Interview with CosplayerNation

Before Christmas myself, Fiona and Jay aka Mechanic Geisha who on the Cosplay Ireland team done an interview about the cosplay scene in Ireland for CosplayerNation who do cosplay documentries around the world. We were very glad to be in this video.

Cosplay Ireland Christmas Shoot

Hope everyone is having a good Christmas. Here are some of the photos we done for Cosplay Ireland before Christmas. Photos taken by Stephen CosplayIreland.

Merry Christmas

I would like to wish the ones who ready my blog, being following my journey and following my cosplays and modelling a Merry Christmas! Without you guys I wouldn't have made it this far. :) Thank you so much for your compliments and encouragement.

Going Professional

It is so strange when I look over this blog and compare my real old posts to my recent ones. It is like my blog has gotten "commerical" is that how I should say it?.. It is like growing up or you are maturing over the years. I now have to be careful how I am percieved on the internet when I once was just a person and be cautious of my image. No complaints.

Interesting Anime Academic Books I am Reading

I just finished reading two books named; Mechademia Volume 1; Emerging Worlds of  Anime and Manga and Fandom Unbound: Otaku Culture In a Connected World.

I really enjoyed these two books. As I may have mentioned that I have a big interest in anime culture giving I come from a strong anime background, being part of con organising for the last 6 years and have been cosplaying for six years I am fascinated to learn more on what anime culture has to offer. Also giving I studied Cultural studies for my BA degree these books were very interesting as they touched on a sense of belonging in the community and on cultural terminology. I really wish I had these books alot sooner when I was doing my Cultural studies degree.

Both books have fascinating articles written by many academic and cultural lecturers and anime fans who are current anime academics.  Mechademia Volume 1 highlights the artistic element to anime and composition such as deep stories and character development and camera angles, while Fandom Unbound focuses more on the wide anime culture and how we are living in a digital age and being connected through conventions, Doujin circles, cosplay and the internet. One of the most fascinating chapters from this book was the first chapter on Train Otaku, this was new to me.

If you are into these sorta book I highly would recommend them. I know want to order and read more of the Mechademia series and more academic books on anime.

Here you watch and download the full video footage which would give you a taster of the Fandom Unbound: Otaku Culture In a Connected World.

Very Busy New Year

I really can't believe Christmas is next week! I am really looking forward to it and will soon be ready for it. Well I have big news, I finally got an internship with an event management company, it is from January to June and I will be working 9-5pm Monday to Tuesday. I look forward to starting and seeing what I come out with and what experience I will gain. I feel this is one step closer getting to my dream. Of course I will still continue my modelling and cosplaying and will try and do professional style shoots for my image. I also need to get back to doing my professional website.

I will be really busy with the Experience Japan Festival which will be held around April. We will be doing a seminar series and will be running events leading up to the festival around cultural museums and galleries in Dublin. In the works, I will be doing a seminar on the arts of cosplay with Fiona and we will be doing many seminars on Anime, Manga, Japanese pop culture and on Japanese traditional culture. I will also try my best to be very productive on this blog and will update the cosplay-educational blog.

Cosplay Ireland Photoshoot

So we had round two for the CosArt exhibition photoshoot yesterday. A big thanks to Stephen Hedley for taking the shots and for the cosplayers for coming along. There were all fantastic and it was such a laugh! Thanks to cosplayer AnonJames who was Grell for doing this video.


The video can be seen here.

Irish Dramas are not all that bad (NSFW)

Ok we can't really compete with Japanese Anime, Korean Dramas and hit American TV shows but I am really enjoying Irish gangster drama Love/Hate. It has superb acting, good character development. The Irish are always getting knocked for their acting but this one is a real gem. I am not sure how well it is doing internationally. It ain't no Sopranos or Breaking Bad but it is a good show for an Irish drama. You might enjoy it.

Running too many sites

It has come to my attention that I am far too many cosplay and modelling sites which leads me to spend too much time on the Internet. As much as I love the Internet and it gave me a great opportunity to get my work out there and connect and meet people who I never would have met before I spend too much time on it, when I don't spend much time doing other things that make me happy such as my family, friends, and watching anime. I am defiantly thinking of deleting my accounts or maybe only update them once and while as I want to support cosplay websites. I need to get back to working on my website and apply for jobs, I suppose it is more of a focus and time management issue and I need to set prioties straight.

My DeviantArt is my main site for uploading images and Facebook but I upload all my work on DeviantArt as I feel some images aren't appropiate for Facebook. I still use Tumblr, cosplay.com, cure, ModelMayhem and WorldCosplay from time to time. Cosplayisland and folio I rarely use but will remain an account there for support and will update occasionally. I will also get back to updating my cosplay educational blog.

This post was for people who follow my work and will know where I update the most.

