Shippo: a mood controlled cat tail from Japan

Kuan Huang Reader Find

By Kuan Huang in New Products on Monday 11 February 2013

Shippo, which means ‘tail’ in Japanese, is a mechanic tail controlled by brain waves which literally interacts with your mood. This gadget captures your brain waves, and interprets the signals into waving patterns. Shippo wags ‘soft and slow’ when the person is relaxed, and ‘hard and fast’ when the person is concerned.

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Cosplayers vs traditional theatre actors

Low Lai Chow Contributor

By Low Lai Chow in New Art on Friday 14 December 2012

For their Soul-Stealer project, Chinese artists Zeng Han and Yang Changhong delved into the two worlds of role-playing, both traditional (landplay in Guizhou and Mulian opera) and contemporary (cosplayers dressing up as anime, manga and World of Warcraft characters), then shot portraits of the players in them.

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Corpse Bride cosplay photoshoot

Michelle Wilding Reader Find

By Michelle Wilding in New Trends on Wednesday 25 May 2011

DeviantArt user Malro-Doll truly brought Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride fantasy animation film to life with the help of her friend Victor. The two are avid cosplayers who successfully pulled-off a photoshoot emulating Burton’s distinctive visual aesthetic.

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Japan’s World Cosplay Summit

The Uncool Hunter Reader Find

By The Uncool Hunter in New Fashion on Wednesday 22 July 2009

Cosplay, an activity for lovers of comics and science fiction, was born in Japan in the 70s. The word derives from the combination of two British words: costume and play. So the translation would be ‘costume to play’. It consists of wearing the costume of some fiction character and dramatizing and acting like that character. The design and preparation of the costume also counts, as does the body shaping in order to make the costume fit and make it as ‘real’ as possible. Cosplayers take part in mass conventions around the world in order to decide the best of them. The most important of them is the World Cosplay Summit, which takes place in Japan every year.

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