Katsucon 2016

I'm back from my 6th Katsucon!! I almost didn't go this year, but I'm really glad I did!

(This post feels like it makes no sense to me. I think I'm sleep deprived. Please forgive me. Hopefully I'll come back to this tomorrow and fix it up.) 

I almost backed out of going this year because none of my con-going friends from school were going. I went to AUSA despite that, but I knew then that I would have Twitter / con friends that I could meet up with. Luckily I was able to borrow one of my friends for the weekend, so I wasn't alone!

This was the first time I put no effort into getting ready for Katsu. It's a little pitiful. This is probably the most chill Katsu I've had, but I still had a lot of fun! I only took ten pictures this year ;; The first couple years I went I took well over a hundred pictures, so this is really strange for me. 

I decided to skip Friday since it lowered the cost for me by $20. My parents told me not to buy my badge ahead of time in case we got a huge snowstorm like last year. We actually did get some snow Friday night into Saturday morning, but luckily nothing like last year. Unfortunately Saturday was freezing cold. 

This year was also unique in the fact this was the first time in six years of con-going that I experienced my first "disaster" of sorts. Jessica and I were out at lunch when we heard about the Gaylord being evacuated, so we luckily missed a lot of the chaos. 

This was the registration line when we got there around 9am Saturday morning. This was insane. The lines are usually long, and last year I was amazed that we got our badges in under an hour. This year we got them in under 20 minutes. Major props to the staff tbh

Jessica and I cosplayed Camp Half-Blood kids, and we managed to find a Camp Jupiter cosplayer, which was :OO

All the other cosplayers I got pictures of were from Miraculous Ladybug! I was so happy to see so many ♥ ML has become my life recently lol

I'm pretty sure this Cat Noir is @thealchemicfox

I saw very few Adrien cosplayers, which I was kind of sad about, since he's probably my favorite character. I'm upset this picture turned out kind of blurry since these two were really cute

I really love the designs of these cosplays! The Ladybug cosplayer complimented my Sailor Moon hoodie after I got their picture, which was really ♥o♥

I owe a lot to Jessica for being willing to come to Katsu with me this year ♥ She was very patient with me while I fangirled about ML and even let me get her into the fandom, which means a lot to me lol She's willing to come to other conventions in the future so I'm hoping it'll work out for us!

I also owe a lot to my parents for spending another Valentine's weekend at the con so I could attend ♥ I really appreciate that they're supportive of my hobby, and that they enjoy the convention enough to continue to come back. (Hopefully they'll start cosplaying next year P: )

This haul is tiny compared to previous years lol I'm getting better about not buying everything I see, since I don't have enough room on my walls to hang all of my posters up anymore :c This year's AA also felt really tiny. Dealer's felt huge this year, and surprisingly I didn't buy anything out of it. 

(I just realized I left out the things I bought on Sunday since I left them in my backpack OTL) 

I'm going to update this post once I can find links to the cosplayers and the artists I bought from! Hopefully it won't take me more than a few days.

I didn't spend as much time at the convention this year from being worn-out from school and not wanting to bore Jessica. I didn't go to any panels or photoshoots, which I'm a little sad about, but I didn't look into any beforehand to know which ones were at the con this year. I also didn't get a schedule of the panels in the booklet :c I don't know if they didn't give any out or if I managed to get a bag without one.

I got to see almost all of my con friends! It was all by chance, too ♥ It means a lot to me that I've made friends through cons and through Twitter that I can look forward to meeting, since that wasn't something I expected to happen when I started going to Katsu back in 8th grade.

My next anime event will be the DC Cherry Blossom Festival! I'm looking forward to it c: After that will be Otakon during my birthday weekend! :D

Katsucon 2015

Katsucon 2015 was a great experience. I've learned so much since my first time five years ago, and it's amazing to see how far I've come and how many awesome experiences I've had. 

This year was actually the first time I didn't have pre-con jitters to the point that it made me anxious. I'm usually pretty wound up the week or so before a convention, which sometimes took a toll on how I felt, and I never experienced that this year. I felt completely prepared and relaxed! I mentioned this in my vlogs, but when I walked into Katsucon this year, I just got this feeling of "home" -- it's become so familiar to me that I just felt so content to be there, even if I wasn't specifically doing anything. 

