int.cosblog

Matka 2012 Nordic Travel Fair - Helsinki Finland!

2012-02-12T15:08:00.008+01:00

Heya!

Three weeks ago, me (Elffi), Shufu, Majo and Rimppu (WCS 2012 representatives of Finland) worked at the MATKA 2012 Nordic Travel Fair in Helsinki. It is the biggest travel fair in Northern Europe. This year the fair attracted a total of 71.098 visitors. Wohoo! So many people and so much things to see!

We worked in the Japan booth for the weekend. We were all cosplaying and we held a little representation of cosplay. People in the fair were not so familiar with our hobby, so we were mostly telling about the history of cosplay in Finland and worldwide. Majo was also dancing some parapara! *grin*And we also had some fellow cosplayers from Helsinki gathered around the stage.

Both days were really great... If we don't count that I had to wake up 7:00 am to paint my tattoos.

Okay, when we reached the fair we noticed that it is a totally different feeling to cosplay in a regular fair compared to a cosplay convention. Those STARES and glances!! Everyone was staring at us. Some older people were totally scared and children were running away. But it was totally worth it! Buaha!

After our show and work we wandered around those huge fair halls and found many interesting places!

The first interesting place was... Rovaniemi, Lapland!
Shufu and Rimppu found this really cool big BUBBLE full of fake snow!
(It was mostly for children but we scared 'em away with our spooky costumes.)

Then some organizer popped out and DIDN'T LET ME IN! ;_;
She said that I WAS TOO POINTY AND SHARP with my armors and lances... *sad face*

You can see how these little children... I mean Rimppu and Shufu are enjoying their fake snow (while I was crying outside)! Blah. I also thought about poking a hole in the bubble with my lance. But I managed to calm my mind. You know why?

Because I found a PORSCHE! *__* Look at that porsche!

Now look back to me! NOW LOOK AT THAT PORSCHE!

...

Well, the trip continues! We said goodbye to Lapland. And as you can see, Rimppu was a feeling a bit sad. Derp she says in this photo below.

But then we rented a caravan! (The fair area was too wide to walk)

We had a little toilet break in a place where carpets were red and people were talking about tango! Don't ask.

Well, after that we jumped on a boat and had a nice cabin with a sea view!

Sea on the left! Nice view. Ah, and those two weird smiling faces up in the middle of the photo, just above us. They are outside the boat, ah! Wait, what?

After the boat trip we spent the evening in the streets of Switzerland, or where was it?

Shufu and Rimppu were giggling under a street lamp. How sweet!

Later Rimppu and Majo had a lovely evening in a local restaurant. Already forgot the country which we were in. Because we were walking so fast. Huh. Maybe Estonia?

Whole weekend went fast, and at Sunday evening we were totally tired. We had a quick meal and then I had to drive back home to Jyväskylä (something over 300km).

Maybe next year we will see even more cosplayers in the travel fair!

Here is a little video of the whole weekend! (by our amazing video editor Rimppu).

Enjoy!

Tattoos and cosplay - do you cover yours up?

2012-02-01T00:22:00.001+01:00

Having very visible tattoos and doing cosplay can be a pain in the ass for some people.

I have a visible tattoo on the inside of my right arms bicep, and being true to the character, I wanted to cover it up. Many people probably want to present the character as close to the original as possible. So what do you think about this?

GRIMAS cake make-up

For me personally, I try to do the above, and cover my tattoo up with product. Currently I'm using products from GRIMAS to do so, which is okay, but other products are out there for people to grab.

Kat von D make-up concealer

Do you have a product that you can vouch for? Please tell us!

DesuCon Frostbite con report

2012-01-28T18:24:00.000+01:00

Going to DesuCon Frostbite in Finland

The convention was one the 14-15th of January, so Stine and I took off from the airport in Copenhagen (Denmark) early in the evening the friday before the con.

Bags were packed with our cosplays earlier that day. We brought our Mononoke / Ayakashi costumes to bring them out more since they only have been shown in Denmark and in the UK (The costumes were originally created for the WCS preliminaries in Denmark back in 2009).

