Since I have a photoshoot coming up this weekend I thought this would be a great chance to talk about things you can do to prep for your own photoshoot!
This weekend I'll be taking my Aerith cosplay out for photos, and possibly my Sailor Jupiter so that means this week I've been updating wigs & props, checking for any maintenance quick fixes, and doing an inventory of all the things I need to take with me. So here's what I've got planned, and you can use this as a guideline for getting your own photoshoot prepped. 1. Grab a friend! - your photographer or handler or both! 2. Make sure your costume pieces are all together 3. Check for fixes 3a. Take a cosplay emergency kit (just in case) 4. Choose your location 5. Pack any photography gear you need (if you are taking it) 6. Check the weather forecast! 7. Have fun! This week I am making new bracelets for Aerith as well as styling her wig, and if time permits I'll style a wig for Sailor Jupiter as well. I've gone over my costumes and made sure there are no rips and frays so we are good to go there, and of course...everything still fits! It's going to be nice and warm and sunny this weekend and we are going to go over to Deer Lake Park to take advantage of the great scenery. We will be packing lots of water and some snacks, as well as sunscreen! I've got my camera charging and picked out which lenses I want to take. By Friday night they will all be in a back pack and ready to go! I hope that the above list helps you get ready for your own photoshoot, and be sure to stay tuned for new photos coming soon!
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You've made your super cool costume, you're really proud of it and you go and do an awesome photoshoot! But how do you make your photos that much better??
With photo editing you can do a wide array of things from making your photos sharper and crisper, adjusting the colour, painting out blemishes or even going as far to completely change out the background! There are plenty of tools available for doing this, but the most common one you will hear of is Adobe's Photoshop and Lightroom. You can also use programs like Affinity Photo, or my favourite (and definitely the least conventional) Nuke. I've had plenty years experience using photoshop, but never to actually edit photos. This is something I want to get better at. I'm learning Affinity photo right now as well, which does all the same things as Photoshop but for a fraction of the cost. The reason my tool of choice is Nuke is because of my years of experience doing compositing for film. In Film and TV you need to know how to adjust colour on elements you are adding to your shot, how to roto around characters and objects to replace backgrounds, and also how to work with different formats and resolutions. This is not the tool I would recommend to a beginner for photo editing, I just find it easier since it's a tool I already use daily. There are SO many books, websites and tutorials that teach you how to do photo editing. I highly recommend looking up some youtube tutorials before you dive in. Try to get some ideas of what you want to do with your photos and watch some videos on how to do that. I just recently bought Kamui Cosplay's book on photography and photo editing for cosplay and I have to say it is by far my favourite reference. She has so many great tips on what to look for in your software, what things you should try changing first on your photo like white balance, brightness and contrast. Well worth a look! I hope this has helped spark some interest for you on editing your photos! - UPDATEThere are SO many great resources on line for learning to cosplay, getting started and even up-ing your game! Here is a bunch of the ones I like to use:
Tutorials and Learning: 1. Bluprint My Bluprint has a ton of amazing videos on all different areas of crafting. It is a subscription service for $10 a month, but you get access to hundreds of professionally taught videos! The website also offers the option to purchase videos at full cost rather than signing up for a subscription. The full price videos cost usually about $50-60 each. 2. Cosplay Tutorial Cosplay Tutorial is an online wiki of all different tutorials collected from around the web on many different topics pertaining just to Cosplay. You can even find tutorials on specific characters here. It's a great place to start getting ideas! 3. YouTube Of course YouTube! This is a wealth of information. So many video tutorials on sewing and crafting skills, cosplay specific tutorials as well as, many Cosplayer's have their own youtube channels and share information on their costumes and perspectives. 4. https://www.deviantart.com/ There are lots of great photos on here for reference as well as concept art and some tutorials. 5.https://www.worbla.com/ The Worbla website has lots of great tutorials on how to use their products. Both the company and cosplayers post videos and blogs all about the different techniques to use Worbla. 6. https://www.kamuicosplay.com/ Kamui Cosplay is an amazing cosplayer and she sells these fabulous books and templates to help you get started in all areas of cosplay! Buy her books!! Sewing: 7. https://www.simplicity.com/ Most of the patterns and costume patterns I buy are from Simplicity. They have such a great variety and are super easy to put together. For some reason, Simplicity patterns are extremely difficult to find in stores in Vancouver, so I generally order online or through a second party online store. Simplicity is home to other pattern brands as well such as Burda and NewLook. When ordering from these folks look for the sales! They will usually do a 10-15% off your purchase online. Some patterns are available as digital download, but the majority are still available only as paper patterns. 