Cosplay Spotlight: Moltres (Pokemon)

Costume: My fifth cosplay and probably the one I am most proud of. Mearle, Tai and I tossed around the idea of going as Pokemon and eventually settled on the three legendary birds. As phoenixes are my thing, I went with Moltres.

This was my first personal foray into dress patterns. Mearle, Tai and I mashed together two dress patterns (one for the basic shape of the dress, and another for the godets) to achieve the desired effect. We debated the merits of colour, since we wanted to capture the birds without outright copying them. Eventually we decided on golden yellow. The fabric is duchess satin, which was purchased from ebay, and it is by far the most beautiful thing I have ever worked with.

The biggest tasks for this dress was the godets. Once all the pattern pieces were cut out, I bought myself lengths of organza in red, orange and yellow, and cut strips of them out. I then chopped at the edge to give them an uneven look, ruffled them, and stitched them to the dress in alternating patterns to create the effect of flames. This took a week of solid sewing, and strained my shoulder something fierce.

After sewing all the pieces together, Mearle assisted in fitting the dress properly to my body shape, and as we were running out of time, offered to do the bias tape herself. Good thing too, as she did it spectacularly.

As the skirt is heavy, and I usually end up dancing in this outfit, there are no tights under the dress. The shoes are flat red slip ons.

Tai and I have tossed around the idea of making wings (either as actual pieces or just arm accessories). Whether something comes of this remains to be seen.

Make up: Make up usually consists of gold eye shadow, and bronze colours everywhere else, except for red on my lips. Once all three of us have our costumes, we intend to do a shoot with some very dramatic make up indeed. In our first year, Tai had fun painting up and down our arms.

Hair: As Moltres has a fiery crest, I usually tie my hair up in a high ponytail and string red and orange ribbons around it. I may make a hair accessory in the future.

Cosplay Spotlight: TARDIS (Doctor Who)

Costume: My fourth cosplay, though it was not really a cosplay initially, just a costume that I was making for the Student Nationals. Our chosen theme was Doctor Who, and I instantly pounced on the idea of being a TARDIS. I thought about making a box initially, but then I realised that would be hell to design and transport (planes being the awkward beasts that they are), and on reflection I thought a dress would be better.

Since I’d never made a dress before in my life, I went simple. The skirt is a circle skirt and I cannot begin to describe just how long it took to sew all that ribbon on. Each ‘side’ of the TARDIS is marked by thick ribbon, and the individual panels are made out of slightly smaller ribbon. The sign is white cotton with black fabric paint. The top bit of the dress and the straps are just more cotton in basic shapes – I went for an empire waist because that meant that a) I did not have to fiddle around with a complicated bodice and most of the outfit could be skirt, and b) it fit the shape of the TARDIS with the skirt being the ‘box’ of the TARDIS and the top being the ‘roof’. The black “Police Box” sign is black ribbon with white fabric paint, tied as a sash.

I usually wear black tights and black flats with this outfit. I discovered while at the Nationals that the bras I had brought with me came up over the top of the dress, necessitating the addition of two safety pins.

Make up: I normally keep my skin fair with little colour, but I try to play up my eyes with dark blues and silver.

Hair: A blue hairband completes the cute factor of this outfit, until I can make myself a fascinator with a light on it (I’m sure it must be doable!)

(Nationals 2011) Group Doctor Who shot! 

(Nationals 2011) Parking!

(Nationals 2011) TARDIS down for maintenance.

Cosplay Spotlight: Miyuki (Lucky Star)

Costume: My third cosplay, made partially because I wanted to wear a sailor fuku (they are unbelievably cute!) and I decided that due to her height, Miyuki was the only one I could reasonably pull off. Her skirt is made from red cotton, with thin white ribbon sewn along the bottom, and box pleats starched and ironed in (thanks Mearle!). The skirt zips half way down on the side (I have put weight on since this cosplay was made, and really should think about adding some extra fabric to avoid pulling the pleats out).

The shirt is made from white cotton, that was roughly sketched and cut out into what we thought was the vague shape. We wanted to make it loose to match the anime (and also to hide the fact that I am flat chested and Miyuki is not). The bottom of the shirt is then tucked into the skirt to get the desired poofy effect. The cuffs were made from red cotton, with thin white ribbon sewn onto them before attaching them to the shirt. The shirt has an opening at the back of the neck to get your head through, which is then buttoned up and covered by the sailor collar.

The sailor collar is made from two layers of red cotton (the cuffs are doubled up too if you were wondering to give stiffness), sewn together, and white ribbon (slightly thicker than the one on the skirt and cuffs) sewn down the edges. The neckerchief is attached to the underside of the collar, and was made from pink fabric. The shirt and the collar have buttons to secure them to each other, and the neckerchief is tied together with an elastic (the fabric does not hang well when tied).

The tights were bought from Accessorize, and I have one backup pair. The glasses are Harry Potter glasses, and work very well for Miyuki.

Make up: Once again, Miyuki is kept light.

Hair: Miyuki’s wig is a curly light pink one, which matches her very well. Due to its weight, it has a clip at the back to secure it onto the head, and I recommend hairpins for a wig of this heaviness too.

