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Home, and rather tired (also hot and sticky, ugh), but I will do a con report before I forget everything. Photos will come later, along with any con-bits I forget here, because I think I've got about a hundred of them, so it'll take a while.
Friday
Got up at quarter 'til nine, which is ridiculously early by my standards, but I had to be on the 10:30 train in. Did any last minute packing, and then got changed into Ada, because I didn't know if we were going to be able to check in when we got there. This, as we will see later, was not the brightest idea. Jon picked me up, we got all out stuff onto the train, and headed in. We accidently made the mistake of getting off at the Hynes stop instead of the Prudential stop. Despite it's name, the Hynes stop is actually about three blocks away from the Hynes, and then security told us we had to go through the Sheraton anyway. My backpack was huge, and I was also trying to lug my summoning staff, an inflatable mattress, and a grocery bag full of food and drinks. In four-inch stiletto heels. Yeah, bad plan. Anyway, we made it into the hotel, and I spotted a RE remake Wesker just as he was walking into the panel and couldn't get his photo. We checked in, and dropped our stuff off in the room before I dashed down to Masquerade HQ, afraid I was going to be late for the begining of judging (I wasn't). It was interesting to be on the other side of the table this year, so to speak. The other two judges were really nice - there was the really enthusiastic friendly one, and then the quiet one. There were a lot of really excellent entries, particularly in the novice division, which was huge (thirty out of the forty total). I did learn costumes that appear simple can be a lot more involved when you know the stories behind them - we gave first place novice to a couple who did Inu-Yasha costumes. It was their first con and first costumes, and they didn't know how to sew when the started. The seams were all straight, all the edges were finished, they were both hand-painted, and the designs matched the references perfectly, and the neatness puts my work to shame.
Anyway, after judging, I wandered around some, mostly trying to find the Wesker. I didn't have any success, but I did find a Chris and a C:V!Wesker, and got photos of a bunch of other really awesome cosplayers, ran into various friends (shout-outs to Katt and company, Michelle and company, and Mel), and also hit the dealer's room in hopes of buying pr0ntastic yaoi doujin. Alas, there was only one dealer, and the selection wasn't good. I also got mistaken as a guy crossplaying as Ada, lending some weight to my jokes about being Leon in drag (Leon hair at the moment). I was under the impression that I was supposed to meet up with Skuld after the Kaiji Big Battel (she went, I didn't) for dinner, but never called, so I ended up changing into Hatori because my feet were killing me, and got in line for the Yaoi-Yuri Dating Game. I actually wound up next to a Kagura, who was one of the two people that recognized me as Hatori, which was neat. We chatted for a while about various stuff - DMC, in particular. The Dating Game ended up being a lot of fun, and there were far too many great bits to post all of them here, but a few of the highlights were Roy (one of the contestants) asking Link (one of the eligible bachelors) if he liked fairies. The responce was "The only good fairy is a bottled fairy! Always with the nagging! 'Hey! Listen! Look! Listen!'", to which Roy went, "...I sense some past emotional baggage here. I'm not sure I want to deal with that.", and then when Hakkai ended up picking Sephiroth, Aeris ran up and started bitching him out, all 'How could you?! Does our relationship mean nothing to you?', and then Tifa comes up and is like 'Aeris, why are you bothering with him?' and then there was hot Aeris/Tifa kissing. After it was all over, I wandered into the dance for a bit and end up being kind of stripper!Hatori because I kept losing layers and undoing buttons because it was hot. I eventually headed up to bed when my feet got tired.
Saturday
I woke up around nine when the fire alarm went off, although it was quickly followed by a PA announcement to the effect of 'Everything is fine, really'. Put summoner!Yuna on in various stages, as that costume has a lot of little fiddly bits, and discovered that the wig is itchy (and also needs to be trimmed, but that's managable), and that my eyebrows are too thick to cosplay Yuna, which will be remedied next time. I did some more wandering, and both took photos and had them taken of me, because everybody loves Yuna. I also actually bought something in the dealer's room, because the Sasuga booth had a copy of the first CCS manga artbook, which is out of print and hard to find, and I've been searching for it for ages. After wandering, it was back to the second round of judging, and then picking the winners, which was tough because the quality level was really high, and because of the number of entries in the novice division was high. A few stood out, though - I think a lot of people probably wondered why we gave the Temari first place advanced, because it outwardly looks like a really simple costume, but her attention to detail and choice of pretty much everything was stunning. Drafting a stuffed ferret pattern and making it out of fake fur (and having it look good enough to be store-bought) = way more hardcore than I will ever be. Did a little more wandering afterwards, and finally ran into the S.T.A.R.S-Wesker I saw Friday, and someone dressed as the Merchant from RE4. I also got a photo of a really awesome Axel cosplayer - there was a flood of KH2 and FFVII:AC cosplayers, but most of them weren't so great.
