More Otakuthon 2011 pictures (Cosplayer Edition)

For your viewing pleasure, Cafe Asta theatre presents....

~*~*~MORE PICTURES FROM OTAKUTHON 2011: Cosplayer Edition~*~*~

(....two months late.)

We got to see some fantastic cosplayers at Otakuthon this year, and we only managed to take the pictures of a few.

[WARNING: PICTURE HEAVY]

Cafe Asta Does Otakuthon 2011

Hello there, it's Angela here to share a little bit of Cafe Asta's summer adventures!

In August we traveled to Montreal, Quebec to participate in Canada's premier bilingual anime convention: Otakuthon.

The 3-and-a-half day adventure was far from boring! Between meeting new friends, constantly changing our displays and struggling to speak en Français, that weekend was unforgettable!

(Picture by the fantastique Veronica Thibault, which is the only picture of both of us at the table. Thanks love!)

Back from Atomic Lollipop!!

Here's a picture of the table we shared with Yoli-chan and deathofrats.Pictured is Steph doing something with her ear, and Yoli-chan looking adorable. Picture taken by deathofrats. Which is why she's not in the picture.

Steph's back from Atomic Lollipop! (Unfortunately Angela couldn't attend due to work, so Steph had to have double the fun for her) It was a ton of fun! She met a lot of great people, and enjoyed the sights and sounds (and the longest, most exciting ferris wheel ride of my life -Steph). It was actually the first time Cafe Asta has sold our stuff at a convetion, so it was a good test run for Otakuthon as well. (We have a lot of work to do....)

Atomic Lollipop seemed like a blast too, even though we (Steph, Yoli-chan and deathofrats) spent most of our time behind the Artist Alley table. There was SO MUCH SUGAR, it was delicious. They gave us free lollipops, and we bought $1 cotton candy. What a steal!

The carnival rides looked like they were lots of fun too! We only went on the Ferris wheel though, because we heard a lot of horror stories about the octopus ride. (It was pretty entertaining seeing a couple of our friends get off the ride, and be immobilized for about an hour because it was so nauseating). The Ferris wheel ride was surprisingly exciting, since it went on FOREVER. We were on it for a good 5 minutes. (It was a lot more fun than that sounds, really.)

We didn't stay for the overnight stuff (needed to wake up early to sell the next morning!) but from the sounds of it, those events were pretty exciting too. The free pancake breakfast Sunday Morning was delicious! (Fact: I will always focus on the food... -Steph)

There were a lot of events happening inside and outside, from pillow fights to fashion shows. We kept seeing people running in and out to go to these events. Kind of sad we didn't really get to participate, but there's always next year!

We will definitely be attending next year! A huge thanks to the organizers of Atomic Lollipop for running such an awesome event. Shout outs to Yoli-chan and deathofrats for being the best tablemates EVAR, and Jen S. and the girls of Atomic Ami for being such amazing artist alley neighbours. Check out their sites! They make amazing things!

After the cut: A closer look at what we were selling at Atomic Lollipop and what we will be selling at Otakuthon! (Unfortunately, Steph was too busy having fun to take pictures of the convention. Next time!)

Upcoming Events! Atomic Lollipop and Otakuthon 2011!

In the next couple of weeks, Cafe ASTA will be attending two exciting events, one in Toronto and one in Montreal! We have been busy preparing for them (as well as dealing with crazy life and school) which is why we haven't been posting much. We promise though, we will start posting more often and about more! (Steph has a million and one reviews on Wendy's salads she should post, and Angie has been making even more pirate bears. ARRR.)


Next weekend (July 30-31), we'll be at Atomic Lollipop! We're partnering up with our lovelies Yoli-chan and deathofrats sharing a table where we will sell charms, art prints, and maybe do some nail art. (Steph will be bringing her nail stamping kit. Ohohoho)

From their website:
"Enter a world of giant robots and magical girls, skirt-chasing samurai and kawaii dreams-come-true.


Join 2000 of your closest friends for two epic days and one mind-blowing night as we explore the imagination- unleashing anime, music, carnival rides and cosplay contests, bouncy castles and circus acts onto an unsuspecting city.


Around-the-clock dance parties, contests, panels, workshops and more make for late-night magic, early-morning mischief, and everything in between. Tis the season for sensory overload! So if your ultimate summer adventure involves donning your cosplay and riding away on a Ferris wheel, nabbing a plushy sidekick from the marketplace, or getting down to bone-shaking beats from world-class DJs, don’t settle for one! Do them ALL at ATOMIC LOLLIPOP.


Your weekend pass gets you unlimited access to all carnival rides, anime panels, gaming tournaments, cosplay contests, circus lessons and music stages, a MASSIVE free pancake picnic Sunday morning and MORE!"


(Click the picture above to get to their website for more information)

In August (12-14), cafe ASTA be road-tripping to la belle ville de Montreal, Quebec. Our French is rusty, but we have an Artist Alley table at Otakuthon! Hope to see you there!


From their website:
"Otakuthon is Quebec's largest festival celebrating Japanese animation (anime), graphic novels (manga), related gaming, and pop culture.

