I'm sharing my opinions and also giving objective reasons why I feel cosplayers should be paid if they are invited or recruited to 'work' for an organisation/club/any form of media. The 'work' discussed here can be defined as menial tasks such as giving out flyers, being a party entertainment, or appearing on any form of media for interviews or as background decorations. In case you haven't sensed my drift. I'm all for it. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not against commercialism, I’m just against exploitation. I believe labor should be paid regardless of who the individual is. Unless of course, if it's for a charitable cause.
Making costumes is expensive.
It's not hard to see how those elaborate costumes with yards of cloth can cost a lot. A lot of people will justify not paying the cosplayers by assuming that since the costume is already made, it doesn't make any difference to them. No extra cost is induced thus the cosplayers have no right to be paid. Following this theory, does it mean if you own a car and paid up all the installments, you should just lend it to someone (you don't personally know) for free? Cosplayers purchased their costumes with either cold hard cash or through their manual labor. To deprive someone else the rewards of their hard work is unreasonable. Especially if you're earning through them.
Cleaning costumes is expensive/troublesome.
It's easy to understand that costumes don't come easy, but few understand that these special costumes require maintenance too. Some costumes require dry cleaning while others need to be hand washed. Regardless of the way it will be cleaned, we can all agree that every wear will contribute to the “withering” lifespan of a costume. And if the work requires entertaining a crowd or walking near slippery mud. There's a fair chance some nasty strangers will help soil it. While some can argue that the diminishing of a costume is inevitable, oxygen and dust alone can help break it down. Please bear in mind that cosplayers wear their costumes to have fun and fulfill their own desires. Why should they risk their costumes to promote you?
Wearing a costume is exhausting and time consuming.
While I agree, not all costumes are uncomfortable, but I'm sure most seasoned cosplayers will agree with me that no cosplay is ever really comfortable. Even if it's not the bulky armor or heavy sword, it's the skimpy bust line. Even if it's not the 4 inch killer heels, it's the winter boots in tropical climate. Even if it's not the heavy hair piece, it's the skull constricting wig net. Even if it's not the spiky accessories, it's the dropping ribbon on your thigh. I don't know about you, but it takes me an average of two to three hours to get everything on and makeup done. Those few hours are always a panicky and stressful period for me.
Each of us is given twenty-four hours per day and the recommended sleeping hour is eight hours. Three divided by sixteen (24 - 8) hours in a day is more than sixteen percent of your entire day. Below is an estimation of the time a cosplayer would need to dedicate.
0.5 hour – Packing, prepping, and ironing a costume
1 hour - Transport time to and fro
2.5 hours - Prep time
2 hours - Work time
A whooping total of six hours! Effectively, that is half a work day and thirty-five percent of waking time. After the cosplay, more time wasted on cleaning the costumes. Why should anyone go through the hassle of dressing up to fulfill the desire of an organisation they don't personally know? Would you exchange six hours of your time for someone you don't know?
Time is money.
Time is precious. People always tend to undermine the importance of something they can't see, but really, if there's one thing you should cherish in life, then that's time. Time is an appreciating asset that grows more and more important as you realize you have lesser and lesser of it. The cruel fact is, everyone was born to die. When the ending is the same for everyone, the only difference comes in the way you live it. Time, unfortunately is something a lot of people assume cosplayers have a lot of. Henceforth, cheap. Many people assume all cosplayers are teeny students. Which is not entirely wrong because the majority of the cosplayers demographics are students, but as the hobby progresses and mature, many of the teenagers have now become young adults with a job. Even if they really are students, their time is better spent revising their textbooks.
I've mentioned many times on different accounts that maintaining this blog, social media pages, and my own cosplays has been very challenging. Writing this entry alone has taken me a few days to complete because I usually have spare time to blog only a few hours. I'm not extremely busy, but I'm not exactly keen to volunteer my time to insincere individuals/organisations either. I don’t know how to put my honest opinion across more politely but no, I’m not interested in helping out in your event and "promote cosplay to the public" for free. That said, if both parties can come to an agreement that benefits both sides then all is great. I don’t know how a cosplayer can benefit from a commercial organizer in any ways other than cash and products, but you get my drift.
Someone is earning through you.
Probably the one most important and teeth grinding point. The event/TV station/media parties are paid big bucks to create entertaining content. Depending on the time slot and channel, a single thirty second advertisement can easily cost more than six digits! Event organizers are paid by their clients to make sure everything for the event runs smoothly and there is sufficient attention on it. To put it simply, event organizing companies are also paid to create hype for the event. If their content includes and some times that hype is you, shouldn’t you get some sort of compensation for your involvement?
Saturday, December 13, 2014
