I finally managed to get some time to share them with you, so if you encounter them, you don’t have to go through the same ordeal.

Since I completely finished a small part of the armor, I thought I should post all the steps that it went through, together with lots of photos.

The part of the armor that I started with is this one

It seems to have a different shape in all the reference photos I have, so I had to adapt for it a shape that I considered fit. First I thought of taking as main reference this photo

but if I was to respect the proportions, my waistline should have measured around 35 cm / 14 “. So I gave up and considered the first photo I posted here because it made my work a bit easier (my waistline had to be 45 cm / 18 ” all around).

First of all, I hid myself under a thick blanket with my laptop, a pencil and a sheet of paper and, in the dark, I copied the shape of the front/back disk and the hip pieces.

I split the image into squares and calculated how much I had to multiply its shape to make it the size that would fit me. Luckily, it was exactly 4 times bigger, so I drew the same squares, just 4 time larger.

This is how I got the size of half of the front/back disk, as I like to call it. This only showed me how it looked seen from the front, so I had to imagine how it looked like from other angles. I also made it a bit wider (by 2 cm / 0.8 ” ), so it realistically fits my hips and waistline. Afterwards I spent some time imagining how thick the disk should be, so I came up with the blueprint for the disk from all the angles. I needed this because I wanted to make a 3D version of the disk, in order to make the mold for vacuum forming.

After I made the blueprints I cut them from thick cardboard and glued them together with hot silicone.

After that I cut four pieces from the extruded polystyrene sheets we previously bought (3 cm / 1.2 ” thick) and glued them to the cardboard.

Now, something important: I had serious problems with gluing the polystyrene to the cardboard. Maninly because most of the glues I wanted to use melted the polystirene. Eventually I discovered that white glue is the best, but it takes time to dry so I had to glue it and only start working on it the next day.

After the polystirene was well glued to the cardboard, the next step that came was sculpting it. This is where the 3D cardboard shape that I cut did its job. It was the guiding line for the overall shape of the disk. In the end it turned out like this:

Cutting it was not enough. It needed a bit of sanding, too. I used really fine sand paper. I don’t know if the roughness of the sand paper in other countries, but the one I used was 320. The higher the number is, the finer the sand paper gets.

Afterwards I decided to use papier mâché to cover the polystirene. I need the mold to vacuum form the plastic on it and the plastic will be hot when I put it on the mold. The last thing I want is to see the polystirene melt under the hot plastic. That is the first reason why I wanted to use the papier mâché on the mold. Another reason is that it makes the mold really hard. You could easily break one’s head if you throw the mold at them (I didn’t try that, really… ). I made the papier mâché paste combining water with a type of white glue. I looked the word up in several dictionaries, but apparently there is no specific word for it in English. It is a creamy white glue, used most of the time for wood, paper and cardboard. At first I thought it is the same thing with white glue, but the white glue is thicker and a bit more translucid. The best way is to look for wood glue in the shops. You can find a ton of recipes for papier mâché paste all over the internet, so I don’t think this should be a big problem.
So, I covered the disk with a few layers of papier mâché, all soaked in the white liquid.

close up to the papier mache

After that I thought it was not enough, so I decided to add a layer of wall putty to make sure I can shape it the way I want it.

To tell you the truth, I didn’t find the putty that effective. It proved to be messy when working with it and dusty when it came to sanding it down, and the results were not that satisfactory. Eventually I ended up using JUST papier mâché and sanding it down with a 60 sand paper. It turns out smooth and you can control and see the bumps better. I used the mold as a test in the vacuum former and… it worked. I will tell the story of the vacuum forming tests in another post.

I cut it and used the dremel tool to make the edges smooth.

That hard part was over! I made blueprints for the ornaments on top of the disk

and cut them from 2mm / 0.1 ” thick craft foam.

The next step was one of those parts that were supposed to be easy, but things got a bit complicated. I used some tips and tricks from this tutorial for my craft foam work. Specifically, I found extremely useful the fact that the girl who made the tutorial used a combination of one part white glue, one part flexible fabric glue and two parts water to make the surface of the craft foam shiny and to withstand bending violently the craft foam. So I tried the combination. It was not the first time I was trying it out. I used this combination (but without adding the water) when I added the tip to the Yoko Nakajima shoes. The moment I mixed the white glue and the fabric glue together, the smell that emerged almost made me choke. It strongly smelled like ammonia. It was quite clear that the two glues together had some chemical reaction. Well, I tried the same again, but I added water. The purpose of the water is that it thins the glue down enough that it will not retain brush strokes and the craft foam absorbs it easily, making the craft foam flexible not only on the outside, but also on the inside. So… I added the water and the result was… this:

The fabric glue separated itself from the rest of the liquid, becoming a big soft chunk. The rest of the liquid was just white glue with water, with some traces of fabric glue in it. I was shocked by this utter failure, so I tried again. This time I mixed the watter slowly into the two glues. It turned out better, but you could still see small chunks of fabric glue. Still, I decided to use it on the craft foam parts that I cut for the disk.