This was our second Finnish convention since TraCon last year. For DesuCon I (Casper) was asked to be a hallway cosplayjudge (link/picture) by their cosplay organizer Heidi. So I couldn't refuse to go to DesuCon, and at the same time go see some friends (also having some drinks and going out). In the confusion, they thought Stine was going to participate as a judge as well, so we were going to judge as a team.

The flight to Finland went rather smooth besides the delay, which you always can expect. Never the less, we got to Helsinki Airport and took the bus outside the terminal, after looking for snacks in the supermarket in the terminal.

Five frozen toes later, we entered the bus and looked at the frozen stuff outside.

When we got to our hotel, as friend of mine that came earlier that day texted me that we should join him and his friend Daniel from Sweeden around 11 PM for some drinks, which we did. We returned back at the hotel at 2AM to sleep.

Saturday

I woke up at 6 in the morning to shave for cosplay, and Stine and I joined Allan and Nadia for breakfast in the hotel dining hall at 7AM.

The breakfast this lovely morning was spent with some of the lovely organizers from the Danish convention Genki (Allan and Nadia). 30 minutes later, we headed back to our room and put on our make-up and costumes. Seven hours and a couple of squaremeters of paint later, we went to the convention and meet the other judges in the info stand.

Short after, we received our awesome Vip badges and got to our judging room to judge the hallway cosplay costumes. The competition was based on staff member selecting the best costumes on saturday, and then make a panel of cosplayers (us) select three persons as the best of the lot. The selection of cosplayers ranged from big costumes that litteraly didn't fit in the judging room, to petite costumes with small fine details. It was very nice judging them since we got a pleasent amount of time to judge and talk about the costumes afterwards.

After the juding of the costumes, the cosplayers were presented in the theater hall together with Frost-chan's selected cosplayers on stage. The theater hall was pretty cool since it had three levels of balchonies.

Around 7pm, we announced the winners on stage. The 1st place, went to Himeko from the game Ookami. The 2nd place went to Death Master from Black Rock Shooter and the 3rd place to Gilgamesh from Fate series.

Afterward we got to go around and look at convention center, but short after we went back to change into ourselves again to go out and party with our Finnish friends.

Sunday

In the morning, we woke up at 8am and Joined Iris Rönkkö and Arttu Seppi in the dinning hall for breakfast. When the time passed 10am, we took a cab to the convention venue. Just after comming to the place, we went into the Dealers room and tried to scout some new manga, which failed, do to lack of manga that is not mainstream.

Later around noon, we ran into Allan and Nadia, who had been to serveal convention related meetings till early in the morning.

Allan dragged us into a meeting with some con organizers and cosplay representatives hosted by Daniel Ulis from NärCon (Sweeden). The meeting conserned a newly project known unofficially as NCC (Nordic Cosplay Championship). The meeting contained a lot of 'nice to know', about the plans of creating a bond between the Nordic conventions with cosplay.

Time for lunch - We received some eating tickets from the staff and went off to the restaurant in the venue.

Then the ending ceremoni came up and Daniel and Allan was asked to go on stage and present their conventions and talk about stuff.

After the ending ceremony, we retired to the Green room to talk to people. About two hours later, we went to the airport to go back to Denmark.

Info

The venue / location of the convention

The convention hall that DesuCon chose was very easy to get to. The travel to Lathi, where the convention is, is about 1 hour and 20 minutes from the airport by bus. So for foreigners it's very easy to trabel to.

The venue is pretty big, and can hold a large amount of people. Even though there are many people, it's easy to move about and take pictures of the cosplayers. You don't get to feel claustrofobic since the convention center is in 5 floors and has a big theater hall with many rooms backstage for the cosplayers to access.

Acompanying the name 'Frostbite' the snow of Finland gets quickly to your toes. But the cold substance also was very nice and many people planned photoshoots around and about.

The cosplay show

DesuCon Frostbite doesn't have an act based cosplayshow but in craftmanship. The show was just a quick walk-on, to show the audience the selection of cosplayers that were handpicked by the staff, also including Frost-chan's favorites (cosplayers picked by the mascot Frost-chan to go to the stage). The show was pretty digestible, and it was easy to see who the audience prefered among the selected cosplayers.

DesuCon Frostbite reached the local Finnish paper!

