How to Transition from Casual to Competitive Cosplay: What You Need to Know

If you have never competed before and have only cosplayed more casually at cons, you might be finally considering taking the next steps with the hobby. Competing is one such path you can go down with your cosplays if you’re looking to improve or find new ways to be apart of the community. Many cons both major or small library cons offer runway contests, masquerades and craftmanship contests. So whether you want to be judged on your skills or a performance, there’s an option for everyone. Strap in as we cover how to transition from casual to competitive cosplay.

Casual Vs. Competitive Cosplay

If you aren’t sure what the difference is between casual and competitive cosplay, then we need to start with defining the two before discussing how to make the change. Being a competitive cosplayer doesn’t necessarily mean you have a huge social media following or get paid. Contests are for all cosplayers, it just depends how serious you are at perfecting what you do. That can be either performance arts for masquerades or sewing, foamsmithing and other techniques for craftmanship contests. At the end of the day, a competitive cosplayer will be more serious about honing these skills whereas some casual cosplayers may not care as much and aren’t looking to be judged on their talents.

How to Transition from Casual to Competitive Cosplaying

• Beginning to make costumes – If you want to be a craftmanship competitor, you have to make your own cosplays. While it’s completely valid to buy costumes, you need to be sure you’re only doing so for the appropriate situation. Read the contest’s rules for how much of your cosplay needs to be made by you.
• Develop and hone your skills – Cosplaying requires quite a few different skills. If it’s masquerades, perfect your character portrayal and performance arts. If it’s a craftmanship contest, perfect your crafting skills be it sewing, prop making, etc.
• Find the contest right for you – There’s different types of cosplay contests. Then within those contest types, there’s different divisions for skill level, crafting technique and more. Look through the requirements, rules and criteria for your specific contest to decide which you want to focus on participating in.
• Get advice from other competitors – The first thing I did before competing was chat with my friends who had competed or judged before. They gave me tons of good advice and feedback to help me prepare both my costume and my mindset so I would have a great time while I competed. I recommend starting with your own friends to see what wisdom they have to share.
• Document your builds – Take lots of pictures of your costume as you create it. At some point you need to create a build book for the cosplay you made to compete. Documenting that process as you go with pictures will make it easier to sit down and sort through them to build that book.
• Read up on rules and criteria – The con itself will have rules for cosplaying at the convention. However, contests will also have a set of rules for competing. This includes things like how much of your costume you have to make, how long your performance can be and more. Always check these out before you start entering into contests. You also will want to read up on the judging criteria so you can properly prepare to compete.
• Prepare for the specific contest – Before you go to prejudging or walk the stage, you need to plan and prepare. Go over what key points you want to highlight to the judges, rehearse your stage performance, etc. Take time to come up with your plan before hand and be sure to cater it to the specific contest you’re competing in.
• Get feedback after a competition – Make the most out of your competition experience by asking for feedback from the judges after. This is a great way to help yourself to grow and improve as a competitive cosplayer.