I got changed back into Ada for the masquerade because I was tired of carrying around the staff, and then took advantage of one of the perks of being a judge, which was third-row seats with no wait. I ended up next to one of the other groups we gave judges awards to, because they had really awesome prop-work. Masquerade this year was overall pretty good - there was only one act I really didn't like at all, which was the dancing moogle-girl. I skipped out when the started playing the AMVs, so I can't comment on the winners of that. Headed over to Advent Children, which was my reason for skipping out early (well, and I don't like AMVs much), only to discover they had switched the schedule around, and it was already half-over. So I've now seen the second half of AC dubbed, and will comment later.
After that, Winter and I got changed for the dance and headed down there after taking some Asher-ish photos, because I love my OCs way too much. Music kind of sucked at first, but they switched DJs at midnight, and it was awesome again. And there was dancing!Rude. He was hands-down one of the best Rude cosplayers I think I've seen - right build, had the little beard and the bald head, right skintone and face shape, piercings (well, okay, not quite as many piercings as Rude). He was standing next to a Reno, sunglasses on, watching the dance floor. He reaches up, takes the sunglasses off, folds them up, puts them in a jacket pocket, and starts dancing. It was pretty awesome, because I am a sad fangirl like that. Totally spent half the dance watching him out of the corner of my eye. I also got asked to dance by two sketchy looking older guys at different points in time (politely said no), and Winter ended up talking to a guy who was cosplaying as Cid earlier, who was pretty cool. We eventually headed upstairs and did most of our packing before going to bed.
Sunday
Which brings us to today! We all kind of slept in, and then had to rush around to get everything out before check-out time. I opted to wear Hatori because it is real clothing, and comfortable shoes. We made our last rounds in the dealer's room, and I picked up Fruits Basket 11 (which I then lost when getting a photo of aforementioned awesome Rude, and found again because anime fans are a little more honest than the average person, and someone returned the bag to the dealer), and took more cosplay photos.
I also ran into Claudia, or more accurately, she ran into me, while I was sitting waiting to meet up with Mara. It was...less awkward than I thought it would be, but still kind of awkward. I'm still not emotionally ready for any sort of relationship with her, even just friendship, and honestly, I'm not sure she is either. Back to the con, though - I got distracted from emoing over relationship junk by spotting the Kagura I met Friday running past dressed as Ayame, with another Kagura in tow. I gave chase, and found out they were running out to meet a Hatsuharu in the courtyard, so we got a bunch of group photos, which was awesome. After I returned, I chatted with awesome-prop-group some more, and then it was time to go. Aside from a 'medical emergency' which stopped up our red line train for fifteen minutes, the trip home was largely uneventful.
Overall, a pretty fun con. I was a bit annoyed by the fact that my friends kept ditching me, but it was nice seeing some familar faces, as well as all the awesome costumes, and I'm glad I went to more events than I usually do - they were all really awesome.
Friday
Got up at quarter 'til nine, which is ridiculously early by my standards, but I had to be on the 10:30 train in. Did any last minute packing, and then got changed into Ada, because I didn't know if we were going to be able to check in when we got there. This, as we will see later, was not the brightest idea. Jon picked me up, we got all out stuff onto the train, and headed in. We accidently made the mistake of getting off at the Hynes stop instead of the Prudential stop. Despite it's name, the Hynes stop is actually about three blocks away from the Hynes, and then security told us we had to go through the Sheraton anyway. My backpack was huge, and I was also trying to lug my summoning staff, an inflatable mattress, and a grocery bag full of food and drinks. In four-inch stiletto heels. Yeah, bad plan. Anyway, we made it into the hotel, and I spotted a RE remake Wesker just as he was walking into the panel and couldn't get his photo. We checked in, and dropped our stuff off in the room before I dashed down to Masquerade HQ, afraid I was going to be late for the begining of judging (I wasn't). It was interesting to be on the other side of the table this year, so to speak. The other two judges were really nice - there was the really enthusiastic friendly one, and then the quiet one. There were a lot of really excellent entries, particularly in the novice division, which was huge (thirty out of the forty total). I did learn costumes that appear simple can be a lot more involved when you know the stories behind them - we gave first place novice to a couple who did Inu-Yasha costumes. It was their first con and first costumes, and they didn't know how to sew when the started. The seams were all straight, all the edges were finished, they were both hand-painted, and the designs matched the references perfectly, and the neatness puts my work to shame.
Anyway, after judging, I wandered around some, mostly trying to find the Wesker. I didn't have any success, but I did find a Chris and a C:V!Wesker, and got photos of a bunch of other really awesome cosplayers, ran into various friends (shout-outs to Katt and company, Michelle and company, and Mel), and also hit the dealer's room in hopes of buying pr0ntastic yaoi doujin. Alas, there was only one dealer, and the selection wasn't good. I also got mistaken as a guy crossplaying as Ada, lending some weight to my jokes about being Leon in drag (Leon hair at the moment). I was under the impression that I was supposed to meet up with Skuld after the Kaiji Big Battel (she went, I didn't) for dinner, but never called, so I ended up changing into Hatori because my feet were killing me, and got in line for the Yaoi-Yuri Dating Game. I actually wound up next to a Kagura, who was one of the two people that recognized me as Hatori, which was neat. We chatted for a while about various stuff - DMC, in particular. The Dating Game ended up being a lot of fun, and there were far too many great bits to post all of them here, but a few of the highlights were Roy (one of the contestants) asking Link (one of the eligible bachelors) if he liked fairies. The responce was "The only good fairy is a bottled fairy! Always with the nagging! 'Hey! Listen! Look! Listen!'", to which Roy went, "...I sense some past emotional baggage here. I'm not sure I want to deal with that.", and then when Hakkai ended up picking Sephiroth, Aeris ran up and started bitching him out, all 'How could you?! Does our relationship mean nothing to you?', and then Tifa comes up and is like 'Aeris, why are you bothering with him?' and then there was hot Aeris/Tifa kissing. After it was all over, I wandered into the dance for a bit and end up being kind of stripper!Hatori because I kept losing layers and undoing buttons because it was hot. I eventually headed up to bed when my feet got tired.