The first of its kind in Montreal, Otakuthon is a full-fledged, fan-run, bilingual anime convention that features a number of special guests as well as many activities and events spotlighting anime, manga, video games, artwork, and Japanese culture."

(Click the picture above to get to their website for more information)

Outtakes

Puffer Fish?

Woah, it's been a while since our last post. Been overrun with family emergencies and exams. We're back and going to get things back into gear!

For our introduction post, we actually did a quick photoshoot in my kitchen with my friend Annie for the photos. Twas a blast, even though the lighting was atrocious (mmm mustard coloured kitchen...), and of course, we have outtakes!

Heading to Anime North~

Hi everyone,

Sorry for the long hiatus, but we're getting ready to go to Anime North this weekend! We promise to take lots and lots of pictures, and we'll be back soon with reports, photos and long delayed blog posts! We will also probably have all of the charms we've made in our bags ^___^;.

I (Stephanie) will be in Bodyline's Antique Clock (Shown Above) and my Shurelia from Ar Tonelico costume. Not necessarily in that order.
And Angela will be in this Bodyline dress in Brown and in a surprise decora outfit (that I have never seen).

If you see us at Anime North, say hi! :3

New Twitter Account

Bet you didn't know what we have a twitter account!

Its true, now we do! Get the latest scoop on what we're working on and what inspires us at twitter.com/cafeASTA

Special treat: Photo shoot outtake!

Still loving all of the sweetness

Behind the Scenes Part 2: PIRATES?!

It’s a pirate’s life for me!

Hello again, Angela here to show you a sneak peek at another one of our delicious looking cookie pieces: Pirate bears!

You can say that this series was if not commissioned then inspired by a fund raiser we were invited to last winter for the GTA Rollergirls…. And used as a prize set for Raffle draws.

I knew right away that I wanted to be pirates. There’s something about pirates that are tough and yet playful, especially when they are cute, big headed teddy bears. How could I go wrong? As per usual I started off with Das brand Air dry paper clay and cut out the bear bases. This was a cutter we had never used before, and I like to call it ‘baby bear’ because it has a huge head, like babies do (Or is it just  my imagination?)

Next (as they dried for about 24-48 hours) I had to think of how pirates dressed, what colors these bears might wear, and what flavors they would look the best in.  Using Acrylic paint for the body (mmm graham cracker flavor) and gems for the eyes, the cuteness only increased.

With puff paint for the clothing, I tried to make each one of them different. Too bad I couldn’t really fit small details like dreads or long beards, but I had the most fun by far with the skulls on the bandanas.

Lastly I added a leopard printed pearlescent bead and some other small treasures and voila! The set of 8 pirates were ready! (theres an extra in the image)

To finish everything off I had to make a hot gun package using small zippered raft bags and our business cards. I’ll admit it was pretty ghetto looking, but I honestly made the packaging 20 minutes before leaving the house. It was pretty random and I can promise you our new (more thought out) packaging is a lot nicer. In this case I hoped the quality of the charms and their adorability would make up for the random display. Next time I’ll be more careful and prepared!

Thanks for checking out our cute little bears! Critiques and comments are muchos appreciated so don’t be shy!

Anime North 2011 Crafter's Corner

Just a quick update...
 
Cafe Asta is currently on the wait-list for Anime North 2011's Crafter Corner.

We are... #20  :(

We are... less than pleased, to say the least. We tried really hard to send our emails at the right time, and it was INTENSE. And it's not like we sent it late, in fact, Angela might have sent it one second too early (7:59:59) and Steph sent it right on time (timestamp was 8:00:00).

...and yet, neither of us got a table. (Angela got ignored... and Steph is waitlist #20.)

Ironically, on the AAtoast Livejournal Community (great resource for Anime North artists... or even Toronto artists in general. Super nice people!), there are people who received tables/higher waitlist positions than us, even though their timestamps are later than ours. Makes no sense.

But we will keep working hard! Have no table? No problem! We will just promote in a different fashion!

(We printed new business cards with the money that would've been used on tables!)

We actually have lots of plans in store for this year's Anime North, even if their Crafter's Corner registration process infuriates us, haha. We look forward to serving you all cookies, cookies and more cookies! Just watch this space for updates <3

Behind the Scenes Part 1: Cookies

Hello everyone and welcome again to Café ASTA! 


Angela here, reporting for duty; its been a long time, hasn’t it? Now that Winter is over, with spring comes renewed energy and new ideas for crafts. 


But first things first: both Steph and I think that we are way overdue with introducing some of the things we’ve made since our debut. Sorry everyone for being unable to post these sooner.


When we started coming up with the idea of Café Asta, Steph and I originally wanted to try a whole bunch of different kinds of Sweets deco, but knew that we had to take it slowly, so we decided to limit it to only a few specific kinds of bases: Cookies, Pies, Waffles and Biscuits. 


It doesn’t sound like much but as you may have noticed in our introductory pictures from December, there really is a LOT you can do with just these four types of bases!

