Cosplayers Paradigm S3 episode 3
[Music] Hey, welcome back everyone to another episode of Cosplayers Paradigm. Today we have a special guest with us today who has been rocking the cosplay community with some phenomenal cosplays and puppetry. Now, who would have thought that we’d see puppets in the cosplay community as prominent as we have lately? But this person is definitely one to go ahead and watch out for because they’re dragon, they’re wicked, and so many more I can only assume to come up here in the near future are just going to be absolutely phenomenal. Let’s go ahead and talk to puppets over people. How are we doing? Hey, how are you? Good, good, good. Thank you so much for having me. Oh, appreciate you. You are phenomenal. I mean, the first time that I saw you, I turn around and all of a sudden here’s a dragon almost in my face just moving around. It’s like, what? What’s going on? Yeah, that dragon that dragon fooled quite a many people. The kids loved him. So he was I can imagine that. Yeah. Your your outfit, the wig, you did everything together, it was just phenomenal. And then seeing in the cosplay contest, how you’re moving around and how opposing and just there was no words for it other than just in awe. Yeah. So, the funny thing about my dragon is that actually was the very first cosplay I ever did um in a competition. So, this is a little crazy, but I only started doing cosplay last November. Um I had never done it before. I didn’t know anything about it. I didn’t know anything about comic cons. I had never been to a Comic-Con. And I built that dragon as a uh costume for Fort Kuster, which is a camping place, has a Halloween trick-or- treat thing, and I did that to show the kids, my kids, that you can build pretty much anything you want. So, I built this dragon. Well, I went as a quote unquote dragon trainer with for this for this costume thing. Well, everybody thought I was How to Train Your Dragon. So, they were asking me if I was the How to Train Your Dragon. I’m like, “No, that’s not Toothless. I don’t look like Hiccup.” You know, that doesn’t make any sense. So, then somebody at Fort Kuster mentioned, “You should go do the contest at the Firekeepers Casino. They have a big costume contest.” And I said, “All right. Well, I already have it made, so I might as well.” I went, the response was overwhelming. I got sixth place out of 476 contestants. And I thought I didn’t even try. Like, I’m not trying to win anything. I just thought it would be cool to use the dragon again. And I would, you know, more than once a year. And somebody at the casino said, “You should take that to a Comic-Con.” And I said, “Why would I take that to a place with comic books? I thought that’s just where they sell comic books.” And they said, “No, they’ve got people that dress up.” And I’m like, “Well, that’s probably the people that they ask.” And you know, that’s that’s not me. And he said, “No, everybody can dress up.” And I thought, “Well, that’s cool. Another reason to dress up. I love that.” So, I thought I’ll try it. And I went to the Grand Rapids ComicCon last November. was the very first time I had ever gone. I went on Saturday. I showed up at noon with my dragon on and everybody said, “Are you putting are you in the contest? Are you in the contest?” And I said, “What contest? I didn’t know there was a contest.” So everything just kept leading to something else. And that actually was the first time I met Night Mage. And him and I had a long conversation and he is just the coolest guy. And he said, I and I kept asking him all these questions. I said, ‘Well, how do I do cosplay? How do you is there a class or do you have to sign up or I mean, how do I do cosplay? And he’s he looked right at me and said, “Girl, you’re doing it.” And I’m like, “This is it. I get to just make cool stuff and bring it out, show it to people.” And he said, “Yeah, that’s it.” I’m in. So a ever since that I have lived and breathed every Comic-Con I could get to and I’ve made my husband travel to Motor City and we went to Kalamazoo and I’ve taken my kids and now my kids have started making things to do cosplays and I realized it was a lot more than just comic books. I never knew that. So I I mean I just I guess I How would you know, right? I didn’t grow up in a gaming family. We didn’t I never gamed. I never watched anime. I don’t know all these shows. I don’t know anything about it. I just like to make things and I craft and I love puppets. And then I didn’t realize that there were I I was like, where are all the puppets? Like, why aren’t there puppets here? And you could have That’s the best thing about cosplay is you get to create your own little kind of niche or niche or whatever you want to say. And I looked around and nobody was doing puppets. And I thought, there it is. That’s that was my my answer. So now it’s puppets over people. You know, it was puppets over people before, but now we’re going to cosplays, too. Nice. No, that is just brilliant because I was at that con when you first showed up and that’s where I saw it and it was just it it was unbelievable. But like you said, you don’t see people do puppets and that’s what got me thinking I wanted to do the one that I told you about. Yes. Then I saw you at Spring Fling, then uh you know, other places as well. You know, I was like, “Wow.” Okay, we we’ve got this right here. We’ve got this one. We What’s going to be next? I mean, what’s more? Well, and the the best is you can be two characters. You literally can be two. Like instead of having to choose just one character to focus on, if you find something that has a sidekick, a counterpart, an animal friend, whatever, you can do both and you don’t have to pick which one you want to do. You can do both and that’s the best. I special with so with my puppets it’s soft style ventriloquist puppets like Manny Adnan Doobie here behind me or but then for cosplays I go to what’s called illusion puppets. So illusion puppets are to make it look like the puppet is actually alive. So you want that the fake arm or some kind of illusion to show that it’s alive. the the dragon. I I puppeted like this. This was his neck, the hand, and then I had the fake arm come down like this. So, people were confused because their brain looks at it and goes, “Wait a minute. I see two hands, but the dragon’s moving, which makes it feel like it’s alive.” So, it’s that illusion and that magic, you know, trying to bring that into your character. So, that and a lot of talent, too. Not anyone can just put their arm into something and Okay. Yes, I can do this. I can do that. But