Nordic Travel Fair - Helsinki

2012-01-19T23:30:00.001+01:00

This weekend me (Elffi), Shufu, Majo and Rimppu (WCS 2012 representatives of Finland) are going to work on MATKA 2012 Nordic Travel Fair in Helsinki. It is the biggest travel fair in Northern Europe. In 2010 over 81,500 professionals and consumers visited the fair. There was over 1,200 exhibitors. It's a huge convention with many different countries all over the world! Last year, 2011, there was approximately 100,000 visitors in the fair.

The fair is mostly offering useful information on new unknown destinations all over the world. It's the main event in Northern Europe for travel industry, and there is a LOT of worldwide known airlines participating. It's an excellent forum for countries, travel agencies and other companies to show their products and meet new partners.

The four of us are going to work on the Japan booth for the weekend. We are all cosplayers and we are going to hold a little representation of cosplay. People in the fair are not so familiar with cosplay, so we are going to introduce history of cosplay in Finland and worldwide. After that there is a little cosplay skit with music. I hope we will meet some people from Japan also, because I wanna discuss things in Japanese.

We have a camera with us and we are going to check out all the booths from different countries to make some new friends and to promote cosplay! And of course we are going to take a lot of photos! Hope you enjoy our forthcoming blog post!

I can already see all the scared faces of the NORMAL people when they see COSPLAYERS in the fair ;D (and I'm not even wearing a shirt!)

Now we're live on Tumblr!

2011-12-26T11:07:00.000+01:00

While we're doing a Weekly fav's the content has been stored away.

Now we've joined Tumblr and are able to give you both more updates and more content from the cosplay bloggers from Tumblr!

Follow our Tumblr

Cheers,

Have a great holiday!

Weekly fav's 26/12/11

2011-12-26T10:43:00.000+01:00

Merry Christmas and Happy New Years!

We're going to be back after a nice holiday after New Years with new content for your reading pleasure! Until that time arrives, you can follow our Tumblr

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

If you got some news that you think should be presented here, please write to us at intcosblog@cosmag.dk

1 - WorldCosplay - New social site for cosplay photo rating

Found via Facebook

WorldCosplay.net is a new social website for cosplayers to post and rate high quality photos of people around the world and themselves. With this social site you can follow your favorite cosplayers and 'like' their uploads. You can use one of your existing logins from either Facebook or Twitter to logon to their system!

Read more here: worldcosplay.net

2 - CosplayGen re-releases #01 issue for free

Many people has been asking the staff behind the magazine about their pilot issue, but sadly enough a reprint of the issue hasn't been done. Instead, the issue has been put up for reading for free on Issuu.com

Weekly fav's 18/12/11

2011-12-17T00:38:00.000+01:00

What you can look forward to in this Weekly fav's

Volpin blogs about his build of the Gravity gun from the game Portal, an awesome Iron Man steampunk costume showcase, an awesome interview of the German cosplayer Sina Voss. The release of CosMag #8 and two articles about apparel and the signals one sends when wearing a costume.

If you got some news that you think should be presented here, please write to us at intcosblog@cosmag.dk

1 - Release of CosMag #8

Found via CosMag.dk

Casper from the blog has run the online Danish cosplay magazine CosMag since 2008. Now the latest issue (number 8) is available for reading online/downloading. Unfortunately it's only in Danish, but you can always look at the pretty pictures!

Read more here: cosmag.dk/cosmag-8-nu-tilgaengeligt-online/

2 - Not Young Justice Us - Sina Voss (German) cosplayer interview

Found via Twitter

The guys from Not Young Justice Us (NERD Cast Network), made an interesting interview with the German cosplayer Sina Voss, about her costuming and things related to the german cosplay culture.

Info on the interview

Listen to the interview here: nerdcastnetwork.com/youngjustice/interview1.mp3

3 -Steampunk Iron Man costume

Found via Twitter

Have a look at this guys awesome Iron Man retro Steampunk costume. I has been featured in Ackson's cosplay video, which you can watch here. You can see him at the period from 3:34-3:59.

See more pictures here: walyou.com/steampunk-iron-man-suit/

4 - Costumes are a communicator

Found via Twitter

Whether we like it or not, the clothes and costumes we wear in different situations, are things that communicate or sends signals to others. This is a topic that the blog About Waifuz has discusses and illuminated. Have a look at their blogpost below to get into their minds. Despite the colorful image that is presented in the article, the things that is put in focus are nice to know, when you go out wearing a cosplay in public.