I actually only cosplayed once this year! Friday, we left right after school, so I asked my parents to bring my Free! Iwatobi jacket for me to change into. I brought my black wig so I could be Haru once I got my badge, but I decided against putting it on. Saturday I got to wear my Tsukino Usagi / sailor hoodie cosplay, which I really loved. Sunday I just wore my Iwatobi jacket again. 

The line situation seemed to be kind of a mess this year, because they grouped both at-door and pre-reg into the same line out in the main hallway, so I thought the line was super long. However, occasionally staff would walk down the line and ask if anyone was pre-reg, and then they would let us go into Hall E. The line inside the reg room got a little messed up right around the front, so Cindy and I probably jumped ahead by accident;; We were only in line for an hour though! I was amazed. Poor Emily had to wait with Charlotte and her bae because they hadn't pre-regged in time and she was nice enough to keep them company. 

I did almost everything I wanted to do this year! The biggest disappointment was not being able to meet Sachie, since I missed meeting her at Otakon like two years ago. But I did get to meet Josie and Liz from twitter, and I got to see a bunch of people in the DTP circles again ♥ I got to stay at the kigu party on Friday for a while, and that was super fun. 

My grandparents came down for the day on Saturday since they seemed curious about conventions, and it actually went a lot smoother than I anticipated. I was a little scared to see how it would go, just because they're unfamiliar with a lot of the anime / congoing culture, but I never got the feeling that they were like "ew your hobby is kind of weird", and I really appreciate that. I had a lot of fun sitting in the atrium with my family and people-watching. They asked me lots of questions, and a lot of times I couldn't answer them because they would ask about series I'm unfamiliar with, but I was really glad that they were engaged and interested. 

We did finally get to experience a Katsnowcon, which was a little bit of a mess. It started snowing Saturday evening, right around the time we were about to leave, and for a few minutes it was basically a white-out. We managed to get home safely, and I think we were really lucky that nothing catastrophic happened at all. Mom and I took the Metro down on Sunday because the roads still looked kind of bad and Dad had to deal with a frozen water pipe (and then got called into work). I'm really hoping that next year we can finally stay down at National Harbor so we don't have to worry about commuting back and forth.  

I actually came home with a relatively small loot this year! I only used ~2/3 of the Christmas money I had saved for the weekend. I only got one "full size" print; the rest are about normal paper size. I think what I'm most excited about is the Ladies of Literature zine, since I saw andythelemon mention it on her tumblr, but I didn't expect I'd ever have a chance to buy it. I also got a commission from kristinkemper, which I am sooooo happy about because she's one of my favorite artists. 

I didn't get to vlog as much as I wanted to, but I got enough footage that I'll have five videos. A good portion of the footage is actually stuff I took at home as a sort of "catch up" for the lack of video at the con itself, so I'm glad I at least have that. I'm getting a little better at talking to the camera when I'm at home ♥ You can find my teaser video here! The videos should go up every Thursday, and this will be the first year that I'm captioning my vlogs. 

TL;DR this year's Katsu was actually pretty chill, and I didn't do all that much, but I still had fun. 

Post-Katsu Shout-out to My Parents

Alternatively titled: "Why I'm grateful my parents humored 8th grader me and let me attend an anime convention"

Seriously, I don't think I'll ever be able to say this enough. My parents gave me so much by letting me go to Katsucon 2011 and continue to attend anime conventions after that. I still haven't figured out the best way to definitively prove my gratefulness, so I thought at least outlining what that one weekend has meant would be something.

I meant to get a picture of all of us at Katsucon, but I forgot;;

My parents gave me bravery

My first Katsucon, I was so incredibly in awe -- and quiet as a mouse. I was so scared of talking to all of these amazing cosplayers that I couldn't ever imagine being able to go up to one and ask for their picture without being a nervous wreck.

But look how far I've come! I have no problems approaching cosplayers to ask for a picture or to compliment their cosplay, and while I'm still a little nervous approaching senpais or other people I look up to, I've gotten lots better! 

This has also carried over into everyday life. I feel more comfortable with having to talk to people I don't know very well (or at all). Having a common factor with people at conventions helped ease me into that. 

