cm Glass Pearls

·         Two 9” x  12” Fun Foam ¼” thick

·         One 12 oz. can of Gloss

·         *Two  3 oz. can of Gloss White

·         One 2fl.oz. of White Acrylic Paint

·         One 2fl.oz. of Metallic Gold Acrylic Paint

·         Hot Glue Gun

·         Krazy Glue

·          

*There is only one shown in the picture because I had originally bought one can. However, you could still slightly see the text on the pipe after the can was used so I bought a second can and added more coats to completely cover the text.

Spray paint the CPVC pipe white using the Gloss White can.  Spray on as many coats as needed [let the pipe dry sometimes before spraying more coats] until the text on the CPVC pipe is completely covered and no longer visible in the slightest.  Once the pipe is dry, spray it with the Gloss.  Wait for it to dry before spraying it once more with the gloss.  Make sure you have everything completely covered with the gloss, if not, go over it once more until you’re satisfied.

While waiting for the staff to dry, start on the rest of the staff!

Paint two 11/4”/31.8mm wood balls white.

Paint one 11/2”/38.1mm and the slightly larger wood ball metallic Gold.

*In this picture it’s hard to tell, but it’s easier to see in a picture later, but I decided before adding these to the staff that it would look best with two of the smaller balls rather than only one of them.  I do not have pictures of these.

Wait about ten minutes for the balls to dry before adding another coat.

On the plastic balls, remove the knob on the top.  Cut this really carefully, giving tiny cuts to one side of the knob, and go back and forth between each sides until it either snaps or is loose enough to cut off.  If there is a little extra that you can’t cut off, don’t worry, it will be covered by glue later.

Stuff the big ball with the Metallic Crinkle.  This may take a little while because it’s annoying to shove it all in there.  Make sure when you close the ball, you line up the spot where you cut off the knob.

Open the small ball and in one half, put a dab of glue in between where you cut the knob.  Place the 3D star inside – make sure one of the tips is in the glue [this is to make sure it doesn’t move around as much] and hold it until it is dried.  Do not put the Metallic Crinkle in this one!  Again, make sure when you close the ball, you line up the spot where you cut off the knob. 

Glue the two plastic balls together where you cut off the knobs.  Hold together until dried.  Reinforce with krazy glue.

In Adobe Photoshop, I outlined one of the wings on Cosmos’ staff and enlarged it to make a printable life-size version.  I cut out the pattern, taped it to the fun foam and cut.  I repeated the same step for the other wing.

Putting the wings aside, take four pearls, each a different size, and hot glued them together along the contour of the big ball and repeate this step to make another set of pearls. 

Once the pearls were dry, place them along the bottom edge of the wings, trace the curve and cut out the curve on the wings. 

Hot glue the pearls to the foam wings and then attached them to the big ball once dried.

Going back to the gold and white balls painted earlier, place the white ball down on its flat side, put a dab of glue from the hot glue gun on the top center and place the corresponding gold bar on top.

·         The 11/4”/31.8mm white ball to the 11/2”/38.1mm gold ball.

·         The 11/4”/31.8mm white ball to the larger gold ball.

*In this picture it’s easier to see, but I decided before adding these to the staff that it would look best with two of the smaller balls rather than only one of them.  I do not have pictures of these.

Once the CPVC pipe is completely dried and glossed, it is now time to assemble the staff.  Taking the large gold and small white balls, hot glue the big gold ball to one end of the staff.  Hold until dried.

Next, hot glue the other set of gold and white balls to the staff topper [the one with the wings on it].  Glue the gold ball directly in between the wings on the bottom of the ball.  Hold until dry. 

Lastly, hot glue the white ball to the staff and hold until dry.

Now that your staff is complete, go back and add glue of your preference to reinforce anything weak [such as the wings and the ball with the star on top].

Also, to your preference, you may add feathers to the wings.  I will be doing this eventually when I order feathers, and when I do, I will be updating this tutorial to include how to add the feathers.

Enjoy your Sailor Cosmos staff!

Total time for staff thus far: 5 hours

Princess Garnet til Alexandros Tutorial

Since cosplay.com wont allow me to edit in the description as to how I made my Garnet cosplay, I shall post it here for all of those curious as to how I made it. ^_^

*~*~*~*~*~*~*

8 yards of white casa satin was purchased for $7.99 per yard.

Corset Top:       

I used about 7/8 yard of casa satin fabric for the corset top.  I followed McCall's Bridal Elegance M5321 Size AA pattern; however, it was altered slightly to fit the style of the character. 

1.     I cut out the pieces of the pattern twice: once for the outer layer and again for the inner layer.

2.     I followed the pattern and sewed both pieces accordingly. 

3.     Once the two halves were sewn, I sewed the boning onto the wrong side of the inner layer.

4.     After the boning was sewn, I pinned the right sides of both layers together, sewed ½ inch along the top and the bottom, then I turned the corset top inside out, touched it up and then ironed it.

5.     I purchased a 7” separating zipper and a pack of white hooks.  I sewed in the zipper and added two hooks on the top to close the gap left by whatever the zipper didn’t close.