to give that movement, to go ahead and give that realism of what the creature actually is, the character, it it it takes dedication, which is amazing because you really had that moving, like you said, the illusion of it being completely alive. The the trick is is and this might sound a little silly and I’m sure people in my car will like if they ever saw me driving around in my car because I’ll pretend to puppet along to songs because you have to almost give half your brain to the puppet and your other brain is working your your body type thing. So, when the dragon is moving, the whole key is to trick other people’s brains to believing that it’s real, which means he doesn’t look exactly like I do. He’s got to look like this. And then he moves when I’m holding still, and then I move when he holds still. And it’s that switching back and forth where they don’t have the same movement. Another thing, especially with an animal creatures, is watching videos. I watched a lot of videos of dragons, how to train your dragon, all all these other, you know, the dragon movie. And I watched their body language and a lot of things that dragons do in movies as they arc their neck up a little bit. So, so while having his nose pointed down and having that neck arc back a little bit, people remember that from movies and then it just makes it feel alive. So, just studying studying your characters which is perfect, you I means everyone studies everything for different characters, how to cosplay, how to movement right there. But you just you really bring it to life because even your wicked the movements of his head while holding on to you, you could almost see like him hugging you as well or loosening up just even though yes, the only thing you’re controlling is the head, everything else still feels like it’s moving as well. So it it’s just an all inspiring. So, anyone out there, if you’re interested in something like this, this is the person to talk to because honestly, you know, they’re killing it and they’ve only been in cosplay for a short period of time. So, yeah. Less than a year. Yeah. You knocked it out of the park walking into it, you know, and Yeah. Well, I’ve been doing crafts my whole life and now I finally have a reason to do it year round, you know. I’ve always done it for like Halloween or or for whatever and and now I get to do it year round and I think that is the biggest gift to me. Um, one funny thing is when I went to Motor City Comic-Con, I had Wicked on and they tried to charge me for an adult and a child because they thought it was real. I actually had to take his head off and show them that it was my hand for them not to charge me for the child. See, that’s how you know you’re doing it right when people can’t tell the difference right there. You know, no, no, no, no, no. Two tickets. Sorry. Yeah. Uh yeah, $160. Come on. I know. I went with my husband. They’re like, “Two adults, one child.” And I’m like, “We didn’t bring kids, did we?” You know, like we don’t have childhoods, do we? And they’re like, “No, two adults, one kid.” And they pointed at Wicked. And I was like, “Oh, no. This this is me. Hi.” and I had to take his hat off and show him. So, I understand how that goes because uh years ago I cosplayed, well, this is before I actually started cosplaying because this was Halloween and I was out in the yard dressed up as a character. No one wanted to come into the yard to get Halloween candy because they were absolutely terrified. So, I had to continuously take the mask off over and over again just for the kids to realize he’s human. Oh, wait a minute. I know him. Okay. Okay, we’re good now. Yeah. Yep. I literally I had kids I had kids talking to Wicket that would come up and say, “Can I be his friend?” and hugging him and can I touch his ears? And so with each cosplay that I’ve done, so Wicked, so this is Wicked 2.0. The first Wicket I built I didn’t like. So I rebuilt the entire thing. Um the first Wicket, the head was too big. It’s too gray in the face. It didn’t look like Wicicket. It didn’t feel right. He wasn’t proportionate and and he didn’t have So the one that I competed with at Motor City just wasn’t right and I had to fix it. But the kids with this one when I took this one to let’s see where did I go after that? No, it was it was Motor City. I don’t know. I I can’t keep track. Oh, no. Lancing. I took him to Lancing. I took this wicket 2.0 know to Lancing and I had kids that wanted to hug him, kiss him, be friends with him, wanted to, you know, lay on his shoulder, play with his hands, you know, all this stuff. So, with each illusion puppet, I have a little gimmick with the little kids. So, with the dragon, if you scratch the bottom of his neck, he’d shake his head. So, he and he loves chicken nuggets and macaroni and cheese and taking naps. So, he has a backstory with Wicked. If you tickled the bottom of his foot, he laughed. So the kids could actually touch him and feel him and but he would react to them touching him and they he I would tell them he’s going to react in this way which made him even more lifelike. Does that make sense? That does. In fact, that is and I know I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Brilliant. I mean, thank you. What else to go ahead and think about right there? I mean, just you think the backstory, you think the foreground, you you kind of covered everything, you know? That’s that’s awesome dedication. That really is. Yeah. Well, you know, he becomes part of the family. You know, it’s like when I build a big creature like this, all my girls I have three girls. All my girls wanted to play with them. And I try to make them durable enough and show my kids that you can play with the things that you make. You don’t have to put them up in a glass box. They should be played with and they should be used like all of my puppets are. I I’ll take a whole box of puppets to church with us and let all the kids just play with them and they’re yanking their heads back and pulling their mouths and I just, you know, whatever. It’s a puppet. So that’s what they’re for. That’s how the creativity comes out and that’s what they’re going to remember. I don’t they don’t need to remember a a dragon head sitting in a glass case. They they wanted to play with it and touch it and pretend with it. And that’s what being a kid is about. So I make them durable enough, but I also make it so that if they do get damaged or they get hurt or they get ripped that we can fix it. So then we work on it together and fix it together. so that they show that it’s lessons but also their creativity and figuring out