Hello there! My name is Samantha, (Sam for short) I'm a currently a college student studying in fashion design. I'm not really a big cosplayer other than for PAX Prime. I'm with the Cookie Brigade and we hand out cookies through out all of PAXs in the land for Child's Play Charity. While I only cosplay at PAX, I'm more of a seamstress when it comes to the cosplay realm. I make patterns from scratch and the measurements that I get from my clients.
Get my degree in Fashion Design and make clothes and cosplays.
PAX Prime 2014 - Tina Belcher from Bob's Burgers, Monokuma from Daigonrompa PAX Prime 2013 - Catbug from Bravest Warriors, Minion from Despicable Me PAX Prime 2012 - Alice Hatteress Outfit from Alice: Madness Returns Kumori-con 2010- Death the Kid from Soul Eater
Dressing up as a character that you like or can relate to and showing your fandom.
I don't have any.
Plan ahead of time. Make a schedule and have your deadlines. As a seamstress, I absolutely hate when people come to me at the last minute for a cosplay and wonder why I charge an arm and a leg to make it. There are some snobs in cosplay, and I will admit that I am one when it comes to the sewing and construction of a garment, its how I've been trained in my degree. A lot of us are willing to help, you just need to ask.
One of the things that pisses me off is some of these cosplayer pages are nothing but over sexual women and how they advertise for their website. You'll have one cosplayer making her outfit in her tank and panties and post it on the internet. One of these women pushed me to the edge with her view on Hanji from Attack on Titan. The author made her androgynous so you don't know if that character is a male or female, and she doesn't have a bust which is what I idol. As a girl who has no chest and has brown hair and glasses, I looked up to that character because she was strong and had a personality. This cosplayer decided to post her photo with just glasses and the scouts jacket, and the picture is 2/3 boobs. Hanji would never do that, she has more respect for herself than that. So I called her out on it and I got bashed a lot about it on the internet. Most of them said I was jealous because I didn't have the chest. I didn't want to feed the trolls so I left it. I believe the cosplayer her self made a post about it, but I never saw it. I eventually unliked alot of pages on where I was seeing this happen alot.
Just do what you like to do. If you need help making a cosplay and if you don't know how to sew, its perfectly fine for you to hire someone. :)