Sierra Mikain (Suikoden 2)
creation: August 2001worn at: Otakon 2001, Katsucon 8
why sierra?: Suikoden! One of the best PSX RPGs, and chock full of awesome characters. Yes, the story is compelling, the music is beautiful, but it's really all about the niftiness of having over a hundred characters to mess with. For my fifth Suikoden costume, I chose Sierra. She's an excellent choice, being a very sleepy and incredibly cute vampire. I was greatly inspired by my Suikogaiden artbook, I must confess... Sierra is actually given a decent amount of characterization in the series. She was betrayed by another vampire who ended up screwing up her entire existence, so she does many horrible things to him. In fact, he's destroyed her so much and she's so desperate that she actually gets the help of some humans so she can annhilate him. Afterwards, she develops a little crush on a young cutie, who is oblivious to her remarks that she is "thirsty" - silly boy.
con notes: Matt (McDohl) and I met up with some other Suikoden people at Otakon. Here's the sign that was posted about the gathering. It was really cute! I reprised this as Katsucon, because I heard about another Suikoden group get-together. Problem was, I had thrown away the shoes and ALL of the jewelry had broken! I ended up having to remake almost every single piece of that jewelry. At least I still had the gems, so it wasn't too bad. The new shoes were a purchase from Wal-mart for $5, and again I had to paint them. They weren't as good as the originals, but the paint didn't flake off as badly and I glued the jewel to them so it didn't fall or this time. The wig was awful, and turned out very strange when I tried to re-style it. I think I melted part of it. It's a BAD wig. It will never be used again. RIP, wig. Another problem was that my white makeup was not working at all, and I had to use eyeshadow. It took FOREVER and a day. The group ended up being really cool and I loved hanging out with them. We plan to have more Suikocosplay at Otakon 2002!
construction: None of my pictures do the costume justice. A problem with having no nice photo shoots of the costume. :( Regardless, you can still see it, sort of. The reason this costume was devastatingly expensive was due to the contacts, which are really red (prescription, no less!), the fangs/makeup, and the wig. I also invested heavily in green rhinestones to make all the jewelry. The silver parts are painted Sculpey. The top and skirt are actually quit simple and the cape was not too hard to make once I figured out the design. The shoes were the biggest problem. I couldn't find anything the right color or type, so I ended up buying a cheap pair of shoes and painting them. Bad idea. The paint flaked off everywhere and the white painted soles became very gross and sticky in the Baltimore weather. I posed by the water fountain with an umbrella most of them time, but I haven't found any pictures of that yet.
