Me and Cosplay

Am I a Cosplayer?
Hmm….ore wa cosplayer desuka? Shiranakatta ne…
Saya juga yang keitung bener2 cosplay juga baru dua kali…dan dengan track record dan frekuensi sesedikit itu dalam jangka waktu dua taun, plus berbagai syarat yg saya terapkan ke diri saya sendiri dalam mendefinisikan cosplay, saya gak berani memanggil diri saya sendiri sebagai cosplayer. Saya juga ndak pernah ikut dalam kompetisi, ndak pernah ikut event di luar kota Surabaya (Cuma pernah di malang sekali) , ndak pernah khusus potses ketika cosplay, ndak punya akun di socmed cosplayer juga. But I made both my costume (Alisa & Yukiko), style my own wig (Alisa), make my own props (Alisa), and gradually learn to play the role (though not perfectly yet).
Pake wig dan make-up doang, beberapa kali :3 but to call it cosplay? Ng…I don’t think so. Cosplay itu buat saya ya memerankan satu karakter dari game/anime/manga. Memerankan, jadi selain appearance total kudu mirip, saya kudu berperan/role playing jadi karakter tersebut. Wig and make up can make you feels as if you’re somebody else. But it doesn’t necessarily called as cosplay. The definition itself may vary from one cosplayer’s point of view from the other, and I don’t think having different point of view means wrong :3 so…yeah. I don’t think I’m someone who can be called as cosplayer yet, though I do cosplaying twice :3

Sejak kapan tau cosplay?
Hmmm….sejak SMP malah, jauh sebelum yang namanya cosplay masuk dan booming di Indonesia. Waktu itu saya baca liputan khususnya majalah Ultima yg mengupas tentang cosplay di Jepang. I was soooo amazed, and wishing sooo much that someday I can witness the same level of epicness in my country. These people are just like popping out of the game/manga/anime…with uncanny resemblance (I watched photos though…I don’t have a clue how do they perform or anything at all).
then came the day when Japanese event went booming in Indonesia, and I saw the best Kadaj cosplay ever by Endiru’s OrochiX in Jakarta. That day I thank God for finally there is another awesome person in my country that could cosplay as good as those people whose photographs I saw in the magazine when I’m in junior high XDDDD.
 

How do I pick a character? udah cosplay apa aja? Dan ada rencana mo cosplay apa lagi?

Saya lebih suka memilih karakter cosplay berdasarkan kesamaan figur badannya dengan badan saya, soalnya saya ada cacat di bagian dada dan terlalu kurus untuk cosu karakter2 yg bohay ato berpakaian agak terbuka. Cacatnya bukan soal dada rata, tapi kelainan bentuk tulang rusuk. Yang ngefans Shun Oguri udah tau kan kalo bagian dadanya ada yg kayak melesak ke dalem gitu? Yep, that’s what I have, except the fact that the deformity happens right at the center left of my rib cage. Hence, my flat-chest appearance =_=.

Yang udah pernah itu baru Yukiko Amagi from Persona 4, sama Alisa Bosconovitch from Tekken 6.
Yukiko itu cosu sekitar taun 2011an kalo ga salah :D I choose her simply because we kinda share the same body figure. Nyari cardigan yg mirip aja sampe muter2 dari Surabaya ke Sidoarjo. Trus roknya dijait sendiri (jahit tangan), dicelup sendiri juga (warna aseli item-putih, warna karakter abu2-item), dan kelepak kerah seifuku-nya juga dijait sendiri. Yang lucu adalah kelepak kerahnya itu lepasan, ga ada sambungan ke atasan seragamnya karena ga berani jait baju sendiri :v but, hey, I do the school logo with my hands XD

Trus yang kedua itu Alisa Bosconovitch dari Tekken 6. Awalnya sebenernya gara2 waktu itu pacar saya dan teman-temannya lagi getol Bajiquan…dari situ obrolan ketarik ke Tekken 6, dan akhirnya pada main Tekken bersama di tempat Ko-J-Tsu biasa ngumpul XDDD
Pas ngomongin cosplay, si Redja tau2 ngusulin Alisa buat saya cosplaykan. Bajunya juga gak terlalu terbuka…tapi saya kepikiran berat ama rambutnya yang dwiwarna =_=. Okelah…Alisa saya masukin wacana saja.

Setelah itu ada jeda beberapa bulan, dan Tekken Blood Vengeance rilis. Pas nonton pilemnya dan liat Alisa…alamakjaaaaaaang! Karaktere moe tibakno! Mati aku! Isok moe teko sebelah endineeeee coba?*dies*
Dan saya lupa….entah dapet dorongan darimana, akhirnya saya memutuskan saya tetep mau lanjut mengcosplaykan Alisa. Berhubung bokek, semua duid saya saya invest ke bahan mentah dan kain. Pas mau jait kebingungan ga punya ongkos, dan akhirnya pinjem mesin jait mbak Putu dan njait sendiri. Bikin atasan putihnya sempet gelagepan…tapi akhirnya jadi juga walopun bagian bawahnya gak rapi. Luaran merahnya juga saya jait dengan penuh airmata karena beberapa kali harus didedel pas ketahuan bagian luar-dalem kain atas-bawahnya kebalik.
Untuk sepatu saya meraba-raba tutorial boot cover dari internet, dan…yokattaaaaaa akhirnya bisa jadi :D. Kembali ke wig, saya pesen wignya dari jauh2 hari. Pas minta tolong di styling-kan ama temen I kinda pick the wrong time, dan jadinya kependekan T^T jadi itu mendadak banget hari minggu pesen wig plain pink baru, rabu wignya datang dan langsung saya styling sendiri. Sebelum pesan saya sudah dari jauh2 hari cair tutorial tentang wig coloring dan beli alat2nya. Potong sendiri, ngelem sisa potongannya untuk bikin belahan rambut bo’ongannya, dan dicoloring sendiri. Cosu ini bener2 cosu paling mendebarkan, sekaligus membanggakan karena hampir semuanya saya lakukan sendiri dengan konsultasi dari Internet dan teman-teman lainnya. Saya ndak bisa minta tolong ke teman lain untuk bantu membuatkan karena teman-teman juga pada sibuk dengan projectnya sendiri.