As you can observe, you can still see small chunks of glue on the craft foam. That made me decide not to use the fabric glue anymore. The white glue is flexible enough, so I decided to only combine it with water. See the difference? No white chunks!

I made a few tests on a sheet of craft foam, trying out different thicknesses to see how it dries out. I was really happy with the result!

After the first fail-glue layer dried out on the ornaments, I noticed that you could still see small white spots on their surface, so that proved me even more that my decision to keep the white glue only in this combination was the right one.

I added another four or five layers of white glue+water only, and tried the golden acrylic spray.
Satisfied with the result, I glued the craft foam to the plastic disk with super glue and sprayed the golden paintall over it.

Then Gabi tried to do some shading on it. He combined some brown acrylic paint with water and used it as a wash. He put it on the edges of the ornaments and then wiped a bit with some tisue. Another problem emerged! This plastic is very shiny and with all the paint on it it became even smoother, so the wash wouldn’t stick to it. That required more nerve-wrecking work, but I could see the difference
Do YOU see the difference? I am looking forward to you comments!

All that remains to be done is to add two layers of transparent varnish, to make sure that the paint job is not easily damaged.

All I need right now is enough time to finish the whole costume. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

I will also post all the videos and photos I have from the competitions, hoping that they will make the cosplayers happy (I was so happy after Mondocon when somebody tagged me in a Facebook video!).

The things I know about the cosplay competition in the first day are from the inside: going to meet the jury, going up on stage and talking to other cosplayers while waiting backstage or waiting for the photo shoot.

Although everything was delayed and my feet hurt like hell, waiting to go meet the jury was fun. it was the perfect moment to look at the others’ costumes. Don’t get me wrong. I didn’t want to spy on them. I just wanted to learn new things. And when I could, I asked “What material is this? Where did you buy it from? How much did it cost?” or “How did you do this?”. And again, this helped me find new materials for my Athena cosplay. The Mondocon experience taught that being locked in the box of your own country doesn’t help. It’s a limited box of knowledge and when that knowledge ends… what are you going to do? That would really bore me to death, I think. That’s why I try to find out as much as I can about the methods and the materials that other cosplayers use. Improving my technique is vital to me.

An overall impression of the cosplay at Holdfeny Con? Well, first of all, something surprises me all the time I come to a convention in Hungary. Many many cosplayers off the stage. Almost every three persona you find somebody who cosplays or has a cosplay-like costume! And I think this is an amazing thing! Cosplaying for fun is a nice thing to do. You must not have a perfect costume, worthy of going up the stage, you just have to feel good in it and enjoy yourself. And apparently the fans in Hungary know how to do this.

As for the competition cosplay, well, that is a bit different, at least that’s how I see it. It always requires more responsability and a lot more work, but it still must be something to be enjoyed. Since it was a summer convention and summer is the season of having fun and not of working, I didn’t expect extraordinary costumes for the cosplay competition. And I was wrong. There were some costumes that were quite impressive and the cosplayers have worked a lot on them. I thought that was a great thing and that showed me that there are some cosplayers in hungary that are really into cosplay and who take it seriously. I must congratulate them for it. it takes a lot of effort and determination to have this hobby. Lots of work and money that only come back to you in the form of people enjoying your costumes or maybe winning some prizes.

Of course, that doesn’t mean all the cosplayers are the same, some don’t care that much about how “perfect” their costume is but the cosplay experience overall. Since I am a perfectionist, it’s hard for me to understand it, so I’ll just keep quiet about it.

There is one thing I will say though: there were things I would have done differently when it came to many of the costumes I saw, but I will not post it here, since I believe it’s not something I should say publicly. So if you believe you can handle some negative feed-back, feel free to ask, I promise I won’t bite! Maybe we can learn from each other interesting things!

Anyway, let’s see what videos we have from the first day:

Danboard: I found it very cute and although it was a simple cosplay, i felt like hugging it (it was her actually).

Hegedűs Szilvia (Vadász – hunter). This is the winner for the original character category, as far as I remember.  didn’t get to see this cosplay very close, but the technique seemed good and i think the cosplayer thought about lots of details when making it.

I do not remember very well all the winners, plus I didn’t understand exactly all the categories for winning, so please let me know if I say something wrong or if I don’t remember something.

Lőrentei Alexandra (Gunner – Atlantica Online) – as far as I remember, she was nominated for the best cosplay in anime/cartoon/game category. I saw this cosplay quite close and Alexandra told me in detail how she did it and I know there has been a lot of work in it. She said it was a rather simple cosplay. I found it a bit complicated. But then again, I think I would have done it differently and it would have taken me more time.