what their what their limits are for what they’re doing. The only thing is is like Wicked’s body is a little too big for the girls. So I’ll wear Wicked or they’ll just use his head or something like that. So that’s awesome right there. Don’t say that to anyone else right there. You know, I know, right? All the star people are Star Trek fans or Star Wars fans. Oh, someone might go ahead and get in trouble. Wait a second. I’m wearing a red shirt. I’ll be the first one down. Yeah, that’ll be me. No, that’s uh that’s awesome though to actually have the kids interact with it for the creativity showing, you know, have fun. You know, nowadays we don’t see that as often. And that’s one thing I love about the cosplay community. The kids come in, even if it’s a storebought costume, they see stuff, then they get all inspired. They meet their heroes essentially, you know, and they go, “Oh, I want to do more.” Or, “Now I have a new idea.” And it it just spitballs into more. And then continues down, you know. Yeah. It’s just wonderful to see this creativity. And well, and another thing, another thing I do with all my cosplays is I use products that you have at home. So, I’ll reuse, you know, paper towel tubes, pingpong balls, fake nails, you know, stuff like that because when the kids do see it and they go, “Wow, he’s got such pretty eyes.” I’ll say, “Yeah, those are two plastic spoons, you know, and that’s just a golf ball and that’s a, you know, these are fake nails and this is an inner, you know, piece of an inner tube and this is so that they know like when they go home and the next time they see two plastic spoons, they might hold them up and go, “Hey, look, I got eyes.” And then that spurs on even more creativity on their part. So, I try to, you know, I don’t buy go out and buy puppet eyes. I make them. I don’t go out and purchase forms for puppets. I I just make it out of an old glove or a sock or a whatever I have. I mean, I’m always at Goodwill seeing what treasures I can find and you know what what my kids now refer to as treasure hunting. So, when we go out treasure hunting, it’s usually for mom’s puppets. So, all the clothes they’re wearing are all Goodwill. All the shoes they’re wearing are all Goodwill. They’re not new store-bought stuff. These were worn by kids, you know. See, I I I re I really love that, you know. But are we going to see in the future maybe you’re going to go ahead and have a Tik Tok going up of you put the hat on and now it’s treasure hunting time. So, come on, kids. Let’s get in the car. I wish I had more time to film Tik Toks. I You know what? I I’ve kind of gotten into this weird um it might I don’t know if it’s good or bad but so with the dragon at the spring show in Kamazoo I won best in show and that was an absolute when I say surprise I didn’t even know that was an award like I was like what is that you I I was so when you saw me at Kazoo being shocked I was legitimately shocked because I did not even know that they had a best in show. So then I kind of got on this mindset of okay, I am not going to make another cosplay until because I would I would just sit down here making cosplays all day long and it would I would never get anything done else. So, I said I didn’t want to do another cosplay until I placed just judge’s choice, first, second, third, best, I don’t care, with Wicked because I don’t want to retire Wicket yet until he places for something. So, that’s when I took him to Motor City and I ran into kind of an issue with the contest at Motor City and it’s not anything against them. These are their rules. But I did not know that some comic cons, and I don’t know if anybody else who competes in Comic-Cons knows this, but they are not judging on props. They will not judge on props. That’s how it was explained to me. So, they did not even look at Wicked. They considered Wicked a prop. And I’m like, no. This is my cosplay. Wicket and I are two characters together, Leia and Wicket, and that is the cosplay. So, I emailed to make sure like, “Hey, just so you know, I’m bringing a puppet.” And they said, “You cannot do any performance.” I said, “He’s not performing, but he moves.” And they said, “Well, you can’t he can’t move.” And I said, “Well, he doesn’t. I’m not puppeting. Like, I’m not up there puppeting. He’s going to move though cuz he’s going to look alive. And when I went to the contest, I again went to the main judge person and I was like, just so we’re clear, this is one whole cosplay, right? Because I just want to make sure I’m I’m setting myself up for preparing. I’m a I’m a planner and I like to know things. I wanted to make sure we were all good. and we went up and three minutes before I walked on stage, she walked up to me and said, “Just so you know, we’re not judging on props and Wicked is a prop.” So I was like five seconds before I walked on stage. So when I go on stage for Motor City, I’m like, “What? What do I do? I can’t move.” Yeah. I don’t know what to do. And then and it wasn’t about placing, it was about doing well. I use all of my contests as content for my TikTok. So there and I met so many amazing people and I got to be on this other podcast thing and I met some news crew people and it was a winwinwinwin all the way around. I left completely happy but a little bit like confused about how I was going to continue doing puppets and cosplay if they’re going to be considered props. So, I I really have still to this day have thought and thought and thought like, how do I not make it a prop? I don’t They didn’t consider the dragon a prop, but they considered Wicked a prop. So, I don’t know if you can only have like one character and it’s part of your character. Like if you did Venom, okay, that’s technically the same character when he turns into Venom, right? But if you do Leia and Wicket, that’s two separate things and I don’t know if that would be considered a prop. So I that I ran into that little bit of a snafu and I don’t know how I’m going to maneuver that. But I also know that every Comic Con is different. This is true. I I don’t know. I don’t know. So how was it when you were at the uh cosplay contest in Capitol City? So when I went to Capitol City, I did not place at all but which is fine again. Again, tons of content, tons of video, met a lot of friends. I talked to a ton of people, saw some awesome cosplays. Everybody loved my cosplay. I always get everybody loving, “Oh my gosh, that’s so cool. It’s the coolest thing I ever seen.” You know, even one of the judges, his entire family took pictures with my cosplay and stuff like that. I don’t understand contests yet. I