It all depends on the sizes, colors and toppings one might want to decorate with, so honestly we stuck the types of things we already knew tasted great and thus made sense for a real-life inspired style. Experimentation followed not long after.

This week's pick:

Cookies (of the Chocolate chip variety):

These were the first that I tried to make and they came out much better than I had expected for being inexperienced with clay modeling. 


In the beginning, everything we made was originally  from white coloured air dry clay that of which we coloured ourselves using acrylic paint or chalk pastels. 


For things like bananas and cookie dough it was quite easy, but the hardest part of making a chocolate chip cookie hands-down is coloring the chocolate chips. 

While kneading a ball of clay about the size of a quarter, you have to add the brown paint little by little: Too much and it would be a huge slimy mess, too little and you’d be there forever. More than once I had been sitting there, kneading the colour completely through the clay for more than 30 minutes!!


Thought I was getting Arthritis from the hand cramps by the end of the week (haha)


It was brief, but this is just part 1 of a  "behind the scenes" series on the items we offer. Stay tuned for the next in the series: ~biscuits!~

Cafe ASTA on Facebook! :D:D

Cafe ASTA has a facebook page! For those of you who do not follow blogger pages lololol
Please like us if you like us! :D

[rant] On Photos and Light-Boxes

So our incredibly long delay in updating was due to our lack of photos (and because both Angela and I are inherently lazy, and yet incredibly busy with school and work and more school and a smidgen of social life). And honestly, the problem isn't fixed yet.

Re: Cameras

Neither of us have a fancy-pants D-SLR or anything of the sort. Angela says she only has a shitty super old point and shoot (Yo A, clarify what kind of camera you have), and I have in my possession a newer Sony Powershot of some kind... and yet I hate it. It's almost too user-friendly, and doesn't allow for manual adjustments (like focus ~_~). Sometimes my cell phone takes better pictures. Sigh.

It's not like we're clueless about camera stuff, Angela's worked at her uncle's photo development place, and I've done classes upon classes of graphic design and photography.... and yet, our product pics end up... less than preferred in quality.

We even made a light box... which might be too big, or made out of the wrong materials, because while it's helped.... it hasn't helped enough.

While I'd love to get a $800 fancypants D-SLR... right now, that's completely not feasible. So sad.

I should go ask the decoden community for help...

What do you use to take your pictures?

*drumroll* Introductions!

So now that we have a couple of items under our belt, we figured it would be a good idea to introduce ourselves and get acquainted with everyone!

Angie and Steph

Store Update!

Hello there~
Angie signing in to announce a store update! As spring is quickly approaching (15 more days!) the sweet smell of love and freshly baked cookies is in the air. Though in our case, the cookies are made of clay~ (Which means they smell... like clay? Haha)

As our little treat to you, we've (finally*) compiled a few photos of our first batch of sweets deco cellphone charms in our growing Chocolate Chip cookie and Biscuit Collections!

But that doesn't mean the bakery hasn't been cooking up a storm! Every week we will be coming up with something new and better.

Each of these items shown can be purchased in our online store! (Click any of the images to take you to our store.)

We'd love for any questions, comments or critiques!. (Seriously, we thrive off constructive criticism. We're beginners; we know we're not perfect, and we have a long way to go.)

We'll see you very soon for a few exciting event updates and tutorials, we promise!

*(We're very sorry for the delay. There were many issues with our homemade light-box, and we're still fixing it up. Consider these Photo Collection try #1. More about this in the next post.) 

What is Sweets Deco and what do you guys have to do with it?

Sorry for the long hiatus since our last post.... we've been working really hard at school and work, and lost track of time. There would be more (and better!) pics of our stuff, but we're still working on making a lightbox. (And we tried posting pictures without a light box... it wasn't pretty. Darn you Canada and your dark winters.) Sorry for the delay!

We're going to start updating regularly soon, and we look forward to showing you what we have in store~

To begin, let's start with an introduction of how we'd define sweets deco~

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
What is Sweets Deco?


Sweet [sweet]
-noun. 1. sweets, pie, cake, candy, and other foods high in sugar content.

(Lactose-Free Red Velvet Cupcakes topped with homemade icing and a swedish berry. These are real and made by Steph.)

Deco
From the Japanese デコ[deko], which is short for decoration, but also encompasses the hobby of decorating items, such as a cell-phone with rhinestones.

(Angie's Blackberry deco'd with pearls, acrylic stickers and plastic roses.)

Put them together:
Sweets + Deco = Sweets Deco!

Decorating items with sweets (made of clay and resin and other materials)!

Like So:

(Decorated Nintendo DS case, available here in our Artfire store)

So what is Cafe ASTA and what do you have to do with Sweets Deco?

Cafe ASTA is our little venture into making sweets deco'd items. We specialize in make sweets style cell-phone charms, but we also decorate mirrors, DS cases, you name it! We also make lots of other jewellery.

This blog is where we'll be keeping track of the stuff we've made, as well as our food adventures and other related activities (mostly crafting posts... and eating posts. We love food, you will know this soon.)