My First Cosplay Tips

Cosplay is defined as “the practice of dressing up as a character from a movie, book or video game.” Some of the most popular cosplay is from anime, video games, books, comics, movies or other pop culture. Many people engage in cosplay when they go to comic cons. The term can be used to describe people simply dressing as characters they like, but some people portray very elaborate personas while they are in costume. My favorite cosplays are subtle actions, like picking up the way a character stands, or the famous clip of Luigi below. Deadpool is always the life of the party, breaking the fourth wall and being silly with characters from every fandom. I also enjoy the fun cosplays of Solid Snake, especially when he is hiding in his box. You can also make up your own cosplay instead of just picking a character. Sometimes people will do things like a steampunk version of a Disney princess, or dress up as a video game character who had been drawn in Tim Burton’s style.

There are a few things you need to consider when picking a character you want to play.

1. Do you want to simply dress up, or do you want to pretend to be your character?
2. Do you want your cosplay to be serious or be a joke?
3. Do you need/have help to get your costume on and off? (corsets look great, but most of them are designed for you to have help donning them)
4. Are you going to be comfortable in it for the length of your event? Can you stand or sit as needed? Can you use the restroom?
5. Can you make the costume in a way that fits your body?
   What are you going to do to bring this character to life?
6. Is your character a specific, named character, or are they an NPC? You could just choose to be an Ewok, not a specific Ewok.
7. Can you get through the day without messing up your makeup? Can you apply a touch up the way you’ve chosen to put it on, or do you have to wash it off and start from scratch?

You don’t have to be able to do all of these things alone, but you need to think of them ahead of time so you don’t feel out of place the day you wear your costume.

For me, the first few times I got to cosplay was actually for work at GameStop. I just wanted to dress up as a character to help the day be a little more fun. I love dressing up in costumes. Halloween has been my favorite holiday for years. Any time you cosplay, you are inviting the world to look at you. Unfortunately, not everyone around is going to have the same goals in mind. You may choose to cosplay a character because you admire them. Others may choose to cosplay because they have been told their whole lives that they look like a certain actor or actress. You may choose a costume because you think you can look very much like that person. Since you are inviting people to look at the spectacle you are creating, there are going to be those out there who are not kind. Some will say your costume is not realistic enough. Others will complain that you are not in the right shape to pretend to be that person. For me, I think that your reasons to cosplay have to be your own, and you need to be able to ignore anyone who thinks that only certain people can be a part of this hobby based on their body size.

At GameStop, we had launch events and midnights that we dressed up for. At the time, I did not sew at all. Each of these costumes were made just by wearing specific articles of clothing. I have found that most characters have one or two

things that are iconic; you really need them to be that character. Most of their clothes do not need to be exactly the same, just the right color or style. For instance, if you want to be Link, you can grab a green tunic, a belt, and find a floppy sock-hat, people are going to know who you are meant to be.  For Assassin’s Creed IV, I dressed up as a fairly generic pirate.

The first time we got to dress

up at work was for May the Fourth. We had a contest to see which store had the most spirit. We decided to dress up as Jedi for the day. This is a relatively easy cosplay. We were both humans wearing relatively normal clothes. Black boots, brown pants, a white tunic style shirt and a brown or black robe. If you are feeling a little more creative, you can braid your hair as well, or you can be a different race of Jedi.

We did a midnight event for Batman Arkham Asylum. My coworker dressed up like Scarecrow, and I did my best (not really) impression of Harley Quinn in the game. This is a cosplay that I really wanted to do, though I definitely do not have the body of a super hero. There aren’t a lot of female characters from the game to choose from.  I had only a few days to get the costume together, so I could not order anything special for it; I had to use all items I could find in my house or quickly at a store.  I focused on the things that would make people know who I was meant to be. I definitely didn’t want to permanently dye my hair for a few hours.  In Batman Arkham City, Harley focuses on her pigtails, and the dual colors.  I didn’t have time to slice up some pants and sew them back together, so I took a little inspiration from Harley’s oldschool jester costume and put her diamond logo on my shirt.  I also wore a fabric corset.  Unfortunately, during the pictures it wasn’t sitting the way it was supposed to.  This was for work as well, so I had to wear another shirt under the red one to be professionally appropriate.  If I had been doing it for fun, I probably would have gotten a lower cut red shirt and used a black lacy bra under it that stuck out.  This is one of the outfits that I would love to spend more time doing and try again at a later time.  She’s such a fun character to play that I would enjoy the chance to bring a bit more of her attitude to my cosplay.

