Sorry it took me quite a while to post my entry about the first day of Cosplay Mania I WAS really tired last night and so I just relaxed for a bit.
Cosplay Mania 2013 was held, as always, at the SM Mall of Asia SMX Convention Center. I left Los Banos with my mom around 7:55 am and arrived at the venue, greeted by a long line of otakus alike, around 10:15.
So what exactly happened in this year's Cosplay Mania that separates itself from the past events?
Judging from my experience yesterday, not really much.
The event occupied 3 halls on the SMX convention with the first hall being the entrance/cosplayers' lounge, the 2nd as the fiesta/festival hall where all the stalls and booths are found as well as most of the organized games, and the third hall is the Event hall where the venue for various cosplay competitions and international guest cosplayers perform.
I didn't have a clear itinerary upon entering the halls, so basically I simply roamed around taking pictures of for a good part of the day. The items on sale in most of the booths are just the same, which is to say that a lot of the past booths from previous events came back with only few new items.
The first item that I bought was a copy of the Cosplay Snapshot Porject volume 4. The design was a leap forward from its predecessor. The photos included were all well made and definitely eye-gasmic to photographers and cosplayers alike (assuming photo manipulation was taken to a minimum). I also would like to thank Mango Manga for giving me a special discount and extra item on my purchase. Senpai, if you're reading this, again, Thank You!
Some stalls, though already recurring, had interesting items up on sale such as Doujin no Mise's anime cushions and dakimakura pre-orders, Eiwa Manga store and the more creative pre-order booths such as the SNK scouting legion jacket pre-orders etc.
There was no doubt that, judging from the popularity of Shingeki no Kyojin, the most frequently cosplayed theme yesterday was SNK characters particularly the main Scouting Legion characters. There were also titan cosplayers such as the Colossal Titan and Eren's titan form. But the great mass of cosplayers that attended seemed to have clustered more on a few particular series unlike last year where the spread of the cosplayers per series was platykurtic (STAT 1 is getting to me).
Still I cannot deny the enthusiasm and charisma of the cosplayers present at the event. They really made the event extra special.
I probably spent an hour and a half in front of the fiesta hall stage area watching the Yoshinoya beef bowl eating contest and taking part in the auction of several items (mostly plush dolls). Around 1:45 pm I went to the event hall to secure my spot to capture some of the international guests on picture.
The hosts of the event hall were mainly the always present Captain Jack Sparrow and the ever so famous Filipino Superman, who (I think) is co-hosting the event for the first time.
Not to bash them or anything but it was obvious that there were quite a lot of technical difficulties regarding the hosting of the event especially by the time Pinky Lu Xun and
Orochi from the group Endless Illution appeared on stage.
Also, after the short Q&A of Pinky and Orochi, the long awaited return of Kaname on stage was gruesome.
The bad thing about waiting for another hour maybe was the hosts didn't mind the general audience during Kaname's prep. backstage. They interviewed a few but didn't cater to the rest.
A good solution would be to move the activities held at the fiesta hall to the event hall and conduct some of the games in-between waiting periods.
After the long wait and cheering of the fans "KANAME", the cosplayer from Japan finally returns on stage cosplaying Fushimi Saruhiko from K. As he posed left, right, middle and greeted the fans in our native tongue, I'm pretty sure more than half the audience fainted (mainly female I suppose). The cheers were definitely louder than last year.
After Kaname's appearance, I left the event hall. (Around this time, my camera started to act up, good thing my mom let me borrow her's).
The time was probably around 3 pm when I roamed the entrance hall and fiesta hall buying stuff and taking pictures of cosplayers.
I was ripped in two when deciding whether I should pre-order a Scouting Legion Jacket because at the event I was starting to consider cosplaying Reiner Braun. I ultimately decided against the idea. Although the green cloak would've been nice.
My mom ate the legendary takoyaki of Octoboy before picking me up. I didn't get as much photos as I always do in past events. But still, to capture the world in photos speaks for a thousand words in each moment. - Inukami, 2013 (I don't think that makes any sense, but that's how I think I should put it).
Well that's it, I'm not gonna talk about the journey back home because I know it won't spark any interest (mainly because it was just listening to music and thinking of Dr. Seuss' "...smile because it happened." quote.
I wonder how's it going now in day 2. They're probably letting con-goers in by now.
Right, the events to be expected in day 2 are the appearance of Reika, the finals of Cosplay TorCH and a lot more.
(Sorry for the low quality of photos, had to resize them because of upload problems.)
