AX Recap – On Judging a Contest and Meeting Danny Choo

AX has ended and I’m happy to say it was the best Anime Expo I’ve attended. The new additions to the Nokia Center really add to the convention experience. It was wonderful to see the live performances from the hotel window and to experience them outside. The hotel was just a short walk and was a pleasure to stay at. Food was so easy to find for a change and not having to deal with shuttles was awesome!

I took 4 costumes to the convention, but ended up wearing mostly just one. It wasn’t anything flashy but it was great to be comfortable for a change XD Photos should be up shortly.

A number of weeks back the staff of cosplay.com contacted me about judging a hall cosplay contest. I was very flattered and gladly accepted. It was my first experience in the judge’s seat and it was great. There were so many excellent costumes. I can’t even express how impressed I am with the dedication and obvious love for the hobby that the entrants had. It was incredibly humbling to see the level of quality and to hear about the time some of the people spent on their projects. I learned a lot from it all and had a awesome time. I left inspired and in awe of so many. Even though we only had 4 judges awards and 3 over all awards we easily could have given out 10+ more. There were so many masquerade winning quality costumes entered and we only had 7 prizes to give (and 48 entries!) so it was tough.

Congrats to the winners yet again. Your costumes were amazing on the exterior and interior and really set a high bar for all of us in the hobby!

Yet another thing that made this AX awesome was meeting Danny Choo, big-time blogger (among other accomplishments) and the man behind Otacool 2! I had some time in between judging entries and the awards, so I ran over to the ESPN Sports bar in LA Live just in time to see the DC/fakku meet start. It was so exciting! Danny was so kind to introduce me to the crowd (I felt so honored) and took some photos with me as well. I’m sad I had to leave so early, but it really made my convention!

I also want to say it was very nice to meet some of you who follow my cosplays. I met some great new people and hope we can keep up with each other in the future~

I can’t wait for next AX. I hope others had as great of a time as I did. It really was a highlight of the year for me and I’m sad it’s over!