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10th December , 2008
02:52 am - Furthermore!
Ball vidyahs.
We arrived a little late so only caught the last part of ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) chococat & ai_honey's duet
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4soQpu9NLkg
The incredibly awesome fire performance, it's missing large chunks because I switched to taking stills a lot but it's got the opening
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RJN0OsZE1kI
The last dance
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwcaNzQP3zM
Edit: and now official YayaApproved (tm) photos up too.
The ball weekend was sublime. It was generally consensused that a late evening event on a Sunday night - and thus ate into Monday morning - was a perfect excuse to make a long weekend of things and use the spare time to do what we so rarely have time to do at cons, sit down and chill :P
My general plan of the weekend was a) crash at Kat's, b) attend ball, c) ??? d) Profit. That's about the extent of it, as to what fills the rest of the time was left blissfully to whatever was going on at the time rather than rushing around in a wild panic, it was quite refreshing.
Such a trip proved an excellent chance to test run the (dundunDUUUN) new suitcase of doom, following the rather strenuous trip to Expo in October and Angie's advice I have officially lost a chunk of my desperately-clutched youth by purchasing luggage. It's a giant red and black box on wheels, it has maybe 0.5-1.0 centimetre each side to spare when going through tube gates, and, well, it's big. I loves it <3 Test run appears successful as it not only held all my crap with room to spare, it makes for a handy "chuck all my stuff in" box, has easy to reach pockets for travelling supplies like drinks, has the pull out carry handle thing, and is big enough that if I pack it carefully I can use it as a seat while travelling \o/ Or a table to rest the tablet on. I'm muchly impressed at its versitility. Oh, and it means my shoulders won't get ripped off so easily anymore. Bonus.
I'm sure you're all thrilled at this news.
Work mehs aside followed by last minute packing followed by a bizarre new train schedule meant I didn't hit the pavement of London streets 'til pretty late, but I had Oh! Edo Rocket to watch so it wasn't so bad.
Thus Friday consisted of not much, I finished off the Chase spectacles I'd started on, there was general revelry, then there was sleep.
Saturday heralded an event at the TokyoToys store in the Trocadeiro, it'd been moved/remodelled, and was acting as a pre-ball promo event with Yaya, Brian, the Koei lot (Jake/Laura/Kaka) and the WCS-winning French duo in attendance
Before that, lex_is_evil was being dragged around random London streets at the request of some really cool Austrian photographers who're producing a book which in some way involves Britannian Princes in phone boxes. Myself and Nia bundled along for support. And heckling. This also led to us being introduced to the utterly bonkers group of Austrian and German cosplayers who'd travelled over for the Ball. Seriously, they're mad, the lot of them, but they're a great laugh and the language barrier wasn't much of an issue for them luckily.
Because it was for a proper commercial venture I wasn't allowed to snap along with them, I got to play with Nia's camera for a bit though. Lexface wasn't feeling too well so things took a little longer than they'd hoped but it was good fun anyway, if a little cold. Food was had, another quick shoot interrupted only by a crazy old guy singing about panties, and we ventured forth towards the TokyoToys event. Lex still fully Schneizel'd up.
The event was surprisingly packed in such a relatively small space, ran into white_leviathan, sandss and Kaka, as well as raven_mocara behind respective desks doing stuff, until Yaya and Brian showed up and things kicked off.
All in all it was a neat little event, there were talks and stuff - although the mic ranged from might-as-well-be-off to OW! EARS! SHEESH! ;) The desk selling Ball tickets ended up being our hiding ground, with several of us randomly taking turns in doing the selling part.. Spotted a rachelmei through glass shelves and generally mooched.
Played around a bit with the tablet, I've since spent a good day tweaking it to death and back, when discussion turned back to when we jokingly got Lex to sign one of the photos of her - which led to.. well, hang on, I really can get people to sign their photos on here o.o; Duly bounced over to Yaya, presented the photo I'd only just taken of her a few minutes ago, and awkwardly asked if she'd mind signing it XD The result? Here. Squee.