Inspirational Spiral Cats Interview

I am a big fan of the Spiral Cats, not only are they fantastic cosplayers, they challenge the whole cosplay professionalism. I really think it is good that they are cosplayers out there pushing it as an art and wish to seek a profession in it in some way. I found this interview inspirational.

If 6 was 9

This is one of the best covers I ever listened to. Tori is amazing.

Oh my Asuka what big Eva you are piloting there..

Really excited! :D

Graduation

Yesterday I graduated from my Postgrade Diploma in Business and Cultural Event Management IADT. It was a very enjoyable day. The ceremony was nice, relaxing and short. It was lovely catching up with my classmates. A big thanks to my family for making it a special day. It was my involvement with Eirtakon and Experience Japan which helped me make the decision to get a qualification in Cultural Event Management.

Lets hope good things come my way. :)

Eirtakon 2012!

Over the weekend I was busy running the cosplay events with Fiona, Jay and Nicole. I have been involved with Eirtakon for six years being one of the Cosplay and Fashion Coordinators and it a large job. Eirtakon went very well this year and it was all thanks to the hard working committee!

So there is me on the right cosplaying as Rei Miyamoto from High School of the Dead with my cosplay partner Fiona cosplaying as Saya looking lovely. This picture was taken at the start of the big day ahead of us!

The three girls, Nicole as Saeko. I used Fiona's BadGirl Baseball bat as a prop. ;)

There were alot of very good Avengers Cosplay. That is Kathryn crossplaying as Loki very impressive! Her cosplays are always fantastic.

This was the Cosplay Experts panel I done with Fiona, Tríona from Tóg.ie, Micheal, Joe and Jay. We talked about different topics and gave advice on different aspects in cosplaying.

I spoke of inspirations for photoshoots and costume ideas. To take your inspirations from everywhere not just from anime, comics and films. As a cosplayer I am really inspired by fashion photography, album art and music and I put more focus on the acting and roleplaying part then the costume. I am still learning and is always looking at ways to improve my skills and when I get abit of free time I would like to begin a dressmaking course so I can make my costumes.  I also highlighted to use your imagination and be creative and that the acting part of Cosplay is just as important as the costume part.

 The above scary looking clown guy is Joe a professional prop maker and made my Babydoll props. He also spoke about prop making in the Cosplay Experts panel. That is Tina as Harlyquinn with an anime twist, she made her own mallet which looks class.

 That is Sean who is on the Eirtakon committee too, doing a panel on Gundam. Mr. Yamada from the Japanese Embassy visit Eirtakon and was very impressed with Sean's Gundam panel.

 Alot of People in the trader hall. We may have had nearly 2,000 attendees which is large for an Irish convention.

 We had a Japanese culture area where the college Japanese society and Experience Japan the other event I am involved with had tables educating people on Japanese culture. These are images of the Wishing Tree were attendees wrote their wishes. :)

This is Fairtakon, a mini carnival Eirtakon style!

 The prizes which are game cards and glorious figurines.

Aha! Speaking of Eirtakon style, we done a suprise event the Gangnam Dance where we acted like eejits and grabed as much as possible to the stage. It was my highlight of Eirtakon!



This was a great idea which the committee came out with! Each member of the committee had to recommend an anime to the attendees. Can you figure out which anime I recommended? ;P

Great SailorIronman and SailorThor cosplayers!

 This is Kate Courtney who does a fantastic Grell. She does alot of shoots and has an account on DeviantArt and WorldCosplay. You may have seen her Grell cosplay around.

 This is the Artist Alley. Alot of very talented aritsts.

Very impressive prop!

 Finally for the first time other Asuka and Rei cosplayers! I cosplayed as Rei with Vicky who was Asuka back at Eirtakon 2010 and eversince we have not seen another Evangelion cosplayer. I spoke to these ladies and they were lovely.

 Impressive Steampunk! It was a pleasure interveiwng these ladies at the StageShow on the Sunday. The
StageShow was an event where Jay and I interviewed cosplayers and fashion people about their creations and ideas.

I really had a fun and enjoyable weekend. It was always a pleasure chatting to folks. Unfortunely we never got a chance to do a mini High School of the Dead shoot as we were so busy running events and then when we were free we were too tired to pose. I might get some pictures this weekend or at the CosArt shoots with Stephen.

Updates!

I apologise for the lack of updates. I will try to be better. :) Alot has happened since I last updated my blog. Things have been going well with Cosplay Ireland. We done a Halloween Cosplay shoot in a lovely park in St. Annes just outside Dublin which went well and we had three fantastic photographers and many cosplayers come along!

Thanks alot to Úna from the Irishpress for doing a blog post on Fiona and I with Cosplay Ireland. It can be read here - http://worldirish.com/story/14451-meet-amy-king-of-cosplay-ireland-an-organisation-based-in-dublin

Also earlier today I done a photoshoot with photographers Lisa Tiffany Gellar and Steve Dempsey in Pheonix Park. They took more photos of my Little Red Riding Rei cosplay and this time thanks to Nora Fox who makes my costume and helps me, she made my cloak and made my basket more the part. The setting for the shoot was beautiful and very well suited to Little Red Riding Hood with alot of leaves and a lake. I had alot of fun with Lisa and Steve.