Amecon 2010, taking photos in a field (as you do) 

Amecon 2010. The lovely obliging firemen let us sit on their fire truck for photos (though they were a little flummoxed as to what exactly this whole thing was about).

Amecon 2012. This Konata cosplayer squeed at the sight of me, and I immediately squeed back. Ah the language of fangirls...

Amecon 2012. Due to poor vision this day, I had to use my real glasses instead of the round ones.

And of course, when Amecon 2010 hands you the Lucky Star dance...

Cosplay Spotlight: Lucy/Nyu (Elfen Lied)

Costume 1 (underwear): My second cosplay, this one happened by accident. I was walking through New Look (excellent place for cheap clothes that you can cut up into pieces and dye the life out of for costumes, if you don’t have the luxury of living near a Primark) and saw a pair of green cotton shorts that immediately made me think of Lucy. They were cheap, so I bought them. I later went and bought a cheap vest shirt from the same place. I made sure to buy the top three sizes larger than usual, as Lucy is supposed to be borrowing a man’s underwear at this stage, and the clothes are noticeably baggy. In colder weather, flesh coloured tights may be used. The shorts are excellent because they have pockets (perfect place for keeping seashells).

Costume 2 (black dress): My fifth cosplay and the one where I learned that you cannot sew jersey. You just can’t. I’m sure there’s probably a way to do it without having your sewing machine chew it up and spit it back out, but you have to be a rocket scientist to figure it out. Once I have become a rocket scientist, I will be completely redoing the top of the dress.

Essentially, I bought a lot of grey jersey fabric and used another dress I owned as a template. This went badly wrong for many reasons – one the design was totally different, and two the fabric was totally different. I ended up just wrapping it around me like a towel and pinning it where I thought it went best. And it still has a huge bulge in the side that I need to take in when I have time.

I realised that I was going to have to do the black trim in jersey too, in order for it to stretch with the dress. Unfortunately I did not have enough time to order any in (this was another last minute cosplay) so I bought a cotton t-shirt from Marks and Spencer (size 22 so that I got the most fabric for my money) and cut off the hems, which were the neatest part of the shirt. I then sewed them to the top of the dress as the trim and the straps. As the fabric is jersey, and the design is meant to be tight, the dress actually holds itself up – which is good, because thanks to the aforementioned sewing difficulty in the first paragraph, the straps are useless.

I bought a long sleeved pink top from New Look. Luckily, pastel colours were in that year, and it was not too hard to find the right shade. The long socks were ordered from ebay, due to the difficulty of finding grey and black stripes.

Make up: I keep Lucy natural and light, though with a little bit of definition on the eyes, as she is supposed to be an anime character. Due to my wimpy nature and a bad first experience with broken contact lenses, I am unable to turn my eyes red for this cosplay.

Hair: My wig was a cheap one off ebay, but experience has taught me that it is almost impossible to find a wig that perfectly matches Lucy’s hair colour, due to the vibrancy. I am still looking for a higher quality replacement. Her horns I made by buying a pink hairband, making a pair of cardboard horns, and papier macheing them half to death. It took several weeks, applying a new layer each day, to build up the appropriate thickness, and to mould them into the correct shape. I then painted the interior a very very light grey in order to get the contrast. I have a backup pair just in case the first ones snap.

Amecon 2010 (I'm on the left - and I don't mind telling you that it was bloody freezing!) 

Cosplay Picnic 2011

Amecon 2012 (I didn't realise till after the con that I'd picked up the wrong ribbon for this cosplay >.<)

Cosplay Spotlight: Riza Hawkeye (Fullmetal Alchemist)

Costume: This was my first cosplay ever, and I cannot take much credit for it. I essentially decided two weeks before my first convention that I did actually want to cosplay, and cruelly lumped the task of creating this outfit on my two best friends Mearle and Tai before jetting off to France.

We hit the charity shops for the trousers, wanting ¾ length cotton trousers that were loose enough to look like the military ones. I already owned the boots and t-shirt, and we agreed that the jacket would be too complicated and difficult. We also purchased a pair of grey trousers from the charity shop, in order to use the waistband for the cavalry skirt, and bought white cotton for the skirt itself. I then buggered off to eat crepes for a week, leaving it in the hands of my capable friends. They cut the skirt and dyed both the white cotton and trousers together in order to get matching shades of blue. The cavalry skirt was double layered in order to make it stiffer. They then made miles and miles of grey bias tape which was hand sewn (this was before we had a sewing machine to our name) to the edges, and attached the grey waistband.

Make up: Light and neutral.

Hair: Ponytail – as my hair has started to grow again and I had my short bits cut in, this hair style has got more difficult to achieve. Fortunately, Tai and I discovered the wonders of African Butterfly Clips, which are excellent at keeping long heavy hair up and out of the way with no pain (and for the purposes of this cosplay, twisting it up into a shorter ponytail).

Kitacon 2009. Photo taken by NekoFlameAlchemist.

Amecon 2010 (there was a giant FMA photoshoot at the con, but all the photos are too far away)

Amecon 2012 (those archways at Keele are the best place for dramatic cosplay shots!)

Sunnycon 2013 - with Vic Mignogna. Photo taken by Mearle.