I've never held much awe and love for celebrities, in general anyway.. They generally have to have become famous for something I personally like to set the internal squeemeters going; I'd sooner fall to my knees in front of Thomas Biskup than the average film star du jour. So when Yaya was announced as the special guest I didn't really blink, I knew of her but hadn't really looked at her website or seen many of her costumes so it was on a similar level with most of the guests we've had at cons here - they've probably done something worthy of fame, but meh. Yaya at least I knew was friends with Mark, which is - believe it or not - a plus point ;) Getting her signature was more for novelty, she's there, she seems nice enough, it's a funky use for the tablet and all.. But on talking to her - and Brian - they're seriously nice people. Seriously. Not nice in the "we've been invited here, put on a face" way either, actually genuinely interested in talking to people. Confusingly this meant that only *after* getting her signature was I particularly interested in having it XD It's all good. I was also kinda surprised how well they fitted in, I mean to some extent I guess people can get used to travelling around into groups of strangers but they seemed to slot right in with everyone rather than standing around awkwardly like I would XD I could also blame it on the fact that our lot are awesome.
After a while, a new invasion force showed up - including princessmark, ai_honey, tom_kun, angelphie, ashechan, shinbios, yuka02, EmiChoco and more I've probably neglected now :P
There were cat ears for sale. Schneizel looks pretty :P
The tablet got stolen and doodled upon.. First this, then it was horribly, cruelly tortured with this, then all was made right with a doodle of Asa <3
General merriment ensued, culminating in a giant photo opportunity of pretty much everyone in attendance, minus the hoardes of us with cameras anyway.
The corridors in the Trocadiero, adverts for bowling aside, are quite photogenic. Time for some zombieness.
Not much more to say on the pre-event really, it was a good laugh, people enjoyed it, the store's kinda nice but didn't have much on sale that interested me, some Haruhi stuff which was nice but mostly of the girls in swimsuits -_- And had a collectable Higurashi figurine set! ...which looked terrible and made by people who haven't seen the show :p So close, sigh.
Rumours had it there was a meal planned afterwards, although I'm pretty sure it was just for the Ball organisey people, but that stretched to organisey people and friends.. and friends of friends.. and, well, we have quite a tightly knit network here.. Yeah, it wasn't going to work. Either way I wasn't on the guest list but apparently they were planning on just showing up and squeezing everyone in regardless, and failing that splitting the party.
So I vanish off to the toilet for a bit - and in fairness in that area this does require navigating several oddly placed escalators - and when I got back everyone'd vanished! With just one of the French cosplayers - Damien - out of costume so I barely recognised him, standing around, also bemused as to where everyone'd gone.
Puzzled texts fired off, as from what I gathered all fitting in one place wasn't going to happen anyway, and wandered outside looking for somewhere else to go. 10 minutes later I get a text from Floz of all people asking if it was really me she just passed somewhere in the Trocadeiro o.o; Didn't manage to find out where she was but replied yes anyway XD another 30 mins later and I'm discovered as missing, before being passed to Emily and given some very vague directions to a completely unrelated resturant and a warning there wasn't much chance of getting in anyway :P
Long story short, found the random restaurant where apparently a friend of Emily's would be leaving and then going to the real place, I then get another panicked call from Nia and Lex who've ventured out - Lex still in nekomimi!Schneizel - to come get me o.O I was duly rescued from the scary streets of London and led back to the ridiculously crowded basement floor of what would otherwise be a lovely Japanese place with karaoke in the corner ;) Amongst the sardine-tinned I spotted odangochan and thekillingdoll before squishing in the corner with my saviours. Illness of doom, having been quiet most of the weekend, decided it was time to kick up the bass and have a house party.. So.. yeah, that was fun ;) Kat grabbed the waiter and got me some water so I managed to survive ;) That and some food later, and I'd mostly recovered thankfully.. Oddly even turning up some 45-60 minutes later than everyone else I still got my food earlier than Nia and Lex :P ravenmocara then came and prodded me for not waiting for the previously mentioned friend T_T
On that note, seriously thanks for helping me out you guys.. I hate putting people out of their way like that -_- Should've left me out there to die, die I say!