Read both articles here: aboutwaifuz.tumblr.com/post/12040231435/slutwalk-otakon-its-not-a-costume-its-a-hat and here
http://aboutwaifuz.tumblr.com/post/12940736099/its-not-a-costume-its-also-communication

Weekly fav's 11/12/11

2011-12-07T09:57:00.001+01:00

This weeks official 'Weekly fav's' has only one thing to tell you about this cold weekend in December.

Volpin blogs about his build of the Gravity gun from the game Portal,

If you got some news that you think should be presented here, please write to us at intcosblog@cosmag.dk

1 - Gravity Gun for Child's Play

Found via Volpin props blog

Volpin has since his Portal gun for Child's Play back been very generous towards making props for charity for kids. This time he gives his gravity gun from the game Portal away.

Read more here: volpinprops.blogspot.com/2011/12/gravity-gun-for-childs-play.html

Weekly fav's 6/12/11

2011-12-06T13:48:00.000+01:00

Last weeks 'Weekly fav's' didn't get out to you do to, too much work, so this week, you'll hopefully get two.

In this Weekly fav's you can look forward to read articles about the cosplay book 'Cosplay in America'

If you got some news that you think should be presented here, please write to us at intcosblog@cosmag.dk

1 - Cosplay make-up that might cover your tattoes

Found via Youtube

If you have ever got a tatto, that has been hard to cover for a cosplay, this product might ease you problems.As a cosplayer myself (Casper Jensen) that has a tattoo on the inside of my right arm, this product might come in handy i cosplay a character that has bare arms.

Read more here: gobeyondthecover.com/

2 - Love Cosplay Magazine to come out in April

Found via Facebook

In 2012 in April, Love Cosplay Magazine releases their first issue of their magazine by the same name. The Editor in chief, Droo gave us a heads up about their plans and what's going on. Join their group on Facebook to get the latest news and promotional items.

Read more here: facebook.com/LoveCosplayMagazine

3 - Awesome Diablo cosplay from the game Diablo 3

Found via @Kenchan

When you thought something awesome wasn't awesome enough, it just became even awesomer! Anubis8500 from Cosplay.com has created a Diablo cosplay from the PC game of the same name. The costume even has lights in it so it glows like flames in the dark!

Have a look at it on video from his Youtube account

Read more here: cosplay.com/costume/403769/

Weekly fav's 25/11/11

2011-11-25T11:31:00.000+01:00

Get ready for more stuff to read! 'Weekly favorites' is one of our new things to do on the blog.

'Weekly favorites' is a summary of the blogposts, articles and other online content that gets posted during the week. Every week, we will post a new blogentry with the 10 most interesting posts from around on the web about cosplay of course! (This being articles, tutorial, reviews and a lot more).

You can also contribute with posts from your own blog or other interest readings and goodies.

Be a comrade and e-mail your favorite reads about cosplay online, and if we like the content, we'll post it along with our stuff here. Send it to intcosblog@cosmag.dk

Down underneath, you'll find this weeks bunch of online goodies.

1 - Soomi Park creates LED lights to open up smaller eye shapes

Found via @francescadani

Soomi Park has created a new type of accessory for the eyes. Two sets of LED lights that reacts to movement, and fits on the lover eyelids. Can these be a new trends in cosplay?
Let's see where this goes.

Read more here: michellephan.com/post/crazy-led-lashes

2 - Volpin props walk-through of Thrall's Doomhammer build

Found via volpinprops.blogspot.com/

Known for his genius skills in propmaking, people that follows Volpins blog here on blogspot. has been amazed with many awesome cosplay prop- and costume builds. Here is an amazing walk-through of the build of Thrall's Doomhammer from WarCraft.

Read more here: volpinprops.blogspot.com/

3 - CosplayGen 4th issue now available

Found via cosplaygen.com

CosplayGen is an international cosplay magazine that released its fourth issue in the start of November, for purchase on their website. This issue contains tons of interviews of cosplayers across the world and renowned japanese cosplay idol Kaname.

