THE COSPLAY: Keyleth was my first self-made cosplay, this photographed here being my ~4th variation of the cosplay in 3 years after its debut at Fanime 2016. Since Keyleth is a DnD character from a live-streamed game, there is much more freedom to get creative in cosplay, since there are very few official designs of the characters. Lots of events in-game change the character’s outfits and appearance, meaning I could create a whole new design for myself to cosplay. 

SPOILERS FOR THE FIRST CAMPAIGN OF CRITICAL ROLE: This specific version of Keyleth is heavily inspired by the unhappy ending that she got from her love story with Vax, another player character in the game. He was taken away by his patron deity (basically died) and they were never able to settle down together like they both wanted so badly. The dark colors represent her mourning and are also an homage to Vax being a champion of the Raven Queen. This symbolism also inspired the feathers in the headpiece and on the top of the mantle. The make-up is inspired by the myth of the cheetah tear marks; a story about having loved ones taken away so young and them never coming back the same way. I always joked that my goal with this cosplay was to make someone cry when they saw it. Many people did see all the details I added, understood the references and I do think a couple people teared up. 

WHAT IS IT THAT DREW YOU TO HER?
Superficially I wanted to cosplay her due to the fact that she was an awkward redhead, and so was I. My brother was the one that introduced me to Keyleth because there was this character that reminded him of me from his new favorite show, Critical Role, and that where the story of this cosplay began. The design elements that were described about her were something that I was really drawn to, like the antlers and the leaves, and these gave me immediate ideas on how I wanted to make them.

WHAT DO YOU LOVE ABOUT THE CHARACTER?
She is insecure about her leadership, but is resolute in her ideals and tries to be the moral compass in her party. Her appearance is somewhat soft and delicate often causing others to underestimate her. Everyone in her party, however, including the goliath barbarian, knows that she is possibly the strongest and most deadly one they travel with. Her anxieties resonated with me, but I love that she still fought for what she believed, and argued with her friends to try and make them see other points of view. She was so strong but also kind, even if she was not able to get her happy ending. 

WHAT WENT INTO THE CREATION OF YOUR COSPLAY? 
This version of Keyleth has been slowly put together over nearly two years. I spent about 30 hours over the course of 18 months putting together the mantle. I created the cloak by gluing the leaves on, sewing the feathers and the trim to the top, creating the shoulder pads, glueing the feathers to those, and sorting the feathers by length to give the desired silhouette. I made my first draft of the cloak with about 1300 flat leaves, a bag of feathers, and a yard of father trim in four days. The next year I collected more and more garlands with three-dimensional leaves to add into the cloak to make it look more organic rather than flat leaf fabric. I added flowers and other things like glitter beads and butterflies into the cloak, really just whatever I found and what fit. I still plan on adding more and more as I find suitable accessories. I even added a lining to the cloak, to make the front of the cosplay as interesting as the back view, since when posing for photos, you generally take one of the front of the outfit and I didn’t want it to be a view of hot glue saturated velvet. 

I later made the corset, my first ever, out of the fabric from a dress I found at Goodwill. After this shoot I remade the corset to improve the fit, as I lost about 30 lbs since first making it. This cosplay is still evolving! The skirt was the most simple aspect, consisting of a blue chiffon layer and a black chiffon layer to create a more interesting color shift than just a single layer of either fabric. This was worn as a wrap skirt under the corset. 

Next, there was the staff. Keyleth uses it as the focus of her druidic magic, but the full staff I made from a real stick and then some model magic, broke on my drive home from AX 2018. I lost the top of it that had broken off completely, and have yet to completely remake it. The staff shown here at Fanime 2019 is a partially repaired version that is model magic and well as some thermoplastic, painted to look like a vine wrapping around the real stick I found in my friend’s yard. 