Food good, company better, just a little on the loud side, being next to the karaoke machine ;)
Eli displays her new Redkun impression. Damn you for having a much shinier camera than me ;)
We managed to escape eventually, and headed off with a Mark and Kelly in tow. Randomly bumping into ailsa_chan and GG on the way o.o
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Sunday
Laaaazy day. Breakfast and mooching, mostly. Mark and Kelly headed off early for rehersals, the rest of us sat around a bit. Panicked cosplay-related call from Amy summoned Kat to venture over and assess the damage.. Returned with the Amy and the workforce was called to arms! Swiftly there was lots and lots of sewing shiny things together for the rest of the day XD The result was worth it, that's one seriously stunning outfit.
Goes without saying of course, that Kat was still sewing hers together too :P
This did sadly mean missing the meal with the pixies et al, but there was bling to be sewn! And sewn it was.
Pizza was thusly ordered as the Chinese wasn't open, boo.
Lex had to go be forcibly clasped into her corsetry of doom ahead of time :P
Nia wasn't able to stay for the ball T_T sads. she valiantly stayed to do everyone's makeup and all though (except mine, pft! favouritism. ;)
Taxi summoned, and off to the ball!
Bumped into James and Leena by the entrance, looking very shiny
We got in about 45 mins after the start, just to catch the end of Kelly & Choco's duet
The "It's YOU" you can just hear at the end of the clip is from none other than the Angela :P as with her voluminous Cinderella dress I was taking up vital space in the stairway XD
First impressions? The place was a lot smaller than I expected.. The dancefloor had obviously been shrunk from whatever its original form was, although it didn't look too full throughout the evening the area around it was ;) Lots of dodging and weaving. I finally discovered the stairs (which were hidden in doomful brick passageways that just yelled YOU SHOULDNT BE HERE) and checked up there.. Lots of space, acres of tiered seating, quite comfy, nicely spaced, but the speakers up there were louder than downstairs! you couldn't dance up there or relax which was a real shame.. if it was a lot quieter up there it'd have been lovely and most likely a lot more used leaving downstairs easier to breathe.. Shame.
It took a good hour before the 'Alice in Wonderland themed photoshoot area' was found. Behind the bar through a door marked "toilets", and up more brickwork stairways, past another level of seating, covered in more dust than can really be healthy.. and.. yeah. I didn't get a close look, it was more of a photo booth affair where you booked a timeslot, moved things around and had pictures taken, from a distance it looked like a wall with some cards stuck on but I didn't really get to see it. Oh well.
Size and sound aside the atmosphere was nice, kinda awkward at first but then I expected that because.. it's a ball, and me and balls are not the most well acquainted things in existence. but it was nice and relaxed; me and this ball? we cool. we cool.
Yaya and the craziest of the cosplayers from the photoshoot - Zineb I'm told - on the dancefloor
Whilst exploring the balcony, the next performance came on - a fire performance! Ooh, I wasn't expecting that. Nor was I expecting him to come on dressed as Roy Mustang from FMA to Ready, Steady, Go and launch fireworks from his hands XD Awesomes.
The rest was really pretty too. I took a lot of silly exposure shots from the balcony and they came out pretty well.
Located a Mark and Kelly! Spiffy. Even if dust on my lens looks like it's about to eat Mark's head.
There were a lot of particles in the air, which I think (hope) was stage smoke of some sort but it certainly made long flash shots a nightmare..
blueskycomplex as Lamiroir \o/
Greyskull, and the apparently non-fictitious girlfriend
I founds me a miss_zetsubou against the shiny wallpaper of doom
ZAH MASK
Also? A Chevi.
Akemi Solloway, doing her thing. Introducing a kimono fashion display of sorts, really nicely put together.
