Work Log: Korra (Legend of Korra) #2

 

Yesterday I mostly completed the top of Korra.  I just need to add the trim to the
collar and arms and finish the hem. I was going to just hem it, but now I think I might also put bias tape on the bottom. It's probably inaccurate, but you can't see the bottom anyway, lol.

Today I make the blue "apron. It's a little difficult to tell from the photo, but it's navy blue. It was really easy to use the suggested method I found here on DeviantArt. 

I also ordered my wig today from EpicCosplay.com as usual. It's the pre-styled ponytail wig in Dark Brown. I love the customer service there, so much. Yesterday the site said that they were out of stock, so I contacted them to try to find out when they'd be back in stock. They emailed me back that they'd checked and actually had a few left.  Yet another reason that I'll keep buying their products.

  

I probably won't have time to work on this again until Saturday, but hopefully I'll finish the top, hem the pants, and get the two lower arm bracers, and the fur "skirt" done.  

Happy Cosplay!

Work Log: Korra (Legend of Korra) #1

I finally started working on my Korra cosplay for Nekocon in November. Last night I made the pants using a free and easy drawstring pant pattern by Martha Stewart, that I found on Pinterest. Yes, I could have just used some of my own pajama pants to make a pattern, but I'm always so nervous that that's not going to work out.

Please excuse the cat butt, lol

The fabric is a poly/cotton twill that I bought from Hancock during their half off sale.  I know the color isn't quite right, but I couldn't find any gray blue fabric that wasn't denim, and I'm still wary about buying fabric online.

Overall I think they turned out pretty good.  I just have to get some twill tape to use for my drawstring. I'm hoping to have time to make the top on Friday.

Happy Cosplay!

Nekocon Line-Up 2015

So I'm still not one of those hardcore cosplayers that wears two (or more) different cosplays in one day and I still can't bring myself to wear one on the Sunday of a con.  Especially not a convention like Nekocon that's in November.  I'm usually so cold while cosplaying that it's a treat to wear warm comfy clothes on that Sunday, lol.

Anyway, to get to the point, I am again only wearing two new cosplays for this convention.  My DH and a couple of our friends want to do a group cosplay and they chose The Last Airbender/ The Legend of Korra as our theme.  I'm, of course, going to be Korra, one friend will be Zuko, the other friend has decided he'll be Tenzin and my DH has decided to be a genderbent Toph. Actually, in the Ember Island Players episode of The Last Airbender, the team goes to see a play by the Ember Island Players about them, and Toph is portrayed as a man, lol.  So that's who my DH is going to cosplay.  (References pics from left to right: Korra, Zuko, Tenzin, Toph (as portrayed by a man).

So that'll be one of the days.  For the other day, I'm going to try to be Shinoa Hiragi from Owari no Seraph (Seraph of the End). I just loved these uniforms and I think she's a great character. Plus now I have a reason to have another giant weapon. I say try because it's usually difficult to find time to work on cosplay once school starts, but I definitely will work my hardest.

I'm so excited for these cosplays! I better get started, lol.

Happy cosplaying!

Otakon Review (2015)

This year for Otakon my DH finally agreed to just let fate lead us instead of trying to plan every minute and get to every panel.  I have to say, this was the best year yet.

Friday, I wore my Princess of the Crystal cosplay.  That one was so much fun and I got a ton of compliments because not many people have seen cosplayers do this character. Plus, it's just fun to wear a big flowing skirt.

This was my first time wearing circle lenses and I have to say that I'm hooked.  They were just as comfortable as my regular contacts and definitely put the final touch on the cosplay. These are the Vassen Cloud Nine Pink from PinkyParadise.com. You can't really see it in the picture, but in real life my eyes were obviously pink.

There is a garden terrace at the Baltimore Convention Center that is great for taking pictures and a lot of cosplayers hang out there, because photographers like to go there and just shoot.  While we were there the author of Cosplay in America, Ejen Chuang, took my picture!  Although I don't think he's posted it anywhere, it's still an honor to even be asked, since he's seen and worked with so many great cosplayers.

I also finally got a picture with Yaya Han on Friday.  Usually the line for her booth is hours long, but we walked up and were only the 3rd people in line.  It was glorious.  She's such an inspiration.

Saturday, I was Esdeath from Akame Ga Kill. Two awesome things happened on Saturday.  The first was that we were interviewed by a journalist from Vice Magazine for an article about cosplay and anime in the black community.  That was just a case of being in the right place at the right time.  We were early for my first professional photoshoot and were just waiting around, when we were approached by the journalist and her photographer.  How serendipitous was that!!  If you want to read the article I've linked it here.