Embroidery:  I hand embroidered the vines along the front of the corset

Total number of hours to sew the corset top: 5 hours

Total number of hours to draw embroidered pattern: 30 minutes

Total number of hours to do embroidery: 6 hours

Total hours for top: 11 h 30m

Skirt:

For skirt I used 4.5 yards of casa satin fabric.  I cut out the pattern for the skirt and tailored the pieces to be at the desired length.

Once everything was cut out, I sewed the pieces together.  For the piece in the back, I started sewing about nine inches down [to leave room for a zipper].

I made a 1.5 inch hem in the front of the dress, and towards the back it increased in length to create the train.  I blind stitched the hem and pressed it.

Tier:

For the tier I used 3 yards of white casa satin.  The two front pieces of the tier were originally from a mistake I made for the skirt.  Not wanting those pieces to go to waste, I simply added them onto the 3 yards for the tier.

To make the tier, I wrapped the 3 yards of fabric around my mannequin and pinned the 2 extra pieces from the skirt to the front.  From there I pinned and tailored the fabric to create the tier.  Once satisfied, I sewed the two pieces to the large piece of fabric and then sewed it in the front so that it can slip over my head.  Then, I placed the entire piece on the floor, evened it out, and cut the curve from the shorter front, to the longer back to get the nice round shape.  Once that was cut, I cut the extra fabric off of the waistline in a perfectly straight line.

I hemmed the waist and sewed along the bottom edge and left about an inch unsewn so that I could insert elastic.  Then I made a 1-inch hem, pressed it, blind stitched it and pressed it again.

I hand embroided 14 of golden fleur-de-lis around the rim of the skirt.  It took me about 28 hours.

I made a 1 inch hem and pressed,

Total number of hours to sew the skirt: 5h 30min

            Total number of hours do draw embroided pattern:

            Total number of hours to do embroidery: 28

Total number of hours to sew the tier: 2h 40min

Total number of hours do draw embroided pattern: 3 h

Total number of hours to do embroidery: 18

Total number of hours for embroidery: 46 h

Total hours for skirt[s]: 21.5

Gloves:

I already had a pair of similar gloves in black, so all I did was trace them, cut the white pair out, and hem it.

Total number of hours to sew gloves: 10 minutes

Total number of hours to draw embroided pattern: 20 min

Total number of hours to do embroidery: 4 hours

Armbands:

I cut out two butterfly shapes, 16 teardrops in 3 sizes and two 9-inch strips and filed them to smooth them out.  I painted them silver and glued them together, adding hooks on the inside.  With model magic clay, I made two small circles and painted them emerald green.  Once dried, I glued them on the top center of the butterflies.  Using 12 inches of chain for each armband, I glued them to the low center back of the butterflies and below the hook on the inside.

Total number of hours to make armbands: 1 h

Headpiece:

To make the headpiece, I had a few pictures available from the game as well as other cosplayers to get an idea as to how they went about creating their headpiece.  I used one 8 oz. pack of white model magic clay, rolled and flattened it out using a dough roller and the palm of my hands.  Once everything was flattened, I took a small piece, rolled it into a ball, pressed it again and molded it into the shape of an oval.  I took another piece of clay but this time rolled it then cut it into two long strands.  I then wrapped the strands around the oval to form an Egyptian-like crown, I cut off the ends and with those remaining pieces, I added a strand around the top of the oval, rounding it off.  With the rest of those two strands, I made a “bridge” on each side of the oval to connect to the teardrop wing pieces.

For the teardrop wings, I once again took some clay, rolled it into a strand and shaped it accordingly.  To fill in the space, I rolled out some clay as thin as I could get it, filled in the teardrop and pressed it flat.  With a butter knife, I highlighted the indentations.

With some more rolled out strands, I formed a lotus shaped piece that will connect the teardrop wings to the rose.

To make the rose, I rolled out six long strands of clay.  I used three for each rose.  I attached [3] strands at the top and braided them to the bottom.  I sealed the braid with the butter knife, cutting it, and from the top of the braid [the starting point] I rolled it inwards. 

All of the “spikes” and outlining was made from more strands of rolled clay.  The balls were obviously balls that I flattened on the underside.  The teardrops I rolled into teardrop shapes and the jewel in the middle was rolled and flattened into shape as well.

I painted two coats of silver paint on the front and back and two coats of green for the jewels.  Took two days to paint/dry.

Total time for headpiece [not including painting]: 3.40

Necklace:

For the necklace I flattened out a small piece of clay and made it round.  Then I made a short strand and wrapped it around the rim of the shape I had already formed.  I rolled out whatever was left of the strand to be thinner and then cut it into five pieces which I attached and pressed onto the shape, making it look more like a crown.  With small pieces of clay I made circles which I pressed on at the bottom of the crown-forming strands, as well as another piece on top.

I painted two coats of silver paint on the outside and inside.  Took two days to paint/dry.

Total time for necklace [not including painting or drying time]: 10 minutes

Belt:

With four large pieces of clay, I rolled three of them into teardrops of the same size.  With the other piece, I created another teardrop but flattened it and made it wider at the base.  I then rolled out a long strand and used it as the rim of the oval mirror.

I painted two coats of green paint on the jewels and front and back of the main teardrop.  I painted two coats of silver around the rim of the teardrop and mirror.  Took two days to paint/dry.

Total time for belt [not including painting]: 10 minutes

Total number of hours for painting: 2

*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Total number of hours for entire costume: 80h 20min

*~*~*~*~*~*~*