Read more here: cosplaygen.com/cosplay-gen-04-preview/

4 - Cosplay for a cause calender

Found via cosplayforacause.com/

Cosplay for a cause is a project, where cosplayers take a picture with sign including a message to the victims of the catastrophe in Japan. Now cosplayforacause.com/ has created a 2012 calender with a selection of cosplay idols from around the world. Buy a calender and support the victims. The proceeds will 100% go to the Japanese Red Cross.

Reed more here: cosplayforacause.com/calendar.html

The Perfect Performance?

2011-11-23T12:23:00.000+01:00

Warning! The following article may contain heavy loads of sarcasm and may be harmful to those with an underdeveloped sense of humour.

This might as well have been titled "The ramblings of a bitter old cosplay hag".

Inspired by Casper's analytical description of different types of performances cosplayers can give on stage, I decided to do a little list of the DOs and DON'Ts of doing a cosplay show (or a "List of things that irk Elina"). Whether something is a DO or a DON'T is completely up for you to decide.

Scenes from the source material
If someone has already scripted a nifty little play for you, why bother coming up with anything else?

Scenes directly from anime or video games are incredibly popular and usually consist of dialogue and music, ripped unabashedly from the source material. The good thing is that the scenes are usually well thought-out and very impressive (if done well, obviously). On the downside, someone who has never seen the original series or played the game is unlikely to get what's going on.

Also: no one likes spoilers. Seriously.

Fighting scenes
Action and gun/sword fighting is awesome. But only if it really looks like someone is going to lose their head. Otherwise it'll just look like a few nutcases walking around the stage, afraid to really hit one another with their fragile props.

Fighting on stage is a lot like dancing. It needs to be well choreographed and each and every move has to have a point. Aiming, dodging, hitting; it all has to happen for a reason. Poking at one another with wooden swords until one of you "dies" isn't really all that exciting.

THIS is what a fight scene should look like.

Death by gunshot
You've all seen this. There's a character, alone on stage, doing something pretty epic. And then, at the height of the performance, a gunshot rings out of nowhere.

The character stumbles backwards, grasping their stomach with one hand and reaching out dramatically with the other. Touching violin music plays. The character falls down on their knees, says a few lines and dies. The audience is in tears.

HAVE YOU GUYS EVER SEEN SOMEONE GET SHOT?

... I haven't either, really, but I've watched enough CSI to know that's not how dying from a gunshot wound really happens. Seriously, you guys. Do your research!

(Ballroom) Dancing
Remember what I wrote about stage fighting being a lot like dancing? Now apply that same thing to actual dancing. And practice. And then practice some more. And then a little more.

And you might look like this (start from 2:40).

YAOI ^_^ xD lol
The Finnish cosplay scene seems to be a perfect place for the teenaged yaoi fans to express themselves. And for some reason a lot of them prefer to express their love of boys loving boys on stage.

The typical yaoi themed cosplay performance goes something like this:

There are characters on stage. They do something. Someone implies that someone else might have homosexual tendencies. The audience squeals. Characters do something again. Suddenly two of them throw themselves in each other's arms and snog. The audience goes wild and lets out high pitched screams. No one can hear a thing for the rest of the day.

Flowy fabrics, ribbons and other things you can wave around
There very rarely is a point to waving around fabrics (which isn't to say there never is a point to them). Which means that if you absolutely must incorporate gymnast's ribbons or other such things into your performance, at least know how to use them.

Like this.

Or like this.

LEDs
If your character has something that is supposed to glow, installing LEDs is a magnificent idea. If you just feel that LEDs would give your costume the much needed ~pop~, ask yourself this: "What is wrong with my costume in the first place?"

LEDs, a lot like spandex, are a privilege, not a right. They're cool when used right and ridiculous and a bit embarrassing if used just for the sake of using them.

Also, I've managed to pinpoint the exact moment when the entire cosplaying world decided it would be great to incorporate LEDs into everything.

This is when it happened.

And now it's challenge time! (I didn't know such a time existed, but now it does.)

I challenge all of you to go out and find me a video of a perfect cosplay skit and link to it in the comments.

I also promise to personally mail a box of cookies to the first person to link me to a yaoi themed cosplay skit that's actually good. And I mean really, actually, properly good. Good luck with that.

