April Insanity

I was going to do a photo post of Mai last week, since I have shots back from both Very Frank Pictures and Everage Photography now... and then all kinds of STUFF happened. 

Cosplay: I've been working hard to finish my Kate Bishop costume, but I needed to stop to get grommets for the quiver. Which I then couldn't find (for a reasonable price). Between many hours wasted searching 5 different dollar stores and then the Easter holiday store closures, I just got a hold of what I need from Fabricland today. So, barring any more disasters, I want to finish assembling the quiver as soon as possible and get the shoulder straps attached before Friday. Since I didn't do any work on Hawkeye over the long weekend, what did I do? 

Checking out the Hawkeye chevron before gluing the fabric down permanently.

One full size arrow and all my "extra" arrows ready to go!

Good Friday: Elemental and I were joined by Darthmarysue at the Mystery Shack for a day of thermoplastic, wig-styling, and spring cleaning, apparently. I had planned to work on Hawkeye and Midna, but tidying up a few things so I had room to work soon became a full-scale clean up of my studio area. The cleaning was long over-due... I managed to purge two garbage bags of trash, and I have two more bags of stuff to donate or give away. There's still much more to do, but in terms of my fabric stash I've achieved a lot, and only have a couple more boxes of fabric to sort, label, and repack.

.... once that's done though, the next big job is getting rid of most of my retired costumes. I still have more storage space to reclaim!

Not the best before and after photo, since the "before" was taken in November, but it does get the point across. The shelves are so much neater and just LOOK AT ALL THAT VISIBLE FLOOR!!!

Seems a little corpsey around here: The following Saturday, Sunday (and Monday) brought a BIG change of pace for me. Hannibal is one of the ongoing TV shows which is produced in Toronto, and my friend Katherine is working on the effects team. They needed some sewing done on a costume for the upcoming season, and since their usual seamstress is on vacation I got the opportunity to fill in! "Baby's first industry job" was the phrase of the day. It was really cool getting to spend a few days surrounded by display pieces from Hannibal and all the Saw movies and more, and to see some of the process on various FX pieces, even though I myself was mostly stitching velcro! I'm not going to post about exactly what I was working on until the episode airs, but I will be sure to follow up on that ^_^

Waitaminute - what the f*ck is that???

Don't worry, I made friends with the corpse totem and they were my new sewing buddies!

Ad-Astra: This con really snuck up on me! I'm working on last-minute fixes/additions/repairs/finishing touches on all of these costumes, but I have faith that everything will at least be wearable. Aside from the masquerade, I'm not planning to participate in events or panels, but I'm looking forward to doing some photo shoots with Elemental and hanging out with Kurumasha and Calamity; girls from the awesome Ottawa cosplay crew. only second to Anime North, Ad-Astra is one of the conventions I've attended the most, and I'm definitely excited to be back again this year (even if most of my cosplay friends are going to GTA Comic Con instead :P)

C2E2: Things seem to be coming together nicely for my Chicago trip with KW Iron Man and Ragz, although I still haven't picked out a costume for Sunday. Plans for Saturday are set in stone though since I'm going to be competing in the C2E2 Crown Championships of Cosplay!!! It's my first ever competition at an AmeriCon* and I'm really excited to get to go on stage with so many very talented people! I can't wait to meet everyone and ogle all the costumes backstage. And I'm also excited to get to talk to the judges - it's not often that I have my workmanship judged by a panel of cosplayers, FX artists, and TV costume designers. 
You should totally check out all the entrants and judges on the competition page!

Still going to try to get those Mai photos posted soon, but with everything else I'm working on at the moment, I'm not making any promises.

*AmeriCon: convention in the US. I'm a literary genius.