Here is one photo from the shoot from Steve. :) Looking forward to seeing the rest!

I had such a great day today! I guess it was very eventful. RTE which is Ireland's national TV channel production company contacted my partner in crime Fiona about Cosplay Ireland getting involved with a lip syncing video with different groups that bring colour and excitment during the recession. We used the song Brewing up the Storm. I really felt I was an extra in a movie as it was very professional and well down, even though we were all very tired with the standing around which we were doing for most of the day, I actually really enjoyed it as I felt I was on set.

We did abit of rehearsing and we met lots of different types of people from all over Ireland in amazing costumes and dress! I spoke for a few minutes to a TV crew about my character C.C. and we got to meet Ryan Tubridy who is a big TV personailty here and hosts the nationwide Late Late Show. A really nice guy. I am really looking forward to seeing the finished project and really hope it will be on TV or even if it gets on to youtube that would be a great experience! It may have been a long and exhausting day but we got cosplay out there and hope more will come our way. Jay Mechanic Geisha -[link] helped out again being our make up artist so it was very good of her to give up her day and help out.

We hope with Cosplay Ireland to do second round of the CosArt exhibition shoots very soon.

There we all are posing with Ryan Tubridy.

The video we danced to.

Then on Sunday I will be C.C. in the Black Knight costume again for the Dublin International Comic Expo. We are trying to encourage cosplay at nany events like at the big Comic Con in the US. Shoud be a fun day!

I am featured in the Sunday Times!

While I was in Budapest I got an unexpected call while on the tour bus from the Sunday Times Newspaper which is a big nationwide newspaper in Ireland. They wanted to do a quick interview on the Cosplay and convention scene in Ireland and on Cosplay Ireland.

Here is the article. :)I will get better pictures of the text tomorrow.

Anime Fandom

I watched this video a few years back and would like to share it. I watched it a few years times and it leaves me with a fuzzy and warm feeling and why I seriously love being involved with conventions and the scene.



This is a good video I found on Youtube of convention life. :)

The World is like a book and those who do not travel only read one page.

I just wanted to say that I really think the internet is really a fascinating place! We really are living in interesting times. It was just after Nomcon I realised the Anime community in Ireland has really come together. We really went from scattered fans to a tight nit community.

I recall at the age of 17 when I was only new to anime and there was a small Irish Anime forum named Eirtaku, then in 2005 came Eirtakon the first proper anime/manga convention in Ireland, then after Eirtakon came Nomcon, Arcadecon and Akumakon and the anime fandom exploded. Due to the scene getting bigger and cosplay getting more popular Cosplay Ireland was created, then came along other communities on Facebook and these all brought the Irish anime/manga community together.  I have been meeting alot of cosplayers which I have never met before. We all really came a long way. It is not only in Ireland but I feel thanks to the Internet I have met great and artistic people through this fandom. I even feel closer to manga artists who seemed light years away when I was younger and now with Twitter and social media we can become connected sharing art pieces and commenting. To takes things on a broader scale thanks to Twitter and Social media we are kept updated on what is happening in the world. Back in the 1960s people wowed over the birth of the television which was an open to day to the world and now we have the Internet.

If it wasn't for the Internet I would have found it harder to express myself, meet like minded folks and it would have been very difficult for the anime communities to come together.

The world is really in your bedroom or at the palm of your hand. The video below is Eric Whitacre Vitual Choir which was a video I used for my Social Media presentation in college. The video was a worldwide virtual choir of 58 countries worldwide taking part in this project in unity. It really potrays the world being connected. It really is amazing how we can work on projects when we are many moons away when it wasn't possible a good few years ago.

 


It really is incredible.

The Tall Ships Festival 2012

During the Nomcon weekend I attended the Tall Ships Festival which is a large festival in Dublin exhibiting pirate ships and military ships from all around the world.

I only attended the Friday night but had a great time! They were lots of people around and a high buzz, also very athmospheric.

Unfortunely it was raining so the picture didn't come out too good.

 This was really cool, the performers were very dramatic and really fast paced dance music was played.

 This performer was gorgeous it really looks like she is flying. Her cape was flown down to the audience. Also spot the mermaid on the sea horse on the right. Stunning costume.

 These were floats going around the festival and people could join in.

 Here are a few images of the Martime Festival (the old name) two years ago. A big difference in the weather!

It is tradition for me to wear my sailor outfit to this festival every year.

Also unfortunely I never really got a chance to volunteer at the Darklight Festival due to work but I heard it was really good so glad it went really well! Also Lorraine Scanlon who I know from the con scene is running a worldwide animation convention named Aka-Con in Dublin around April if anyone is interested.