The economics of cosplay.

• Author: Biton, Adva
• Position: Around Utah

Salt Lake City -- It looked like Halloween came early downtown during this year's ComicCon--all part of a growing trend from pop and geek culture enthusiasts. The practice of dressing up as a character from a movie, book, television show, game or comic--called cosplay--is especially popular around events like SALT LAKE COMICCON, held in late September. This year, the convention claimed the world record for the most people dressed as comic book characters gathered in one place with a staggering 1,784 cosplaying fans turning up for the attempt.

"There's an explosion of interest around the country in cosplay. There are YouTube videos--it's definitely out of the barn now," says Jennifer McGrew, owner, designer and producer at MCGREW STUDIOS, a custom production design studio that makes costumes sets and props for the industry, both commercial and for fun.

McGrew Studios itself was present at ComicCon, but was also well represented by customers.

"We participated with a booth and we were exhibitors this year. We primarily showed off a few costumes, but mostly we did custom props that we did for different films and commercials and commercial entertainment," she says. "There were several people running around ComicCon with our costumes that we made this year and previous years."

Cosplay has as wide a range of devotion as it has complexity. One cosplay of The Joker from Batman might include an old suit, face paint and green hair spray all thrown together in a few hours, while another might involve painstakingly replicating an outfit from a specific movie, episode, comic book or game, complete with Hollywood-level makeup and wig.

In addition to a wide spread of interests and interpretations, the cost varies widely, too: costumes can range from a few dollars of thrift-store finds to hundreds--or even thousands--of dollars. "If you want the quality [in a costume], you have to invest either the time or the money, and as we all know, sometimes time equals money," says Aaron Forrester, a cosplay consultant and judge who was on a Salt Lake ComicCon panel about making affordable cosplay costumes.

The panelists, all experts at cosplay, suggested would-be cosplayers plan out their costumes, look for sales at stores, and repurpose accessories, pieces of clothing or common household items whenever possible. Another big tip from the panel was for cosplayers to learn the basics of sewing, painting, molding and other skills to be able to make a costume from raw...