The quickest and easiest cosplay I have ever done was Misty from Pokémon. I’ll tell you a secret: I actually really have no love for Pokémon. I appreciate that the game is incredibly popular and that it is well done, but I don’t like leveling and catching little dudes that much. We had a launch event for Pokémon X & Y on a Sunday. All you need is a pair of jean shorts, red suspenders and a yellow tank top. I went a little further and sprayed my hair orange for the day. Would you be able to tell who I was? Sure. Would you confuse me with an actress playing Misty? Probably not, I’m not twelve. But you have to figure out your goals

I have never cosplayed a silly role. Sometimes people will mix characters, like this pic of John Snow White, via BuzzFeed.

Some cosplays are meant to be ironic. Just google Iron Man cosplay. I’ll give you a hint, there are a few more pictures of dudes inside clothes irons than you’d expect. The number of men who have dressed up like Misty from Pokémon is kind of astounding. It’s not uncommon for people to cosplay the opposite sex, however these dudes aren’t trying to pretend they’re girls. They’re just being bearded, hairy grown men in the same clothing Misty wears. If you’re a little more outgoing, this may be the style of cosplay you pick first.

All of my cosplays so far have revolved around comfort. I have not picked a cosplay that will make me need help to get dressed or undressed, which means I have no trouble using the restroom alone. Most of the characters I have played do not involve a lot of makeup. The lipstick I used for Harley Quinn was the thing I had to be careful with most. I had black on one lip and red on the other. Getting better makeup if I had been going to wear it all day would have helped me not have to reapply.

Making your costume fit you is one of the most important parts to cosplay. I’ve learned from watching What Not To Wear that many Americans don’t know how to dress themselves properly even in regular clothes. It is much more important to have clothes that fit you properly than almost anything else. Let’s say you are cosplaying Yuna from FFX-2. She wears a pair of blue shorts that crawl up her behind, her chest is rather large and she is unable to be wearing anything supportive under that shirt, and her abs are rockin’, so her shirt does not come down to meet her shorts. But she has a really cool half skirt, and she’s an amazing character. Video game characters are animated, and many of them are unrealistic. Yuna never has a wardrobe malfunction, even though her shorts or shirt appear to be able to slip at any moment. You should not be concerned with the exact length of your shorts compared to hers; you should be concerned with whether or not you can spend the day in those shorts. Are they too baggy or are you spilling out of them?  You can make her shirt a little longer if you are not comfortable showing off your belly. Nobody is going to get out a ruler and tell you that your shirt doesn’t come to the right place. But if you appear to be bursting out of your clothing, or you have a beer gut hanging out between your shirt and your shorts, you are going to destroy the illusion of the character you are trying to be, and you will probably receive nastier comments from rude people. It is better to alter the costume to your body type than to play a character of a body type you are not. Sometimes this means making the clothing a little longer, sometimes it involves adding muscles made of padding, sometimes it just involves the correct underclothes, but you need to design your costume so people are looking at the costume, not worrying about other things like your body type.

There is a vocal community of people who often attack others, especially women, for cosplaying characters who are not of the same body type. People are attacked for being men playing as women, women playing as men, or characters only being allowed to be played by one race. If you are African American, and you want to play almost any Final Fantasy character (which are all a weird mix of white-washed Asians), you should have the confidence to rock your costume. If I want to play Michonne from The Walking Dead, I should be able to. There are entire websites dedicated to what they call “cosplay gone wrong,” which I will not link here, because I believe these people’s opinions are not valid. It is possible that you will get made fun of for your cosplay, especially if you are a larger woman. Almost all lead female characters are smaller than the average American, and most animated leads are not proportioned like normal humans. The most well known professional cosplayers get cosmetic surgery to appear more like our stylized version of beauty. The only opinion that matters is your own. Are you having fun doing what you are doing? I do not want anyone to be scared to try it because of what others may say, but I personally would want to be prepared to deal with jerks instead of being blindsided by their intolerance.  If you are going to cosplay, make sure you are doing it for you, and for the other people who want to have fun, not the people who are going to hate.

Halloween makeup is a fine place to start if you are going to be at a party for a few hours. If you are going to a convention for an entire day and you’d like your makeup to last, you may want to invest in some stage makeup. For me, after an hour or two any colored Halloween makeup starts to crack or itch. Some of it flakes off, and some of it smudges really easily. If you’re going to spend a lot of time doing intricate makeup, you probably want it to last all day, so making a higher quality purchase will probably help. I have some great matte lipstick that I can get through hours without having to reapply. Even if you are playing a character that has no makeup, you will look a lot more like you belong in a game with simple things like foundation and eyeliner.

That’s all the advice I have to give to people who may want to think about their first simple cosplay. Beyond everything else, have fun. If you’re not having fun, there’s no point. Later, we’ll explore some more involved cosplay and maybe even get to talk to someone who has done it on a professional level.