think that they’re all very different, but I also don’t know what’s going on behind the scenes. So, I don’t know. I’m just going to do the best I can and come out and be positive and and support everybody else who does win and does place. The the people that placed at Motor City were amazing cosplays. Tons of sewing, lots of um detailed like bead work and stuff like that. That takes a crap ton of time. I’m a sewer, too. So, I know how much went into those cosplays. I think the difference is the wow factor versus knowing how much they put into those cosplays because people walking by seeing that beautiful dress she made would have no idea that she put 300 hours into that dress, you know? And that is sad to me because she should be wearing a sign that said, “I put 300 hours into this dress and you could never do this because it was that good, you know. So, I get it. I totally understand. And I don’t know how these judges do it because you’ve got people that are 3D printing the most amazing stuff on the planet. You’ve got other people doing foam work, which are is unreal. You’ve got other people doing sewing, which is unreal. You’ve got other people with fabulous props and LED lights and battery packs and sound machines and all this electronical animatronic stuff that just crazy. I How do you pick? They’re all geniuses in their own area. So that’s very true. I don’t know how they do it. You know, I have no answer for that myself. I’ve seen so many and at the Grand Rapids Comic- Con with all the guests that they had for the cosplayers. You talked to Night Mage. He does his on a budget and it looks phenomenal. You probably saw BB who was next to him. She deals with foam work couple. She’s phenomenal foam work. I’ve watched some of her videos. I just I can’t understand it. So good. I know, right? And then you look down at the other tables and you see like the pinks, pink opal and pink petal. One doing hand sewing on some fabric that normally would tell anyone, “Nope, we’re not going to touch you.” But still does it and nails it. The other one with the wig working and the 3D printing and you know, you just keep looking at everyone. Each one’s got their style of what they showcase, but not limited to like you. You’re a seamstress, but you focus on the puppets. You have that demeanor about you at the same time. you envelop, become the character, you know. Yeah. It’s everyone’s got their thing and it’s hard to say. I mean, you know, one guy I would do cosplay just for the kids. I honestly I would go I would do cosplay just for the kids. When I go to comic cons any of my cosplays, I only have two, so I guess I can say any in either of my cosplays. the the look on the kids’ face when I walk in and they for just a half a second think that my creature is real is that little bit of magic that we lose when we’re adults. We have no more magic in our lives. We have no we have so much hate and negativity and politics and arguing and anger and all these things in our lives and we don’t have any just peaceful magic anymore like we had when we were kids. And if I can bring just just a minute of that back to somebody when they’re at Comic-Con and surrounded by all these amazing things and these colorful, wonderful, happy things and they just for a second believe that that fantasy could be real. That’s worth it. That’s that’s my my gold star every time. So, I couldn’t agree more. Getting that tap on the shoulder and saying, “Oh my gosh, I love it. Can I please get a picture? I’m such a fan. And you know, you just it melts in your heart. You know, you feel like a kid again. Yeah. You know, but you’re right. We we lose that magic as we go ahead and progress in age. And trying to hold on to it is hard. Knowing we have a community like this, the cosplay community, which is worldwide. We have all these people we can talk to that hold on to that magic. And you know, I’m perfect with it. It’s Toys R Us in a whole new level. I don’t want to grow up. I want to be a kid. I know. And what’s so amazing that I have found, now mind you, I’ve only been to four ComicCons, right? So, Grand Rapids in last November, Kalamazoo, Motor City, Capital City, and then I my next one will be back in Grand Rapids in November. So, that literally I’ve been to four. And the one thing that I have noticed, which I don’t know, like people that have been in this community for a really long time probably just don’t even realize this is happening, but there is no judging. I love that people can walk in with a store-bought or bed sheet pulled over their head with some Sharpie on it and then there can be the $3,000 animatronic 8 foot tall crazy gaming monster and just as many smiles when the kids realize what characters each of them are. There is no judging on that’s not good enough, that’s too much for here, that’s not done well enough, that’s there’s no judging. There’s no judging. Everybody is so accepting of each other. There’s no pushing. There’s no shoving. There’s no arguing. There’s no insulting. There’s no meanness. There’s no none of that. Well, hopefully. I haven’t seen any. But that’s good. Whether people 3D print or foam or sew or do puppets or have furry things or the the fur suit people, I don’t know what they’re called, or the anime people or the whatever grew gaming groups or whatever. It’s just everybody is so accepting and we don’t have that in life anymore. We don’t we don’t have it anywhere. You can’t go to the grocery store without people arguing with each other. Unfortunately, this is true. Yeah. And the worst part is it feels like it started in high school. You get separated in the clicks and somehow in your mind. You stick with the clicks. You grow up. You go into the workforce and same thing. Oh, well that person’s over there in, you know, automotive. Well, I’m over here in photo or something like that. I guess these are my You have to identify like that for the rest of your life because that’s the label that’s been placed on you. Yeah. But the problem is I like to scratch labels off. Yeah. Oh, I am I am I am a I will change my personality daily. You can ask my husband. I’m like, “Today I’m feeling preppy. Today I’m feeling grungy. Today I’m feeling stretched pants in a hoodie. Today I’m feeling, you know, today I want to make a mean, angry puppet with tattoos. The next day I want to make a pink monster puppet. and the next day I want to make you know that’s what it’s kind of the joke that these are all my personalities you know that that I can I can store my personality like in Dubbie here this is my stoner puppet and then Nanny Edna who’s the the old lady