For Esdeath I'm wearing the Vassen Cloud Nine Blue circle lenses also from PinkyParadise and they were just as comfortable and vivid as the pink ones.












The second awesome thing was my first professional photoshoot. I have to shoutout Ash B Images for the amazing photos that I've posted here..   If you like her work, you can check out her Facebook page, by clicking her name.

Registration was low this year for Otakon, which is of course bad for the convention, but it was great for us because it was much easier to get around and I just feel like I was able to pay more attention to cosplay since my line of sight wasn't being overloaded.  I do hope, however, that they are able to get the numbers that they want next year.  I love to see my favorite conventions succeed.

I also made two new friends at this convention, which is always a great thing and a few of us are planning a group cosplay.  There will be more about that in the next post though.

To see more pictures of my cosplays check out my DH's photography Facebook page at Tarou Studios. If you like s work, message him and maybe he'll take some pics for you at our next convention.

Happy cosplay!

Hey! That's me in that article!!

A journalist from VICE Magazine was writing a story about cosplay and anime in the black community and they interviewed me, my husband and our two friends.  It was absolutely exciting to just be interviewed, but they even used all of our interviews and published the article with pictures of us!  Out of the 30 people that she interviewed, she actually used all of us.  It's so exciting!  I wish it was in print so that I could buy a bunch of copies, but printing it out from online will have to do.

The article titled "What Black Anime Fans Can Teach Us About Race in America" was a really good read, and I'm so happy to have been able to contribute.  If you want to read it yourself, just click the link above.

Happy cosplay!

Work Log: Esdeath (Akame Ga Kill) #5

The last thing for this cosplay was to make the black cuffs at the top of her boots.  I chose not to wear actual boots because I want to be able to take off the high heels and put on flats.  So instead I'm wearing thigh highs and these cuffs will just be tucked in.

The cuffs are just made from quilter's cotton, with 1" elastic inside so that it'll stay on by itself.  When I tested it, I put it on upside down, pulled the tight high up over the elastic, then folded the rest down over the outside and it seems secure.  I added two black eyelets to the front so that I could thread the ribbon through for the bow and done.

I'm so happy that I'm done with a day to spare, lol!!

Happy cosplay!!


(Added 8/17/15 - These worked beautifully.  They stayed up the whole day and so did the thigh highs.  I had planned to some how add Xs to the thigh highs so that it would looked like a laced up boot, but forgot.  I'll have to go back and do that later.)

Work Log: Princess of the Crystal (Mawaru Penguindrum) #5

The last thing I had to do for this cosplay was to make her fluffy arm cuffs.  It took me a while to figure out what to do, but I realized that they are similar to Elizabethan collars.  So I went on a search to find a tutorial for that and immediately found two easy ones on my favorite site, YouTube.


The first video by Sumikins was on How to Make an Easy Elizabethan Ruffle.  Hers was made as a collar.  Although the audio on this was a little low, it was indeed an easy tutorial.  She hand-sewed her ruffle and it was attached to a ribbon that was tied around her neck.  Since mine was to go on my arm, I machine-sewed a cuff that would fit my arm, with elastic in the middle to make it snug and keep it on.  The base cuff is 4" tall, because that's how tall I decided my ruffles would be, and is 10.5" around, but scrunches to 9.5 because that's the circumference of my upper arm.  I also machine-sewed on the same eyelet trim from the rest of this cosplay on the top and bottom of the cuff BEFORE hand-sewing on the ruffle.

I combined Sumikins tutorial with Axceleration Cosplay's Harley Quinn cuff tutorial.  What I liked about this one was that she pre-marked on her base ribbon where the ribbon for the cuff would be attached.  She marked increments of 3/8" on the base ribbon and then machine sewed her ruffle together. 

I, however, did the following:
1. I marked out the 3/8" increments on my already made cuffs at the top and bottom edges.

2. I marked the 4" increments on white 1.5" wide grograin ribbon.  This ribbon is used to make the ruffle.

3. Using Sumikins method, I hand-sewed the ribbon into a ruffle be matching each 4" mark on the ribbon, to one of the 3/8" marks on the base cuff.  Just like Sumikin, once I had attached the top to the base cuff, I then flipped it over, and did the same thing for the bottom of the cuff.

This was super easy, and I hope that my explanation was clear, lol.  If not, feel free to ask questions.

Happy cosplay!

