NPC Cosplay

Wig Tutorial: Creating a Double-Thick Wig

Wefting and De-wefting Techniques

Double-thick wigs are useful for all sorts of situations - they’re especially great for spiking because extra fiber creates an extra-thick spike, but they are also useful for characters who simply have a ton of wild hair, such as Jasper or Jiraiya. Even wig brands renown for their thick hair can’t hold a candle to a double-thick wig, especially when you double up on a wig style that was thick to start with.

Supply List

Two wigs

A wighead and stand

Pins

A seam-ripper or small pair of scissors

Duckbill or alligator clips

Tacky glue or a needle & thread

Keep reading below to learn how to make your own super thick wig!

#1 The real world comes first

This is a no-brainer, but get your priorities in order. Never let cosplay come between you and paying bills, paying rent, buying this semester’s textbooks, funding car repairs etc. Do not starve yourself for cosplay. Do not let let yourself get into a financial cesspool over cosplay because that is the fastest way to guarantee that you won’t be making new cosplays any time soon. 

But, that doesn’t mean that you can’t cut back from regular spending to help fund cosplay. Maybe you can rent that movie when it comes out, rather than pay full price tickets. Perhaps you wait a month or two before getting that new manga omnibus. 

#2 Set a budget (no matter how loose) for each costume

This doesn’t need to be anything elaborate. It can be as simple as deciding “I only want to spend $100” or “I don’t want to put a money ceiling on this costume - the sky’s the limit!”

My costumes usually come in two varieties: quicker costumes that I’m putting together for fun and larger, competitive/show pieces. I usually set smaller budgets for the fast/easy costumes because I don’t want to spend a fortune on them. For craftsmanship pieces I usually don’t set a limit because I want to get them right, which means shelling out for prototypes, fabric samples, better materials etc. 

But this brings me to my next point:

#3 Track your spending and limit yourself

I realized that I was spending a lot on cosplay, so I started tracking how much I spent on cosplay a month (you don’t want to know how much). Then, I looked at my real-world expenses and established that I could afford to spend $X a month on cosplay-related materials. 

So now I use a month-by-month budget to keep my spending under control. I also track how much I spend on each costume so that if it’s a costume where I was trying to keep to a budget, I know when I’m about to hit the limit. 

Every month I re-evaluate upcoming expenses and factor those into the amount available as well. (December is particularly rough because of the holidays). 

#4 Be aware when coupons/sales are happening, but don’t feel pressured to act

If you subscribe to Jo-Anns, Michaels, AC Moore etc, you undoubtedly get loads of coupons or news about sales in the mail/by e-mail/in-store etc. As tempting as it might be, don’t feel pressured to use them just because coupons are about to expire or a sale is about to end.

There will always be another coupon, another sale. Don’t rush to make a purchase just because the sale is RIGHT NOW. Making impulse purchases can quickly set your budget awry and worse, you may end up committing to materials that are “good enough” instead of what you really wanted.

#5 Be prepared to spend a lot and plan

Cosplay is an expensive hobby. Be aware that to make even one costume can be hundreds of dollars. Most costumes have garment pieces, under garments, accessories, a wig, shoes, props, (not to mention what you are going to transport/store the costume in!) 

Let’s talk about why checking your fabric’s grain line is important! I got lazy on the mockup of this skirt and didn’t check the grain line on my muslin before I cut the center front panel. The result is that the center front panel of the skirt is almost two inches (!!!) bigger than the center front of the bodice. I double-checked my patterns and, if I had checked the grain line, it would have been a perfect fit. Cutting pieces on the bias (the diagonal) causes them to stretch and distort, and then you end up with mistakes like the one I made!

HOW TO CHECK THE GRAIN ON YOU FABRIC:

First, look closely at your woven fabric. You should be able to see a distinct pattern of threads woven over each other. Pull on it along the selvage, and you should find that the fabric has no give in that direction (UNLESS you are using a fabric woven with spandex fibers, then it may have stretch in every direction!)

We’re having a St. Paddy’s Day FLASH SALE! All of our green wigs including Matcha Brown are 25% off! Enter code OHMYGREEN at checkout for the discount. Sale will only last until Monday, March 20th 2017 at 9:00AM PST. 

“Cosplay Tutorial - How to make a cheap and cool scalemail” by Anhyra Cosplay

Hey guys, I made a quick little tutorial on French Seams. I’ve done about 20+ meters of them in the past week, so I was on a bit of a roll lol. French seams are a handy technique to know for: - preventing seams from fraying without using an overlocker - creating tidy looking seams inside unlined garments Kind of a noob topic, but I thought it might be handy for some beginner cosplayers :)

ATTENTION COSPLAYERS:

I would like to make the paint brand “Angelus” known. It is a special paint that is for leather, faux leather, rubber, and similar surfaces.

This is literally the best paint you can buy if you love a pair of shoes, but they aren’t in the right color for your character.

This stuff coats VERY well AND the coats of paint bend with your shoes. This means no cracking!!

