Cosplay Competitions are always one of the highlights of any convention. If you’ve ever been sat in the audience, or watching a stream at home, and have been confused by the winners that are announced, there’s a good chance you’ve been watching a craftsmanship competition!

Craftsmanship competitions, like ReedPop’s Cosplay Central Crown Championships, don’t focus on the biggest, flashiest and most popular costumes, but instead focus on the fine skills, quality of finish, variety of techniques and ingenuity of the costume maker. The judges have always inspected these costumes closely before the cosplayers walk the stage in pre-judging interviews where they get to question the cosplayer and learn all their secret techniques, flip seams and inspect the inside of those outwardly impressive foam builds and glorious ballgowns. They get to see all those details it’s impossible to see from way back in the audience! Everyone always has their personal favourite, but it’s important to understand the kind of competition you are watching, especially to appreciate why a more outwardly ‘simple’ costume beat something with a bigger wow factor on stage.

In the USA regional rounds, the Crown Championships selects a winner specialised in each major costume category - Needlework, Armor and FX - and an overall top 3. The top 3 costumes in master level competitions like this will regularly cross over the categories, having a combination of several sewing, armor and FX techniques and all done to an exceptionally high standard. To give more insight into the details that the judges get to see we’re sharing a series of interviews with the six winners from New York Comic Con’s Crown Championships Qualifier.

Armor Category Winner: Supadezz

The armor category is for costumes that focus on construction by moulding and shaping materials, such as card, eva foam, thermoplastics, resin casting, fiberglass and 3D Printing. Supadezz impressed the judges to take the category win with his build of Onyx Guard from Gears of War.

Popverse: Congratulations on winning the armor category award! What motivated you to enter the Crown Championships at NYCC?
Supadezz: I got started from making small props. Later as I developed my skills more I got into more complex builds with a lot of details. I knew my Onyx build was my most ambitious build to date so I wanted to take a chance and showcase my talent at the costume crown.

What was your process to create this costume?
To recreate the costume I took many references of the costume first. I self patterned everything and constructed it for my proportions. Some new techniques I learned were sewing and electronic engineering.

What are your favourite parts of the costume?
My favorite part of the costume is the helmet because I have attempted this build many times and failed, I finally developed the skills to make it accurate. The details in the chest, boots, and weapons are accurate to the references.

Any advice for other cosplayers?
My advice is to go out there and perform your best for crowd and have a great time no matter the outcome.

Missed the competition on stage? You can check out all the entries right here on Popverse in our VOD of the NYCC livestream!