The guys need to step it up - Denmark

2011-11-21T11:31:00.001+01:00

(I wish that more guys would participate along side me in the cosplayshows in Denmark.)

The performance in cosplay in Denmark consists of about 98% women and the remaining 2% are the guys. Converted into an amount of persons, we got about 2-3 guys making an appearance on stage in a cosplay competition.

My question to the male part of the cosplay community is, why is that?

I would love to see some more guys unfold into the art, in acts with fights and things alike.

What I get from observing the presented cosplay communities at the conventions here, are that the guys simply aren’t interested in performing on stage. Can this be the truht?

I’ve seen and been in awe of homemade costumes being displayed at the Danish conventions, and the male cosplayers wearing the costumes has done an awesome job both wear and constructing them. There are so much potential just being wasted on Hall cosplay.. Why not put this awesomeness on stage?

Social cosplayer theory
In this current world of cosplay, I’ve developed a bunch of typical profiles that most of cosplayers can be labeled with. One of these are the ‘social cosplayer’ profile, which I from only observating male cosplayers at the popular conventions here in Denmark will state, is the most common amongst male cosplayers here.
Whether we like it or not, our clothes is a communicator, and cosplay makes a great tool for this. Put simply, cosplay is being used as an indicator for people to make easy contact with others alike.
I could go on and on about theories, but what I am trying to defend here, is a theory that males mostly use cosplay as a social tool. (I'll be writting a separate post about the stereo typical cosplay personas that I think there is find in the different cosplay communities)

It’s an artform - put it on the stage!
As a male cosplayer myself, I find that cosplay easily makes contact with other fans of a particular series possible. Putting the ‘social tool / communicator’ aside, in my mind and world, I strive to portrait cosplay as a visual- and performance art, where portraying a characters true self is the highest priority. Not saying this can’t be done off the stage, but is most nicely done before an audience. So fellow male cosplayers, please do consider bringing your newly polished cosplay boots to the stage and interact with the audience.

What would it take for the guys to step it up?
Sadly I don’t have an answer to this question, which I would love to have.
What I’ve tried to do was creating a platform for both female and male cosplayers to brighten their horizons with. The Danish cosplay magazine ‘CosMag.dk’, which I’m the Editor in chief for, was started in 2008, with the goal of raising the interest in cosplayers creating their own costumes and illuminate what parts of the popculture and news that is relevant to keep up with the trends, construction and the social part of the cosplay community.

Taking a look at the typical reader of the magazine, one finds that the typical reader ofcourse is female, which could be that it (by it meaning the magazine) simply doesn’t appeal to the male audience, since it’s layout and content intent isn’t targetet towards females 100%.

What I’ll be trying to do about this
At the next couple of conventions happening here in Denmark, I’ll try to talk with these kind of male cosplayers and incourage them to take the leap and join their female counterparts on stage.

Besides incourage them, I’ll try and analyse their answers and bring it in a later blogentry some time in the feature.

Trends in cosplay on stage

2011-11-17T11:03:00.001+01:00

(This is written with how the Danish cosplay scene has been and is, in mind).

Since performance in cosplay has begun to grow as big as the craftmanship part, judges has as well begun to expect more of effects and such in acts on stage.

In Denmark, the 'walking on stage' and presenting the costume, was a pretty common thing back in the day, but as the social part of the internet displaying the art grew, the whole cosplay performance scene has now evolved into much more than that.

Talking a look at the media today, gives one a good idea of what cosplayers can use on stage.

Dancing / singing / performing - inspiration from media

As the local TV stations the world over broadcasts programs as 'Dancing with the Stars', ' Insert country name - Got Talent', 'Idol' and so on. A large amount of the viewers probably are cosplayers, so they will be inspired by what this kind of media serves them. At the moment dancing is a big trend in the Danish cosplay scene, and the media has its part of involvement, but is of course not the only source of inspiration.

Singing has been and still plays a huge part of the acts on stage. Software like Vocaloid has become a revolution to cosplayers singing and performing dance on stage. Here the online social media like Youtube and Nico Nico Douga, has played its part in developing the interest in these part of performances. Alot of fans of the software, has created and posted videos of the characters singing and performing, for other fans to comment and get inspired by.