who cusses like a sailor and then you know Dr. Constantine who knows everything. These are all my personalities. These are the people that all the hats I wear. You know, I do some people write it down in a journal. Others go out and they paint a picture or do something along the lines of that. You do it in puppets. And that’s that’s absolutely wonderful, you know, an outlet to be able to enjoy yourself to go and really bring back everything that’s, you know, there with the character. How do you go wrong, you know? Yeah, that I would love to see. I would love to see more puppetry in cosplay. I not puppetry in the sense that you’re going to stand up and be a ventriloquist. That’s not what I’m saying. I’m talking about using all of your appendages for other things, you know, like instead of just having that arm piece of I don’t know. I mean, I have a whole list of ones I want to do. The next I want to do Toothless. I really want to do Hiccup and Toothless. And with the new movie coming out, I was going to try to get it done by November, but there’s no way. And Wicked hasn’t placed yet. So, I’m going to keep going with Wicked until he at least places for something so that I can put him off to the side and start the next one. But I want to do a Ripley with an alien from Aliens. Oh, I am a huge huge Alien fan. I’ve watched that since I was little and I love every single Aliens movie. So, I want to do the big yellow loader, like the 10 foot tall yellow loader, but I wanted to have an alien puppet coming over the top of it snapping at her. That is Yeah. Wow. That that’s I can’t even imagine it, but at the same time, I can. I would love to see that. Yes. I did see online though years ago someone made a power loader like that. Yeah. But they put their daughter in the front. So they’re in the loader itself operating it while she’s just standing there looking like she’s operating it. I saw that they had one a couple years ago at C2E2 and I really liked it. But what I did is I kind of have started my research. I have some snippets from the movie. um the size like how to figure out sizing of how big certain things need to be the harness like what parts could should come apart. My biggest problem how do I fit through a door? That’s my biggest issue like I need to make it so that I can fit through a door. So how do I do that? So that working that out maybe removable arm pieces or being able to duck and walk through or something like that but then with the alien puppet over the top. So then I was thinking, well, maybe if I did just a Ripley walking around and then she’s caught the alien puppet and it’s in chains, then I can do the illusion puppet as the alien moving. So I could try that. But then why would Ripley have an alien in chains? That doesn’t make any sense. So I’ve kind of gone back and forth with how I’m going to do stuff. I would love to do the loader, but I need to be able to add a puppet. That’s one thing I have set the precedent for myself that whatever cosplay I’m going to do has a puppet. I have to do a puppet every time. That that’s the goal I set for myself is that I have to have some kind of puppetry in every cosplay I do. So whether that’s little or big or whatever I’d like to do an Alice in Wonderland with a Cheshire cat. And I’d like to do Yes, that one. That one would be a lot of fun. I’d like to do something from the Jungle Book think that I’m like I’m kind of old school. I’m not a gamer and I don’t read comic books and I I don’t watch anime so I don’t know what to do other than what I know that is there is nothing wrong with that. And the funny part is is over the years you may have actually been watching anime and didn’t realize it and because it could be categorized as a cartoon but one way shapers form we’ve we’ve seen different things. I mean you may not have read a comic book itself per se but you might have read comics in the Sunday papers you know so you know you you have knowledge from all over which is good and I love the pop culture definitely. I mean, you’re looking at a guy whose first cosplay was Castiel from Supernatural. Oh, okay. So, I get it. And my second one was Ash from Evil Dead. Oh, I love that movie. So, I did the chainsaw guys coming out. I love horror movies. I did the chainsaw for the hand. I did the, you know, shotgun hanging out of the back. I did the whole thing right there. And, uh, it got a lot of love. But, uh, yeah, you know, I mean, I wouldn’t mind doing Popeye, like Robin Williams version. Um, you know, there’s Yeah, I’d like to do Maleficent once just so that I could do the wings. I just want to do the wings and because I have like the body structure for Maleficent like with makeup and stuff and I feel like I could pull it off, but I I’m again go big or go home. So, I want to make I would like to make a 20 foot wingspan. That’s my I want it at least here and then I want it to be at least six more feet that come out and then another piece that pops up and flares. So I’ve got to figure out the contraption on that. But there is plans already online for that because people have done that. Yes, they’re arm wings. So the arms are actually in there and they go ahead and operate them and they have a trigger inside the um the end. So when their arms extend the rest, they pull the trigger and that does the last part. But how does it fold back down? So when you go ahead and undo the trigger, the end part folds in. And then when you bring your arm down, that folds in the rest of the way. Oh, okay. And then when you lower your arms, the rest of the wings come down because they’re on a hinge. Yeah. So they only go up when you bring your arms up. And then after that, when you extend your hand out, do what you’re holding the second section. Yeah, that’s what I was trying to figure out. Like if I strapped some so like fabric up to my wrist and then had some kind of handle that I can flip with my finger up so that when I put it back down, I can fold it back under and then do two fake hands like this in the front. Yeah, might do that. And that would be amazing. I mean, you see Maleficent, but you don’t really see that kind of Maleficent. And when you do, it’s still the standard walking around, you know, no wings, and if you do, they’re usually small because some people don’t want to do the full size because unless you have people going around with you, it does make it hard. Yeah. But that right there would be Wow. Yeah. So that that that might be one that I can do quickly. Like like wicket takes a while. The dragon took a while. The toothless body that I have I don’t really like. I know. Um I keep