Balázs Beáta (Etna – Disgaea 2) – to tell you the truth, the thing that struck me the most about this cosplay was… oh, well… the abs on the cosplayer! My god, were they looking great! I even felt envious for a second 

Mile Renáta (Yuuichi Komura – Hiiro no Kakera) – a cosplay with lots of potential. I liked the way the tails looked like!

Jobbágy Ildikó Melinda (Elf Mystic Muse, Arcana Robe – Linage II) – the winner from anime/cartoon/games category. A really nicely done costume, very detailed and good technique. I remember I was next to the stage when she had her performance and there were two times when I thought she would fall off her high heels… my heart froze for a second  but all ended well, I guess!

Szabó Andrea (Sophia – Luminous arc 2) – I also got to see this cosplay close enough. I liked the necklace and the staff. And the song from the performance (because it’s one of my favourites), but I have no idea if it fit the character she cosplayed.

Livia Viziteu (Shinju) – Yoko Nakajima 12 kingdoms – well, this is my performance. I have to admit that i didn’t have anything in mind about my performance 10 minutes before going up the stage. The problems I usually have with the costumes I choose are that I don’t have much to do on stage. I barely invented something for the Medicine Seller and for Yoko I really had no idea. All she did when she was wearing this costume was talk, listen and worry. Oh, yeah, and… walk!

So eventually I thought I should pose and swirl a bit because it makes the dress look good . I saw the video and I must say I am quite satisfied, considering I thought about it while queuing up for the stage.

Bata Renáta (Superbi Squalo – Katekyo Hitman Reborn) – unfortunately I don’t remember much about this cosplay. But I remember seeing her play games later (I think she participated in the Soul Calibur competition, also)

Laukó Viktória (Night elf druid — Tier 6 set – World of Warcraft) – I liked the cosplay, she was really similar to the reference! I will cheer for her at London Expo.

Passalacqua Stella (Ariel – The little mermaid) – I liked the fact that she put the closing system on the side of the bra, not in the back, to be very visible…

Kiss Krisztina (Sötét angyal – dark angel) – original character. I cannot say much about this cosplay, because I don’t know anything about the character, but Krisztina was sweet enough to offer me water while we were waiting to enter at the jury. Thanks, I was thirsty!

Tihanyi Mária (Daenerys Targaryen – Game of Thrones) – I didn’t see Game of Thrones – although all my friends did and really urged me to do so, but I postponed it until it ends. Well, I should see it, I guess… So I can’t really judge the cosplay, but I can say one thing: my god, did she look hot!

Kovács Mercédesz (Black Rock Shooter – Black Rock Shooter THE GAME) – I want a wig just as long for my Athena cosplay (

Bokusatsu Tenshi – I was really amused to see this character. I like it and always thought it would be nice to be able to use the log ) She made it out of some soft fabric, so she could actually hit people with it! I wonder if she did so!

Bender Futurama – Now this was a funny cosplay! Especially when I  tried to feed him grapes! That was a hard one!

Then the group craftsmanship competition came:

Burton’s Doll (Corpse Bride, Nightmare Before Christmas) – They had great make-up and they knew exactly how to take advantage of their physical appearance when choosing the cosplays. I like that! And I think they won the prize for best group at craftsmanship, right?

Arkham (Batman Arkham Asylum) – the thing that impressed me the most was the Batman costume! I thought he had bought it, not made it himself! impressive!

King & Queen (Dynasty Warriors 7) – I took a closer look at the costumes and they seemed to be pretty detailed and looked good even on a zoom in

And that is all the videos I have on the cosplay competition! If anyone wants the video, just write me an email and I will send it to you in all the full HD splendor )

And somebody please write in a comment what were the rest of the winners that i didn’t mention, because I don’t remember them now or I don’t know exactly what they won.

the next day I didn’t expect much, because i don’t understand Hungarian, but actually the skits were quite understandable! Betty Boop looked a lot like the character and the Epic meal time made me laugh my ass off! I think they won something, but I am not sure what!

As for the Eurocosplay, at least I have some photos!

the winner

I will not say my opinion on the Eurocosplay contest, because I didn’t get to see the costumes from a close range, and I think this really matters when it comes to Eurocosplay competition. But I have to say I enjoyed the last skit. Although I didn’t understand the lyrics, I think I got the idea.

Oh, yes, I forgot to say something in the other post!

We met somebody who cosplayed Romania from Hetalia! She was so surprised when we told her we’re from Romania… that was priceless!

So now, with a rather fresh mind I am trying to tell the world how HoldfenyCon was for me.

I will skip the adventures we had to go through to get to Budapest (we must always have some sort of adventures, and not the pleasant kind) and go straight to the con.

