I started out Friday by getting into my Litchi Faye Ling cosplay from BlazBlue! Thank you Laurel for this shot:

click to see larger photo

After hanging out at my Merchants booth for a while and greeting the attendees at Opening Ceremonies, I changed into my Christie costume from Dead or Alive, for a group meet with 3 other DoA girls. Photos coming soon! That night I hosted my popular Sociology of Cosplay panel and was happy to see a packed standing room only room full of cosplayers eager to share their stories. We ran out of the 1 hour slot super fast. I will need more minutes next time. Wherever I go, I advocate "Anyone can cosplay", no matter their gender, race, age, height, weight, bodytype etc. It is so important for cosplayers to be positive toward each other, and understanding of each others' situations. It warms my heart whenever I meet like-minded people and at during the Sociology panel I was happy to meet all of you.

Saturday was THE big day for me. I agreed to take on the craftsmanship and performance judging duties for the Katsucon Masquerade, as well as host the World Cosplay Summit afterward. It was also the day I was debuting the new costume I had been working on like mad. I got up at 7:30am to iron Carmilla and lay out all of my costume pieces, and by 10:30am I was suited up and ready to hit the con. 

My new cosplay is another Granado Espada Wizard design, that has been on my list for a while now. It involves a corset, heavy mermaid skirt, a hoop skirt and full petticoat underneath, 7 inch heels because in order to get to Silhouette of the dress right, I had to be much taller than I am, and a hat that covered my left eye lol. Walking, or more like hobbling, in that costume was fun. 

 Photos by Joseph Lin, Anna Fisher and Judy Stephens - click to see larger images

 I started having a sore throat on Thursday morning and by Saturday I was struck with a full blown cold. Thankfully TrainerNick and Paloma from Security took great care of me all day, making sure I took medicine and ate regularly. I managed to sneak in some Wizard photos with the talented people above and Slave To Anime, then it was time to craftsmanship judge the Masquerade contestants. That took 3 hours, I walked around a bit and then settled in for the Masquerade itself. It was fantastic this year and we enjoyed the skits especially. Congrats to the giant Zelda group for winning Best in Show! My favorite skit was the Ranma group, as I grew up with the manga and anime and they did such an amazing job with the writing and execution of the performance, not to mention super clean well made costumes. I was so happy to see a perfect Ranma skit on stage.

With no break after the Masquerade, I marched into the Green Room of the World Cosplay Summit Prelims, to go over last minute technical stage related things. So many amazing costumes were fluttering around backstage! I wished the groups good luck and got ready for my cue to go on stage.

Hosting the WCS was a huge honor and great experience - thank you again to Laura and Ed for letting me be a part of the event. I had the best seat in the house! Watching the performances up close made me appreciate all the hard work the cosplayers put into them even more. Before I knew it, all 22 teams did their skits and the judges went to deliberate. As I had a lot of friends competing, I was just as nervous as they were, anticipating the winners. I was overjoyed to hear Katie and Diana announced as Team USA - these laides will represent our country well in Japan. Keep up with them on Facebook over here! 
After the coongratulations it was past midnight and I had been in costume for 13 hours. There was nothing left to do but to change and fall in to bed.

Sunday morning came early for me - I had a videoshoot appointment with Ackson at 9am with my Carmilla - Vampire Hunter D costume. I started getting read at 7:30am and managed to get out the door in full costume by 10am!! Ackson recorded some of me getting ready in the room, and footage on the floor of Katsucon. The video he produced is unreal, I am so shocked at the artistry and soul this man puts into his videos. The level of sophistication is incredible, yet he always maintains a sense of humor as well. 

Please enjoy Ackson's 2nd Katsucon video, there are some amazing costumes featured in here! Crunchyroll also posted an article about Ackson's videos here.

I also did some photos with various photographers on the floor, including Elysiam.org. Last 2 images are by Gary Thompson and I-Hate-The-World. Thank you!


Click to see larger images

I'll leave you with a couple of fun shots of Carmilla and Ponies! Left image is by Fenyx Designs!

Overall an amazing amazing convention, despite being sick the entire time I got to do everything I set out to, and my friends took such wonderful care of me that it made me appreciate them that much more. Can not wait until Katsucon 2013!