‘Behind the Curtain’ is a bi-weekly advice column written by masquerade judges answering anonymous questions from the community. These columns are written with the perspective of how Guild run competitions are, and may not apply to non-Guild run contests. Our column is built on your questions, there is a form to submit your question anonymously at the footer of every column!
This week’s question is answered by: Captain Amelia
This is such an important question! I’m not going to answer it!
If there’s something you need to remember about competitions, it’s that you don’t start with 100 points and lose them. You start with 0 points and gain them.
Now read that again.
Everything you bring into the judging room, everything you do on stage, is to gain you points, not risk you losing them. The judges give you points for the great things that you do, and we’re trying to give you as many points as possible. We want you to succeed! We want you to do well!
So, instead of ‘what am I doing that’s losing me points?’, it’s ‘how can I get more points on the things I’m already doing?’
Here are some quick tips:
While crafting
- Think about using appropriate fabrics for your character’s atmosphere and time period, ie. steer clear of shiny satins and brocades if your character is a warrior or a servant.
- Think about your character’s environment. If they live in the woods, grubby up their costume with loads of weathering. It can instantly elevate a good costume to great.
- Finishing is key to a clean costume. Most of us don’t have access to an overlocker, so a zig-zagged edge is absolutely fine. If you can, add a lining to any garments that need it. Don’t forget to trim your loose threads and press your seams!
- Sure, you could just buy a pair of brown trousers – but if you consider those trousers an opportunity to show that you know how to sew French seams, a zipped fly, and hand-finished buttonholes, that can make an additional contribution to your construction score.
- Take tons of work-in-progress photos. Remember, any detail you can’t show the judges in person, eg. fancy seam finishing or your handmade corset, needs to be represented in your progress book in order to secure your points.
In pre-judging
- Bring a high-quality, full-length reference photo into judging. If you’ve spent weeks agonising over the colour of your fabric, give us the goods to prove that it’s bang-on accurate.
- Rehearse your judging spiel so you don’t forget to mention anything important, and play Heads, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes when you’re in the room to catch everything.
- Leave yourself ~30 seconds of time for us to ask questions. We might be super interested in a wacky material or a crazy technique that you glossed over because to you it’s old hat. Remember: if we’re asking, it’s important.
- If there’s a particular detail about your performance you think we should know – eg. you scripted and recorded your own audio, you painted the backdrop yourself, or your dance is inspired by the character’s culture – tell us that in pre-judging. Your performance is a big chunk of your score, so taking a few seconds now to give us some more detail can help us reflect on the full picture of your combined costume and stage efforts later on.
- Don’t tell us things that are inaccurate, wrong, or unfinished! I guarantee we would never have looked or noticed if you hadn’t pointed it out ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
On the stage
- Use as much of the stage as you can to throw your performance out to the audience. Draw a rectangle on some paper and plot your path across the stage with a pen until that squiggle fills as much of the space as possible.
- Exaggerate every moment. BIG gestures and BIG movements help even the back row see you clearly. If there’s a very specific character move you can rehearse, eg. Loki’s hair flip or Sailor Moon’s hand gestures, nail that to show us you mean business.
- Entering and exiting the stage in character, and moving between poses in character, automatically gives your performance more polish, and instantly makes it more memorable.
- Rehearse your movements and/or your lip-sync, don’t leave it up to chance that you’ll remember on the day. Set the audio as your morning alarm or your ringtone if you need to!
- Hold your poses for longer than feels comfortable – count to five elephants in your head and move your attention slowly across the audience while you count. It feels like a lifetime while you’re up there, but it’s the best way to show us your costume and get some good photos from all angles.
You’ll never ‘lose points’ for: not wearing contact lenses, not making your own wigs/shoes/underwear, your convention wristband or lanyard being visible, any technical failures that aren’t your fault, your body size or shape, the colour of your skin, your sex or gender, or for being nervous.
But, throughout the whole process, try and reframe all your thoughts into being about gaining points rather than losing them.
Remember: You start with 0 points, so the only way is up.
Break a leg!
Captain Amelia is a competitive cosplayer, cosplay judge, and all-round drama queen. Follow her on Instagram, Facebook, and, when the captions get too long, her blog The Captain’s Log.