When the convention started I was surprised to see chairs for a small  orchestra on the stage. And, indeed, a small orchestra came and played for us. Unfortunately I was rather busy when that happened, but my boyfriend (Gabi) managed to film them a bit, while they were playing some songs from Star Wars.

I was really looking forward to the cosplay competition, although my costume was no-win material.I knew I’d get to see interesting cosplay costumes and I was looking forward to meeting some cosplayers I have befriended at Mondocon and afterwards.

I was very proud of how my shoes turned out, but I managed to ruin them before the competition by walking among the sharp plastic boxes I had around my table/booth. I managed somehow to save them in the last moment, but I will need to fix them in order to wear them again.

My boyfriend managed to film some of the performances (unfortunately not all of them, because he didn’t have much space on the memory card), and I will post them in another article.

We didn’t take too many photos, though, and I am really frustrated about it, but apparently our 8GB memory card in the camera was not enough for films and photos… We DID manage though to take a few photos of the Yoko Nakajima cosplay, so that I can compare them to the old ones in 2008.

this is the 2008 cosplay

And the Holdfeny Con cosplay (click on the photos to view them larger):

First of all, this time my shoes were complete and similar to the ones in the anime, which made me really happy. I changed the green collar (I made it more comfortable to wear), I sewed it to the main “vest”. I took out the sleeves (both the grey ones and the frilled ones) and made a separate “kimono” to put them on. I cut the lower part of  the dark grey “vest” and made out of it a separate part to put on top of the purple skirt.

I totally remade the striped circles under the belt, I changed the velcro tape on the belt because I lost weight in the last 2 months and apparently I am thinner now than I was in 2008. I totally remade the purple belt, which was way too big and uncomfortable. It used to be put together with velcro tape, but I finally decided on a corset-like system, with thread and holes to make it less thick. I also remade the edges of the frilled sleeves and skirt. As I said in a previous post about my old cosplay, I am happy I have a serger to help me with my work! And I also did a big petticoat underneath the two skirts to keep my frilled skirt fluffy, because it’s very heavy (around 4 kg). I repainted a bit the crown and the earings and I changed the gemstone on the crown (actually it used to be a green piece of paper I cut from a magazine). I bought a gemstone, I used the dremel tool to give it the needed shape and glued it there. I will post a more detailed article about it in the next few days. I also used superglue to stiffen the shape of the knot underneath the green and white beads tied to the dress.

I was also happy to meet one of my favourite characters, the 10th Doctor from Doctor Who, and even got to use one of his Sonic Screwdrivers! Yey!

After working again so much, going to a convention felt genuinely like a holiday. I was happy to see people I wanted to meet and talk to them about cosplay plans and techniques. There were lots of people who recognized me and I was a bit surprised, but sometimes I was frustrated that the language barrier stopped us from communicating more. There were people who couldn’t speak English and since I can’t speak Hungarian, we would just look at each other, wanting to speak, but not being able to.

I went to see how the guys from the Star Wars team showed everybody how they made their storm trooper armors and I appreciated the fact that they were patient enough to explain to me in English how things are done. I was really interested in this because this is how I want to make my Athena armor!

I appreciate a lot the help we got from the organising team who gave us volunteers to translate for us at the table. That helped a lot and made things a lot easier for us! Although there were far fewer people than I expected to see, I really had a good time and went to sleep with a smile on my face.

It was interesting to see for sale things I haven’t seen before, like candy  – lots of shapes and sizes!, steam punk accessories, polymer clay sweet lolita accessories (which reminded me of the time when I used to play with polymer clay) or some very unusual jewelry. I drooled over the miniatures/figures that were exhibited right in the middle of the hall and wanted the Japanese-pattern umbrellas on the first floor.

Oh, let me not forget the 2 statues (Halo on the ground floor and a very cute Alien on the first floor). I only took a photo of the second one, unfortunately, but we have the Halo statue filmed:

Towards the end of the day they held the Soul Calibur 4 competiton on stage and even Darth Vader came to fight and pleased us with a dance at the end!

I liked the fact that towards the end the atmosphere was really friendly, they put some music, people would go up the stage and dance together, there was a lot of para-para involved and everybody seemed to be having a good time.

They announced the winners to all the competitions at the end of the day, so people gathered to see it and they even had the chances to win something (there was a raffle with gifts for the public).

And although I enjoyed myself so much in the first day, the second day was my favourite! No more thick costumes and complicated hair-dues, the weather was cooler and the pressure was lower. I can’t say I cosplayed on the second day, although I was wearing part of a cosplay costume (Saya from Blood C). Consequently, nobody recognized me and I didn’t even want them to.

I just wanted to spend time doing the things I enjoyed. I even had a greater time with the Star Wars guys, I joined the dark side, because Darth Vader was such a sweetie (and no, he had no cookies)

I just joined the dark side!

and Boba Fett and I chased each other with the cameras around the convention.

