Friday, February 13, 2015

The Best Cosplay of Dragon Con 2014, Pt 5

Did I really just take a 5 month break in the middle of posting my Dragon Con cosplay pics? 

YES I DID.  

But let's not dwell on that.

After all, the important thing here is that I finally found a few days to finish editing the rest of my gazillion photos, and I AM READY TO SHARE.

As always, I'll only be sharing my favs and/or the ones I want to talk about here. You can see ALL the madness over on my Flickr account.

Now... ONWARD!



Fiona from Adventure Time! I thought this cosplayer had just the loveliest skin. And now that I've typed that, I realize how creepy it sounds. So, I guess we're off to my usual bang-up start. :D

I didn't remember the dress, so I looked it up:

Aha! Perfection.

Clear your schedule for the next few minutes, 'cuz you'll need at least that long to see all the fab details on these SOCK HOP DISNEY PRINCESSES:

 Wha whaaa?? SO AWESOME.

Can I just point out that Esmerelda's purse is shaped like a tambourine? And Belle's is a rose? And Flynn's letterman jacket has his initials on it?

Oh! And Tiana there is an Epbot reader, so everyone say HI, TIANA*! 
(*not her real name.)

Anyone remember Flight of the Navigator?

 
 So clever to build the Navigator out of a backpack like that, and if you look closely, you can see the cutesy little creature guy perched on his hat. D'aww.

 (Bonus Weird Al Yankovic dressed as Jesus in the background. Because DRAGON CON.)


This Dungeon Master was walking around with a full playing board, complete with giant lighted dice on columns:


And another option for a game? This chess-playing Jawa:

 
 I heard later the Jawa is actually a young kid who happens to be a chess master, and he never spoke; just shook hands after every game (which he almost always won.) LOVE IT.  (That's his mom holding the sign.)


On Saturday night I stepped out as Lady Vadore again, mostly so I could meet this guy:

 The ultimate power couple!

Yep, that's Dave Lee, aka Steampunk Darth Vader. We only had a moment for pics in a very dark walkway, but I'm glad I caught him. Dave just moved to Germany, so this was my last chance!

 While we waited for Dave, John and I also spotted the Femme version of Steampunk Boba Fett, who doesn't make me look quite so short in comparison, thank goodness.
 


Next up, some spot-on classic Star Trek:

 Seriously, she looks like she just stepped off the screen!

And just so you guys can see why editing takes me so long; here's a comparison of that shot with the "before" straight off my camera:

 I'm still a total amateur with my camera (I know, it's sad), so combined with DC's cave-like lighting, it takes a LOT of post-processing to get my pics even half-way presentable.

I do love it, though. Looking at all my before-and-afters makes me happy. :)

And of course most shots just get a crop and general brightening up; I only take extra time with my favorites.

K, moving on...
Some unlikely friendships:

Those Breaking Bad guys are perfect. And props to "Walt" for going full-on tighty whitey. Ha!


I like this Batgirl's suit; it looks like a comfy stretch knit material:

Way more practical for kickin' butt than latex & spandex, am I right?

I may have posted this knight before:

 If so, I still like his purple lights.


A beautifully gender-swapped Joker from Tim Burton's Batman:

Complete with her own henchman!


Which reminds me: A while back I mentioned wanting to see cosplay of all the Disney princesses gender-swapped, so a bunch of you immediately pointed me to these guys:

 They're at DC every year, and are hilarious, but when I say "gender-swapped" I mean something more like this:

 
 The Wicked Tailor there completely re-imagined Elsa as a King instead of a Queen. Both guys did all their own embroidery work, too - my pic doesn't come close to doing it justice. (And "Anna" has the white streak in his hair - nice!)


I'm going to need some help ID'ing this next one, guys, because what the actual heck:

She's wearing fake, flesh-toned boobs over her real boobs, and let me tell ya, in the dark hallways of DC they were extremely convincing. Which is probably why it took me until just now to notice that her gun has a hand sticking out of it. (?!?)