Action / Fight

Alot of anime, manga and other entertainment, contains scenes of either fights, violence and thing alike. To do actual martial arts, I encourage people to take classes of actual martial arts, to make the 'performance' or 'act' as realistic as possible. Of course at some point, some costume doesn't allow you to respond with normal body movements, and you are forced to go down another road to make your performance more alive.

Comedy

This topic takes part in many anime, manga, entertainment and so on to give things a push in different directions. On stage in an act, this has been used amongst popular shows like Naruto, Bleach and so on. Performance wise, comedy is a great way to catch people, but it can be hard to attain the right effect.

Scenery
In 2009 scenery started to emerge, and in 2010 most of the groups participating in the cosplay competition at the convention J-Popcon, had a piece of scenery with them on the stage. After this year, the convention created a high black piece of scenery, that could be placed where the cosplayers wanted it on the stage.

VFX / Lights in the costumes / dolls
Among cosplayers in Denmark, putting lights in costumes, has since 2009 begun to catch on, and people put light in everything from their props to their costumes and scenery. Not only has lights sunk it's claws into the cosplayers, visual effects like flying confetti, bubble blowing is being used to show magical moments or explosions.

When competitions only allow a certain amount of people, and an act only makes sense when an extra person is on stage, people often use dolls to visualize it. This method has been used for a while in Denmark, and has become pretty normal. Lately puppetry has also been used to present characters and such.

Changing costumes on stage
Changing into or from a costume to another, became popular some years ago, and has catched on. It is being overused, but can be really interesting, if the changing of clothes are a huge part of the performance. In Denmark in 2011, a group performing at the convention J-Popcon, Copenhagen, did a performance, where one of the participants changed five times on stage.

What makes a performance spectacular / non expected / a new experience?

Trends are 'old' things that used to be original in performances like VFX and unexpected things in an act.

There is not a recipe for an act to be spectacular or new. The only thing that you can do to give a spectacular experience for the audience / judges watching your performance, is having a look at the previous trends, and decide what parts you want to include or exclude and find something that no one has used before, to create something extraordinary.

It can be hard to find something that has not been done before, but it definitely is possible to create something that will make the hearts of the judges beat faster.

My thoughts as an experienced cosplayjudge
I find that the different media can be a great inspiration, to what you can add to a performance to present an atmosphere, feeling or so. People do tend to creat performances that are similar, since everything is a 'remix' of something else. (Like movies, music and so on. Watch the series of 'Everything is a remix', to get some ideas of what has been created from other things (Star Wars etc).) When I get to judge a cosplay competition, I try to see how people are being true to their character and the game/entertainment source, while trying to create a new experience from an already know script etc.

Personally, I find that just copying a whole scene from the source and just presenting that without 'remixing' it with something new, can just be a boring show. You got to make it 'yours' and present it in your way.

But what is most important, is that you create a performance that you are satisfied with, and that you feel represents the series-/game-/entertainments source the best.

Things are up for discussion, so please feel free to link to this blogpost, or write a comment below.

Making cosplay come alive on video - Angel James de Ocampo

2011-09-26T10:30:00.000+02:00

Video has become yet another popular media that people uses to project cosplay out to an audience. A small amount of people proved themselves in its art on video streaming sites like Youtube and Vimeo, and received praise and joy from their user. One of these upcoming names are Angel James de Ocampo. James refers to himself as the nick 'Omaru' when online. But on the service Youtube, his videos can be found on the channel Alarzy.

James started out his cosplay video adventures back in September in 2010, where he attended one of the small conventions in France. His reason for starting to make videos of cosplay, was that he got tired of cosplay photography, and at the same time he started getting an interest in capturing video with DSLR cameras. James did a lot of research on the Internet, and came across the group StillMotion that creates wedding videos with DSLR cameras. StillMotion's style of recording inspired James a lot. Their clean and simple style encouraged James to take up the media instead of just doing still photography.

After some time, James stumbled upon the channel of the American cosplay video artist Acksonl. With a look at what Acksonl had created with his SteadyCam and Canon equipment, James thought it was possible for him to contribute to the cosplay community.

James interest has mostly been in cosplay photography, but he has tried out cosplay a single time as the character Kohta Hirano from High School of the Dead. Now most of his time in the world of cosplay, is spend at conventions capturing cosplayers in their elements.

