In early June, the SoCal Cosplay crew announced "Cospix." Instead of holding the usual gathering, they collaborated with Pixel Memory Studio to present "Cospix," a cosplay purikura party. This 18-and-over, paid event took place from 7 PM to midnight on July 20th in Los Angeles's "Little Osaka," as Sawtelle Blvd. is sometimes called. Thus, Cospix ended up pre-empting the SoCal Cosplay Summer Gathering. The SoCal Cosplay crew also announced on later on that they would reduce their bi-annual gathering to just an annual one in order to maintain the value and quality of their event.
One and a half weeks after the Cospix announcement on the SoCal Cosplay website and 15 hours after the "no summer gathering" announcment, Hazel Chaz posted a thread on cosplay.com to gauge the interest of Southern California members in attending a "cosplay picnic." By the week of the picnic, over 100 users had already RSVP'd, with more than 20 on the "maybe" list. According to Hazel Chaz, 115 people signed in; however, more people may have come without signing in.
The roster hits the one-hundred mark!
Picnickers supplied the food and drink. Everything―from pasta, to veggie sticks, to chips, to Pokémon cookies, to Death Note brownies, and even to sushi―populated the two three long picnic tables designated for food. (Thanks Chaz for the factual correction!)
"Deliciousness, I choose you!" exclaims a Team Rocket cosplayer who reached for a cookie shortly after this photo was taken.
Lazarathe on cosplay.com very graciously provided two boxes of hamburger patties for hungry picnic-goers. According to the boxes, over sixty patties had been grilled that day. In addition to the hamburgers, volunteers grilled hot dogs, and even sliced zucchini, to feed the masses.
Chaz commented how the success of self-organized events, such as the cosplay picnic and ALA, always impresses him. He also noted that such events demonstrate the strength of the community. Regarding the abundance of delicious and substantial food, he remarked, "Someone even brought sushi!" Chaz.
During the picnic, a number of cosplayers (including myself and my friends) had photoshoots to take advantage of the beautiful park scenery. The 345-acre park houses a stunning 9-acre-large lake, along with plenty of lovely trees, and some nice rocky areas as well. The stunning park had plenty of suitable photoshoot locations for cosplayers to utilize.
Some people met with con friends from Anime Expo at the picnic, while others just hung out with friends they had come with. I spoke with a small group of friends cosplaying the Joker and their own movie renditions of Harley-Quinn and Robin. My sister asked if they were planning to watch The Dark Knight later on, and it turned out that they actually were! "She's made little kids cry!" said one of the group, regarding her friend's Joker cosplay. "I don't know if I should get into character or not!" the Joker cosplayer exclaimed.
I hope they had a good time at the movie theatres. Though, I'm sure they all had conflicting feelings regarding the subject of making children cry. Any cosplayer would probably feel somewhat proud and flattered that they costume was so convincing that it would evoke such strong emotions; however, at the same time, he or she would feel bad for striking fear into a child. In the end, I must say that I was personally very impressed with the creativity involved in their group cosplay.
Although the thread estimated the time duration of the picnic from 12 to 5 PM, a fair number of people were still at the park when I left with some friends at 5:30 PM to eat ramen at a nearby Japanese supermarket. All in all, the picnic was a success; everyone had a great time at the cosplay picnic, which was probably the last cosplay event of the summer.
Photos by KrazEELegaL
Written by Megwa (Megan) on 8-11-08