(Added 8/17/15 - I LOVE how these turned out and they only took me about an hour to make from start to finish.  I got so many compliments on them, and no one believed that they were actually the easiest part of the cosplay.)

Work Log: Princess of the Crystal (Mawaru Penguindrum) #4

Today I made her very decorative penguin hat. I started with a basic fleece hat in all black.  I used the Fleece Beanie Hat tutorial from CrafyGemini on YouTube.  Not only was it super easy to make, but she includes a PDF pattern to make it even easier.  The only thing that I did differently was that I didn't add on the cuff like she does.  I used her pattern to get the circumference correct, but my cuff was not as tall as hers.  I also added a small triangle to the front so that when I sewed on the white trim, I could bring it down to form a point just like the Princess's hat.

For the "ears" on the hat I drew triangles to the shape that I wanted and cut 4 out of the black fleece (2 for each ear). I used a stiff iron-on interfacing, cut to the same size and shape as the ears and ironed that on before sewing the ears together on two sides (right sides together).  Then I flipped them right side out.  Using CraftyGemini's tutorial you would sew two separate halves of the hat, before putting the whole thing together, so I did that first step, then I sandwiched the ears between the two halves and sewed the hat together, that way the ears were easily part of the hat without me having to cut any holes.

The beak is two triangles of yellow gold cotton sewn together on two sides, then flipped right side out and stuffed with poly-fill. To close the back of it, I just cut a small rectangle out of some cardboard, pressed it down a little to cover the poly-fil and then hot glued the sides of the fabric to the cardboard making sure that all edges were attached and the poly-fill was totally covered.  Then I just used fabric glue to attach it to the hat.

The eyes are made of a light pink craft foam and then a glittery dark pink craft foam that I found at Walmart.  The glitter craft foam had a sticky back so I didn't need to use glue to attach it to the light pink.  Then I used fabric glue to attach them to the hat.

For the "wings" I cut the shape out of craft foam, and covered it front and back with Plasti-Dip to seal it and make it sturdy.  Because I only had white Plasti-Dip on hand, I painted the front and back with a couple of coats of yellow acrylic paint.  I used Velcro dots to attach this to the hat so that I could remove the wings during travel, since they stick out from the sides.

The green "jewel" is just a fake jewel I found in a pack from Michaels glue on to a piece of yellow fleece and the smaller yellow jewel is also from a different pack from Michaels.  I used Gem-Tac to attach those and since that takes 24 hours to dry well, I actually put them on last.
 
The white trim under the wings and around the back is the same eyelet that I used for the scarf and on the bottom of the bodice, sewn on with my machine.

 For the "tassels" on both sides here's what I did. . .
1. I cut four pieces of yellow cotton to 4" wide by 22" tall.  The length was what I estimated from it's placement on the hat, down to my natural waist.  I cut a curve at one end of each piece, because the bottom of hers are rounded.

2. I sewed two pieces together (right sides together) on three sides, which includes the curved end.

3. For the large white beads I actually used 2" round Styrofoam balls.  I had previously used 3-5 layers of Modge Podge to seal them before painting on 2-3 coats of white acrylic paint and then sealing one more time just for the shine.  The tear-drop bead at the bottom and gold beads are actual beads that I found I the jewelry-making section at Michaels.

4. I used a thick twine, also from the jewelry-making section at Michaels, to string all of those together, and then used a big-eyed needle and sewed that whole thing to the center of the curved end of the yellow "tassel".


5. Lastly I stuffed the "tassel" with a few inches of polyfill just to make it a little "3D" because hers wasn't flat and then sewed them onto the hat under the eyelet trim.

That took a lot of steps and planning, but I actually like the way it turned out and it fits!

The last things I need to do are make her fluffy arm cuffs, and then go back to my Esdeath cosplay and finish the thigh highs for that.  I'm so close to finished, whew.

I'm sorry I don't have more pictures of the process.  I get so focused on working that I don't think about it until the piece is completed.  I'm going to try to do better when I start working on my cosplays for my next convention.

Happy Cosplay!!

Work Log: Princess of the Crystal (Mawaru Penguindrum) #3

Today I made the skirt of this cosplay.  After a lot of thinking I realized it's just a long circle skirt.  My measurements from my natural waist to floor, while wearing the bustle cage and my heels is 47".  I'm measuring at my natural waist, instead of where I usually measure, because the top of the skirt will be hidden by the bodice.

