Today Livvy and her husband Adam join in our cosplayer interviews to share their real cosplay story, hope you like it
1.Introduce you and your husband first, I know you always do couple cosplay
We are Livvy and Adam. We have been cosplaying together since AWA 11.
2.How did you get started in with cosplay, what was the first cosplay?
AWA 10 was our first ever convention. We fell in love with the costumes and felt so left out in plain clothes. After that, we decided the next convention we were going to cosplay! Since Ranma 1/2 is one of our favorite animes that we watch together, we decided to go with Ranma’s outfit. It was the first outfit I (livvy) have ever sewn and with the help of my mother we got our first cosplays completed! It was fun being the same character in boy and girl form and we have been cosplaying ever since.
3.What has been your favourite cosplay?
Adam: My favorite was The Creep, it was mostly a closet cosplay, but it was more comfortable than our usual lot. Really enjoyed ‘creepin around Dragon*Con and rocking my pencil thin mustache.
Livvy: Cure Blossom is mine hands down. Ever since we started cosplaying, I dreamed of doing a magical girl cosplay. The main problem with that is the male characters are often not masculine enough so they always got vetoed. That was until Heartcatch Precure! Kumojacky was the perfect shonen character in a magical girl show.
So I got Adam to watch and we both loved (ok I loved, he was ok with it) the show and we started working on the cosplays. After a year and a half we finally got them completed and ended up even winning a Best in Show award for it!
4.Describe your creative process for starting a costume through completion!
Usually we are watching a show or looking around online and say ‘Oh Wow that character design is awesome’ or ‘I really love this character.’ We tend to pick characters that we both feel comfortable cosplaying. Not only does it need asthetic, comfort and decency, but we must like the character enough to embody them for a day at the convention. We keep a master list of characters we want to cosplay and look at how much work it will possibly take and with our jobs will it be possible to complete.
Many of our costumes are simple to just have fun, however, when we want to go all out, we research and innovate to reach how the character feels to us.
5.Do you have any favorite Asian films?
We absolutely loved the live action Cromartie High School movie
6.What is the biggest learning curve you couple has learned about the hobby in the past years?
Adam: old style carpentry and staining techniques, hand stitching with a hammer.
Livvylove: sewing more difficult fabrics, cobbling with pleather.
7.Do you have one piece of advice that you would give to cosplay virgins,especial couple cosplay?
Always make time for friends, family, life, etc. Don’t let a hobby get in the way of your relationships (or job/education).
8.Lastly, what is your con schedule looking like through 2013?
We will be in the Artist Alley for Momocon and AWA this year with KawaiiFix.com
We plan on also going to Dragon*Con and Seishuncon as of now.