Saturday
I woke up around nine when the fire alarm went off, although it was quickly followed by a PA announcement to the effect of 'Everything is fine, really'. Put summoner!Yuna on in various stages, as that costume has a lot of little fiddly bits, and discovered that the wig is itchy (and also needs to be trimmed, but that's managable), and that my eyebrows are too thick to cosplay Yuna, which will be remedied next time. I did some more wandering, and both took photos and had them taken of me, because everybody loves Yuna. I also actually bought something in the dealer's room, because the Sasuga booth had a copy of the first CCS manga artbook, which is out of print and hard to find, and I've been searching for it for ages. After wandering, it was back to the second round of judging, and then picking the winners, which was tough because the quality level was really high, and because of the number of entries in the novice division was high. A few stood out, though - I think a lot of people probably wondered why we gave the Temari first place advanced, because it outwardly looks like a really simple costume, but her attention to detail and choice of pretty much everything was stunning. Drafting a stuffed ferret pattern and making it out of fake fur (and having it look good enough to be store-bought) = way more hardcore than I will ever be. Did a little more wandering afterwards, and finally ran into the S.T.A.R.S-Wesker I saw Friday, and someone dressed as the Merchant from RE4. I also got a photo of a really awesome Axel cosplayer - there was a flood of KH2 and FFVII:AC cosplayers, but most of them weren't so great.
I got changed back into Ada for the masquerade because I was tired of carrying around the staff, and then took advantage of one of the perks of being a judge, which was third-row seats with no wait. I ended up next to one of the other groups we gave judges awards to, because they had really awesome prop-work. Masquerade this year was overall pretty good - there was only one act I really didn't like at all, which was the dancing moogle-girl. I skipped out when the started playing the AMVs, so I can't comment on the winners of that. Headed over to Advent Children, which was my reason for skipping out early (well, and I don't like AMVs much), only to discover they had switched the schedule around, and it was already half-over. So I've now seen the second half of AC dubbed, and will comment later.
After that, Winter and I got changed for the dance and headed down there after taking some Asher-ish photos, because I love my OCs way too much. Music kind of sucked at first, but they switched DJs at midnight, and it was awesome again. And there was dancing!Rude. He was hands-down one of the best Rude cosplayers I think I've seen - right build, had the little beard and the bald head, right skintone and face shape, piercings (well, okay, not quite as many piercings as Rude). He was standing next to a Reno, sunglasses on, watching the dance floor. He reaches up, takes the sunglasses off, folds them up, puts them in a jacket pocket, and starts dancing. It was pretty awesome, because I am a sad fangirl like that. Totally spent half the dance watching him out of the corner of my eye. I also got asked to dance by two sketchy looking older guys at different points in time (politely said no), and Winter ended up talking to a guy who was cosplaying as Cid earlier, who was pretty cool. We eventually headed upstairs and did most of our packing before going to bed.
Sunday
Which brings us to today! We all kind of slept in, and then had to rush around to get everything out before check-out time. I opted to wear Hatori because it is real clothing, and comfortable shoes. We made our last rounds in the dealer's room, and I picked up Fruits Basket 11 (which I then lost when getting a photo of aforementioned awesome Rude, and found again because anime fans are a little more honest than the average person, and someone returned the bag to the dealer), and took more cosplay photos.
I also ran into Claudia, or more accurately, she ran into me, while I was sitting waiting to meet up with Mara. It was...less awkward than I thought it would be, but still kind of awkward. I'm still not emotionally ready for any sort of relationship with her, even just friendship, and honestly, I'm not sure she is either. Back to the con, though - I got distracted from emoing over relationship junk by spotting the Kagura I met Friday running past dressed as Ayame, with another Kagura in tow. I gave chase, and found out they were running out to meet a Hatsuharu in the courtyard, so we got a bunch of group photos, which was awesome. After I returned, I chatted with awesome-prop-group some more, and then it was time to go. Aside from a 'medical emergency' which stopped up our red line train for fifteen minutes, the trip home was largely uneventful.
Overall, a pretty fun con. I was a bit annoyed by the fact that my friends kept ditching me, but it was nice seeing some familar faces, as well as all the awesome costumes, and I'm glad I went to more events than I usually do - they were all really awesome.