Hi everyone! Sorry for the extended silence, I was super super busy with work but I sorted that out and I have more time to get you even more and better information on how things are going with the World Cosplay Summit, Preliminary rounds or general life in Japan. Well lets pick up where we left off, I will attach pictures of the winners from the championship in August.

Here is the winners, the French team. Their presentation was an exciting mix of different animes and Damdam (Damian) turned Isabelle into an Otaku with his Otaku note.

Above is team Tokyo, Kikiwan and Naoki. They won the runner up prize with a very entertaining Death Note cosplay where they went about killing some of the MCs and Judges. Risky but the did it with a sense of humor and it paid off for them. Very enjoyable!

Above is Team Mexico: sisters Linaloe and Alejandra. They did an interpretation of Sailor Moon. In fact there were 2 groups to do the same cosplay making it very challenging for the judges. It may have been Alejandra's character expression on stage that did it for them however, she was really evil! I remember even after they left the stage Alejandra was still growling and threatening people, pumped with the rush of having been on stage.

What do you think of the new 2008 version of the WCS homepage? Kishi and the tech team at TVA have been working on it for a month or so and it just went up today. No great changes from the 2007 version but I don't think any big changes were needed. If you like the new version leave a comment and let Kishi know.

Happy news! It is a great honor to be welcoming representation from the US for WCS 2008! After a 2 year hiatus, the New York Anime Festival will be be the host for the representative selection event this December.

The United States is one of the leading cosplay nations and not to have representatives at the WCS is just wrong. The TVA staff is looking forward to working closely with NYAF in putting together a great event!

Taking a closer look at the 07-08 homepage, it looks like the links between pages have been improved, overall the site itself is more user friendly but maybe the greatest improvement are the photo galleries. A great number of photos are easily viewable from each preliminary round and previous championships going back to the first in 2005. There are still many great photos from 2003 and 2004 that I am sure are still available, It would be great to have those up and viewable to see how the event has progressed.

There will be changes for the direction of blog entries and content this year as well. Over the last year blog entries have been spotty at best, you can expect more regular information in the coming year. As far as content goes last year covered preliminary updates, representative introductions and had one or two interviews and related information such as introductions of sponsors.

This year what I will try to include many more interviews with events and representatives. One new thing I want to include is information on manga/anime/cosplay culture from a Japanese perspective. In different countries there are different things that are popular but perhaps I can give a different view with the state of manga/anime/cosplay from within Japan. Finally I will also add a few general updates just on the seasons and weather changes and any other interesting little things that may come up as well. Anyway, please do keep checking back and leaving comments; I will make sure to provide you with interesting reading!

Minako made a good point about the new world map addition to the WCS 2008 web page in a comment she made in the "USA to take part in WCS 2008!" blog entry. It is a neat new way to get information on each participating country, you can check it out here! As events come up and new countries send representatives you will see the countries outlined on the map and you can get information by clicking on them.

As I mentioned before I will be including more general things that I see around me that may not be directly related to manga/anime/cosplay. Depending on how culturally related manga or anime is you may see some of these things in background of the work. Usually culturally relative manga or anime do not translate well into other languages or cultures.

The four seasons are very distinct in Japan and there are many indicators for the arrival of autumn. 2 of those are the fluffy fall clouds and the blooming of the cosmos flower. I took a picture of them here.

There are many preliminary rounds taking part in the fall. Some of them are finished and there are a couple coming up very soon.

Germany: Connichi took place from September 7th to 9th. The WCS 2008 representatives Annie and Katherina's profile can be seen here!

Thailand: Japan Week was held from September 17th to 23rd with the preliminary being on the 23rd. Julaluk and Jittraporn's profile (limited version) can be seen here!

Italy: Romics fell on the first weekend of this month from October 5th to 7th. There is no information on the representatives updated yet but you can see Nadia and Martina's pictures here and here!

Denmark: Coming up on the first weekend of November, J-Popcon will be held from the 2nd to 4th with the preliminaries planned for the 3rd.

Spain: XIII Salon del Manga will be held on the same weekend as her counterpart in Denmark, going from the 1st to 4th of November in Barcelona.

In the coming months look forward to the Brazil regional rounds which should begin in December and continue until the national finals in June. The Mexico preliminaries at TNT GT2 are planned to be held in February.

I will keep you updated with information from each event and hopefully direct information from the representatives as well!