CCA Championship Of Cosplay
Costume: Yennefer of Vengerberg from The Witcher 3.
Judges: Nana Kuronoma, Narga-chan Cosplay, Tsuyas Cosplaywerkstatt
Result: 1st prize
Personal impressions
Since I won the single category last year I didn’t get my hopes up to actually win again. Sure I thought it would be nice to be placed. However, since I had so much fun last year even before the victory ceremony I just thought: “The heck with it! I’m definitely have a great time even if I can’t defend my title.”
The prejudging was a bit unconventional, we all gathered in the eSports hall and again I saw a few very good costumes of which I thought they could easily beat my 90% sewing costume.
So we randomly walked on stage for the prejudging while the host walked around with a microphone to talk to us about our costumes. Amazingly she memorized all of our interviews and repeated them on stage during our performance.
I was the second to be judged and my friend Nikaj’s turn who was cosplaying Triss Merigold was right after mine so we had a whole lot of time to explore the convention a bit more with Tilliel Cosplay and Art as our Ciri before the stage performance began.
Making up a performance for Yennefer was quite difficult since
I can’t cast spells in real life and she also has no weapons I could
flourish with. That’s why I sewed the cape to give my entrance a little
bit more drama. So I had my costume fully hidden under my cloak. I
walked in the middle of the stage to first pull off my hodd and then
drop the whole cape. I gestured to cast a spell with my crystal raven
skull and then showed a Yennefer like attitude.
The victory ceremony was shortly after like last year. When
the third and the second prize has already been announced I have to
admid that I was a little bit disappointed because I thought that’s it
for me. The acoustics backstage was really bad I had a hard time to make
out what they were exactly talking about on stage. I just heard bits of
“favourite” and then: “Yennefer!”
At the moment I was totally confused. I didn’t hear the part where the judge Tsuya from Tsuyas Cosplaywerkstatt was saying that they would now announce the winner so I thought I might be an honorable mention which (would have) made me also extremely happy! So maybe some of you who saw me on stage were noticing my confusion. But while I was standing up there I saw the host grabbing the winner prizes, that’s when I was pretty sure I won the thing again! (I asked the host again after the we got off the stage, just to be 100% sure! I’m awkward, I know….) I even was able to hold a short speech that came to me a few weeks earlier when I was looking at one of my cosplay photos…
“To all of the cosplay beginners:
If somebody would have told me five years ago that I could make a costume like this myself, I probably would have laughed at this person. But last year I was standing up here, I am standing up here again and you can get here too. You just have to try.”
Unfortunately the crowd already dissolved right after the judges actually nominated an honorable mention so we didn’t get to take a group picture. I took photos with some visitors and then I also went back to the convention floor.