Cosplay in itself has also helped me become braver. While I can still be kind of nervous when I'm cosplaying, I also feel stronger. It's allowed me to tackle a hobby completely on my own and trial-and-error my way to cosplays I'm proud of. I've become more comfortable with myself and occasionally standing out. 

My parents gave me freedom

After my first convention, my parents allowed me to continue to go -- without them. They allowed me to go down the next year to Katsucon with friends, then to Otakon, and to Anime USA completely on my own. 

They allowed me to learn on my own. They let me take chances the first times I went to Otakon and Anime USA, and they let me use my babysitting paychecks towards a hobby that probably still seems a little strange to them at times. They never stopped me when I would spend upwards of $50 to attend a con only to spend hundreds of dollars more in merch. They let me spend tons of money on outfits I can really only wear a few times a year.(Mom still gives me a hard time, but she never tries to dictate what I do with my own money.) 

This year, Mom also allowed me to wander around Katsucon on my own without a buddy, something that was really exhilarating. I've always had to be with a buddy before, and while I completely understood the reasoning for that, it could be restricting at times. Knowing that Mom trusts me enough to walk around a convention alone for a relatively short period of time was great, and I'm really grateful that she allowed me to do that. 

My parents gave me responsibility

Freedom came with a certain degree of responsibility. I was in charge of researching details for cons. I had to learn how to budget myself so I wouldn't blow all my money on unnecessary cosplay materials or stuff from Dealer's and Artist Alley that I didn't really need. I was in charge of myself for hours at a time in a large crowd of people. 

My parents gave me the opportunity to prove that I could handle myself in a situation when they weren't immediately available -- I learned to anticipate possible problems that could come up, from minor injuries like blisters to ride conflicts. I learned from Mom's preparedness and tried to emulate that. I'd like to think that I've done a good job with being prepared for everything that could come my way. 

My parents gave me their time (and money)

I am incredibly grateful that my parents are willing to devote an entire weekend to Katsucon each year -- especially the past two when it's fallen around Valentine's Day. I appreciate that they're willing to drive me up to an hour each way to a convention and sit around to people-watch or to return home until I call again many hours later. They've orchestrated their work schedules around my conventions and paid who knows how much money in gas and parking. They've been patient when I don't know what I'm doing with a cosplay and have to make multiple runs to AC Moore or Jo-Ann's in order to get what I need. They've occasionally fronted me money or bought me pieces of my cosplays that I can use everyday as well. 

This year, Dad gave up snow duty on Saturday so he could stay down at the convention with us, and Mom spent over four hours on the Metro with me so I could spend three hours at the con itself on Sunday. I really appreciate that they were willing to do this for me. 

My parents gave me their support

They've always been open-minded with my hobby, and that means a lot to me.  They never stopped me from pursuing cosplay. They gave me the means to make new friends and find a new hobby I never expected to be proficient with. They've never looked down on conventions or the other attendees. They let me take over sections of the house to piece together my cosplays and give the best help they can when I'm stuck. They've humored me when I bring up conventions out of our area that I'd like to attend someday. 

My parents gave me their trust, and I can never thank them enough for that. 

How to: Katsucon

So, this upcoming Katsucon will be my 5th time attending. I'm kind of shocked, to be honest. I've been a congoer for five years at this point. I know I could've been a lot more prepared my first year, so I decided to try and use my years of experience to help someone who is attending for the first time.

I have to be honest, I got a lot of my inspiration for this from dejavudea's video from 2013 -- and while it's really helpful, it's two years old at this point and I know that I rely heavily on visuals, something that I felt was missing from her video.

This is a guide specific to Katsucon, and I'm going to skim over a lot of general con rules because I feel like that deserves its own post. This is mainly for someone who hasn't attended Katsucon before and wants to know a little bit more before it happens.

Also as a disclaimer: I've never stayed at a hotel for Katsucon. I've always commuted from home. I'm leaving out any details regarding staying within National Harbor itself because I feel like Dejavudea covers staying within the Gaylord well and I have no additional information to give.

This is going to be fairly image-heavy, so I'm putting everything under a cut.

