Hall Meeting: When Should I Buy Theatrical Contacts?

Ah, Halloween. That special time of year when your beloved vampire/werewolf/hybrid lover can look into your eyes with those romantic... super creepy... glowing red eyes of his.

Theatrical contacts, while not much more expensive than a long wig for even prescription lenses, are commonly seen as quite an investment that many people opt out of when putting together cosplay. Maybe it’s because you have to go through the trouble of having an updated prescription (even for plano lenses), maybe it’s nearly impossible to get them if you’ve chosen to do a last-minute cosplay, maybe because it’s one more thing added to the budget. So realistically, when should you buy contacts? Here are my conditions for buying contacts.

1) If you’re going to steadily cosplay that character. I have ‘Terran’ blue contacts for Kuja because I will be cosplaying that man for quite some time.
2) If you have a lot of characters with the same altered eye color planned. For some reason, I’ve been attracted to gold-eyed characters lately. Post Tokyo-Revelations Fai Fluorite, Grell Sutcliff, Albireo, and Emperor Fou-lu all have gold eye(s).
3) If having the right-colored eyes is the only way for the make-up/hair/skin tone scheme to work. For the aforementioned Kuja cosplay, those blue eyes locked in the pale skin and silver hair color combination.
4) If that eye color is significant to the plot. If that character has blue eyes just because that’s how the art is, then that’s not so bad. But if your character has blue eyes that glow like toxic waste because he was pumped full of Jenova’s DNA, then you should invest in contacts.

In general, if you can fit the contacts into your budget, there is no reason to not plan ahead of time and order them. For me, they make a huge difference in how in character I will be. At a convention, I’ll turn off being in character to do something like… walk into the women’s restroom, take a breather to check my phone, readjust my wig and reapply my man-lipstick. All I have to do is look in the mirror. Just having an eye color different from my own (not too many hazel brown-eyed characters in the world of anime) gets me back in character. It’s pretty handy.

Hall Meeting: Guest Lecturer!

Watch as Sea Lion-sensee demonstrates improper convention behavior:

1) no inappropriate glomping

2) no disturbing others with random shouting

3) no pushing and shoving!

(This movie belongs to me.)

Hall Meeting: My Real Name

Let’s flash back to Anime Matsuri 2. I’m working the game room, making sure everyone is being nice and civil when beating each other to a pulp in SSBM. And I’m wearing Duo Lon from King of Fighters, because I needed another costume last minute and it had to fit both the gaming theme and my tastes in cosplay.

You are doing the game room thing. And you ask for my name. How nice. So I tell you: greyrondo. You have a creepy kind of look in your eye and you sound really sleazy when you ask for my real name.

I fork it over, wondering if possibly you’re new to this whole thing and you’re uncomfortable with the concept of a cosplay name. When in reality, no. You’re just a creeper.

Unless I have struck up a long conversation with you and I intend to speak with you after this convention, if you ask for my name in costume, I will tell you greyrondo. If you ask me outside of costume, I will likely tell you my birth name.

What’s the difference? Giving you my cosplay name will give you a way to find me on the forums and is much easier than printing ‘business’ cards. When I’m in costume, telling you my real name is ridiculous. No one recognizes me out of costume. Ever. I have stared people in the face. I have embarrassingly waved at people in packed restaurants and made a fool out of myself.

And they still didn’t recognize me.

Hall Meeting: When Acting in Character Becomes Downright Anti-social

In all my years, I don’t think I have cosplayed a single normal, entirely socially-adjusted character. So I get it. Your character can destroy the world with about as much thought as it takes for me to make a peanut-butter and jelly sandwich. And because your character can do this, he/she/it/all of the above looks down on the rest of society and either says nothing or only opens their mouth to be a jerkface. And because you’re a dedicated cosplayer, you act in character.

Normally, I’d tell anyone who acts in character that they’re awesome for being so committed. But frankly, I don’t want to tell you because you’ll respond with something like, “heh. You humans are dazzled by the most pathetic things. Go drown yourselves in the slime of your own inadequacies.”

If your character is belligerently anti-social, for the love of cosplay, turn it on when you’re posing for a photo or when you’re role-playing. For the rest of the world, just be neutral. People will remember you as the amazing cosplayer who could effortlessly go between their character and real life.

Hall Meeting: The Other Side of the Lens

If you’ve already taken photographs of cosplayers and you haven’t yet been mauled, then you’re already doing mostly everything right. But here are a few more things to keep in mind to make the cosplayers like you even more (yes, we remember who you are.)

Do ask before you take your photograph. Don’t groan just yet: ‘asking’ can mean different things depending on the context. I won’t hold it against you if you’re the more shy type who looks hopeful and then points to their camera while making eye contact, or if someone else is already taking a photograph and you take a shot yourself without a peace offering.

I feel that this is important because it gives the cosplayer time to prepare. Particularly with cosplayers like myself who wear less rather than more, I feel much more comfortable when you ask before taking the shot. If I hear the shutter noise and I turn around to find you facing me but closing up your camera, I’m going to assume that you were taking a photograph of my backside. If you ask me beforehand, even if it’s your intent to take a picture of say, my wig or some pattern on my skirt, then I’m fine with what otherwise would have seriously peeved me.

If you consider yourself a more serious photographer, please treat the cosplayer well and, if possible, give direction. I’ve known a more serious and famous cosplay photographer or two who will more or less take their shot, demand ‘what other poses have you got?’ and then take their kill and stalk off in search of more, as if their status puts them at the same level as, say, Miranda Priestly of Devil Wears Prada fame (who everyone in the novel secretly hated, I might note.) We both know that you’re going to upload all of these photos to cosplay.com at the end of the weekend, why not take a few more moments to offer assistance and make the photograph look better for both parties?

And for cosplayers: please take the two seconds to acknowledge the people who took your photographs after all is said and done. I like to maintain character and offer a flourished bow with a vampiric smile. Flash a victory sign, a salute… whatever works!