Cosplay Spotlight: Vampricyoda

Rise, Vampricyoda and take part of your COSPLAY SPOTLIGHT!!!!!

Why do you cosplay?

I came into it back in 2005. I heard about it from a friend of mine who was trying to get me to go to conventions and at first did it just for myself and as a joke. I still treat cosplaying at conventions and photoshoots that way. But these days I mostly cosplay for chairty and other promotional events. Free Comic Book Day as an example.

What was your first cosplay?

My first cosplay was a White Mage from the first Final Fantasy game. A friend of mine made it for me and I only ever got to wear the thing twice.both times the costume was mistaken for something offensive by parents and other non-con goers. Having to choose between my fun and causing a legitimate offense, I choose not to use the costume again and learned to be a bit wiser with costume choices.

Do you make your own cosplay costumes, if so, which ones, and how long does an average costume take to make?

It depends on your definition of make. I don’t sew or do props. But a great deal of my costumes are closet costumes. I think there’s a skill to being able to decide on a character you want to do and finding the costume pieces in a thrift shop or the like. I don’t consider it NEARLY the same as creating a costume from scratch. But sometimes it can take just as long. It took me over a year to find a proper 1970’s vest for my Tom Baker, 4th Doctor costume.

What is your favorite character to play?

This is hard. I’ve had quite a lot of fun in most of my costumes. But I think I had the most fun in my Lex Luthor and Jean-Luc Picard costumes for the same reason. At many events we have the same children and they know we’re people in costume if we’re not using a mask. They even know some of us outside of costume in general. But when I shaved my head for those characters to those children I looked completely different and they had no idea who I was. So I was able to play the character fully because the children weren’t able to figure out who I was.

Amongst animation, comics, movies, or video games, what is your biggest inspiration for cosplay?

Comics and Doctor Who are probably my biggest inspiration for cosplay at the moment. Doctor Who mostly because when you go into anything from the 60’s-80’s time people still know who you’re cosplaying but it isn’t so over done people aren’t excited to see it. With comics there’s always a new superhero to discover. Or find a new arc and a new costume variation.

Have you ever made any mistakes that you’d warn a first timer about?

I think my biggest mistake was what I spoke about with the White Mage costume. The only other bit of advice I’ll give anyone wanting to try a superhero with spandex or a zentai suit.

Jock Straps/Dancers Cups are your best friend. I had a Green Ranger image go slightly viral for a while because I didn’t think about that until it was too late and the picture was up.