Boba Fett escaped in an elevator!

Oh, yes, and Gabi got pawned badly by Vader

Was he aiming for some soft parts?

and you’re down!

We were even surprised to see Rei (who delighted us the day before dancing in the storm trooper costume) play the harmonica on stage (he even played the Star Wars theme song, but we failed to film it)

The performance cosplay competition was fun, although I didn’t understand much, since it was in Hungarian, but even the language barrier didn’t stop me from seeing the hilarious parts in the skits.

Anyway,more opinions on the competition will be found in the post especially dedicated entirely to cosplay.

But I still want to participate in cosplay competitons! What do I do? I adapt older costumes. That seemed as the best choice.
I always loved my Yoko Nakajima cosplay. Maybe because it was the first cosplay I did with my heart (I didn’t care much about the previous Matsumoto, except for the big boobs) and because it was my first cosplay to participate in a competition.

And thanks to a friend of mine, my boyfriend and I started reading the “Twelve Kingdoms” books. And I fell in love again with this wonderful world and with Yoko. And since we are going next week to HoldfenyCon in Budapest, I took out of the closet my old Yoko cosplay. And to tell you the truth… I was horrified!

My God, was I a noob back then! If I was proud of it in 2008, now I wasn’t. My decision to participate in the cosplay competition didn’t seem so appealing anymore. Maybe I was hoping of winning something at HoldfenyCon. This time I am sure I won’t! I know the competition and my costume will post probably be a bit more than dull. But I don’t care… I participate for the fun of it, the shivers before going to stage, the weak knees with every step I take, the burning lights that won’t let you see a thing, the happy thoughts that cross your head after you get out, well… I think it’s more like… eagerly searching for adrenaline rush… and succeeding!

So I decided to change some things on my costume.
Remember this?

Well, it’s no-no.
I decided to wear my own hair this time (a wig in mid-August?! Hell, no!), because it’s long enough and I like being a redhead. The crown is ok, I will just add some extra clip-ons to attach to the head, so it doesn’t fall easily.
I took the sleeves out completely because they were hanging by a mere thread and lots of safety pins (yes, I am ashamed to admit it) and decided to make another system to get them on the rest of the kimono. I took out the green part, which also looked funny and washed it. I haven’t modified it yet, I don’t know how exactly, but tomorrow I will figure out a way…
See those black-striped white circles on my tummy? They looked horrible actually. Painted in the last moment with golden acrylic and the lines were made by a… marker…*cough*
I redid all the hem lines at the sleeves and the white part of the skirt. I am so happy I have a serger and I could make it look so professional!
Now the shoes… the ones I had in 2008 at Nijikon were simply some pumps, but no high heels. Oh, yes, and I had painted them gold. But the shoes that Yoko actually wore looked like this:

So I decided to modify the ones I had. I wanted to make a small “How I made it” article on how I did that, but since our camera is away visiting the great mountains of Romania, I got the leftovers (my cel phone camera, which sucks big time) . I took the photos but I am not sure I was to post them here. They almost hurt my eyes. I did post them on Facebook and Google+ for a change with some explanations.
I’ll see. Still have some days to think about it.

Now this is the old cosplay. And I am thinking that… although it is not such a great costume (right now I find it average and easy to make), it’s really close to my heart. Making it in 2008 felt like such a great effort, so difficult! And I think that my love for the “Twelve Kingdoms” world makes me like it so much. I love it so much that my boyfriend and I want to play a campaign in Pathfinder (spiritual follower of D&D 3.5) inside this world!

Anyway, enough with the old cosplay… I was thinking that I have been telling everybody what cosplay I want to make this autumn, but I didn’t post it on my blog!

And AGAIN I will say “It will be the most difficult cosplay I have done until now”.
The character is Athena (full armor) from Saint Seiya. Really old, isn’t it? My boyfriend has been asking poeple about it in the last year and finally decided to watch it. Surprisingly, he said he liked it and convinced me to watch it with him.

Athena seemed a spoiled brat at the beginning and not so interesting as a character, but as the story goes she gets some balls and gets more entertaining.
And if you google Athena… omg, that is a change!!! I was shocked by the beauty of the armor! I still haven’t figured out where she appears in that armor in the anime (haven’t had time to finish it and there are movies and OVA’s!), except for that artbook, but I really don’t care.

The photo above will be my main reference, I think, but I also found some other photos that proved to be very useful:

As you can see, there are slight differences in the many images representing Athena and I will have to decide on which one.
One thing I decided for sure. I want mo make my wings articulated and I will work my ass for it!
Until the next time, have fun cosplaying!

The first one was Mondocon, which took place in Budapest, Hungary, on the 14^th and the 15^th of May.

