COSPLAY PET PEEVES (Blog Revamp 2017!)

Hi guys! It's been a long time since I posted anything on this blog, and today decided that I am going to fully restart here. I may even change the name of this blog to Regrettiforgetti, as corsetsbooksandbands is getting pretty old and less relevant by the day. Anyway, I think a good topic of conversation is cosplay pet peeves- Every cosplayer has things which annoy them about costume making, fandoms, or the cosplay community. Most of these will be relevant to characters I have cosplayed, or am making cosplays of. Without further ado, let us begin!

1: Face Paint Woes

Ever cosplayed a character with a strange skin tone? A character with a heck of a lot of tattoos? Ever traipsed around a convention, skin fully covered in a greasy mess, trying to keep that stuff on your face and not on the clothes you so lovingly bought and made? Well, if you have, you will know that by the end of the day that stuff is cracking, that stuff is sweating off and your skin is showing. And the amount of time you take to put it on... damn, kid. A word of advice- Seal your facepaint. Use baby powder and a powder puff or something. I used a cut up pair of (new) tights to put the powder on my face for my Kurloz cosplay, and it worked fine. Also, if you're going to be using face paint a lot, I would recommend Mehron face paint and a lot of baby powder. It stays on wonderfully, and takes a lot less time to put on than your average gunky Snazaroo stuff. You do need baby oil to take it off, and it costs a tad more than other brands, but this stuff is theatrical face paint. It'll stay on for an entire day as long as you seal it well.

2: Long Clothes

Ah, long clothes. They look cool, and look awesome for cosplay, but damn can that extra fabric be inconvenient. Stairs will forever be an issue. Escalators even more so. Crowded convention halls can be bad, but even more so when someone steps on your tail every ten seconds. Ever tried holding a phone whilst ascending stairs in a very long trenchcoat and a mask with very little visibility? Welcome to my own personal hell.

TO WHOEVER INVENTED STAIRS IN CONVENTION SPACES: LEAVE

JUST LEAVE

3: Finding That One Specific Thing You Need

Ohhh boy, this one really gets my goat. Storytime- I am currently shopping for a long labcoat for a Handplates!Gaster inspired Gaster cosplay. For those of you who don't know, Handplates!Gaster looks like this:

(Art and comic by Zarla on deviantart, it can be found here and I would highly recommend it if you've played Undertale)

Notice how he wears a very long labcoat? Well, even though in anime, cartoons, and books, labcoats are generally getting longer, in real life they are getting shorter and shorter. Why must real life be so un-awesome? And so un-anime? As a result of this, I have spent many hours trawling ebay and amazon, and the only labcoats I found similar to Gaster's one are fancy dress ones or very expensive designer ones (designer labcoats are a legitimate thing I'm so proud of the designers who made that a thing).

4: There's No Such Thing As The Perfect Fabric

If there's anyone out there who's cosplayed a God Tier version of a Homestuck character, you know this feeling. You walk into the fabric store, you look around, and then you realise-

Crap

How the heckity do I choose the correct fabric for this

WHAT IS THIS

It's the same for any other cosplay, honestly. If you've ever tried to make a fursuit, or find fabric for the eyes of a mask, you know the exact same feeling. That feeling of dread when you realise "I have absolutely no clue what the heck I am even doing." This is especially true for n00b cosplayers such as myself, who have little experience choosing the correct fabrics.

5: *Cosplay Falls Apart Midway Through A Con*

"Wait, why am I col- oh crap what broke"

"WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME MY HORN WAS COMING OFF MY WIG"

"Why can I see better now... what fell off the mask oh  c r a p"

"Wait what was that ominous "snap" sound please don't say- oH DAMN THIS SWORD"

"Where did that gem go?"

"THE LIGHTS AREN'T WORKING"

Let's face it, we've all been there, or know somebody who has. When a cosplay breaks, it's pretty much the same as or close to heartbreak for the cosplayer. At my first comic con whilst in cosplay, I ended up with significantly less paint on my Gamzee horns than I had at the beginning. I didn't notice at the time because nobody told me, but there was a huge yellow patch of felt on the red-orange section of the left horn.

It happens to all of us. A quick tip- most cons have a cosplay repair stall. You can fix up anything broken there. If a con will not have a repair stall, BRING A HOT GLUE GUN AND SOME SEWING STUFF. I cannot say the amount of times I have seen someone have to fix their cosplay at a con.

Anyway, that's all I have time for today! If you liked this, and want more stuff like it, go ahead and follow this blog, or go follow my Instagrams (Cosplay acc here and main here). My Tumblr is also a thing (go check the madness out here)

-Etch