Great Cosplay

Today I am showing some of my favorite cosplay from the past 2 years. I don't take many photos and they are all from my phone. But I wanted to share the standouts that have caught my eye. THIS is what I love at fan conventions. The creativity and cleverness of what these builders pull together is AMAZING and so much of it HANDMADE?! 

This was at the very first ComiCon. I have no idea if this is a character or what materials she used. It is just an amazing build. She had barely entered the Salt Palace and was surrounded for photos. It was so cool. There had to be wheels under the tail end to help it glide along. 

This falls into the clever. 

I saw these two cuties walking with their dad and had to ask for a photo. So Stinking adorable. We saw them later at KidCon dancing. Darth had requested a Michael Jackson song and was busting a move. 

This Snow White was GORGEOUS! The fabrics were beautiful she did an amazing job making this.  

Love the sass going on here. 

One of my first shots from the most recent FanX. How awesome is the Sponge-Bob Captain?

Thor here is a favorite with the ladies. There was an entire 100+ comment, Facebook thread pretty much dedicated to him. He is the nicest guy as well. I first "met" him helping kids shoot arrows at Fantasy Con and asked him (awkwardly/creepily) if he cosplayed Thor, because he totally should. I was relieved when he said Thor would be there the next day. 

He came over twice to do Superhero Training at KidCon/FanX. He did the full rotation with the kids then stayed for each kid to get a photo with him. I smiled seeing a cute little girl just watching him in awe. (some of our kidCon volunteers looked at him with the same look;-)   

These are friends of my daughters. They are always lovely, but I liked their Steampunk Ariel and Ursula. 

This is my awesome sister. She was trying to think of a Halloween costume and decided to go with one of her childhood favorites. I love how she pulled this together in a matter of hours. One creative idea is that she found the socks, realized they were perfect and bought 2 pairs making one into the sleeves. 

Very nice man who was a nearly perfect Spock. We recently learned of Leonard Nimoy's death. This is a nice reminder of all the Nimoy greatness

This couple has been doing the Galaxy Quest Aliens for a few cons and are always appreciated. They do all the weird noised and motions and even the -lead with the knee-caps- walk. This is the first time I was able to get a photo.

This little guy is awesome. His Dad built this costume. It has even received a twitter thumbs up from James Gunn the director of Guardians of the Galaxy. He loves the costume so much he'll wear it on random days to grocery shop. But if you think this is cute it gets better

When you see the cutie inside.

This is a halloween costume I had to share. Anna here... is my nephew Parker. He and his buddies were trying to decide what to dress up as. His mom teased them about being Elsa and Anna. they figured it was a great idea and went with it. 

They are in sunday flats and I LOVE his sassy pose. 

I was able to help at Boo at the Zoo when this awesome Frozen family came in. How CUTE are they?

Lloyd Christmas and Harry Dunne from Dumb & Dumber. These two guys walked in sword fighting with their canes and whacking each others legs. It was perfect but I'm sure Mom was rethinking it before the day was through. 

Cary Elwes came to Comicon 2014. This group came as Men in Tights. I noticed their great poses through out the day. People getting into their characters and playing along makes it even better. 

I saw this family and Had to get a shot. How cute is Russell. I Love UP!

Back to the clever. I saw this lady with a milk crate with handle bars attached to her. I watched her for a minute before I realized what she was doing. I asked for a photo and she pulled out the moon. Too funny

The Knights who say Ni. Always love a good Holy Grail reference. 

This cute Toy Story group also came to Kid Con to do photos with the kids. This photo also features my friend Lisa and her daughter Hannah

Sometimes I think "I have worked really hard on this one. Maybe we should enter it into a cosplay contest." Then I see things like THIS.  

How amazing is this Dark Angel? This is all hand made! Just incredible. She is the dark and her friend Is the Light. 

How gorgeous are they?  

Surprising no one, They won the Fantasy Con Costume contest. 

See... Amazing! I love making costumes and trying new things but I will never be at THIS level. I will always be amazed and fascinated by the cosplayers. I love to just find a seat and watch them walk in. So if you are ever in downtown Salt Lake the weekend of a fan convention pay attention, you may see works of art walking right by you. 

Sea Shells from the Sea Shore.

It doesn't matter how old I am. If I'm at the beach and there are sea shells. I will be picking some up. 

I love them. 

But what do you do with them once you have them? I didn't really want a jar or a picture frame, and that was about all I could think of. Until I realized they WERE my souvenir. So instead of framing something else,I decided to frame them. This one is from a 2012 trip and a beautiful day at Laguna Beach. The Sea Stars were purchased. The rest were found. 