So if any of you are willing to admit you know what insane movie this is based on, tell us in the comments, and I promise we won't judge. Much.

[UPDATE: Aha! Jane Fonda's Barbarella! I should have known. Thanks, guys!]

 This next one is one of my favorite cosplays of the whole con: a completely original twist on Booker from BioShock: Infinite:


Why is this so cool? Well, since the game is first-person, and because you play Booker, you only see Booker's hands on screen, like this:

Booker's left hand changes according to what special power you're using: it can look like it's crackling with electricity, on fire, or, for the popular Murder of Crows, it sprouts black feathers & claws. So that Booker up there has a Murder of Crows hand. AND IT IS SO COOL!!

 Ahem.
 
Some lovely ladies:


 


And the prettiest faun!


Look at those colors! She had little purple lights in her flower headdress, but for once it was so bright they don't really show:


This is in the food court, and given all that glorious light I'm tempted to just camp out there next year. (Too bad so many of the cosplays only come out at night...)

A few more from the same area:





Hard to see, but this Totoro has soot sprites in her underskirt!

And I JUST noticed she has the little white forest spirit hanging from her lanyard!  
D'aww.


I'll be honest, I hesitated before taking this next pic:


Kind of an "If the Nazis had won" take on The Rocketeer. For some reason it gave me pause in a way that Red Skull cosplay doesn't - maybe because Red Skull is so obviously fantasy? I dunno. Anyway, really well done, but I bet smarter geeks than I could have some fascinating discussions on where The Line is in cosplay - or if there even is a line. (Admit it: you'd go to that panel, right?)

Can you tell I write these posts pretty stream-of-conscious? Ha! Ok, Jen, button it up and show the people the pretty peektures, already...

No idea on the character, but look how amazing:


Can she be on my side, please?

[Update: Consensus is she's Hela, death goddess. Thx, guys!]

Adventure Time fans do some pretty fun stuff to adapt the cartoon's style into a more realistic cosplay. Case in point, one guy took the Ice King from this:


To this:

That's as creepy as it is cool - pun intended.

And I want that glowing staff!

Another of my top favorites: Princess Bubblegum Leia!

 YES. We need to see more Leia mashups like this! Love it.

(This is Princess Bubblegum, btw:)



K, I'm going to quit there for now, but there's LOTS more amazing cosplay to come. And since the pics are all edited now, I promise you won't have to wait so long for the next batch!

 I've got about 2 more posts' worth to go, so I'll try to write up one per week to space it out a bit. Don't want to give you guys cosplay fatigue. Heh.

'Til next time!


 {Click here for Part 6, or here to go back to Part 1.}

28 comments:

  1. Pretty sure the woman in your "what the actual heck" pic is supposed to be Jane Fonda's Barbarella.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Fairly certain fake boob lady is Barbarella.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Fake boob lady is absolutely Barbarella, and the man with her is from the same movie. I'm not even ashamed...

    ReplyDelete
  4. Spectacular- worth the wait! I always love your con pics, you're so good at getting people to pose for you. One note: I think the 'fawn' is actually a 'faun' (forest god/goddess). Baby deer don't typically play musical instruments. ;-) Either way, she's gorgeous. Thanks as always for sharing.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Khalysta from VersaillesFebruary 13, 2015 at 3:50 PM

      I would add a little detail : I think she is the two-legged version of one of the many dryads in World of Warcraft.

      Delete
    2. Boops. Good catch! Off to fix...

      Delete
  5. Thanks so much for posting these pix! It's almost like being there. :)

    As for the lady in green-and-black armor with the giant horns ... I'm pretty sure that's Hela, the death goddess. She turns up a lot in Thor comics.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I think the girl with the sword and the green headdress is Hela from the Marvel universe.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Speaking of The Ice King, have you seen this from Deviant Art? Beautiful!

    http://chasestone.deviantart.com/art/The-Ice-King-510570319

    ReplyDelete
  8. I'm wondering -- what's the etiquette of asking people who they're cosplaying? Is it considered rude, or is there a way to do it that's okay?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I usually tell them how cool/beautiful/etc. I think their costume is, and then ask what it's from. Most cosplayers are really excited to share what they love with a new captive audience!