I am not going to get into details about how we got there, or why they didn’t let us pass the border to hungary at 2 am, this is a story for another post. For me the biggest shock was changing the environment, and not in the way that you are thinking! For more than a month before Mondocon I was a hermit, locked inside my home and working around 12 hours a day on my cosplay costume. And suddenly… a huge crowd of people at the entrance gate of Hung Expo, the Convention Center where Mondcon took place.

(click on the photos to view them bigger)

After meeting the jury

The medicine box was the star

But the scale is still my favourite

and going up the stage,

I had more time to enjoy the whole convention.

The thing that shocked me the most was the fact that I saw so many cosplayers (almost half of the people I saw there were wearing some sort of cosplay or costume), and many of them were not particularly young.

Fairy Tail for the win!

I saw many girls holding hands with their mother, who “happened” to wear the same outfit,

Double Sakura!

we even had an Avatar Family!

I really enjoyed the fact that the people attending the convention had lots of space outdoors for photos, hanging around, talking, or just enjoying the good weather.

That prevented overcrowding the buildings, although the concert hall was always packed during the cosplay competitions.

I was happy to see how many contests they held (cosplay, AMV, DDR, karaoke, drawing, gaming, fanfic, etc.), although I didn’t have the time to participate. I wish I went to the DDR competition, I saw they had beginner, advanced, pro and veteran categories. This is a good way for all-level competitors to feel that they have a chance of winning. I would have chosen the beginner one, because I was overwhelmed to see what the pros and veterans can do!

I also managed to get to see the commercial area. Lots of manga (too bad most of it was on Hungarian), merchandise for J-pop/rock fans, for anime/manga fans in general (from T-shirts to key-chains), but also for those who love the Japanese traditional wear and culture or just plain cute jewelry. Let’s not forget about the many miniatures and figures from Holdfeny! I always craved for some things from them, but never seemed to have enough money to buy what I wanted. I saw part of the karaoke contest (or so it seemed to be), which was on stage and the girls singing knew the songs by heart. Most of them had good voices and the public seemed to enjoy their performance.

One of the things that I really enjoyed was participating in the cosplay competition with my Medicine Seller costume. Although I was dead tired and I could barely walk on stage with the 13cm (5”) geta shoes AND the 15kg (33lbs) medicine box on my back, I had help from friends and all organizing team. I got to talk to several great cosplayers and exchanged useful information. I planned to go to other conventions both in Hungary and in Austria this year and meet other cosplayers and participate in other cosplay competitions, to test my skills at European level.

I was happy to be appreciated in Hungary. I won the “Best Technique” Prize, I was also nominated for “Favourite of the public”, “Best accessory” and “Best costume” and I must say the competition was tight.

Winner of “Best Costume”

Winner of “Favourite of the Public”

They also chose one of their contestants for EuroCosplay(link) this year

Also Winner of “Best accessory” in the regular competition

And that made me wish we had EuroCosplay in Romania, too.

All in all, I had a really great time at Mondocon this spring and I am really looking forward to the Autumn Mondocon! Until then, here are some highlights from the event:

Epic Battle

one of my favourites

awwww

Part of the jury in the cosplay competition

Trinity Blood again

Some Joker, eh?

My medicine seller costume

left: jury; right: winner for “Best Character”

My whole outfit

A group from the “World of Kung Fu” game

The Trinity Blood group – winner of “Best Group” Prize

The contestants for Euro Cosplay

Thank Cosplay.hu and the photographers Födémesi Csaba, Budai Benjamin, Écsi Dávid, Gabriel Solymossy and Methos for all the photos and Krambo for the film with my performance on stage.

Soon I will write about the time I had at Otaku Festival 2011 and share a couple of impressions on the Cosplayers there.

Mi-a luat mult sa il concep, a fost mult mai greu decat am crezut ca va fi pentru ca mi-am dat seama ca erau atatea detalii de care trebuia sa ma leg… dar in cele din urma am razbit .

In primul rand am considerat ca sunt doua criterii principale pe baza carora am dezvoltat cate un arbore de notare: “tehnica si complexitate” si “fidelitate generala”, corora le-am acordat 60 si respectiv 40 de sutimi dintr-o nota generala de 10 (100 de sutimi). De ce? Ei bine, eu cred ca una e sa faci cosplay si alta e sa participi la un concurs de cosplay. A participa la un concurs de cosplay implica mai multa responsabilitate, ca sa zic asa, si mai multa munca. Trebuie sa demonstrezi ca meriti sa ajungi pe un podium, sa iesi cumva in evidenta, fie prin jocul scenic, fie prin costum, fie prin ambele. De aceea nu e de ajuns sa semeni cu personajul respectiv (poti face asta la fel de bine printr-un costum cumparat sau facut de altcineva), ci sa muncesti la propriul costum, sa ai mandria ca tu l-ai facut atunci cand il porti. De asemenea, consider ca un costum mai complex, in consecinta mai “muncit”, este mai demn de un concurs de cosplay decat unul f simplu. Vrem sa ridicam nivelul cosplay-ului in Romania, nu? Sa ne uitam la altii, sa luam exemplu. Ce costume castiga in alte tari? Ce este apreciat? Putem si noi sa ajungem acolo? Sperand ca acest barem va ajuta oarecum sa formeze acea directie, am considerat ca tehnica si complexitatea conteaza un pic mai mult decat asemanarea cu personajul.

