artafrd

[artafrd]

My A-KON 2018 experience.

Greetings everyone! I know that this technically isn't new, but it occurred to me that I haven't told everyone about my previous project. I'm sure everyone is dying to know.

 A few months ago, my fabulous boyfriend Jace invited me to go to A-kon with him in Fort Worth Texas.

 At these conventions, they have cosplay contests.  In these, you can either enter as a walk on (think, runway modeling for nerds) OR a skit. Obviously, I chose the skit. What can I say, I'm just a sucker for performing.

 First step was to decide who to go as. I made a short list, but soon I chose Alice in Wonderland. Because I would make an awesome Alice. Plus, I've always wanted to do a wonderland themed dance.

 Next step: Music. This was a full weekend project. First thing I did was decide on a song. It took about an hour to decide I definitely had no choice but to do Sweet Dreams (are made of this). Obviously. I spent HOURS listening to covers, remixes, whatever I could find. I couldn't settle on one song, so I took 3 different versions and mashed them into one living breathing thing. I liked it, but it needed something more.  I decided to take actual audio from the movie and sprinkle it on top. (During this whole process I was showing my dad my progress and asking his opinion. When I added the quotes, I could tell by his reaction I had nailed it. Thanks, dad.)

When I had finally finished the music, I sent it in to be approved. The cut off limit for skits was 3 minutes. ...my song was 2 minutes and 58 seconds.

(Here is a link if you want to hear it! )

 Next step, a concept. Obviously, with this song I wanted to do something inspired by the idea of Alice's descent into madness. Mom and I started throwing out ideas about having a costume that transforms during the performance. I loved the idea. I started doing some sketches.

 Then, CHOREOGRAPHY. 2:58 minutes worth of it. What have I done?? I knew I wanted to go from a classic, cute little ballet thing like the “classic” Alice, then morph it into creepy contemporary for the “mad” Alice. It took months to finish. I was working in a roughly 30 by 25 foot room, also. This means I couldn't do it full out until I went home where I could use the dance studio. After many sore muscles, frustrated chorio sessions, and help from my dad when I was stuck, I got it done.

 The costume itself didn't take very long. When Mom came up to WV, we sat down and came up with a little tear away dress and a leotard with a torn up skirt. It worked flawlessly.

 I get down to Arkansas and only have a very short amount of time to practice full out. Maybe a week. Lots and lots of hard work. I was actually really scared that I couldn't make it all the way to the end of the dance. It was so high energy and high difficulty for nearly 3 minutes! It was considered a good practice when I could make it through the whole thing once or twice. Katie, mom, Jace and miss Patty were very helpful and encouraging. I'm so grateful to have them.

 The convention finally comes around! I get signed in for the contest. I meet a couple people who I was gonna be going against. I start getting a little nervous.

 Later that evening they had a roll call and the line up. The walk on went first, then the skits. Surprise, I was the very last contestant.

  Waiting to go on, I started marking the dance. Soon I realized my shoes were going to slide off if I didn't do something about it. I talk to Jace, and we decided to maybe attach the shoes to my stockings. In a room full of cosplayers, it took about half a second to get a needle and thread after Jace shouted what we needed.

 Jace was such a trooper through the whole thing, I was so nervous I would bite his shoulders or hands or arms. He didn't like it very much, but it helped. Haha. Eventually he got me ice to chew on.

 Soon it was finally time. I was so nervous. When I started, I didn't get much applause so I thought everyone hated it. The change in choreography, music and costume surprised everyone and they were all roaring. I was SO relieved. Through the rest of the dance, everybody loved it. I made it through the entire dance, even after hitting my head on the stage.

 Jace had been videoing the whole thing (so my family didn't murder him) from right next to the stage. As soon as I got off he was right there with praise and hugs and kisses. I was so happy. We got back stage and my adrenaline rush crashed. I was shaking all over and hitting my head didn't help, so he carried me into the room all the contestants were kept. I'm pretty sure he got boyfriend of the year award as soon as he walked through the door with me in his arms. Everyone was being so nice!! I'm so happy that I got to participate with all of those sweet people. We came in and they all applauded. I was blown away, honestly.

I ended up getting second place in skits! I was very happy. The group who won were telling me they had decided if they lost to me, they would be perfectly okay with it. That was honestly the nicest thing to say. They deserve it.

Walking around the convention, I suddenly had a few fans. I was known as THE Alice. It was really cool.

Definitely an awesome experience.

[artafrd]

HEY ARTISTS!

Do you design a lot of characters living in not-modern eras and you’re tired of combing through google for the perfect outfit references? Well I got good news for you kiddo, this website has you covered! Originally @modmad made a post about it, but her link stopped working and I managed to fix it, so here’s a new post. Basically, this is a costume rental website for plays and stage shows and what not, they have outfits for several different decades from medieval to the 1980s. LOOK AT THIS SELECTION:

OPEN ANY CATEGORY AND OH LORDY–

There’s a lot of really specific stuff in here, I design a lot of 1930s characters for my ask blog and with more chapters on the way for the game it belongs to I’m gonna be designing more, and this website is going to be an invaluable reference. I hope this can be useful to my other fellow artists as well! :)