Katsucon 2014

Katsucon XX was held Feb 14 - 16 at the Gaylord National in National Harbor, Maryland. It was my fourth year of attending Katsucon! I still can't really believe it. I've been con-going for four years now, and I think it's only gotten better as time has gone on.

I spent most of the weekend with Emily and her boyfriend Jason. It was a little bit awkward, especially on Friday it was Valentines Day and I was third-wheeling, but it was still fun nonetheless. Neither of them had been to Katsucon before (and it was Jason's first anime convention), so I acted as a kind of tour guide for them. Luckily, I've finally gotten a good handle of the Gaylord's layout, so we never really got lost.

I also got to meet a lot of sempais this year! I was lucky enough to cross paths with mangosirene, domineau, alexpinku, and stickehbun, and I also got to meet up with staciastarburst, who I started talking to through tumblr. I also got to talk to uberwren, dejavudea, and Alec from DTP. It amazes me that people know and remember my name / face after meeting them!

I spent less money than I have in previous years, but I think I came home with more? I don't have a definite comparison compared to other conventions or previous Katsucons, but I still came home with $90 after buying many posters from AA and a few things from Dealer's. I think one of the favorite things I bought was my Tsukino Usagi / Sailor Moon wig, which was only $40! I've always dreamed of cosplaying Usagi, and I'm finally taking those steps to completing it! I also got tons of cute Pokemon / RotBTD fanart (including a Jack Frost tote bag), and I got a print from the artist of High Tide, an animation short that has made me consider pursuing animation.

I didn't have any big cosplay plans this year. Friday I wore the blue hamster kigurumi I bought at last year's Katsucon. Saturday I wore a combination Jack Frost / Danny Phantom cosplay I made a week before the con, and on Sunday Emily and I cosplayed as Danny Phantom and Danny Fenton.

I think for once I didn't have any sort of problems with the convention at all! The past three years there have been conflicts regarding friends or sharing the Gaylord with another con, but this year there didn't seem to be any major problems! I'm really grateful for that. I was able to buy everything I wanted to, and much more than I actually needed to. I had lots of fun with my friends and I didn't feel any sort of insecurities about my cosplays. I wish I had recorded more video and vlogged more in-depth, but that's something I can improve on in the future, and I still was able to get around an hour's worth of video.

Otakon Vlog Reflections

My photography teacher is always telling us to write reflections about how our assignments turned out so we can figure out where we went wrong and how we might be able to fix it in the future. As I'm going through and finishing the last half of my Otakon 2013 vlogs, I'm noticing some problems, and I figured I could talk about it! I'm at a loss for what to blog about right now.

I recorded my Otakon videos with a new camcorder I had bought this spring. I had recorded my Katsucon videos with my digital camera, but I wanted something that would take "better" video, as well as avoid having to switch between the photo / video options. Unfortunately, the camcorder is bulkier than my digital camera, and because of that I didn't use it as much as I probably would have with the digital camera. I'm still trying to find settings on the camcorder that work for me, but as of right now I haven't found how to make the quality better without making everything on my computer run slow while trying to use that footage.

It was also harder to get things in the frame while recording with the camcorder. It had a hand strap, but that made it hard to turn the camera around to my face. The camcorder is also heavier than the digital camera so I had trouble holding it up high enough while I was recording. I ended up cutting off my friends' faces a lot...

My camcorder does have a better zoom to it and doesn't have dust in the lens (as of yet) like my digital camera does. It can also take pictures while you're recording, and often takes them automatically every few minutes, though those usually aren't the best. (All of them somehow made us look bad ...)

This point isn't related to the camera issue, but with time management of sorts. I didn't really vlog while we were doing things. A majority of the video I have is while we're sitting down and resting between going to panels or Artist Alley / Dealer's and photoshoots. I'm not sure how much of this could be avoided, because I know at least Anime USA had a policy against photo / video recording in their Dealer's Hall last year. I'll have to look into that for Katsucon.

So, ways that I can improve for Katsucon 2014:

• Aim -- getting everything in the shot is good
• Vlogging more -- hopefully not just when we're sitting down and resting. I'd love to get more "action" video, or at least give a recap of what I did. 
• Content -- more talking! I need to get better at talking while I'm vlogging. 