Iata si impartirea baremului. Dati click pe imagine pt a o vedea mare. Mai jos se gasesc explicatii la unii termeni din barem care ar putea sa fie vagi.

Barem costume concurs cosplay Otakufestival

(1) numarul de accesorii – se ia in calcul numarul de accesorii diferite (cele de acelasi fel nu se pun la numaratoare). Se calculeaza ca accesorii tot ce nu reprezinta haina sau nu e facut din material. Incaltamintea este considerata accesoriu, perucile nu, au categorie separat.

(2) dificultatea tiparului – se va lua in considerare cat de mult cosplayerul a incercat sa se foloseasca de tipare in realizarea costumului, cat de corect au fost acestea folosite si in cazuri in care se cerea improvizare sau creativitate pe langa un tipar clasic, cum a facut-o si ce rezultat a avut.

(3) materialele flosite   – cat de bine se potrivesc materialele pentru cosplay-ul ales.

(4) procent de lucru – cat la suta din costum a fost facut de concurent si ce alt ajutor a primit de la altii. De asemenea, ce a cumparat gata facut si ce modificari a facut, daca a fost cazul.

(5) calitatea cusaturii si a imbinarilor – cat de bine au fost facute cusaturile, finisajele la cusaturi (atat in in cazul cusutului la masina, cat si de mana), cum arata pe interiorul hainelor finisajele. Hainele nu trebuie sa arate bine doar de la departare, ci si de aproape.

(6) sistemele de prindere –  se refera la orice modalitate prin care anumite accesorii sau haine sunt mentinute intr-o pozitie potrivita costumului (de obicei pozitii care sfideaza legile fizicii). Pentru costumele care nu au nici un sistem de prindere (desi sunt f rare), nu se va acorda nici un punct.

(7) sisteme de prindere – cat de mult este vizibil sistemul de prindere si cat din el ar trebui sa se vada de fapt.

(8) stabilitate – cat de bine isi face sistemul de prindere treaba, cat de bine stau hainele sau accesoriile, sa nu se miste, sa fie instabile, sa tinda sa se indoie, rupa, etc…

(9) calitatea accesoriilor – cat de bine au fost asamblate/finisate accesoriile. (Ele nu trebuie sa arate bine doar de la distanta, ci si de aproape.)

(a) parul/peruca – aspectul parului/perucii si daca acesta este fidel personajului.

(b) coafura – cat de bine a coafat/aranjat parul/peruca/mesele. Aici intra si lungimea, volumul, si orice alt detaliu legat de felul in care e coafat parul.

(c) machiajul – fidelitatea cu care cosplayerul reuseste sa redea infatisarea personajului cu ajutorul machiajului. Nu ne referim doar la anumite machiaje speciale pe care anumite personaje le cer, ci si un machiaj simplu care ar putea sa imbunatateasca aspectul general al concurentului.

(d) fidelitatea imbracamintii – fidelitatea cu care cosplayerul reuseste sa redea infatisarea personajului cu ajutorul imbracamintii

(e) detaliile  - se refera la ori ce amanunt specific costumului. Se va nota prezenta acestora si fidelitatea lor.

(f) fidelitatea cu care cosplayerul reuseste sa redea infatisarea personajului cu ajutorul accesoriilor. Printre accesorii se include si Incaltamintea, lentile de contact, orice fel de arme, etc…

(g) aspectul texturii  - se refera la faptul ca majoritatea accesorilor nu sunt facute din materialele originale ale sursei. De acea se va nota fidelitatea cu care accesoriile (care de cele mai multe ori sunt facute din alte materiale) redau textura si aspectul originale.

(h) aspectul fizic – se va puncta cat de mult se apropie aspectul fizic si fizionomia cosplayerului fata de personaj.

Daca aveti nelamuriri va rog scrieti un comment, sa pot sa remediez explicatiile. De asemena, puteti intreba de ce am ales o anumita categorie, sau de ce i-am dat un anumit punctaj.

Zilele urmatoare o sa incerc sa exemplific baremul pe doua cosplayuri – unul simplu si unul mai complex.

Astept feedback!