telling myself to just make it work and fix it. I haven’t made the head. I have the body, but it’s a little heavy and I don’t know how else to make it. So I kind of want to go back to the drawing board. But I also have spent about 50 hours on it. So I don’t know if I want to scrap it quite yet. So I had to set it aside. That’s what I do when I work on a project. If I get stuck or frustrated, I set it aside and I forget about it for a few weeks and then I come back to it so that I can get a fresh perspective and look at it kind of again and see if I can fix it or make it work. But the one the problem that I have with this Toothless that I built is he sits on my back like a backpack. So it looks like Toothless is like this, but now my arm’s too long to reach his head. So Toothless has a very short neck. He does. But what if instead of doing Hiccup, you did Astra? Because it’s hers has a long neck. I know, but it’s not it’s not toothless. And he’s already flat. He’s got fur. Oh, you already Oh, okay. I did not know that part yet. Yeah. So, I have the tail and the wings and the legs and the body made. And I haven’t made the head yet. But then when I put the neck on, which is the same distance as the neck of my other dragon, I’m like, “This does not look right. It looks like Toothless got his neck stretched out. It doesn’t look right.” So, I went back to the drawing board and was like, “How do I fix this body to sit higher on my shoulder so that my arm can go through it?” But now my arm won’t fit through the body because it’s all full of foam. I have an idea, but I think I’m going to save this till after the show so no one else hears what it is. Okay. This way, if you like it, it’s a good surprise and people not know what’s going on. Okay, I like that. So, we’ll get back to that one a little bit later on. But you’ve sent a lot of awesome photos. Yes. And after all the discussion here talking about the puppets for those who can’t see them in the background well or if you can, we got some stuff here to show you because, you know, we talked about the dragon and wicket. Look at this people. Yes. That’s That’s Drogon and uh Dinerius Targaryen. That’s the one in Kazoo. Yep. I really love the black and white, so I had to showcase those ones. Yes. Yep. That’s him. That’s my furniture. That’s a jewelry box. That’s another jewelry box I made. That’s my craft room in the background. There’s Doobie. Yep. Smoking his joint. That’s Dr. personal Constantine. And there’s the first wicket. And there’s the second wicket, taking a nap. And there’s Trixie, my daughter’s monster. And that’s me. So, I had to go ahead and showcase those. Definitely. Um, for sure. Your first wicket with a gray face. Honestly, I didn’t think it was wicked at first. No, it doesn’t look like wicked, does it? I have them over here. But but instead it actually looks like one of the others. This is the first wicket. So with the gray style and the setup there because he has a little bit more of an elongated face. Yes. I was thinking I was Well, I was thinking the gray one that had the spear in the beginning that uh was uh trying to go ahead, you know, have fun poking, you know, fun at Han and everyone else. Yes, he does a little bit. So that’s what I was thinking at first and then when I found out it was wicked, it’s like, oh, it’s still amazing, but you know, the color scheme. Well, and every every Ewok is different in the movie. So I did my research. Every Ewok is different. But I started out saying that I was going to make Leia and Wicket because that’s like the main Ewok. So then I made this head and this looks a lot more like Wicket. Very true. But still both are amazing. And he had a sound box. He actually makes Ewok sounds but nobody could hear him because it was so loud at Comic-Con. Oh yeah. So he didn’t have So again, but then it added weight to the the thing. You know what I mean? So it was just it was too much to add the And these are the ping pong balls. And then if you want to go ahead and add if you want to add voice and not do too much weight, but something simple, go to Build-A-Bear. Oh, get the small get the small little voice box, then record the voice that you want in there, like a couple phrases. Yeah. And that way you can put inside the mask, you can go ahead and put them on different sides. So maybe your your forefinger hits the button on one or your pinky hits. That’s what I did. I got the thing off Amazon. It was a voice thing. And then I had my husband record actual sounds from the movie of Wicked talking. So, and then but you couldn’t hear it from the little tiny speaker with it being so loud. So, then I was like, I’ll have to hook it up to a better like speaker, battery, Bluetooth, something like that. And we just couldn’t fit I couldn’t fit the weight in the puppet because I’m having to hold it like this already. But a little trick to anybody who wants to do illusion puppets and they have to hold their arm up like that. Do you know the white shelf brackets that you can get at Lowe’s? Put some padding on it. Stick it right under there and it’ll actually hold your arm up just like this. You know, every question I was going to ask, you’ve actually answered before I can ask it, which is awesome because that was the biggest question. That’s the biggest question I got from a lot of people when they saw your, you know, your cosplay. Yeah. Yeah. They’re like, “You need to ask her how she keeps her arm up the entire con like that because I tried doing something like that and 20 minutes later I got to drop it and here she is.” The dragon. So the dragon one was the hardest because it was like this and because you had to keep your hand almost next and move it. So you could don’t get a lot of movement that way. He his head’s not very heavy. But one thing I would do is again working it into the character work is he got sleepy a lot. So he would come down like this and I would pat his head. It’s okay buddy. You’re sleepy like that. Which really I’m actually holding my arm up so that I could take a break from my you know whatever. And his his neck was long enough that when his head was down like this, I could rest it and I could actually lower my elbow like this and I would do this and it would hide my arm. So I could rest my arm down like that, but then when he woke up, he’d start nose up and he’d come up like that. Love the movement. Yeah. Oh yeah. So, and if anybody’s making a dragon, FYI, these are dollar store fake teeth. Fake uh nails. Sorry, for teeth. Fake nails. That’s all they are. Yeah. They’re just cut at an angle and put into foam. And they naturally