Yaya's performance kicked off, I took video but it was from a distance and I'm sure someone else must've gotten clearer footage so I haven't uploaded it.. and filming meant I didn't get any photos so.. DOUBLE FAIL
Balcony-bound again, and spotted a firedaemon with an oversized lollipop in one of the private boxes, I couldn't resist taking a photo :P Decadence!
Lex spotted me and dragged me in, at which point I discover that the boxes are actually quite nice, if small, but other than people like me who knew others had booked them and thus they were private, people were wandering in and out all night assuming they were free for all -_- bleh. A sign mentioning if you hadn't booked them then they're private would've been good there..
It was a good vantage point to sneak photos of EmiChoco and Yuka though :P
Amy, up close and blingy.
Bumped into kazzoo and Chevi to discuss worldly matters such as certain individuals of disrepute XD
I did very briefly run into seraphim_cry and it took me a while to recognise her o.o Lovely costume but didn't get a picture T_T
Probably one of the nicest photos I managed to take, before she thieved the tablet again for more doodling :P Though got interrupted this time and didn't finish, boo.
Located two nifty Utena cosplayers and by the time I caught up with them, they'd adorned themselves on one of the sofas. So asking for a photo was reasonably simple :P Turns out they'd come all the way from Spain o.o I got their card and everything.
Yuka found me and dragged me off for a Code Geass shoot of sorts, the only major group of any particularly source that evening it seemed, other than Lewis Carrol anyway.
Lots of pretty photos of pretty people. I utterly failed to recognise Jessie even through all of those photos until much later o.o;
It's not so obvious in the gallery, but the fact that this photo precedes this one amuses me greatly.
Kamiko and Natsumi hiding away in bright white XD
Amber and Mike, awww..
It took a while getting the shots of those two, I always have trouble finding them together in costume XD by the time we'd finished somehow they discovered a huge butterfly clip of some sort where they were standing.. It ended up getting attached to me and pretty much stayed there as no one else claimed it.
I then got attacked by a rather intoxicated Laura, Nina and Jake :P
Some American McGee's Alice, apt ;)
Finally got some better shots of tom_kun's yellow wig of.. doom's overused.. devastation? Wig of Devastation.
An Elifish with wings. The most terrifying kind.
Angela then thieved my camera, and was quite gleeful at this, even taking pictures of the cash machine o.O On enquiring what she'd been drinking, Eli squealed in much a manner that implied whatever it was, she was on the same :P
Many photos where thusly taken of peoples faces.
Eli broke out into rock suddenly, then into dance, Ailsa applied the boot.
A laheie :O I haven't seen her in.. yikes, ages!
Katface. Determined to not let me get any photos, and clearly failing XD Although without a lighter background the hair doesn't come out so well. Looks like she's wearing a candelabra tiara though :P
There were.. a lot of trains that evening.
A Padme!Lex. Watching the show.
Damien, as Velvet from Odin Sphere
The night was winding up, people were saying goodnight for last trains home or out of general tiredness.. But the penultimate song was up, and in classical ball style.. it was Sweet Child of Mine by Guns and Roses?
There was rock. Much rock.
THEN the last dance, with Choco singing the night out.
Emily bids everyone goodnight. Kind of amusing that most of the people speaking on stage were the ones in largest violation of the dress code XD
Slight downer as the overzealous venue staff were taking leaves from the excel centre staff handbook and were forcibly kicking everyone out as soon as the song was over.. It was a struggle just to get back to the box where my jacket was! Then we were duly tossed on the street.. Mark and Kelly obviously wanting to bid a good night to Yaya and Brian were met with closed doors, bleh.
Taxis back was also fun, turns out the companies we took down just in case don't pick up from public places.. even the one that only accepts calls from mobile phones.. Huh. There was a taxi stall just next door so we used that instead.
le zonk.