Although I am up high  in the Alps right now I managed to find out about the tragedies that have struck Japan in the last week and since I finally got to some internet, I thought I should write a few words here before I start the post. But… nothing right comes to mind. What can be said in such moments? Except for the hope that I keep in my heart that the situation will not get worse and worse… Having to deal with earthquakes and tsunamis was not enough apparently, the nuclear reactor is now giving much trouble than anyone could have ever thought. Despite all this, I trust the Japanese people will fight this with all their power and knowing their determination and strenghth, I know this will have a good ending.

And now bacl to cosplay. Since this week I am away and because my internet sucks big time, I decided to show you the screenshots I am using as reference for my cosplay.

Before you look at any photo, I have a challenge for you guys! While paying attention to the details in the screenshots I discovered the guys who made this anime made some mistakes (drew something one way in a scene and in a different way in another scene, so right now I don’t even know how to make some accessories). Let me see how many of these mistakes you can find!!!

That being said, here come the screenshots:

General:

Accessories:

- the geta shoes:

- the mirror necklace:

- the “bead” necklace:

- the sword:

- the scale:

- the medicine box:

From Medicine Seller – screen shots

- the umbrella:

- the paper charms:

- the ring:

- the elastic hair string:

- the sword box:

The outfit:

- the tabi socks, the bandage “pants” and the black pants:

- the three layers of kimono:

- the obi:

- the scarf on the head:

- the scarf under the obi:

- the red string that ties the obi:

Extra:

- the hair:

- the ears:

- the make-up:

So, here is Episode 1, the Introduction to the whole series:

And for now here’s the list of the things I will use for the accessories I will make:

Geta shoes

-          An oak-tree or any hard wood  plank/board, preferably at least 30-40 mm thick

-          Wood stain (ro. baitz)

-          Varnish/Lac (optional)

-          Nails/Screws

-          A small piece of yellow fabric and some cotton wool

-          Some rubber sheets for the soles

Tabi socks

-          A thick fluffy black fabric or any black and thick hard fabric (about 40 /150 cm)

Round necklace

-          A round mirror (around 10-12 cm diameter)

-          A 30-40 cm diameter ball or bowl, used for shaping

-          Plaster or polyurethane foam or any filling material

-          Wall or wood putty

-          Acrylic paint  - light and dark golden

-          Matte transparent acrylic varnish

-          A simple “dirty light blue” thread

-          A small piece of wire

Necklace (beads)

-          6 round beads, 7-8 mm diameter

-          A tear-shaped bead, ~ 15 mm length

-         Some “invisible” thread

Sword

-          A piece of wood (~40/5/3 cm)

-          Wood putty

-          Polymer clay

-          Plastic gem stones

-          White artificial hair

-          Scarlet/brown, white and gold acrylic paint

-          matte acrylic varnish

-          Cat bell (4 cm diameter)

-          Dark blue string (~20 cm)

The scale

-          1mm thick plastic sheet (50/100 cm)

-          Double sided tape

-          2 screws

-          Some thin string

-          Plastic beads and gems

-          Putty

-          2 cat bells (~1.5 cm diameter)

-          Hard transparent piece of plastic

The medicine box

-        thin pressed wood boards (MDF)(3-4 mm), with a dark brown wood finish

-        pieces of wood for assembling

-        small nails/screws

-        metallic wall corners

-        knobs for the drawers

-        big ring + knob to attach it to

-        gold acrylic paint

-        matte varnish for acrylic paint

-        thick red string (around 2m long)

-        2 red tassels (ro. ciucuri)

-        ~ 2cm thick white rope (~ 1 m long)

Other things

-          4 round elastic hair strings(something in between light blue and teal)

-          Elf ears to buy from the internet

-          Long fake nails and purple-blue-ish nail enamel

One more important thing… from now on, I will stick to English. And it will be mainly about cosplay. For now I want to keep it a secret so you’ll have to be patient untill next week!

Am fost la Holdfeny Con la Budapesta pe 18 decembrie si ne-a placut mult. Toata actiunea a avut loc intr-o singura sala mare imensa, ca o hala, asa ca am putut vedea tot in timp ce stateam la stand. Si asa am vazut concursul de cosplay si… mi s-a facut pofta!

Asa ca pentru Otaku Festival m-am hotarat sa imi fac si eu un cosplay. Incepusem lucrul la alt costum, dar pe ala momentan il amanam din cauza complexitatii si a lipsei de resurse prime (aka bani). Nu voi participa la concurs, dar am o pofta teribila de facut cosplay, asa ca o sa mi-o satisfac.

Si o data cu asta, o sa aveti parte de o mica surpriza aici pe site, de asta fac acum un prim mic anunt.

Totusi daca doriti rochite sau orice accesorii trimiteti un mail la shinjusworkshop@yahoo.com si va raspund.

Cu astea spuse, sper sa ne auzim cat mai curand.