Philippines is one of the countries that is slowly but surely getting into the cosplay industry. There are lots of really good cosplayers there and the one I’m going to feature is a cosplayer who started from humble beginnings.
What started as a hobby turned into something like a dream. Ban Azure, started to cosplay just as a hobby and loved how he looked just like his admired anime character. He started when he graduated in college as a nurse, and found it fun to try cosplay since he is really into anime. One of his first cosplay is Yagami Raito of Death Note.
He joined small Cosplay events at first. There are times when he didn’t win any, or that it’s just simply a convention where there is no prize at all. There are also times when the prize he won isn’t enough to compensate the amount he spent on the costumes. He spends an average amount of $150 on his costumes and the prizes for small Cosplay events aren’t that big. But the self-fulfillment is priceless.
Fast forward five years later, he tried something entirely different. First, it’s not from a Japanese anime. Secondly, it is a cosplay of Maleficent. Not everyone can make it look exactly like Maleficent, especially if you’re a guy. Dhurt Espina took wonderful shots of him as Maleficent and he posted it on his personal social media account. Because of this, the local newspaper even featured him.
All his experiences and experiments with costumes, make up and wigs finally paid off. He won at the local competition and became a candidate ARCC held in Singapore last November 2015 as Oda Nobunaga, SW2. There are lots of contestants from all over Asia and he won 3rd place.
You may also check his photos through their official Facebook page, where he is a member of the cosplay duo, Ban X Kai.
- Maleficent takes a selfie