The last aspect of the cosplay was the antler headpiece. I first created this headpiece 3 years ago, but I have changed it so much that I cannot say it is the same, outside of the foam antlers I used. I removed the front crown piece to replace it with gold body paint on my forehead. I used floral wire to stabilize the antlers as well as give a base for the flowers and the feathers to be attached. A wire goes across the top to connect the two antlers, but is covered by my hair texture, to give the illusion that the antlers are magic, just floating on my head, or coming out from my head.

WHAT WERE YOUR STRUGGLES?
Many components of this outfit were my first venture into these challenges of cosplay. I had never made such a structured corset, so I spent hours struggling and breaking needles on my sewing machine to get into all the curves and stabbing myself with the pins in the garment. While the skirt is so simple and nicely draped, those fabrics were so slippery that even with lots of pinning, the fabric slid around and didn’t fall flat on one another. Wearing the whole thing is a struggle in itself, since the mantle is so heavy and trails far behind me. I often worry about people stepping on the mantle or getting in their way. 

WHAT WERE YOUR TRIUMPHS?
Even if the cloak is a hassle, it is by far my favorite aspect of this cosplay, and something that I will always be proud of no matter how far into this hobby I get. I loved the original design, and find myself loving it more and more with everything that I add. The corset is  also something that I am very proud I made, even if I did have to remake it to fit better after this shoot was done. It had been my first attempt at such a structured garment, and it ended up working out better than I had expected, so it remains a point of pride. With the combination of the leaves, the dark blues, the make-up and tattoos, the whole look finally came together and had the feeling I was going for. It took several tries with different colors of dress and make up, but I finally reached a point of which I was very proud to wear it to a con. 

WHAT’S THE THING YOU’RE MOST PROUD OF?
I mentioned that the cloak is the aspect I am most proud of, and it definitely is the most fabulous and dramatic piece that everyone’s eyes go to when they look at my cosplay. The leaf mantle is one of the few signature aspects of Keyleth, being a DnD character from a show with no visuals of the exact characters,  having that be my focus and point of pride within the cosplay is amazing. 

BIO: I have been cosplaying now for about four years with my sister, and have only recently started using my handle of @gillysagoldfish for cosplay exclusively. I got into it because my sister was going to Fanime with her friends, and I already enjoyed Halloween and putting together character costumes, so cosplay was something I quickly fell in love with. 

I went to my first convention in cosplay in 2015, a sophomore in high school, and the experience is something I will never forget. Those first cosplays were premades that we had bought online, and soon after we started making our own from scratch. My first ever self-made cosplay was a DnD character from the show Critical Role, and since then my skills have grown and I have learned so much more to be able to create the cosplays I use now.

HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN COSPLAYING? 
I have been dressing up as characters for longer than I can remember, but I first started calling it cosplay in 2015 when I was 15 years old. My first cosplays (bought pre-mades) were Erwin from Attack on Titan and Bokuto from Haikyuu at Fanime 2015. My first homemade cosplays were the Female Titan from Attack on Titan and my first version of Keyleth at Fanime 2016. 

WHAT INSPIRED YOU TO START? 
I visited my sister at local cons, after she had gotten into the hobby, which made me want to go with her. I started dressing up to attend along side of her. 

Cosplay gave me a way to express my creativity in a unique way and also delved into my interest in make-up and body painting. To be a little sad for a moment, I have always been artistic, but my older sister has always been the artist. Whenever I did any painting or classical art, I was compared to her, and felt very inadequate from my own perspective as well as the off hand comments of my parents. Cosplay gave me a new outlet that I immediately fell in love with and was able to grasp onto as my art of choice. Even though my sister cosplays along with me,  we are able to learn from each other and don’t compare ourselves.

As I continue to grow, the surprise from my parents about my skill in this hobby and their acknowledgement that I too have some artistry in me, has made it even more validating and motivating. I love being able to dress up as someone else and get to be someone else for a little while, because if I am not loving who I am at the moment, I can throw on a homemade outfit, a wig, and some make up and feel like a new person. It is an escape for me.

COSPLAY BY GILLY
PHOTOGRAPHY AND DESIGN BY BRIAN NISHIMOTO

GALLERY