pull together because they naturally and so they’re just fake nails like the real long fake nails. They’ve already got the little embedded part where you’re supposed to put them on your nails. So you just cut at an angle. Cut at an angle. I don’t know. These are thumb ones. But still they go ahead and add for that extra, you know, because not all the teeth are the same. So changing them out like that. That’s and they’re all different sizes. Ping pong balls. Little bit of UV resin over the top to make him shiny. This is just fabric laid down with the foam. I mean, he’s got a personality. He’s a little little twitchy. Yeah. And a place with tons of noise. Why wouldn’t he be, right? Yeah, exactly. That is one thing about the ComicCons. It does get noisy at times, but depending where you go, there’s so much to do. And even if it’s a smaller con, there’s still a lot to do, which is nice. Yeah, I didn’t realize that celebrities went to comic cons. I didn’t know that. See, again, I every con I learn something new and I’m like, there’s celebrities here. There’s celebrities here. And then I realized who they were and they were actually like the voices of the shows that I watch. Futurama, Family Guy, you know, all these like awesome shows. And I’m like looking at this guy like, “That’s so and so from the show. That’s so crazy.” And then I totally geeked out because Tom Lennon from Reno 911 was at Motor City and I met him and I love Tom Lennon. Like I love him. So I made a puppet of him because I love him so much. And the goal was to have the puppet ready for him to sign at Comic Con, but instead I was doing the Comic Con crunch, as they call it, the night before, trying to finish my cosplay, and I was competing that day. So, I was like, I got to hold off on the puppet. So, now he’s hanging out over there until I’m done. And then when he’s done, next time he shows up to a con, you’ll be ready. Yes. I got a story cosplay. Oh, you do? So last year I ended off going down to Galaxy Con. It was in December. And I’m walking around. I’m near the Celebrity area and I turn around and no more than turning around. There he is in full cop ear going, “Hey, what’s up, man? High five.” And of course, what’s your first reaction? Someone says, “High five.” You raise your hand. You give them a high five. So I do this and then literally I’m holding my hand here going and I turn around. He’s already busy with the line. Yeah. Oh, he’s 100 miles an hour. 100 miles an hour. Oh yeah. But the fact he was right there did that. It was like, dude, holy crap. I met him and passing gave me a high five and then he jumped in someone’s arms right there showing off his butt like let’s go. Yeah, we did that. Yeah, because when when he posed with us, he was using his comb to comb Wicket’s hair. He was like fixing his hair with his comb. And then we got a a picture signed from him and um he was like, “Do you want to pose for a picture?” And then he asked my husband, “Can you hold me?” And he jumped up in my husband’s arm. So he’s like like this with a like a baby in my husband’s arms. We love Reno 911. So that was so that was super exciting. So that has started becoming a trend where I look and see who is going to be there. Um, we met um the guy who played Predator at Kazoo. Yep. The nicest person I think I’ve ever met in my life. And he actually the one Yes. He was the one that told me how to act for the competition that I won best in show. I don’t know if you know that. I talked to him before that. I said, “I have this competition coming up. I’ve never competed before. I don’t know what I’m doing.” And he gave me the best advice. He said, “You are not you anymore. You are Daenerys Targaryen and you’re going up there for everybody to look at you because you are the queen and you don’t care what they think. You have to be her.” And I was like, “Okay, that’s going to be hard to switch off because I do care what people think.” But I went up there and switched my brain into I am the queen with the dragon and all of you will bow to me. And I was a little nervous, but made it through. And I came back and I told him I got best in show and he gave me the biggest hug and he was just the sweetest man. So I was he was so happy to meet him. When I went up to him, I didn’t have much money that weekend. And uh I I told everyone that when I met them, I at least wanted to go ahead and tell them that I love what they do and I just had to at least shake your hand, you know? Yeah. But he’s looking around. He’s like, “I don’t see anyone else here. Why don’t you stay here? Let’s hang out. Let’s talk.” So we did. And then he ends up getting a picture taken with me, you know, and he does it on his own accord and it’s like I I I don’t have anything. No, no, no. We’re doing this. You know what? Come on, let’s go. Yes. And he was just phenomenal. I mean, yeah, we didn’t pay for one either. And the whole family loves My whole family loves Predator. Even the kids watch it. So, we we all watch Predator and we’re big horror movie buffs. So, we he was like, “Let me get a picture with the whole family.” And he just like literally handed my phone to some random stranger and was like, “Take a picture. No, take a different one. No, you stand over here. Take a different one.” And and we got all these great pictures. And as we walked away, I said to my husband like, “We didn’t give him any money for his photos.” And he’s like, “But he didn’t ask.” And I said, “I know, but we should offer, right?” And he’s like, “I don’t know.” And then I want to say my husband went back to try to give him something, I think. And and he was like, “No.” I just how cool is that? Like, where else are you going to meet such amazing people than at a Comic-Con? I My kids loved it. And I have three very different children. They’re I call them the triangle because they are all very different. Very opposite of each other. Huh. Okay. Yeah. I mean, I’ve got my super smart, geeky artist computer person wiz. I’ve got my my clothes are not matching, drama, sweet, caring, you know, more girly side. And then I have Shirley Temple. So, I mean, those that’s the three I have. And each one of them is so different, but they all went to their very first Comic-Con together with us, my husband and I, and they all found something for them that they all met people and found something for them that they could geek out over. And I thought, what other place can I come and bring my entire family and geek out over whether it’s horror movies, gaming, D and D. You know, my oldest daughter is learning how to play D and D. I’ve never played it before. I don’t