I recently returned from a wonderful California trip with my Mom and my Sister. We started at Santa Monica Pier and made it all the way down to Laguna with most of our time spent at Newport. My sister and I walked the beach in search of treasures. I couldn't believe it when I found a fully intact Sand Dollar. It was the first time I have ever found one. I was excited to show my sister and we decided we would look until we found one for her. My Mom finally found it for her. I'm sure it is strange, but it felt like a reassuring gift to us.  

When we got home I started the search for the right frame. I had one I was working on but decided an 8x10 opening was too small. Our Shopko is closing so I decided to see what they had on clearance. I found this lovely piece of wall art. 

I looked past the chicken and knew I could do something with it. I brought it home and taped up all the framing then sprayed the chicken away with primer. 

Bye Bye Chicken

I added my favorite gold paint -Krylon Caramel Latte. 

It is a lovely, soft gold. I use this paint a lot. 

Now for the frame. I liked its rough, barn wood look, but the color wasn't beachie enough. 

A bit of deglosser to take the seal off of the wood. 

Water down some turquoise paint to brush onto the frame,

leave it to soak in for just a minute, then wipe off the excess 

Not sure you can tell with my lighting, but the left side has some blue, most of the right hasn't been painted yet. 

 Time to figure the lay out and glue it down. 

I love how it ended up. I need to find someone with great handwriting. I would like to add the year and location to the frame. -But in a good way. Which rules out me EVER taking sharpie to it.-  

So whatd'ya think?  Not bad for Chicken art  

Sweeny Todd

I was trying to come up with a costume Matt and I could do together. He loves Sweeny Todd. I figured that might work. So which version do you do when there are so many great costumes in the movie? I decided I was seeing far less of this one so I went with it. 

I found the circle fabric and fell in love with it. There was no other choice for the vest. The black and white stripe became a massive search. In fact, the blue and white stripe for the skirt was incredibly difficult to find too. I finally found a blue stripe but it was knit when the rest of the skirt fabric was cotton. It was the only stripe so I went with it. 

The skirt was fun to pull together. (eye-roll) There are multiple layers. The 3 solid blues to divide and define. The bottom stripe with the eyelet edge was a ribbon I found at Hobby Lobby. The Chevron print and the top stripe. I finished the skirt then within days, found a perfect, cotton blue and white stripe. So the main skirt was removed from all the bottom layers and switched out.  

Mrs Lovett front and back

This skirt has since been used as a Pirate skirt, a Steampunk skirt and I'm sure we'll find other uses. it is full and fun. There is a fluffy petticoat that you don't see here but it adds to the fun, fullness of the skirt. 

Then we get to the suit. I sewed a suit... Its crazy. I can't believe it worked. 

The end result. Ignore my make up bag. Should have realized I was still holding it. 

I think the next post will be a rundown of some of my favorite cosplays over the past conventions. I usually post on Tuesday but sometimes get the itch and post sooner. so, we'll see.

Have a lovely week

Snow White Wrist Cuff

Lets finish off the Snow White extras today. 

One thing I have been seeing in Steampunk costuming is wrist cuffs. These can be layered or carved leather, metal, lace, fabric. Any shapable material.  I have wanted to try to make one and my limited ability is still best in fabric. This is my step by step. 

I cut out a fabric piece in this shape

Then made accordion folds

Then, realizing the back wasn't going to look too good,  I cut out a muslin backing, sewed it wrong sides together leaving an opening about midway on both sided to add ribbon ties later. Turned it right side out, reshaped the accordion folds and added some cool lace. Sewing the lace down to secure all the folds. 

I gathered items that I thought might work then eliminated most of them due to weight. The chains, charms and Seven Dwarves ended up on her belt chain. The scrolled frame is actually a dollhouse mirror. I covered the mirror with tape to repaint and glaze the detail then decided I liked a different shape more (it came in a 3 pack) I also used a tiny drill bit on my Dremel to drill a hole through the top and bottom of the mirror.  I sewed through that to attach it onto the cuff. 

This is what I decided on. Then sewed it all down with transparent thread. 

I don't have a clear shot of the cuff with her costume but took this to show how it ended up. Nothing too major. Just a fun extra detail. 

Still lots of photos loaded and awaiting attention. More should be coming soon. 

Have a wonderful sunday

Snow White update

After a fun, first ComiCon, Kori decided she wanted to be more involved and started trying to figure out how do more with costuming. She had this Snow White costume but wanted to personalize it with SteamPunk elements. We soaked the costume in a brown dye in an attempt to age it a bit, but its a  synthetic silky finish so that didn't do much. We looked for other elements that a first time maker could do. 

We added Goggles, a corset belt, A chain with various Snow White Icon charms, a longer "slip" for added length and her awesome skull Converse Allstars.  

