Picture taken by Carmina~
I apologize if this isn’t as organized as most of my other posts tend to (kind of) be, but please bear with me as I tell my story (and also, the featured image above was taken by Meta).
The con, this year, proved to have gone without a hitch. It was certainly one of the best experiences I’ve had in years. We all agreed that if we are to go again, getting a hotel room would not be a question any more.
Really, I found it really interesting as I had mentioned in my previous post that I did not go to any of the panels. I think while I was choosing panels to possibly visit, I really knew that I wasn’t going to visit any of them considering just how much I really enjoy taking pictures of others.
It was also the first con I finally got to really test out my Nikon 35mm 1.8 prime lens. To be honest, after a week and two days ish after the con and editing them each day, I’m a bit disappointed with a lot of them. I definitely was able to get a lot more with much more ease than with the stock lens I had before, but I think I needed to experiment more. I’ve only really used it on taking pictures of my figures and nendoroids. Now I know what I need to improve on in the future so I can take better pictures! Hopefully I can get the 50mm prime lens as well for the outdoor pictures. My friend Meta pointed out, however, that the Seattle Convention Center was one of the best places he’s been to take pictures of cosplays. I’ve never really been to many other places except for A-Kon (both back around 2012 and 2015). The only real comparison I can draw out of those experiences is that the Seattle Convention Center has a lot of places where you can use natural lighting and has a wide enough space to comfortably take pictures of people.
After the con was over, I came back home and was debating on whether I should go to work and finish up whatever was left. Though by the time I would get there, there would only be roughly about 3.5 hours that I would have to be there and figured that time could be better spent if I were to start transferring the files to my computer and start editing. I had taken over 1100+ pictures and I knew I would have to start filtering through them to see which would stay and which wouldn’t.
While I was waiting for all those pictures to transfer into my computer, I hung around and started chatting with my mother with my dogs practically all over my face. It appears that while I was gone, there had been some retarded drama that was going on with the girl my mother had hired to help clean the house. It’s really a long story that’s not worth telling so I won’t bother with it too much. I will at least mention that a lot of it had to do with her insecurity and her husband’s inferiority complex getting in the way of his rational thinking. Not only that, one of the interpreters that my mother had hired into her agency has been giving her a lot of attitude. My mother can’t fire her because she needs a Korean interpreter to help cover the other appointments she can’t get to.
Despite all this, the evening seemed pretty warm. The house was much cleaner now, the sun was just beginning to go down, the dogs all taking a nap on my lap, and just small chat between my mother and I. It was one of those small moments that, to me, really felt like a picture worthy scene.
The following days afterwards came by as though nothing had happened in the weekend. For what would be for the next week and a half, I would wake up, work, come home, edit, and then repeat. In that time, I had gone through 1100+ pictures and I managed to keep around 300ish. For me, that’s a good turn out (I think it’s the most I got so far). As I kept working on it and looking through other people’s photos, I began to feel a bit discouraged thinking mine were lower quality than the others. With a bit of encouragement from friends and peers, I’ve decided that I’ll just do my best to improve upon my skills.
After going back to work the day after Sakura-Con, I noticed two things.
I noticed how easy it was to get back into the flow of work as though nothing happened. Then I realized that it’s really because I practically live at the store. I mean it’s not as though I work at the store every single day.
Secondly, I realized that I didn’t really experience that “post-con depression” phase that most people do. I had brought it up during a conversation with a good friend, and that friend brought up the point that I had been going to cons pretty frequently by now. At this point, I already know how things are and have learned to move on from it. I think my friend had a good point with that, however it was until after I finished editing the pictures that I realized that was just half of the reason.
I never really had that sense of closure.
When I had finally posted the Day 3 pictures, I finally felt that the convention was completely over. In my head, I was still somewhat reliving the con because the memories of taking the pictures were still so vivid in my mind. There’s also that huge influx of Facebook posts of cosplayers asking for their pictures, photographers putting up their albums, and people reconnecting with each other.
Now that I had nothing else to work on, I realized I could finally go on through a “normal” night. That was what I felt was missing after the convention had ended. I guess the problem I will have to go through each year is closure.
Nevertheless, I really had a lot of fun this year. I’ve also learned quite a bit thanks to having someone like metayani around. I certainly do hope that I will be able to run into him a bit more frequently now that he’s seen how great Washington State is! Actually… I don’t think he got to really see much of it. If he does decide to come back, I will have to make it an effort on my part to show him more of the place where I live.
I definitely look forward to next year with great excitement! I hope to see old cosplayers and new cosplayers as well~