What is Cosplay?
According to the Oxford Dictionaries cosplay is “the practice of dressing up as
a character from a film, book, or video game, especially one from the Japanese
genres of manga or anime.”1 Although
cosplay is primarily composed of characters from manga or anime, cosplaying
American video game, comic or movie characters has become popular at
conventions as well.
When Did Cosplay
Start?
Cosplay is believed to have started in 1978 at a science fiction
convention in Japan. At the time, the point of cosplay was for role-playing.2
Cosplay Today
Cosplay has now become and industry unto itself. Many companies
survive solely on the production of cosplay costumes and accessories alone.
Many wig makers also cater to cosplayers. Special contacts to make the wearer’s
irises appear bigger have even been developed in an attempt to further imitate anime
and manga characters.
Modern cosplayers make and wear costumes for
- Conventions
- Photoshoots
- Cosplay gatherings
Cosplayers often wear the same costume multiple times, so one
costume may see each of these types of events over its lifetime.
Many of the conventions also hold cosplay competitions. Prizes are
awarded for categories such as best costume and most creative and will vary
from convention to convention. If your goal in cosplaying is to enter and win
competitions then your costumes need to be both unique and very well executed.
References
- Defintion of Cosplay. (n.d.). Oxford Dictionaries. Retrieved October 12, 2011, from oxforddictionaries.com/definition/cosplay
- Thorn, M. (n.d.). Girls and Women Getting Out of Hand. Welcome to matt-thorn.com––shoujo manga (shojo manga) and more!. Retrieved October 14, 2011, from http://matt-thorn.com/shoujo_manga/outofhand/index.php
Again, I've never been familiar with cosplay, so forgive the noob questions:
ReplyDeleteDo Cosplayers strictly dress as existing characters?
Are there "rules" to cosplay?
My only source of context for cosplay is how people dress up and act like vampires - is cosplay sort of like that?
Cosplay in its truest form is of existing characters. Those boundaries have been pushed with people dressing up as characters they have created, but that do exist. Examples of these are World of Warcraft characters.
ReplyDeleteAs with most hobbies, there are different levels of participants. Some people only consider something true cosplay if the person cosplaying is dressed as a real character and did the hair and is in character, etc. Others, such as myself, have a more open mindset that cosplay is about dressing up as a character and having fun.
Similarly, "rules" to cosplay depend on who you ask. Many cosplayers don't like to see people wear costumes purchased rather than handmade. Also, lots of cosplayers get very annoyed when people do a whole character except for the hair, or just use colored hair spray.
As for the people dressing up and acting like vampires, I don't know exactly because that is something I am not familiar with. If they are doing it for fun and just acting out a role, then yes, I would consider it cosplay. However, if they believe themselves to be vampires or have their religious beliefs attached then I would not call that cosplay.