COSFEST VIII, 11 July (Sat) - 12 July (Sun) 2009

Imagine rubbing shoulders with the likes of Sheryl Nome and Ranka Lee from the anime Macross Frontier or witnessing a fight from the game The Samurai Warriors. Visitors to Cosfest VIII at Downtown East did just that and much more! As some of you already know, Cosfest is a yearly event organized by the Singapore Cosplay Club and NTUC. This year, it was also marked as a pre-event of the JCC. The highlight of Cosfest was the World Cosplay Summit (Singapore) Competition. As mentioned in the Straits Times (14 July 2009), the event is ‘no mere show’. The pair of winners of this competition category will go on an all-expense-paid trip to Nagoya, Japan, in August 2009 to represent Singapore at the World Cosplay Summit. How cool is that?!

This year, the panel of judges entrusted with this important task included our very own Takahashi-san, the Deputy Director of the Japan Creative Centre (JCC). He was the one dressed as Kakashi from Naruto. Is he sporting or what! Bright young star Dawn Yeoh, our JCC Goodwill Ambassador, was also a judge for the competition. She was dressed as Ayanami Rei from Evagelion. Kawaii ne!

 

Our dynamic duo getting in on the action and discussing important Cosfest matters.

 

Here are some highlights of the Cosplay Competition. The contestants did costumes changes, sang, danced, re-enacted scenes from anime, manga and games. One team even brought a doorway to an alternate universe! Check out the stiff competition!

 
 
 

After individually scoring the contestants, the judges were whisked away to a secret location for their deliberation. They had some tough decision-making to do!

Now, for the results of the Cosplay Competitions...

The winner of the Singles Cosplay Competition was Lim Wei Lun who cosplayed as Alex Louis Armstrong from Full Metal Alchemist. He charmed his way into the hearts of the audience and the judges with his song and dance routine. His enthusiasm was very infectious. Look at what happened to the crowd. They went wild! He went away with a return air-ticket to Tokyo.

The Best Group Award went to the Samurai Warriors from Indonesia who dazzled the crowd with their sleek costumes and killer moves. The fantastic foursome took home an Anime Hamper worth $288!

The pair crowned the winners of World Cosplay Summit (Singapore) were Andrea Tan and Gill Ho who cosplayed as Sheryl Nome and Ranka Lee from Macross Frontier. They wowed the crowd with their very lively and energetic performance! They won an all-expense-paid trip to Nagoya, Japan, to represent Singapore in the World Cosplay Summit 2009. Ganbatte!!!

 

The cosplayers were not the only ones in action. The massive crowd that turned up remained high energy throughout the event shopping for their swords, masks and other collectibles that were on sale that day and laughing and dancing along with the cosplayers.

The organizers carried out a cool tradition which had ALL cosplayers (even those that did not take part in the competition!) come up onto the stage for a photo op. Such a feast for the eyes!!

This yearly tradition was literally a crowd puller. The crowd came forward to take some final shots of their heroes, heroines and other delectable characters from their favourite anime, manga and games. It seemed like everybody in the audience brought their camera that day! Cosfest 2009 was truly a very happy event for everyone!! Ja, until next time! Sayonara!!