In the photos above I took black rain boots and painted them with Angelus Turquoise. As you can see, they don’t look black any more! It’s so good!

I managed to paint two boots with a little one ounce bottle of the paint, and I still have a third of the bottle left over!

The paint dries very fast, so you can put layer on top of layer on top of layer without it streaking.

You can get the paint on Amazon and it comes in every color!

So @mtacofficial is less than two months away… 

Here’s my costume lineup for this year!

Friday - Levi (festival yukata) - Wings of Counterattack

Saturday - Magical Girl Umbreon - Pokemon

Sunday - Yuuri Katsuki (episode 1) - Yuri!!! On Ice

We’re also doing five (!!!?!?!?!??!?) panels this year, so I’ll update this with panel days and times when we get our schedule. Be on the lookout for:

Let’s Dress Up!:  Cosplay 101

Cosplay Fabric 101  -  new and improved for this year!

Cosplay Fabric 201:  Stretching Your Money (And Your Fabric)

Henshin Your Hair:  Cosplay Wigs

Put Your Best Face Forward:  Cosplay Makeup

We’ve reformatted a lot of our panels, so I can guarantee you’re going to see something new even if you’ve been to our panels before!

See you all in April!

For the past nine years of cosplaying, I’ve done multiple costumes changes a day. After a few experiences at Katsucon this year, I am so over doing multiple costume changes each day, unless it’s into some variation of the same character. It just ain’t worth the 10+ hours of circle lenses or using up that much expensive makeup product. From now on: one costume per day, then a kigu or pajamas (again, unless it’s a casual/PJ version of whatever character I was already cosplaying that day). No more of this multiple-characters-per-day craziness that I’ve done when I was younger, I’m too old for it. x____x

That being said: here’s some advice if you do want to wear multiple costumes a day!

1. Make a schedule for the day and stick to it. Know when you have to be back in the room to change, making sure to account for how long it’ll take you to do so.

2. Unless you’re cosplaying characters with very, very similar looks, you’ll want to fully redo your makeup. It’s tedious and a pain, but it’ll give you the opportunity to wash off any build-up and look fresh for your next character.

3. Have a snack and hydrate before going out for round two. You’ve already been through one costume and likely a few photoshoots by this point. Make sure to replenish your energy with food and drink water while you have the chance!

4. If possible, lay out your second costume before leaving the hotel room in the morning. That way, when you come back, your next costume is already set out and ready to change into without having to hunt for it while tired. (Instead you can use this time to actually, idk, sit down and catch your breath.)

5. Plan to wear the more difficult/physically-taxing costume in the morning. The worst thing (at least, IMO!) is being out all day in a costume then coming back to the room and having to change into full armor or a giant ballgown. With my energy levels, I greatly prefer changing into a more comfortable costume for late afternoon/evening.

There will always be someone that you feel is better than you. Always. Learn to accept that.

What takes you two days now will, with practice, take you two hours later. Keep at it.

There will be people who tell you that you’re too fat, or thin, or black, or white to cosplay a character. For every one of them, there are 10 who love your cosplay. Don’t listen to the hate.

Keep the first cosplay you ever make. Or at least photos. It will remind you of how far you’ve come later.

Always map out how much fabric you need and buy a yard more.

When you see a $0.99 pattern sale, buy as many as you can. You never know when they’ll come in handy. (It’s also fun to see the crazy high price under “you saved” when you buy 30 $20 patterns for 99 cents each).

When you go to a convention in the first costume you ever make yourself, there will be a 100% chance of a more experienced cosplayer in the same cosplay. And you will want to throw yours away. Don’t do it.

Muslin is your friend. It’s $1 a yard and it’ll help you figure out if the pattern your using will fit before you cut into your $10 a yard fabric.

There is nothing wrong with starting simple and starting small. Know your skill level when you start. Stay relatively inside it and you will be less frustrated and more proud of your work.

A little later, pick cosplays that have aspects you know how to do and aspects you don’t know how to do. Look up tutorials and try new things.

Don’t be afraid to ask for help, but make sure you try to help yourself first. Keep bookmarks of online tutorial and guide resources. 

Don’t be afraid to start over from scratch. If you don’t like what the end product looks like don’t let the hours you spent on it force you to keep it. Rip seams. Re-do hems. Go out and buy more fabric. All the work will be worth it for a cosplay you’re proud of.

Have cosplayers you look up to, but do not try to become them. Become you.

Invest in good materials. Starting with cheap products like $5 scissors means you will have to replace them much more frequently as your experience tells you that they aren’t good enough and you need better. Get better from the start.

Don’t be afraid to cosplay alone.

Get a sewing machine with at least 5 different types of stitches on it. You may not know how to use them now but as you learn you will want them available to you.

There will always be someone who gets more attention than you for the same cosplay. Don’t let that make you bitter. Likewise, don’t let it make you power hungry.

Don’t let notes on tumblr of favorites on deviantart dictate the quality of your cosplay.

Set goals and work to achieve them, like “5 new cosplays this year” or “win something in a costume contest.”