It took forever to go around locating all the pieces for this costume, and there are a lot. I'm extremely proud of the shirt, because it's my first attempt at actually sewing anything large, with NO help from my mom. I'm not especially wonderful, and there are a few small mistakes in sewing technique, but not glaring. I am happy with the silver ribbon trim and black ribbon lacing. I actually re-learned (remembered?) how to use the sewing machine for it, because I'm sure I would have died had I even attempted hand-sewing it (and then it would have looked crappy). I just hand-sewed the blue shoulder areas to the already-cut white fabric (since I wasn't experienced enough to alter patterns at the time), and some pieces of the collar when I couldn't for the life of me figure out how the directions were supposed to work using a bulky sewing machine.

The excitingly bright red pants were bought from Target, and then I added the triangle stripes from the knee down (yay, more hand-sewing, and I managed to stab myself in some interesting places trying them on before I took all the pins out). I also purchased the shirt fabric, bandanna, belt, and shoes. That puts me at a bit over $50 for the costume, not bad...plus labor, but it wasn't particularly grueling because I love Naoki so much ^___^

The first two pictures were taken in my bathroom using the timer on the digicam, and for some reason it severely hated the color. So the pants look rather more pink than they really are, and the blue of the shirt was such a horrid neutral grey color that I went back on the computer and altered it. I did not buy shoes until the day I went to the Team Rocket photo shoot with Tania, so they get a separate picture. The paint peels off every once in a while. Acrylic does not appreciate staying on shoe-rubber. However, it's easy enough to just go in and retouch them when it happens.

This costume has been retired, partly because I loaned it to Caitlin and haven't gotten back anything but the shoes (the rest is in unpacked boxes from her last move), and partly because I wore the shoes too much and some blister-inducing plastic bits are now sticking out on the inside. I'll have to ditch them, alas. It was fun being you, Naoki! Some day if nostalgia gets the better of me, I may re-make it, but finding the right kind of shoes is a real pain!

A-kon 13: Naoki was my invisible costume. Nobody (well, except for friends of mine who knew the costumes I was bringing) recognized me or photographed me, but Naoki is still my favorite costume! However, I did get one photo from Ryan of the full costume with all pieces. I even cut all my hair off for this costume/con...my hairdresser was horrified that I wanted to get it so short. I didn't tell her that the only reason I wanted it was for the costume (although it is really nice having it short for once).

Ushicon 2: er, I technically wore it...but it was just my "plain-clothes" costume that I wore part of in the car on the way down to Austin, and changed the rest of the way into when we got there, but it was Friday night so nobody really saw me ~_~

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