      Delete
    2. Since I don't typically dress as a certain character, just with the 'essence' of the show/movie I have in mind [Is there a term for that? Is bounding used for casual cosplay that isn't Disney-related?], I would love if people asked instead of just staring with quizzical looks. But that's me -- can't say what/how other people would do/feel.

      Delete
    3. I second Karli; so long as you ask in a really complimentary way, I find that cosplayers are usually quite excited to talk to you about their character!

      Delete
  9. I thought that about the girl in the white dress too -- nary a zit on the dame! How did she do it? Does she bathe in milk? The blood of virgins? Get back there and interview her on her skincare regime.

    Loving this post. And all the freewheeling commentary on the photos. Especially the Nazi comment. I would love to know what's "okay," and what's not. Because I can't tell. I see swastikas and I FREAK. Even in the context of movies. It's this reliance on Nazis as villains, I think -- as a blanket statement of "bad." Even to this day, the idea of Germany is frightening, which I realized only recently when a friend mentioned going abroad. She was like "i'm going to France, Spain, Germany --" and I just imagined people rounding her up and hurting her. But it was SO LONG AGO. It's just whenever you see a German, that's the first thing that occurs to you. Nazis. The concept of Nazi-ism is at once completely pervasive (it's consumed all things German, to the exclusion of any other traits they as a country might have had) and completely taboo.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Not everyone thinks of the Nazis when they think of Germans and Germany. Food and beer are the big things for a lot of people I know, especially in the fall (Oktoberfest!). Or engineering, or incredibly long incomprehensible words that use half the alphabet. :)

      Having said that, I think if that costume came from a scene in a movie it would be fine, but if it was just a random decision it would squick me out a little. Neo Nazis are a thing in some places, and I personally don't want to see costumes based on real-life villains who are still hurting people. That's where the line is for me.

      Delete
    2. Super Starling!, I live in Austria, which is right next to Germany, we share a language (at least much in the same sense that USA and GB do: same with some differences), we share culture, and we (sadly) share a lot of the last 100 years of history.

      I feel very sad and slightly offended that you reduce Germany (and at that length also Austria) to the Nazi crimes that happened when my grandparents (may they rest in peace) were little more than teenagers. Seriously, if you want to talk to people who have memories of the war time and the Nazi regime, you have to visit senior centers, and you better go soon or they will all be dead.

      In present times there are more Neo Nazis in the USA than there are here. Here in Austria we have a law that outrules any kind of Nazi display in public (exept very critical statements): The law states that:

      "
      whoever in a printed work, on broadcasting or in any other media,
      or whoever otherwise publicly in a matter that it makes it accessible to many people,
      denies, belittles, condones or tries to justify the Nazi genocide or other Nazi crimes against humanity
      shall be punished with imprisonment for one year up to ten years, in the case of special perilousness of the offender or the engagement up to twenty years. All cases are to be tried by jury." (Wikipedia)

      Here, the guy in the photo above would have been arrested on sight.

      Moreover, don't get me wrong, I know that our past has been unspeakably horrible, but that was the last war ever we had any involvement in. There are even talks to abolish our (very small) standing army completely. How many wars did your country (probability wise I'm just going to assume USA) fight since the end of WWII? There was Korea, Vietnam, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Lebanon, Grenada, Panama, the Gulf War, Iraq, Somalia, the Yugoslav War, Afghanistan, Iraq again, Pakistan, Yemen, IS. Some of them are even going on as we speak. And I'm not even counting the "Interventions" and the Cold War. Sure, none of those wars were on US Territory, but I'm not sure that makes it any better, since half of the conflicts didn't even have anything to do with the USA, they just picked a side and jumped in.

      Please do think about that before you go and fear for your friend when she is visiting a country that hasn't fought in a war in the last 70 years (not counting sending small troups on NATO or UNO assignments, because most of those are directed at stabilizing the situation and protecting civilians).