Of course, I'll probably come up with more later, especially as it gets closer to Valentine's weekend. I'm already excited for Katsucon and it's still about two months off! I'm not sure how I'm going to bide my time until then. 

Obligatory Katsucon post -- video

This should probably have some sort of formal introduction but I can't think of anything right now;; Anyway, I'm just gonna throw in links to my vlogs from the convention and update this post as they're uploaded to YouTube sometime within the next few weeks.

Teaser video! (Funny, Blogger wouldn't let me choose it through my own videos but once I searched for it, it came right up...)

Katsucon 2013 pt 1: CON TIME

Katsucon 2013 pt 2: Mt Dew Jitters

Katsucon 2013 pt 3: Saturday

Katsucon 2013 pt 4: whut

Katsucon 2013 pt 5: "But Manga!"

Katsuon 2013 pt 6: The End

Thanks for watching my videos! 

Obligatory Katsucon Post -- text

I'm going to break this up into a few different pieces: text, videos, and photos. Because otherwise I think the post would be way too long and unmanageable. This way, if you only want to look at one aspect, you don't have to sift through the other bits.

Let me start this off by saying how much I love Katsucon. Katsu 17 was my first convention, and each year I've gone it's been better. I've practically been looking forward to this year's convention since last year, since I knew it was a definite even if Otakon fell through. I've had a running countdown since probably about September, when katsucon.org still said "200+ days until Katsucon 19". It ran simultaneously with my AUSA countdown. Every time I hear Lights by Ellie Goulding, I can't help but think about all of the awesome videography by acksonl or MLZstudios, which has gotten through post-con depression and boosted my motivation to work on cosplay.

This was the first time I've been to Katsucon all weekend. I think that was what helped make it my favorite. We didn't get to the Gaylord on Friday until sometime in the afternoon, but we stayed until at least 10pm. Saturday we got there earlier and therefore didn't stay as long, and Sunday we left by 3.

I really only cosplayed on Saturday. Friday I wore my fem!Green Oak to school, but the wig was giving me grief and I took it off to replace it with a Gumi wig I bought. Saturday I was trainer!Jack Frost and it was really fun because it was the first time I was asked for pictures, and I was in a little bit of the Pokemon photoshoot. Sunday I wore my Gumi wig along with my yellow Matryoshka hoodie.

I ran into a few people I knew, including my friend Kaylee from tumblr and a girl that sits next to me in Spanish class. I got to meet a lot of my sempais,  including: uberwren, minomotu, dejavudea, the-guardian-of-fun, and missmurrka. It turned me into a bundle of nerves and jitters, but it was totally worth it! Also considering all the ROTG artwork I was able to buy at the con. I spent $400, and a good majority of it went to the Artist Alley. I don't know how much I spent on each specific AA thing, but from the dealer's: $35 Gumi wig, $15 Lapras plushie, $20 grab bag, $16 for two manga, $15 Rilakkuma plushie, and $54 kigurumi.

The only downside to the weekend was the little run-in we had with BBYO, which is in no way as bad as other people had it. Saturday my friend and I took up chairs near the bathrooms at the end of one of their hallways, because we were waiting for my family to come back and park in the garage. The security guards didn't bother us even though we were sitting right in front of them. However, once we exited and tried to come back in they made us turn around and go through the main entrance -- which was a little annoying, considering I was wearing my Jack cosplay and my feet were freezing. We had walked through that hallway when arriving there in the morning and nobody gave us any hassle. They also wouldn't let us through it to the garage that evening, and on the gazebo level they forced us to walk through the crowded Katsu side of the open area even though there was nobody in front of the ballroom on their side and nobody was guarding it on the other side of the gazebo. We ended up getting disoriented on our way out. Other than that, though, I didn't have any problem with the other convention that ran the same time as Katsucon did.

I haven't had any con depression yet, but I think that's because I'm so happy with how Katsucon turned out to be. I have absolutely no regrets. The closest thing I've had to con depression was hating having to go back to school this morning.

Long story short, I had a super awesome time at Katsucon 19! I'll work on the other two posts as soon as I get around to processing the pictures and video I took.