She was a hit with lots of photos taken. (the ultimate cosplay compliment) 

But after a couple of cons we decided it was time for some updating. We added a new longer backed Petticoat/ Bustle, 

A new slip with a beautiful lace edging.

A new, cool Corset belt that sits a little different on her bustle. 

We found a cool necklace with the 7 Dwarves. It was a weird color, but I am becoming quite brave with a can of spray paint. 

We also made a pouch for her cell phone to loosen up her hands when kids attack her

This photo taken by a con photographer which is why it beats my usual cellphone shots. 

Before        and        After

It is an adapt of a pre-made costume. Homemade is wonderful but not always feasible or sometimes you find a perfect element to help you along the way to your costume. Cosplay can be anything and is just a chance to express your fandoms. I think Kori's love of Snow has grown as she has been stopped for photos, recognized as "You're Steampunk Snow White??" (she is getting a following) and while watching children eyes light up as they run to hug her. 

We have made quite a few different pieces now and we are discussing creating a whole new dress. I am not sure how or when this might happen. There are details we really love and things we would like to do better. So keep an eye out as Septembers ComiCon approaches. We may have a new Snow White to reveal

We have seen this dress used once since and thought it was cool to see the different eye used to create this Snow White found with a group of lovely Steampunk Princesses

Setting up future posts.

I haven't added to this blog in SO long. I think I was trying to get some projects finished then life exploded. So I will be working on a bunch of posts to get some of this off my mind (and iPhoto). But first setting up information and a couple of definitions that might be helpful.

My family has become ComiCon people. Mostly due to Jenna. She found Doctor Who and that lead her to other fandoms. After that we started looking where ComiCons were held to see if we could ever get her to one. Then the announcement came for a local Salt Lake ComiCon.  We bought our tickets quickly and started working on costumes for the kids since we knew dressing as favorite characters is a fun part of any Con. 

Cosplay:
       The art or practice of wearing costumes to portray characters from fiction, especially from manga, animation, and science fiction. (Superhero, Princesses or any character you love.)

We had a blast. It was amazing to see the creativity and talent of the Cosplayers. We were also impressed at the quality of guests, displays and artists especially considering it was the first event like this.  

All items below from Weta Workshop. The creators of Middle Earth in Lord of the Rings.

We have attended 2 ComicCons, 2 FanX events and 1 FantasyCon so far and are awaiting announcements for the next event. It has added so much to our lives. It gives us something to bond over as a family. It gives me a creative outlet as the kids challenge me with cosplay items to make and skills to develop. It gives inspiration as you see the amazing creations from talented builders, costumers and others who, like me, are just trying our hand at something new.  Friendships have been formed for the kids and through volunteering I have become surrounded by the most amazing people. This past year has brought great things to us that I can directly associate it to. I have loved watching this support grow around our family. 

I wanted to intro what is to come as I have uploaded MANY photos for future blog posts. Most associated with cosplay.

Another word for future use. 

Steampunk: 

Is a subgenre of scifi and fantasy literature, but has developed in recent years to become a craft and lifestyle movement that commonly features aspects of steam-powered machinery. Steampunk works are often set in an alternative history of the 19th century's British Victorian era or American "Wild West", in a post-apocalyptic future during which steam power has maintained mainstream use, or in a fantasy world that similarly employs steam power.

Steampunk fashion has no set guidelines but tends to synthesize modern styles with influences from the Victorian era. This may include bustles, corsets, gowns, and petticoats; suits with waistcoats, coats, top hats, tailcoats and spats; or military-inspired garments. Steampunk-influenced outfits are usually accented with several technological and "period" accessories: timepieces, parasols, flying/driving goggles, and ray guns.

(Wiki)

SteamPunk Headband

In February the Fantasy Con group hosted a Cosplay Ball. I needed to pull something together. 

I like the steampunk look and style. It's great because it's about details. It gave me a few little projects to work on. 

I knew I wanted a flaired skirt that was fitted at the waist. I love the bi-level hem. It's fun to walk in this skirt. Especially down stairs. (I'm like a 5 year old with a spiny dress) 

There aren't a lot of ways to "dress up" short hair. I knew I wanted to add a cool head band. 

Pretty huh? It turned out much how I imagined. I found the The clock hands in Michals scrapbooking section. The flower charm in beads. Cut out the same colored center bead and put it all back together with the peacock blue bead for more color and shine. Then decided a little more bling couldn't hurt and added the Crystals . 

Time for some pops of color. A simple wrist cuff. I loved the fabric but when I started working with it, I decided the grayish back side was more steamy and interesting than the silver front. 

             

  I had the clock insides and doll house mirror kicking around. The little mirror had previously been painted and aged. I Added a few gears and a pin back to make a broach. 

That's it, my steampunk look. I have worn the skirt lots since then. I love it.