by Joey S, Photographer

For the last 20 years, Otakorp has gathered some of the most dedicated fans of Japanese animation for their annual anime convention, Otakon. During the last few years the convention has been held at the Baltimore Convention Center. Recently they announced the con is moving to the Washington DC Convention Center in 2017. I attended the event in Baltimore for the second time in August 2013. We saw some amazing cosplay and special guests while roaming the very crowded halls. The last estimate we saw said there were over 34,000 fans in attendance, most of whom appeared in costume. Events ranged from discussion panels lead by fans to panels by members of the industry. They had directors, producers, music writers and voice actors. There were even a couple concerts and a Masquerade featuring skits developed and acted by fans.  They had a hall dedicated to artists, another hall for vendors, and a third hall with a huge collection of TVs and video game consuls. And of course, they showed Anime on big screens.

Btw, Otakon comes from Otaku, which is a Japanese term that refers to people with obsessive interests…

Here are a few of the characters we encountered. For more pictures take a look at our Facebook gallery. My co-conspirator, Momoko, also wrote an article about one of the special guests, Director Shinichiro Watanabe.

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These costumes made it to the final round of the Hall Costume Contest:

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This Voltron team performed a dance number at the Masquerade event

Producer Masayuki Ozaaki with Sunrise Inc. Best known for his work on the Gundam series.

Actor Tomokazu Seki with a drawing that was a gift from a fan.

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