Anime Festival Asia 2012: It's A Go!

And it is confirmed!

I will be going to Anime Festival Asia 2012 (AFA 2012) to be held at Singapore Expo. This was merely a coincidence because we booked our flight to Singapore for November 9 to 12 last August and after a week of our booking I saw AFA's advertisement. I was like, YAAAAYYY!!

If going to Singapore is my first time to head outside the country, AFA is my first ever international convention. Not only that, it is a well-known gathering of otakus all over Asia and has amazing booths and programs planned for the attendees. This year, AFA was held also in other countries like Malaysia and Indonesia.

AFA is not only an anime convention but also a movie house and a concert hall. I Love Anisong which is dubbed Electric Groove is the musical event for AFA and it will hold three concerts for its three-day event starting 7:00 PM. On November 9, there is the Electro Stage for a solo concert of T.M. Revolution. The next day there will be the Jump Stage for FLOW, LiSa, BABYMETAL, fripSide and m.o.v.e.. On its last day, the Diamond Stage will feature May'n, Minami Kuribayashi, Sea*A and Sphere. Aside from the concerts, movies such as Puella Magi Madoka Magica and Naruto: Road to Ninja will be shown during the day. Separate tickets apply for all of the abovementioned.

Having all of these ahead of me, who am I to be not that excited? See you AFA and see you Singapore!

Hero Face-Off 2012

Despite my late arrival at home last night, there's no stopping to go to my second cosplay convention this year: Hero Face-Off 2012. It was held at MegaTrade Hall 1 in SM Megamall Building B. This event is mainly a cosplay competition and the winner will be the representative of the Philippines for Anime Festival Asia in Singapore on November.

I didn't come to cosplay at all. I came for a new purpose, and that would be photography. Since I've been inactive in cosplay for almost 8 months already (my last cosplay was at AME Monogatari last November), I decided that I will figure out a reason to go to conventions even without a costume. Thank God He gave me a camera. It will now be put into a good use as I'll be roaming around practicing my photography skills.

Also, we had a general meeting with my other club, Otaku URule! Shot Glass, which is the photography division of my cosplay organization from my alma mater, PUP Otaku URule!. I am required to attend because I urged our founder to make this work. Hearing his visions and desire of the other members to learn, I gained the motivation to push this through. We took pictures of the cosplayers outside the hall (yes, I don't have money for the ticket) who are in really cool costumes. Thanks to my officemate who lent me his Lumix camera, I was able to keep up with the settings and produce cute pictures.

Here are some of the pictures I took:

Check the photos at my FlickR account: http://www.flickr.com/people/paupaulene .

It was a tiring day, yet I am very happy to meet other people who walks under the same light as mine. Cheers!