Cosplay Streetfest

On Tuesday morning, we went into Nipponbashi, Osaka, to view a cosplay street festival. A large section of road was closed to traffic, and was filled with people dressed in an amazing assortment of costumes. The streets abounded with people dressed as maids, manga (Japanese comic book) characters, characters from computer games, and characters from movies, walking around and posing for photographs. Milling around them were several thousand people in ordinary clothes, trying to take photographs. There were a few very scantily clad women who had circles six people deep all around, of mostly men trying to get a good look, and a photo.

Some of the characters we recognized, many we didn't, but the costumes were of an exceptionally high quality, and it was a great look at a side of Japanese culture that we hadn't seen much of. I've captioned the ones I know, the others I just photographed because they looked cool.

The above Minecraft creeper made Hunter's day.

The above two photos star characters from various Ghibli movies. I've seen all the movies, but to be honest, I can't quite figure out who everyone is supposed to be, and can't be bothered labelling all the ones I know. However, the girl with red hair, red dress and bucket is Ponyo, a goldfish who turns into a 5-year-old girl.

Luigi! There were others, but I missed them.

The taller one is actually a guy, there was a fair bit of gender bending going on.

Mis-matched army guys, I expect from some computer game

Mario, the children's entertainer.

Spiderman

Jack sparrow - he was really in character