The hardest part of this was cutting it out and the long seams.  (I hate long seams because I get so bored, lol).  I had to tape 6 pieces of my large graph paper together and get my DH's help to draw the pattern, then instead of using the quarter-sized pattern, I folded that in half so that my pattern was an eighth, meaning it would take 8 pieces using that pattern to make the skirt.

I cut the pattern out 6 times in the red fabric and 6 times in the black.  6 pieces, because it's open front so I didn't need to make a fully round skirt.  The fabric I used for this is just quilter's cotton. The black was the cheapest black that I could find and the red was the one that I thought was the best color choice.  I sewed the red skirt together first and ended up only using 5 pattern pieces and that fit me exactly the way I wanted it to. It was probably my typical bad measuring that made the pieces big enough for that, lol.  I didn't finish the edges because I already had a plan for that.

Before putting the black together I made the ruffles.  These are also made from cheap quilter's cotton.  I cut the fabric to the length I needed (with 1/2" seam allowance) and double the height so that I could fold it in half and not have to worry about hemming the exposed edge.  I made 4 sets of 4" pleated ruffles.

When I sewed the 5 black pattern pieces together, I sewed one ruffle between pieces 2 and 3 and then another between pieces 3 and 4 so that they are evenly spaced in the back.  For the front two ruffles I pinned the completed red and black sections right sides together and sandwiched the ruffles on the inside, and sewed the sides and the bottom, leaving the top (waist) open.  Once everything was sewed in place I flipped the skirt right sides out. Now it's hemmed and I only have raw edges at the top.

For the waist band I made a tube that is 1.75" tall and fits around my hips comfortably.  I closed of the top 1.25" of the tube to make a casing for the elastic.  I inserted a piece of elastic small enough that it would hold on my waist, but stretchy enough so that I could pull it over my hips, then using the remaining 1/2" of the waistband I attached it to the skirt.  The front 10" of the waist band don't have any skirt attached. I then used my serger to finish the raw edges at the top of the skirt and on the waistband.  You could also use a zigzag stitch.

 After trying the skirt on, it is the perfect length and very comfortable because the cotton is so light.  I don't know what I'll work on tomorrow yet, but it'll probably be the hat.

Happy Cosplaying!

Work Log: Princess of the Crystal (Mawaru Penguindrum) #2

Today I made the scarf and armwarmers for this cosplay and started the bustle cage for the skirt. 

The scarf was very easy since it's just a purple tube stuffed with some polyfill.  I added snaps to the front so that I could put it around my neck instead of trying to figure out how to get it over my big head, lol.  The pink scarf is just a rectangle that I sewed together, flipped right side out and then closed the hole.  It just gets tied on.  Her purple neckwarmer, has what I took to be more eyelet attached around it.  I used the same eyelet that's on the bodice by just sewing it into the seam as I sewed the purple part into a tube that I then flipped right side out and filled.



The armwarmers are really basic.  I ended up making 3 trials before I made one I liked.  They're made out of stretch nylon, it's basically swimwear/dancewear material that has a 4-way stretch.  I cut the fabric to the exact width of my arm so that when I sewed it with a 1/2" seam allowance it would stretch and fit my arm without elastic.  For the tube length I measured about 1" down onto my hand, then added on a triangle for the finger part and hand sewed in a piece of 1/8" elastic for the fingerloop.



For the bustle cage I used this Bustle Cage tutorial that I found on Pinterest. I used 1/4" pex pipe that I got from Home Depot and red Duck tape because I want it to camouflage with the inside of my skirt which will be red. I also added a second row of pipe in the middle of the cage.  The pex pipe was pretty flexible but didn't really hold it's shape, so my DH later warmed it with a heat gun and gave it a little more roundness.  This was a little time-consuming to get right, but I wanted to have that done so I can put it on when I measure for the skirt.

Tomorrow I'll sew her open-front ball gown skirt and hopefully finish it tomorrow.

Happy Cosplaying!!

Work Log: Princess of the Crystal (Mawaru Penguindrum) #1

Yesterday I started and finished the bodice for my Princess of the Crystal cosplay for Otakon.  I'm super shocked that I managed to complete it in one day.

The day before, I spent the day making samples and doing trial and error with muslin.  I started with a cheap Strapless Top pattern from Etsy during my research.  I made one out of muslin in my suggested size and it fit perfectly, but was shorter in the front that I wanted, so for my final product I just added 3 inches to the front.

The next step was the figure out how to add the points to the front (and back).  I made sample after sample, never quite getting them to fit correctly.  It would look good, but because I was just making the top longer, there wasn't any flare to accommodate my hips.  Then I had the epiphany that I could just modify a peplum and everything fell into place.

