AnimeCentral '09 Con Review!
Haha, I'm taking responsibility for this one, even though it's super-late, I think there needs to be something said about it, for CosplayConQueso's sake.
AnimeCentral 2009 was incredible. We managed to make it there fairly early on Friday in order to get to the Gravitation shoot , Jeffy was good enough to get K-san's budda-budda-budda ('machine gun' for you English speakers) checked with con staff while Jenny and I quickchanged into our Gravi cosplay (public restrooms, ftw) and located the shoot itself. Such a good time. I personally am not in the Gravitation fandom, and it's not quite my thing - maybe I'll read the manga at some point. Many, many OOC moments were had. It was pretty crazy, and awesome. Very sociable, it set the standard high for cosplayer interactions the rest of the con.
Each night, Jenny and I got into DOGS closet cosplay ('Helga' and 'Bertha' even had nametags - if this confuses you, please see the first post of worksforsmokes ). At insane times. One of us would look at the other at 10 or 11PM and say, "DOGS?" And we would promptly get in our cosplay and kbai for a few hours. Of course, everyone tagged along in the most comfy cosplay available, not necessarily matching.
Holy crap, OURAN PANEL. It was bigger and better than ever (this sounds like a commercial for erm...something else). But seriously. So many people came, they were lined down the hallway and blocking other con traffic. We asked the people at the front of the line how long they'd been there, and they had totally been waiting half an hour. Half an hour, no chairs or suitable seating, just plopped on the floor, making sure they'd get in to see us. It was crazy. The panel itself was a little disorganized. We spent more time online organizing than finalizing, so at least we know that and a few other trip-ups to fix for next time. We were in character, got our individual hosting in, played 'Red Light, Green Light' and 'Musical Hosts' (Musical Chairs with Hosts on the chairs =3), and organized an auction with Ouranbucks (obviously photoshopped dollar bills printed up on blue paper). Everyone received funny fangirl reactions from all the - well, fangirls who were there. Don't get us wrong - there were a fair share of fanboys - but I'm fairly sure they were the boyfriends of the fangirls. Perhaps not! A guy friend of mine did say that Ouran was pretty entertaining once he got past the show's description.
The Hellsing shoot was fairly cool - I spent two and a half hours doing Jenny's Zorin Blitz tattoo. We showed up a bit late to the shoot, but we still had a good time. It was very unsociable compared to a normal shoot (not even close to 'Gravi shoot' levels, haha). However, after the official shoot, Jenny and I were able to have a personal minishoot with Jen(Ranka)'s friend Amanda (Benio). It was a grand time. Saturday night was once again the time to run around in DOGS cosplay - we had about 4 or 5 different people recognize us and/or ask us for pictures, even a Grell cosplayer (Black Butler/Kuroshitsuji)! It was pretty awesome.
Sunday's Loveless shoot was incredibly fun. I kept getting tugged around as Soubi, but that's probably because I was super-recognizable and a bunch of Ritsukas showed up without one. I was more than happy to share, haha. Jenny's Seimei was pimpin'. Crystal, Jen, Jenny and some other friends all worked together to get/make me the purple, fur-trimmed jacket Soubi is well-known for. There were some great shots of famous 'word battles' between key characters. I wish someone would have been Breathless - I think it's such a cool and different cosplay. But there were some good Youjis and Natsuos (the Zeros). The rest of the Loveless folk noticed that a bunch of us came together and made us all pose together - that was a high compliment that they wanted a photo of just us together. It was a great memory-maker.
All in all, a great con. Massively fun. Massively exhausting. But that's the way cons are supposed to be, right? ^_^
Pictures here:
Gravitation pix
Hellsing shoot/minishoot
Ouran shoot
Loveless shoot
DOGS-related pix
General Con pix
AnimeCentral 2009 was incredible. We managed to make it there fairly early on Friday in order to get to the Gravitation shoot , Jeffy was good enough to get K-san's budda-budda-budda ('machine gun' for you English speakers) checked with con staff while Jenny and I quickchanged into our Gravi cosplay (public restrooms, ftw) and located the shoot itself. Such a good time. I personally am not in the Gravitation fandom, and it's not quite my thing - maybe I'll read the manga at some point. Many, many OOC moments were had. It was pretty crazy, and awesome. Very sociable, it set the standard high for cosplayer interactions the rest of the con.
Each night, Jenny and I got into DOGS closet cosplay ('Helga' and 'Bertha' even had nametags - if this confuses you, please see the first post of worksforsmokes ). At insane times. One of us would look at the other at 10 or 11PM and say, "DOGS?" And we would promptly get in our cosplay and kbai for a few hours. Of course, everyone tagged along in the most comfy cosplay available, not necessarily matching.
Holy crap, OURAN PANEL. It was bigger and better than ever (this sounds like a commercial for erm...something else). But seriously. So many people came, they were lined down the hallway and blocking other con traffic. We asked the people at the front of the line how long they'd been there, and they had totally been waiting half an hour. Half an hour, no chairs or suitable seating, just plopped on the floor, making sure they'd get in to see us. It was crazy. The panel itself was a little disorganized. We spent more time online organizing than finalizing, so at least we know that and a few other trip-ups to fix for next time. We were in character, got our individual hosting in, played 'Red Light, Green Light' and 'Musical Hosts' (Musical Chairs with Hosts on the chairs =3), and organized an auction with Ouranbucks (obviously photoshopped dollar bills printed up on blue paper). Everyone received funny fangirl reactions from all the - well, fangirls who were there. Don't get us wrong - there were a fair share of fanboys - but I'm fairly sure they were the boyfriends of the fangirls. Perhaps not! A guy friend of mine did say that Ouran was pretty entertaining once he got past the show's description.
The Hellsing shoot was fairly cool - I spent two and a half hours doing Jenny's Zorin Blitz tattoo. We showed up a bit late to the shoot, but we still had a good time. It was very unsociable compared to a normal shoot (not even close to 'Gravi shoot' levels, haha). However, after the official shoot, Jenny and I were able to have a personal minishoot with Jen(Ranka)'s friend Amanda (Benio). It was a grand time. Saturday night was once again the time to run around in DOGS cosplay - we had about 4 or 5 different people recognize us and/or ask us for pictures, even a Grell cosplayer (Black Butler/Kuroshitsuji)! It was pretty awesome.
Sunday's Loveless shoot was incredibly fun. I kept getting tugged around as Soubi, but that's probably because I was super-recognizable and a bunch of Ritsukas showed up without one. I was more than happy to share, haha. Jenny's Seimei was pimpin'. Crystal, Jen, Jenny and some other friends all worked together to get/make me the purple, fur-trimmed jacket Soubi is well-known for. There were some great shots of famous 'word battles' between key characters. I wish someone would have been Breathless - I think it's such a cool and different cosplay. But there were some good Youjis and Natsuos (the Zeros). The rest of the Loveless folk noticed that a bunch of us came together and made us all pose together - that was a high compliment that they wanted a photo of just us together. It was a great memory-maker.
All in all, a great con. Massively fun. Massively exhausting. But that's the way cons are supposed to be, right? ^_^
Pictures here:
Gravitation pix
Hellsing shoot/minishoot
Ouran shoot
Loveless shoot
DOGS-related pix
General Con pix