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| the magician's looking glass: WhiteMage_1's Cosplay |
| "Of course the cosplay idea is being seriously considered!" "Three weeks away..." |
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| Cosplay: |
| Conventions: |
| Miscellaneous: |
| The Paper // Yomiko Readman Read or Die OAV 2 If I hadn't been told other people were going to cosplay, this one wouldn't have happened. Just like the last UTMAnime show I went in costume to, this one was completely out of the blue. In fact, this one was even more out of the blue because it was the last show of the season and not Halloween. A couple of my friends were planning on dressing up, so I figured it was a perfect excuse to make another costume. When I was watching ROD, I gradually came to the conclusion that I should do a Yomiko costume...and then the cosplay opportunity just...poofed into being! Since I had three weeks, I figured this wouldn't be a problem. I ended spending several late nights (believe it or not) sewing this, despite its seemingly simple nature. This was a definite learning experience and I'm glad to say that I think it paid off, even if I was one of only four people cosplaying at the show. This costume will replace the ???? one at Anime North. |
| Costume Stats: Start: March 2002 || Finish: March 2002 Length of Process: 3 weeks Creator: WhiteMage_1 Appearances: UTM Anime - special End of Year Showing, Anime North 2002 Approx. Cost: $20 Future Appearances?: None Planned Awards: First Place (UTMAnime 1st Anniversary) |
| Vest: Another purchase from Goodwill. I originally was going to use a brown-ish vest I had in my closet, but it's the same story as the tie. I found a vest that looked perfect. Of course, nothing's ever really perfect, so it turned out the vest was err...quite a few sizes too big. So, I took apart the seams and sewed it back together. I've never done anything like that before, so I'm quite happy with how it turned out. Yeah, I know that anyone who knows how to sew would find that a no brainer, but for me it was quite stressful and I was afraid I'd ruin the vest entirely. I still didn't make the waist of the vest small enough, but luckily it's got that tie in the back and, even though when I tighten it it doesn't look as good, there's a jacket to hide it from view. Skirt: I used the skirt that I'd originally bought solely for the fabric. Its original purpose was to provide fabric for Tifa's very long gloves and then for Chairman Kaga's ruffled shirt collar and cuffs. I found it was the perfect length for Yomiko, though, so it's been spared the scissors. Jacket: Again from Goodwill. I went to about half a dozen thrift stores before I found this jacket. It wasn't perfect, but it was the closest I could find. I used a permanent marker to colour the buttons black and bought some fabric, which I used to make all the brown parts of the jacket. Shoes: I didn't have time to look for the proper shoes (nor did I have the money, which is another reason I settled for a smack-'em-together costume for this), so I settled for wearing my school shoes sans socks. If I do end up re-doing this, I'll find myself more time to consider footwear. I wore a spare pair of cheap stockings I hadn't ended up wearing with the Tifa costume. Next time, I find a better pair. Of course, I hate wearing stockings. >_<; Hair: My own, natural hair. Yomiko's hair is black, but at least my hair's pretty dark and about the same length, as far as I can tell I don't have bangs, but not many people with hair this long have bangs that poof out like that. Bardiel braided the braids for me, since I didn't have a mirror handy when I was putting the finishing touches on my hair on the way to the event. Yomiko's hair is supposed to be tied with paper, but I cheated and used white twist ties instead. Eyes: The colour of Yomiko's eyes is blue, but I haven't been able to spare the time to look into non-prescription contact lenses. Besides, this was a costume prepared on little notice and with little effort (lets face it: Homework comes before cosplay). Changes for Version 2 (worn at Anime North): One change I made was to shorten the jacket. While in some of my reference pics, the jacket looks quite long (like in the pic at the top of the page), in a lot of pics and in the anime, the hem of the jacket seems to be a palm's breadth higher than the hem of the skirt. Shortening it was a bit of a problem, since I'd washed the jacket and the lining hadn't shrunk, while the shell had. I had a lot of issues with the sewing machine, since the fabric was a little stiff and quite thick, but I did manage to shorten it satisfactorily (I think). One thing I was planning to fix, but didn't get around to, was changing the angle of the flaps on the pockets, since they should be on a more shallow angle (I followed the angle of the pocket opening when I first sewed them on). Another change was that I managed to get some decent shoes. They were a bit too pointy and they were high heels instead of the relatively flat shoes Yomiko wears, but I figured it was better that I gain a little height than purchase some more accurate shoes. These were extremely uncomfortable walking so much around the convention all day. >.<; Another alteration was that I tied my hair up with ribbon instead of twist ties, so it didn't look so stiff. The last change was the addition of a wheel along suitcase sort of thing. I'm not sure if this is the bag Yomiko uses in the second OAV, but one of the cases she uses does look like this, though of course it's not identical. This was the one thing people commented on that made my costume stand out. *sweatdrops* It was really nice to hear the positive comments people made. I just wish that the three other R.O.D. cosplayers had been in those costumes on Friday so I could've taken pics with them. ^_^ They did a fantastic job! That Miss Deep smile was /perfect/! ^_^ (btw, I discovered that Yomiko wears stockings (if you watch closely when she wakes up in the first OAV) so I kind of had to wear them....Icky. >.<;) |
| [Yomiko Readman] |
| [More Photos of Costume coming soon...hopefully a full-body one showing my rolling suitcase-ish thing! lol]] [photo credits are in mouse-overs and following thumbnails] |
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| Construction: Shirt: Score! I finally got to reuse a piece of another costume! I used the shirt from the Relena costume. Luckily, it's the right kind of shirt for this costume, even though it wasn't for the Relena one. Tie: I raided my father's closet and came up with a tie which, while not perfect, was close enough for the hack job I was planning. Of course, then an opportunity to search through a Goodwill came up and I found a much better tie. At that point, I figured I'd do a good job on the costume, instead of just using things from my closet. So, I got a nearly perfect red tie. |
| UPDATE! At an impromptu cosplay contest at the UTMAnime end of year show, this costume won first place. How did that happen? I have no idea. o_o; I won the Nadesico movie OST. ^^; |
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| photo credit: #1 -Linus Lam Network News (that's one of my friends as Cho Hakai, by the way) ^^ #2 - Shinigami Angel Cosplay (There's Hakai again...lol) #3 - Ikegami Pictures (Mog! *glomp*) #4 - A Fan's View |
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