I had a rather long Christmas break (about 3 weeks) free from cosplay and it was actually pretty hard to get back into the swing of things!

Just finished:

Current projects:

Also, a really good article that I think every one who commissions cosplay or does commissions ought to read ~ good etiquette for both parties. I’ve been lucky so far in that everyone who has asked for commissions from me has been honest and straightforward, but I’m also not naive enough to think that the commissioning life will always be this easy. Two points that I especially like from the article:

# Recognize business hours and costs related to doing their job. Just because they are self employed doesn’t mean that they’re expected to work 18 hour days for below minimum wage, or not have health insurance to keep their costs low. Realize that they are running a business and expect that to be included in your costs. If they have to go out and buy new supplies to create your product, don’t be surprised that some of that overhead has ended up in your final costs!

# Don’t expect discounts! Related to the above point, these people are trying to run a business– and as much as I love a discount (and I know you do too!), there is a difference between waiting for a promo or sale and asking for the price to be reduced.

I’ve had the occasional client ask me for discounts. Sometimes it’s reasonable, as in when the client is ordering two or three props at once and asks for discounted shipping, or the cost of the props combined is over $300. Then I feel okay about a slight “bulk” discount. But as other commissioners know, one of the worst things is a client contacting you asking for a quote, and then wheedling you to “make it for less.”

I know there are unscrupulous commissioners out there who charge way too much and then don’t deliver, but most of us pride ourselves on the quality of our work!

Again, this is just a thought on the general state of commissioning. I enjoy my work and I enjoy my customers, and all of them so far have been very friendly cosplayers who just enjoy cosplaying as much as I do. XD

My next big cosplay, for Otakon 2010, will be Shiva from Final Fantasy X – yes, the ice-blue girl with the giant hair. Shiva as a cosplay appeals to me not only because of the amazing character design, but because I have and always will be a prop girl and not a seamstress. Weapons and armor and accessories and even wigs are more my thing than sewing is, although I have taught myself to sew somewhat decently. Such an amazing cosplay that requires so little sewing and so much prop making is ideal for me – and really, I can’t really think of ANYTHING for Shiva that requires sewing except for a few stitches of modifying a standard blue bikini bottom. (I COULD sew the bottom from scratch, but I could get a ready-made one for much cheaper, and for a 1% of the costume that I’m going to heavily modify anyway, I don’t think it’s worth it to sew it myself.)

So today over lunch I bought my Shiva wig – or, at least, I bought the materials to make the wig for Shiva.

Most of them.

It’s 1 long blue wig + 13 packs of extensions in 5 colors so far. I still need the foamcore batting for the inside of the braids, as well as blue yarn, which I have been told works well for bulk. I think I have enough extensions to cover all the braids, and if not, well, I’ll have to improvise! I ended up getting 5 different colors of blue/purple because the highlights in Shiva’s wig are various shades of purple and light blue, and I think that looks much more realistic than just straight cobalt blue.

The hair ties and hair rings I will get when I have finished assembling the wig, since I have no idea what I need right now, and how much.

I already have plenty of hot glue and upholstery thread. XDDD

$100 and counting!

Just installed WP on this server, here’s testing the system to see how it looks!