So this is a bit of a breakdown of the toy I’ve been playing with the last few weeks. Inspired by cosplay fanvideos around the world I noted the video mode on my Canon 550d and set about doing some research on whether I could do anything similar!

Usual disclaimer, this is all my understanding of things and how they work, I could well be wrong or misguided, feel free to throw in comments if you know better! However for now this is kind of a layman’s view on things, I got a LOT of enquiries about the steadicam while running around with it at KitaCon and I promised I’d do a detailed writeup of how I abused the poor thing.

There’ll be a later post on actually using the thing and considerations for the filming itself, but for now this is the techy side of fixing up a cheapo steadicam.

This rig, of course, is all I used for the first Cosplay Cascade video, so the results are already out there!

Continue reading The NertCam Steadicam…

KitaCon returns! Only my second visit but hardcore veterans were hitting the dancefloor for the fourth year running. If anyone worries the con scene might start to stagnate with the same faces every time, that’s not happening anytime soon! So many new faces in and out of costume it was quite the change to barely recognise anyone! Aw man, I have to do the whole socialising thing again?

Kita4 managed to best the previous year on just about every count, the vibe throughout the venue was amazing, lots of lovely costumes, and all the special guests were awesome to meet.

While the gallery numbers are respectable for a small event, Kita is anything but, so what gives? Also what the HELL is up with that massive data count, I ask myself? I may have been.. preoccupied the entire convention with the gadget you may have noticed in an earlier post. Details are still sketchy and we haven’t got all the intelligence on the matter yet, but rumour has it that I was filming cosplayers all about the convention merlin-steadicam-style. To what end? We just don’t have the answers yet..

But soon…

So we’ve got quite the run up of events approaching at shocking speed, MinamiCon is this coming weekend and once more I’ll be waxing satirical about photography rubbish so if you’re around earlyish on the Friday I appear to once more be taking over Event Room 2 from 5 ’til 6. So be there. Or don’t be. That’s fine; I won’t mind. I-it’s not like I do these things for you or anything.

To the right you may well notice something unusual, you may see this at the forthcoming events, do not run, do not fear or panic. Well, unless it looks good in 60fps, then feel free. Most importantly, don’t freeze on the spot! The deer-in-headlights look isn’t in fashion this season, do something cool instead! The lemon demands it. ManyLemons may well be revisiting something of a page from its own tattered, ancient-runed book, and taking a little return to roots with a project I have in mind.

To this end: EXPECT THE LENS

First event of the new year for me! HyperJapan returns for its third outing in an even larger venue and appears to have smacked its queuing problems on the head from last year, the event is only improving and this year was host to the UK qualifiers for both the European Cosplay Gathering, and – for the first time ever – World Cosplay Summit. The UK is finally on the WCS map!

Congratulations to our winners for both!

Lex and Sands are our representatives for the 2012 World Cosplay Summit with their excellent Vampire Hunter D (Amano version) costumes and performance, and will be attending the finals in Japan.

Yuka and Dahlia will be representing us at the 2012 European Cosplay Gathering with their costumes and performance from Final Fantasy XIII, as with Nomes with her Son Goku from Dragonball Z (which sadly I missed seeing!) at the finals held in France.

Other prizes went to contestants for: Judges’ Choice, Best Junior, Best Individual, 4th place, and 3rd place.

What’s this?! An entry on ML that isn’t specifically attached to an event of somesort?

Heresy.

tl;dr version: What kind of panel/workshop would you want to see from me? or for me to generally arrange and drag people into?

Continue reading Lack of Con Season…

Another Expo has passed by and this time I was truly in the thick of it.  Hosting the second EuroCosplay championship pretty much ate the entirety of my Friday and Saturday, I’m now down on the staff list as Photographer Overlord, apparently  o.o;

I got a brief bit of freedom but otherwise was chained to the photo studio for the ECC finalists until Sunday.  My first attempt at seamless white!  Not my kit so thanks to Pounce for supplying it but after the feedback everyone got from Aya’s studios I tried a more adventurous setup with duct tape and foam gobos, painted MDF flooring and stuff like that.  It’s gone pretty well though now going through the photos again on a white screen it’s clear where the falloff still lies, sads!  Also thanks to Ashe for the loan of a gorgeous bit of kit in the shape of the 24-70mm f/2.8L Canon lens for the weekend, but JEEZ my arms hurt for days after carrying that thing for two days solid..

This year’s EuroCosplay contest was spectacular, once again some real showmanship and camaraderie between the majority of the finalists and some familiar faces back from across the waters.  The opening video was of mine and Locke’s creation, I did the stupidly overdramatic stuff and the cringingly patriotic flags, the 3D country flyovers were made from his sweat and tears learning the 3D mechanics over the last month.

Apologies for anyone looking for me on the Saturday, I was intending to get a bit more free time to do my usual thing but sadly was not to be.

Forgot to plaster these on the front page: A few more for the 3D pile!

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So much Felixize tri-dimensional love :P