osts several other events throughout the year, including another MiniCon in the summer.<\/span><\/p>\nTwo\u00a0<\/span>y<\/span>oung kids dart up to\u00a0<\/span>Stanek, who wears a white wig and a black blindfold stretched tautly over his eyes. They\u2019r<\/span>e eager to know whether he is dressed as the character on their sticker: Gojo Satoru from the Japanese animated series, \u201cJujutsu Kaisen.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\nStanek actu<\/span>ally portrays an android from the video game, \u201cNieR:Automata.\u201d To the untrained eye, these charact<\/span>ers are identical.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s another guy that has white hair and a blindfold,\u201d Stanek says. His own character\u2019s hair is less \u201cspikey.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\nThe question he gets asked the most: Can he see?<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cI spent probably an hour at the fabric store stretching fabric over my face,\u201d he says. \u201cI had to find one that\u2019s just thin enough to see, but thick enough that it doesn\u2019t look that weird.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\nStanek\u2019s favorite part of cosplay is the creative process of designing props for his characters. His pas<\/span>sion is evid<\/span>ent in the meticulous detailing on his sword, which looks like the stock of a rifle that slowly morphs into a blade.<\/span><\/p>\nThe prop he holds in his other hand is homemade, too. His fingers, clad in chunky silver rings and black nail p<\/span>olish, toy with a black plastic box. Patterns on each side of the box, illuminated by white LED string lights, resemble the innards of a computer system.<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cIt\u2019s 3D<\/span>-printed,\u201d he explains. \u201cThey\u2019re just flat panels, and then I glued them at the seams inside.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n
Not fa<\/span>r away, Shane Matkowsky can be seen above the crowd in black bunny ears and a cotton-candy-b<\/span>lue wig. She\u2019s dressed as Rem, a \u201cmaid \u2026 who is also a demon,\u201d she explains, from the Japanese animate<\/span>d series, \u201cRe:Zero.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cI feel\u00a0<\/span>con<\/span>fident in cosplay. I dress up and I feel good about myself,\u201d she says. \u201cAnd it\u2019s fun.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\nFor <\/span>Diana Hernandez, cosplay lets her inhabit characters she admires. Today, she has on a black hat with red cherry blossoms on the side: a tribute to Hu Tao, a character from the Chinese video game, \u201cGenshin Impact.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\nCompared to the characters she usually portrays, Hu Tao is more girly. \u201c[She\u2019s] more cutesy, and more cringe,\u201d Hernandez explains.<\/span><\/p>\nYellow flower-shaped pupils bloom in the middle of her bright red contact lenses.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nCan she see out of these? Barely.<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cI can see you guys, but it has a yellow tint,\u201d she says.<\/span><\/p>\nOn the grass outside of the armory, Hunter Bishop inspects the inside of his helmet. Bishop creates not only his costumes from scratch, but also the characters themselves, inspired partly by his doodles from high school and partly by video games.<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cThat way, I can express myself a lot more easier,\u201d he says.<\/span><\/p>\nBishop makes every part of his costume by hand. The costume is, definitively, homemade. Hot glue gun marks and irregular etchings are evidence of his devoted handiwork, all the way down to the craggy, gold-painted toes attached to his boots.<\/span><\/p>\nHis character, the Grand Slayer, looks like the child of a knight and a gladiator \u2014 in outer space. The Grand Slayer may have claws jutting out of his shoulders, bedazzled lizard skin dangling from his belt, and beige fur atop his shoulders \u2014 but he still celebrates human holidays.<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cThis is, technically, a se<\/span>cond<\/span>, \u2026 more Halloween-themed armor for him.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n
Although his costume is vibrant, Bishop himself prefers to stay mysterious behind his helmet.<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cI put chrome mirror stuff on the very back of the visor, so no one can actually see my face,\u201d he says.<\/span><\/p>\nHis current costume took <\/span>\u00ad\u00ad\u00ad<\/b>around a year<\/span> to create and assemble. He debuted it at Raleigh\u2019s GalaxyCon in 2023, where he won a medal for \u201coriginal costume,\u201d he says.<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cI didn\u2019t know that was a category. So, I lucked out!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\nBack inside the armory, the android and other fantastical characters brighten the dimly lit hall. Vendors line the middle of the room, selling colorful stickers and figurines, original comic books, and custom cosplay props.<\/span><\/p>\nTyler Llewellyn sits behind a table stacked high with colorful boxes of character memorabilia.<\/span><\/p>\nIn years past, he\u2019s cosplayed \u201can awful lot,\u201d he says. Today, he\u2019s selling stickers and figurines.<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cI have a lot of fun being a merchant,\u201d he says, \u201cI pretty much run up breaking even.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\nLlewellyn won some of these figurines by playing claw machines, and bought the others for himself. Now he thinks it\u2019s time to start selling his collection.<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cAs you get older, you realize: You\u2019re a grown man with a \u2018My Little Pony\u2019 statue.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\nAbove: Getting in character at Durham Mini Comic Con. Photos by Abigail Bromberger \u2014 The 9th Street Journal\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Wolfgang Stanek brandishes a sword and wears a blindfold. In any other setting, no one would approach him. But on a recent Saturday inside the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":76,"featured_media":11718,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,11],"tags":[269],"class_list":["post-11715","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-a-moment-in-durham","category-life-in-durham","tag-the-9th-street-journal","entry"],"yoast_head":"\n
A moment in Durham: 'I feel confident in cosplay' - 9th Street Journal<\/title>\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\t \n\t \n\t \n \n \n \n\t \n\t \n\t \n