I used the How to Sew a Peplum tutorial from It's Always Autumn that I already had pinned on Pinterest and voilà my pattern was complete.  So I started yesterday afternoon and by the end of the night I had completed the top.

I used 1/2" gold metallic bias tape for the gold trim, the bottom white trim is eyelet trim and the white lines across the front are 1/4" twill tape. I have to go back to Hancock a buy two more buttons for the bottom row, because I thought I already had two, but didn't.  I am however, done!

Next I'll be working on the black armwarmers and the puffy white cuffs she has on. I'm sort of procrastinating to avoid figuring out the skirt, but I'll most likely start that tomorrow. I have an idea for making the skirt puff out like hers, but I'll get to that in another post.

Happy Cosplaying!!

Work Log: Esdeath (Akame Ga Kill) #4

 
So, due to unforeseen circumstances (e.g. basically people requiring me to do things for them unexpectedly), it took me longer to finish Esdeath's belt and hat than I wanted.  I am, however, finished and think I did a pretty good job.

 For the belt, I just bought 1 1/2" leather strapping from the fabric store. The cross is craft foam that I cut, sealed with Plasti-Dip and then painted.  It's a black cross on top of a silver cross.  The ends of the belt are covered with silver stretch polyester, and then the belt and cross are joined by a piece of felt in the back.

For the hat, instead of making a hat from scratch, I bought a black military style hat from Amazon.  "Why black?", you ask.  Black so that the part of the rim that was left sticking out would be black as it is supposed to be.



I measured the top portion, and the circumference of the hat, and sewed it on to cover the hat.  The front black portion is faux leather, cut to shape and then trimmed with bias tape.  I already had the chain leftover from a previous project, and just hand-sewed that on.  I think the hat turned out really well and I'm super excited to wear it.


I don't have a picture of the thigh highs because I'm still not happy with the way they turned out.  Trying to sew on the black "collar" portion has been difficult.  I'm able to do it, but I don't like the way they turn out and am worried that they won't stay up at the con.  I'm going to try just making the "collar" separately, then simply attaching it with double sided tape instead of sewing it on.  That way the thigh high will maintain it's own stretchiness.  Then I'll just have to hand-sew the Xs on.  When I do that, I'll take pics and let you know how it turned out.

Now that I'm basically done with Esdeath, I'm going to start working on The Princess of the Crystal, from Mawaru Penguindrum.  I'm excited about this one because I love outrageous outfits.  Do you??

Happy Cosplaying!

Work Log: Esdeath (Akame Ga Kill) #3

Last night, I made the tassels and cut out the template for the belt buckle.  After trying the tassels on they're like 2-3 inches too long in my opinion, but I probably won't worry about it too much.

I made the collar that holds the tassels 2 inches wide and 16 inches around. My neck circumference is 14", so I added 1" or comfort and then 1" more to accommodate snaps.

In my effort to be accurate I decided the "scarf" portion should stop just a little below my hip line, so I measured to the top of the back pocket on my jeans. From the base of my neck to that line is 25" and I added two more to the top to anchor the tassels securely to the collar. The fur part of the tassels is 21" in length, since Esdeath's are so ridiculously huge, and they're just stuffed with polyester filling. Mine aren't as round and fat as hers are because I didn't want them to be too heavy and after trying them on, they're actually more comfortable than I thought they'd be.

Today I'll hopefully finish everything that's left since I don't have anything else to do today.  I just have to make and attach the belt buckle, make the thigh highs and decorate the hat from Amazon. 

I'm getting so excited about wearing this.

Happy Cosplaying!

Work Log: Esdeath (Akame Ga Kill) #2

I didn't get a chance to go to the Hancock Fabrics yesterday, so unfortunately I couldn't get anything accomplished.  Today however, I did have time to make the arm warmers.  I don't want to start her tassels because it's so late.

The arm warmers of course were easy, they're just two tubes, with elastic at the top.  I measured my arm where I wanted them to go and my upper arm is 9 inches around.  The final arm warmer is 10 inches around to allow the fabric to bunch up when I bend my elbow.

Tomorrow I'm going to make the tassels, and hopefully start on the belt buckle.  I don't think I'm going to make the hat from scratch.  I ordered a white hat from Amazon and I will most likely just embellish it to save time.  I have 19 days until Otakon and I haven't even started on my second cosplay.  Gotta love working under pressure, lol.

Happy Cosplaying!