Rencana cosu berikutnya ada banyak (dan makin nambah), tapi yg paling deket kayaknya Taiwan-chan dari Hetalia Axis Powers :3

How was it feels to do a cosplay?

Simply exciting :D You choose a character, doing a research of it, preparing things to make it real, and put it all together when you’re finish. You should also put some make up, strike up poses, learning how your character should act, react, and talk too. To top them all, when you’ve successfully gather every piece of hardwork together in a cosplay, it is sooo rewarding to hear someone says you did a good job because you seems like the character itself alive, and then they ask to take a picture together with you :’D
Even if after the event finish and you’ve wiped out all your make-ups and put off your costume these people don’t recognize you anymore, it feels sooo amazing :’D

The happiest part of being a cosplayer

To me it’s when you pick a character, prepare all the things u need, make it into something and wearing it. Basicly every process is fun to me. It also fun to have and to know that you are not alone in this if u had a team. You admire another cosplayer doing a great cosplay, and it also somehow motivates you to do the same good job in cosplaying.
You also catch a glimpse of how would it feels to live the way your character live for few hours, or a day. It feels kinda refreshing to me, to get out of your daily character for once in a while and do something that could’ve been the opposite of your daily life.

The hardest part of being a cosplayer
To be a part of its drama life, and to experience unexpected treatment from the event organizer/visitor/society. Not just cosplay I think….even doing your everyday job could get you into its own drama too. But when you do cosplay solely to have fun with it and it’s process, you won’t like getting caught on one of the world’s drama. It might make you hate cosplay and everything related to it if you somehow became the victim, and the cosplay world wouldn’t be the same again if you do become the victim. Cosplayers could also become the victim of the event organizing team. Sometimes they only see that a cosplay event may attract lots and lots of visitor, and they only want to have more visitor. They may not provide cosplayer with their basic needs (changing room with mirror in it, places/room to keep the belonging save while we’re doing a cosplay all around the venue, unfair judgement/prizes in a competition, etc). A cosplayer may experience some kind of harassment from the visitor too. One time I had a visitor asking to take a photograph together, and he was just like flung his arms around and pose :( it’s only happened for a few second, but I don’t like it (and by the second I was about to protest, the photo’s been taken and he say thanks and then just left). Society might also think that cosplaying is nothing more than being a clown. Cosplayer might looks like a freak sometimes…wearing colourful hair with odd outfit that costs quite a sum and saying stuff that non-otaku people don’t even have a clue about. Some might say that cosplayers wasting their money for something that gave them no visible profit, or doing a disrespect act to our nation by displaying an act that promote a country that once had invade our country.
Well, I think those people might only see cosplay from his/her own point of view that differs from mine or yours, and avoiding the fact that you can see cosplay from too many standpoint to get a bigger, varied and new picture of how it truly is. Everyone may agree or disagree, but no ome had the right to say right or wrong before they see it from the multiple point of view. 

Why am I doing cosplay?
 I want to have fun. My definition of fun might differs from you or anyone, because I rarely do anything idly for a simple novelty. I do serious fun, in order to get the maximum effect of doing something that I classify as “fun”. I want to do a correct cosplaying, because I want to have the fun and feel proud for doing a good cosplay. I don’t want to do a character that had been cosplayed by another people I know because (although it is inevitable in any occasion) I don’t want people to compare my version with another people’s version. I want to feel the relief of escaping my daily self by playing a role as one of my favorite character in a cosplay. I don’t want to involve in any team-related group of cosplay because team usually had their projects related and doing the cosplays together in a timeline. My activity and fund resources are not enabled to do such way of cosplaying, so I simply won’t push myself to do it that way.
To think of it, I have the same tagline with Natsume : Serious fun. In order to have fun with something, I have to seriously doing it. I’ll have my fun when I’ve been doing it properly :D
Cosplay is fun to me when you may learn so many new things, tricks, making process of something, and of course, when you can learn about the multi-billions new characters of people (and game’anime/manga).
I do hope that no matter how other people might do it, cosplya will always be a fun thing for anyone to do. Don’t let anyone ruin your hobby, and don’t stop doing something as fun as cosplay only because someone wants to make you feel bad about it (solely by being there and doing the same fun thing). Do what you love, and do it properly, for life might be too short for any of us to not doing something as fun as the hobby we love :D