know anything about it, but I think it’s pretty cool. Like madeup stuff. I was like, oo, could I be a puppet? Technically, you could, but maybe not in the direct sense. You know, there has been nothing about it. I just know they have really cool monsters in books. When I went into this one store, they had a D and D book with all these like pictures in it, and I was like, these are the coolest monsters. And they have all these really cool statue things, which I think are so cool. And then I’ve watched people make like landscape things. I don’t know what that’s for, but that’s really cool, too. So, I’m like, I like all the parts. I don’t know how to play, but I like all the parts. The simplest way to describe how to play, have you seen a movie where someone is pretending to be someone else? Are you creative? Put the two together and roll dice. Someone else tells you where you’re at, what’s going on? You just choose. Do I attack? Do I go left, right? What do I do? You know what? I’m just going to go ahead and forget what you spent hours making and I’m going to go grab a beer at the counter. you know, so it’s all imaginary, which is beautiful, and it allows you to use this more than anything else. And the creativity going into D and D is just amazing, you know, especially if you have the right person telling the story. So if they go ahead and tell you, you know, you have just walked into Honeywood and you see a tavern, you’ve been traveling for hours and you need to, you’re parched. You know, they tell that story, the the detail that goes into it, you start believing it, you hear, you know, in your head, you see it, you know what’s going on, and then you just make the decisions. Now, they could be a nice DM and say, “Okay, uh, go ahead and uh roll the dice to see if you went ahead and convinced this person.” All right. Or they can say, “You just walked into a room. Roll the dice. Uh, why am I rolling? Don’t worry about it. I’ll tell you later.” Yeah. Then you have that anxious of what’s going on. Did I set something off? Did I die? I I I need to know. Can you die in Dn D? You can. Oh, perfect. But the be but the beauty of that is is like anything even if your character dies you can roll up a new character, go through the books, choose everything, and then the DM can incorporate like you met this new person in another town. Maybe you had to rescue them or they just randomly tried to rob you but doesn’t really want to, you know, be a villain. They just need money and then you say, “Hey, do you want to come with us instead? Now you’re best friends.” It’s all up to how they want to paint that story. Wow. Yeah. I might since there’s so much you can do. There’s a lot. But uh we are coming towards the end of the episode. Sure. U we this has been a wonderful time. You have been a wonderful guest. Oh, thank you so much. I’m sending hearts. Now, now I do have usually a closers that I do right here before the episode ends. You’ve covered pretty much everything, but the big one right now is you have two cosplays so far that you’ve made. If you could choose either one of them and anywhere in the world to do a photo shoot with that character, where would you choose? [Music] Does it have to be a real place? No. I would have to say Princess Leia and Wicked on planet Endor. So, Washington, Redwood Forest, but it has to say Planet Endor on it. True. In my mind, I was actually thinking Wicked. I don’t know because I love Wicked and Le I mean, I really do have a connection with all my cosplays. I love my dragon, but if I could upgrade my dragon a little bit and change a few things and fix it and kind of take the glare off his eyes a little bit and make him a little bit more dark and dreary, I think the island of Cit The castle of the minotaur in in cit with dinarius Targaryen and drill gun. I love that. Yes. And the castle of the menitar. And it has to have the skulls on the wall. Obviously. Obviously. Oh, I I love that. That is one of the most creative that I’ve heard. That’s that’s very specific, isn’t it? It’s specific, but at the same time, it’s I can see it. And that’s just Yes. Yes. Heck yes. You got have like the stone walls, the the the minotaur, the the skulls up on the I mean, I’m I’m kind of a dark and horror person, so you’ve got to have something really dark and smoky and like probably like a rainy, cloudy, nasty day. And it’s got to be dirty and gritty and a little bloody and Yeah, that’d be sweet. Which can always be done in post. Yes, exactly. We’ll add some blood to his teeth, some flesh or something. There you go. All right. And last of course, but not least, for anyone out there who’d love to get into cosplay, puppet work, or anything along the lines, what would you give as best advice? Oh, best advice is honestly, you don’t have to do it like anybody else. You really don’t. You really don’t. You can use a sock. You can use a piece of cardboard. You can use Amazon boxes. You can use a plastic bag. You can use uh hair clips as things. You can use ping pong balls and fake nails that you you can go to Goodwill. You can find an old puppet and switch it. Um I had a couple monster puppets that I dyed their hair. I mean, I actually have videos on my TikTok on how to dye hair on YouTube, how to fix like puppet hair and make it different colors. I mean, if you want to just have like this is the best thing about puppetry, okay? And this is all I’m going to say. When you bring a puppet into this world, you give it its soul. When you give a puppet its soul, you get to decide what soul it has. So, it can be dark and dreary and monster, or it can cuss and swear and be sassy, or it can be sweet and girly and pink, or it can be radical and molehawks and piercings and tattoos. It can be literally anything. And that is the magic of puppetry is that you are literally creating another soul and giving it whatever you want. So I love that. Thank you so much. Absolutely. So everyone, it has been wonderful having you here again and until next time, of course remember everyone, you can dream, believe, create. Until next time. [Music]
コスプレはさまざまな形をとることができ、彫刻家が何もないところから新しいアートを作成するように、このコスプレイヤーは、芸術のベテランではありますが、非常に現実的で驚くべきコスプレを作成しました。幻想的な人形劇を「人の人形」と話しながらご参加ください。 ＃manganime #diy #cosplay #costume #games #anime #anime #michigancosplayer＃cosplayover30 #cosplayerofinstagram #podcastersofinstagram #cosplayers #cosplaylife #cosplayersofinstagram #conlife #conventionvibes #nerdculture #geekculture #gosplayshowcase #cosplayinspo #cosplayphotography #cosplaytransformation #cosplaycraft Streamyardをチェックして、10ドルの割引を受けてください！ https://streamyard.com/pal/d/5359272511930368