I asked James about his relation to Acksonl, and he responded that they actually talk relatively often on Facebook, where they give each other pointers and encourage different techniques. When I told him that people online has begun to refer to him the 'French Acksonl', he responded: "I feel flattered being compared to him!". At the moment people are getting used to James recording at the conventions in France, and there when people are talking about him, they say "Oh yeah, it's that video guy". James is currently planning to tour Europe to do cosplay videos of conventions.

How do you approach the creation of a 'fan video'?

Before James goes to a convention, he chooses a song that he wants to use, and as he explains, he "goes with the flow", and just feel his way through the convention. On special occasions he makes storyboards for his video on ideas he gets. He gives an example of this with his Vocaloid Music video.

Interacting with the cosplayers for good footage, is a whole other side of the box. The way that James approaches cosplayers for videos at the conventions, is pretty much like headhunting. Often, he talks to cosplayers that he knows before the particular convention, and asks them about which cosplays they will prepare. James refers to this process as scouting. At the conventions James are often approached by cosplayers that asks that if he would film them, and he chooses to record them, if he feels that they will fit into the video.

Working with cosplayers can sometimes be a struggle he says, but most of the french cosplayers knows of his videos and how he works, so most of the time it's easy to approach.

When going out for an average shoot, James equips himself with about 10kilos of gear. For making the shoot as comfortably as possible, he wears a light shirt to easily lose heat. For choice of pants, he mostly wears cargo shorts with many side pockets, to keep spare batteries and memory cards for easy accessibility.

Heading towards end of the interview, I asked James for some finishing remarks to the readers; like if people would like to start doing the same that he does. James responded with: "Just start! Don't be limited with gear. If you have a camera than can shoot 60 fps and in HD (yeah I am biased, SD sucks anyway) then that is a good start. Try to study other guys doing cosplay videos and learn from them".

Interview by Casper Jensen

Welcome to int.cosblog

2011-09-14T14:57:00.000+02:00

Welcome to the International cosplay blog.

This blog is a project started up by a group of cosplayers from Europe. The project itself has been named int.cosblog which is an abbreviation of the words 'International', 'cosplay' and of course 'blog'.

The idea
So the idea of the blog pretty much reflects in the name. We want the blog to be a hub for cosplayers around the world, where we discuss and write articles about the things happening in the cosplay world.

The writers

Casper Jensen / Usk
Age: 24
Main focus in cosplay: crafting costumes and working on props.
Nationality: Danish

A bit of information about Casper: My nick online is Usk, I'm mostly know for the cosplay magazine in Denmark by the name CosMag. I've been cosplaying since 2005 and been a WCS (World Cosplay Summit) judge at three conventions (Connichi 2009 in Germany, AnimeCon 2011 in the Netherlands and at TraCon 2011 in Finland). I love judging cosplay and watch how people immerse themselves into crafting cosplay props and costumes.

Iris Rönkkö
Age: 25
Main focus in cosplay: Craftsmanship, judging competitions.
Nationality: Finnish

A Bit of information about Iris: I've been cosplaying since 2003 and was part of the first Team Finland at the World Cosplay Summit in 2009 with my boyfriend. I've been a judge in about ten or more cosplay competitions, and have a big interest in developing the cosplay scene in Finland. I'm also a seamstress/dressmaker and a huge fabric geek - I often have to stop myself from touching other people's costumes. I just like touching fabrics so much! I am also completely useless with props and afraid of styling wigs.

Janne Rusanen / Elffi
Age: 23
Main focus in cosplay: Crafting costumes, mainly focusing on all kind of props and prop tutorials/lectures.
Nationality: Finnish

A bit of information about Janne: I was part of the WCS Team Finland in 2011. I'v been a judge in Finnish conventions for 3 years (normal conventions, WCS judge once, EC judge twice). I really love prop making and I'm trying to develope new ways and methods to make props easily.

Elina/Rimppu
Age: 24
Main focus in cosplay: Hosting masquerades, making bootcovers/shoes.
Nationality: Finnish

Bit of information about myself: I've been cosplaying since 2004 and hosting masquerades since 2007. I keep a cosplay video blog and am the media contact for Cosplay Finland. I'm also a part of the WCS Team Finland 2012 and a complete shoe geek.