Everyone I talked to, Leah's annoying encounter with a drunk guy and a drink aside, was having a great time, for every issue that's been mentioned about the venue, staff, or mishaps, there were a dozen grinning faces just having a good time in their own ways. It was a much more formal event than ame or expo pulled off, but it was much more relaxed at the same time, it's hard to describe. I figure because it was on its own, not during an already hectic con, and because many people made a full weekend of it anyway, it was just less panic and stress on everyone and I think it really showed.. I'd actually prefer the ball to remain separate like this than bundled with a con, as part of ame it's just one evening event but because there's a dress code the outfits are usually just as elaborate and delicate as a masquerade costume so fitting it in a suitcase and setting aside prep time and so on with the rest of a con isn't as much fun as having the whole weekend like this..
I figure if the Grand Cosplay Ball is going to run again/regularly, it'd be nice to see other events leave it to it.. This could just be because I find cons too hectically packed as is but I dunno, I really feel this is the proper way to hold a ball event, I'd rather see con-time used differently I think..
Monday
More laziness, much not doing of anything whatsoever. \o/ Followed by Chinese, followed by the trek home.
One image to sum it up:
Win.
A most enjoyably relaxing weekend, with a Ball thrown in for a nominal fee.
...
Only for Tuesday to be wracked with chest pains and difficulty walking. Go me. Unrelated to the Ball at least..
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Comments:
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/81909054/12741333) | | From: | sandss |
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| Date: | 10th December, 2008 03:32 am (UTC) |
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"Greyskull, and the apparently non-fictitious girlfriend"
oh my god I lold SO hard!
ahhh this made for an enjoyable read with all the photos, you certainly area ninja with the camera.
I would say sorry for being so drunk but...Im not, it was too much fun haha!
was awesome seeing you on the weekend =] glad you had a fun time
A top write-up Sir! How you remember so much detail this late on I'll never know (but then, I have a goldfish memory) :)
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/76935374/676258) | | From: | nert |
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| Date: | 12th December, 2008 01:23 am (UTC) |
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I have a camera with timestamps XD
They're getting harder to write as I meet more people and I know I forget half of them now -_-
I really ought to do some kind of a ball update on my cosplay LJ ^_^
And yes, if I ever hunt down that red-clad git who spilled beer down my costume there'll be hell to pay. Or at least the dry-cleaner's bill.
I couldnt get through the whole post, my bones are cold!! but, DID Y OU GET ME CAT EARS????
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/40401852/433343) | | From: | chococat |
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| Date: | 10th December, 2008 01:03 pm (UTC) |
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"Yaya and the craziest of the cosplayers from the photoshoot (I for the life of me can't remember her name now..) on the dancefloor"
I believe she's called Zineb :)
Thanks for the videos, I didn't realise anyone got vids of us singing! I'm always glad to be able to assess my performance after an event, so thank you for that :) Any chance I could trouble you for a copy of the Eyes on Me video? The edited version is fine, I'd just like slightly better quality than YouTube as I have a purpose in mind for it :)
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/63486503/676258) | | From: | nert |
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| Date: | 10th December, 2008 05:27 pm (UTC) |
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![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/12714881/433343) | | From: | chococat |
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| Date: | 10th December, 2008 10:24 pm (UTC) |
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Thank you! I has grabbed it :)
Ahaha, the Roy!Fireworks thing is quite possibly the most awesome thing I've seen in ages :D Nice shots of the fire poi, too!
Ahaha. I loved the "Redkun impression" bit (though now I must bop Eli on the head next time we meet. :p)
Seeing all the photos, I'm a little sad I didn't go. I'm glad it went well and everyone had a good time.
Getting no food was obviously our PUNISHMENT for rescuing you D:
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/83645775/676258) | | From: | nert |
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| Date: | 10th December, 2008 06:55 pm (UTC) |
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I'm sorry T_T I'll order something horribly complicated next time so we're still waiting for it long after everyone's gone home XD
"Only for Tuesday to be wracked with chest pains and difficulty walking. Go me. Unrelated to the Ball at least.."
Ouch. Hope you feel better soon.
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