      By the way, we do have a lot of ancient and newer culture, cuisine, architecture, we do have stunning landscapes, we have lots of lakes and mountains, you can go skiing and ice skating in winter, swimming and hiking and mountain climbing in summer. In fact, this is the view from a platform very close to where I live: http://bit.ly/1zgSxM1

      Maybe you should just pack up your luggage and visit sometime, so that you can aquire a more timely and accurate sense of what we are like!

      Delete
  10. Great and wonderful as usual, Jen! I was completely impressed when you showed the before editing to the after editing, very impressive. And I always appreciate you showing where characters come from. I wouldn't have known about the hand, but the guy really did a great job with it. Well, this is just to thank you for all your hard work!
    Beth

    ReplyDelete
  11. The detail in some of those cosplays is insane!

    ReplyDelete
  12. Batgirl is adorable! :)

    ReplyDelete
  13. Wow! Did Walt & Jesse just come off the set? Lol :)

    ReplyDelete
  14. I think the Rocketeer is from the movie they watch about the Germans rocket packs.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Oh those princesses! I want to steal all their outifts... a 50s Disney Princess range, then I could be Rapunzel wearing Flynn's jacket (Because as soon as you pointed out his jacket that's what I wanted to see, they're my favourite couple, in case you couldn't tell :P ) Also the Beast's expression in that photo is perfect.
    Also the beautiful ladies in the beautiful red/white costumes, are they characters? Because all I could think was Rose Red and Snow White but I'm probably wrong. Wonderful costumes anyway!
    Hoorah for more cosplay posts, they're some of my favourites and where I come for inspiration.

    ReplyDelete
  16. I am in love with the Mars Attacks aliens by the sushi bar! So awesome. I miss Dragon Con, so much fun.

    ReplyDelete
  17. These are so fun!! I LOVE that fawn!
    Do you mind me asking how you learned photoshop? I bought it, but every time I open it up I get super overwhelmed and don't know where to start and I promptly shut it back down before I start to sweat.
    Do you have any suggestions of how to actually get started (books or websites or ???)
    Thanks! :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Photoshop still intimidates the heck out of me, so I actually use a program called Perfect Photo Suite. It's way WAY easier to use (but then, amost anything is easier than PS), and I actually figured out most things just by playing with all the buttons. :D I'm also sloooowly learning my way around Light Room, which is a little less user-friendly, but still fairly easy to figure out just by jumping in and exploring.

      I don't use those for everything, though; just for the pics I want to go the extra mile with - or that need a LOT of work like some of these DC shots. All of my pics start in iPhoto, and roughly half of what I post is only edited there, with general crop/brightening/contrast tweaks.

      Hope that helps!

      Delete
    2. If I might make a suggestion as someone who learned the hard way. Don't use Photoshop for post processing photography. Its not designed for it. You will get much better results from a dedicated photo editing program. I made the switch to Lightroom last year and the difference was night & day. Photoshop comes in handy for more complicated editing like add/removing elements, merging photos, special effects, restoration, etc. I often use it to make PC and smart phone backgrounds. Yet if you just want tweak exposure and shadows/highlights, I recommend using a different program. :)

      Delete
    3. Wow! Thank you both for your suggestions and ideas. I feel a little less dumb about the whole PS thing now! I'll definitely look into your suggestions. Thanks for spending the time to share with me! :)

      Delete
  18. Wow, so fun to dig back into these costumes. And this totally cements it for me, I HAVE to get to D.C. this year! I've kind of been hemming and hawing, trying to find someone to go with me so I don't have to go to a huge con like this by myself the first time, but I think I'm going to bite the bullet and just book the hotel and flight, and hope that someone decides to come along at some point. And one goal of going is to meet you, so yeah, I have to get there. :D Looking forward to more pics!

    ReplyDelete

Please be respectful when commenting; dissenting opinions are great, but personal attacks or hateful remarks will be removed. Also, including a link? Then here's your html cheat sheet: <a href="LINK ADDRESS">YOUR TEXT</a>