AnimeUSA 2016 Summary

I have finally finished editing all my photos from AnimeUSA 2016. (AnimeUSA 2016 Gallery) I like shooting at AnimeUSA because it is a small convention and allows the use of light stands and other photographic equipment, which allows me to be a bit more creative. The convention location also has a very nice garden area and a nice white room that is set up like an antique sitting room.

I shot this convention using a Canon 70D, 18-200mm lens, Yongnuo radio triggers, speedlight, light stand, and an 80/20 bounce attachment. For hall shots, I had the light stand mounted to my backpack so I could continually use off camera flash. Now let’s talk some statistics. This year I had 12 individual sessions lined up, of which two were groups of six plus people. Of 991 photos taken during the course of the convention, 75% were shot at 28mm equivalent and only 2% were shot at 55mm equivalent. Then 72% of my shots were taken at f5 with 10% were taken at f3.5 and f6.3. Of the 991 images, 23% of the images were taken at 1/100s and 14% were taken at 1/200s and 1/250s. I either used an ISO 100 or ISO 200 for the shots.

Overall, I had several nice shots, below are a few of my favorite images. The first few are from the Gokatia session with Akiryu Yoru Cosplay. The first image reminds me of an album cover.

The second set of images is from the Saber Nero session with MiGuo Cosplay. I like these two shots because they are polar opposites.

This shot is from the Sakirou Maccha Latte session with Vira Mal Cosplay. I loved shooting this cosplay because I love Sakirou’s work and have always wanted to shoot a cosplay based off Sakirou's paper doll art work.

This last shot is from the Weiss from RWBY session with Rosettica Cosplay. I like this shot because of the dramatic lighting.

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Cobwebs Everywhere

On October 7 th , I did a studio spooky session with Coralinx Cosplay . The central theme of this shoot was a pretty goth girl who had a fondness for spiders and decorating with cobwebs, making it a perfect Halloween session. Note: Cobwebs are defined as abandoned or old spiderwebs that have collected dust. Many cobwebs are the result of comb-footed spider (i.e., black widows) that make irregularly shaped webs. Spiderwebs are active structures built to catch prey. (Source: Western Exterminator Company) For these sessions, I used: Photography Equipment Other Equipment Cannon R6 24-105 mm Lens Transmitter/Trigger 2 Westcott FJ400 2 Phottix Strobes 2 strip boxes 2 rectangular soft boxes 2 c-stands 3 light stands Backdrop stand Black seamless 2 Westcott silicon gels Tether cable Laptop Laptop holder Sandbags A-clamps Spyder Color checker Fake cobwebs Table ...

2025 Year in Review and Looking Forward to 2026

This year was a bit interesting especially since during the day, I’m a government employee, which resulted in a lot of stress and a 42-day furlough. I didn’t attend as many cosplay events with the D.C Cosplay group, now Costume and Camera, as I normally would have, due to schedule conflicts. However, I traveled up to Poughkeepsie, New York for two photo events, one of which I was a featured photographer. I attended two conventions, one of which didn’t turn out as expected and the other just confirmed my decision to take a break from it. Though happily I did a lot of studio work this year, which I enjoyed. But on the other hand, I lost my dear “studio supervisor”, my dog Teddy. He liked to great clients and then “supervise” while lying/sleeping in his bed. I also started to work on the business side of my photography work, by investing in a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) site to manage bookings, schedules, and payments. No more trying to juggle...

Attempted Camping

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The Munchkin's Notebook

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