8. https://mccallpattern.mccall.com/ McCalls has a ton of great patterns to get you started right as well as their own cosplay line up found here: https://cosplay.mccall.com/. McCalls is home to other sewing brands such as Butterick, Kwiksew and Vogue. When buying patterns from these guys definitely keep an eye out for sales!! They will bring their pattern prices down to $3.99USD for their main brands and $5.99-9.99USD for Vogue. McCalls also offers a digital pattern option for their patterns which is super quick and convenient and easy to use. 9. https://sewingpatterns.com/ This is a great website to buy sewing patterns for cheaper. If you buy directly from the parent company you could be paying upwards of $13USD per pattern, but if you buy from this website you can get patterns for about $5USD. I do caution, don't buy digital patterns if you can avoid it. Digital patterns from this site might be super cheap and convenient, but the service they have for reading the files: printsew.com has had multiple server issues and download issues as well as no responses from customer service to address the issues. So stick with paper pattern orders from these folks. - UPDATE: while buying physical patterns from this website is fine, I do not recommend buying digital patterns as they are affiliated with printsew.com which continuously has problems and NO customer service. Crafting supplies: 10. https://www.cosplaysupplies.com/ This online shop has a ton of great crafting supplies from craft foams to worbla, paint to crystals, they have just about anything you are looking for. They ship super quick too and are fairly priced! 11. https://www.redmooncosplaysolutions.com/ Another online shop that carries all kinds of worbla and craft foam among other crafting supplies. They are a smaller company located in Canada. 12. https://ardawigscanada.ca/ & https://arda-wigs.com/ Arda Wigs is the leading cosplay wig supplier. But not only can you buy the perfect wig from them, you can get craft foam and foam clay, styling supplies and accessories. They also have a ton of tutorials on how to style their wigs! 13. Amazon When in doubt, go to Amazon. Amazon carries everything! And of course, if you have Prime shipping it gets to you in no time flat! This week some of our BC Mermaid Pod had a special mid week meetup to spend time with a very special guest, The Mermaid Seamstress! She came up to visit us from the US and we were so thrilled to be able to meet her and spend time with her!
I think all of us were a little star struck at having some many youtuber mers in one pool :) We also had the fabulous opportunity to re-unite all of our Vancouver Mermaid tails! So many incredible designs by Courtney Mermaid. We spent a good deal of time splashing around in the pool, teaching each other new tricks, trying fancy moves for the camera and just having an overall fabulous time!! You can check out her youtube here: The Mermaid Seamstress and be sure to check out our amazing tail maker here: shopvancouvermermaid After packing three costumes to take to Calgary Expo with me, I felt this would be a great topic to share with all of you.
Cosplay's can be large and cumbersome, or super delicate and the last thing you want is to pack up your precious costume, take it on a plane and find out at your destination that it's been destroyed or there are pieces missing. I have seen all sorts of creative ways to get costumes to cons, and from watching other cosplayer's struggle I've come up with a few thoughts on the do's and don'ts of traveling with cosplays. 1. Pack as much as you can in a suitcase or carry-on. No matter if your costume is sewn or if it is foam armor or worbla, if you can fit it in a suitcase, then do so. This is probably the most efficient way to get your costume to a con, and the safest way. If you are taking a mask with you, or foam armor, I would recommend balling up cloth inside of the foam pieces to help it hold it's shape. I find that the more you put in your suitcase, the easier it gets for your armour to squish, which means you have to spend time re-forming it the right shape when you unpack. 2. If it's big, is it worth taking with you? If you have a giant prop that goes with your costume, think really carefully if it is worth taking a plane with you. If it looks like a weapon (foam or not) airlines will not permit you to take it with you in a carry on or checked bag. I highly recommend that if you do have large props that belong with your costume, you may not want to travel with them, or choose a different costume to take with you. One example I can think of is, in an episode of "Heroes of Cosplay" one of the cosplayer's had built a race car to go with her cosplay. They packed it up in a refrigerator box and shipped it through the airline. When the box arrived at their destination, the TSA had opened it up and removed pieces of it as they were deemed unsafe for air travel. So the prop was now useless. Make sure and do your research before you go and take large props, or just leave them at home. 3. Don't go nuts! For my trip to Calgary Fan Expo I packed three costumes in the same suitcase. I was bound and determined to have a different costume for each day of the convention, plus have one day for just wearing casual clothes. Granted, things changed in our plans while in Calgary so I only got to wear two costumes while there. One of them I only wore for a couple of hours, and the other one I removed pieces of it so it was just me dressed steam punk rather than as a character. I felt awful and guilty about not wearing my costumes, not having my wigs styled properly and just not feeling like dressing up. On top of that, we had to pay for the checked bags which would have been an unnecessary cost if I had only taken one costume. So what I'm saying is...It's ok not to pack multiple costumes and just take one with you! Pick what you really want to show off, and something that is comfortable, easy to travel with. You don't need to have multiple costumes for multiple days. Of course, the choice is yours of what you want to bring to a con, but just be sure to pack smartly!! Good luck and have fun! While I’ve been working like crazy to get this done, and I’ve been happy with my progress, this costume is officially on HOLD until further notice.
This is the first costume I’ve had everything cut out and sized and then lost weight in the middle of making it. So until I do some problem solving to figure out how to best tackle sizing the corset down, I will have to move onto another costume. |
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