All photos belong to Inukami, please do ask permission if you want to use them, or just simply use the link as reference.
Thanks for reading~!
Cosplay Mania 2013 was held, as always, at the SM Mall of Asia SMX Convention Center. I left Los Banos with my mom around 7:55 am and arrived at the venue, greeted by a long line of otakus alike, around 10:15.
So what exactly happened in this year's Cosplay Mania that separates itself from the past events?
Judging from my experience yesterday, not really much.
The event occupied 3 halls on the SMX convention with the first hall being the entrance/cosplayers' lounge, the 2nd as the fiesta/festival hall where all the stalls and booths are found as well as most of the organized games, and the third hall is the Event hall where the venue for various cosplay competitions and international guest cosplayers perform.
I didn't have a clear itinerary upon entering the halls, so basically I simply roamed around taking pictures of for a good part of the day. The items on sale in most of the booths are just the same, which is to say that a lot of the past booths from previous events came back with only few new items.
The first item that I bought was a copy of the Cosplay Snapshot Porject volume 4. The design was a leap forward from its predecessor. The photos included were all well made and definitely eye-gasmic to photographers and cosplayers alike (assuming photo manipulation was taken to a minimum). I also would like to thank Mango Manga for giving me a special discount and extra item on my purchase. Senpai, if you're reading this, again, Thank You!
Some stalls, though already recurring, had interesting items up on sale such as Doujin no Mise's anime cushions and dakimakura pre-orders, Eiwa Manga store and the more creative pre-order booths such as the SNK scouting legion jacket pre-orders etc.
There was no doubt that, judging from the popularity of Shingeki no Kyojin, the most frequently cosplayed theme yesterday was SNK characters particularly the main Scouting Legion characters. There were also titan cosplayers such as the Colossal Titan and Eren's titan form. But the great mass of cosplayers that attended seemed to have clustered more on a few particular series unlike last year where the spread of the cosplayers per series was platykurtic (STAT 1 is getting to me).
I probably spent an hour and a half in front of the fiesta hall stage area watching the Yoshinoya beef bowl eating contest and taking part in the auction of several items (mostly plush dolls). Around 1:45 pm I went to the event hall to secure my spot to capture some of the international guests on picture.
The hosts of the event hall were mainly the always present Captain Jack Sparrow and the ever so famous Filipino Superman, who (I think) is co-hosting the event for the first time.
 |
| international guests: Pinky and Orochi, Shinji couldn't make it |
Orochi from the group Endless Illution appeared on stage.
Also, after the short Q&A of Pinky and Orochi, the long awaited return of Kaname on stage was gruesome.
The bad thing about waiting for another hour maybe was the hosts didn't mind the general audience during Kaname's prep. backstage. They interviewed a few but didn't cater to the rest.
A good solution would be to move the activities held at the fiesta hall to the event hall and conduct some of the games in-between waiting periods.
After the long wait and cheering of the fans "KANAME", the cosplayer from Japan finally returns on stage cosplaying Fushimi Saruhiko from K. As he posed left, right, middle and greeted the fans in our native tongue, I'm pretty sure more than half the audience fainted (mainly female I suppose). The cheers were definitely louder than last year.
 |
| International guest: Kaname |
The time was probably around 3 pm when I roamed the entrance hall and fiesta hall buying stuff and taking pictures of cosplayers.
I was ripped in two when deciding whether I should pre-order a Scouting Legion Jacket because at the event I was starting to consider cosplaying Reiner Braun. I ultimately decided against the idea. Although the green cloak would've been nice.
My mom ate the legendary takoyaki of Octoboy before picking me up. I didn't get as much photos as I always do in past events. But still, to capture the world in photos speaks for a thousand words in each moment. - Inukami, 2013 (I don't think that makes any sense, but that's how I think I should put it).
Well that's it, I'm not gonna talk about the journey back home because I know it won't spark any interest (mainly because it was just listening to music and thinking of Dr. Seuss' "...smile because it happened." quote.
I wonder how's it going now in day 2. They're probably letting con-goers in by now.
Right, the events to be expected in day 2 are the appearance of Reika, the finals of Cosplay TorCH and a lot more.
(Sorry for the low quality of photos, had to resize them because of upload problems.)
All photos belong to Inukami, please do ask permission if you want to use them, or just simply use the link as reference.
Thanks for reading~!
While I agree that SnK is a great anime adaptation, it's still debatable on whether it's indeed the best Anime of 2013.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I surely would like to see you cosplaying Sasha. Also, thanks for sharing the link, I'll consider that as a possible source of my future cosplay plans.