Well, I had an awesome time at Fanime! Shooting and hanging out with everybody was tons of fun, and I’ve got some pretty awesome pictures to edit and post soon.

I met and gave my card to a whole bunch of really cool people, and I’m always down to stay in touch with cosplayers, photographers, and anybody else in the con scene. If you’re checking this out, feel free to add me on Facebook, Twitter, or deviantART.

Two weeks until FanimeCon! Oh crap, that’s way too soon!

Can’t wait, actually. Just picked up a new lens that I’m looking forward to using, and of course I always enjoy doing shoots in general. I’ll be around for the whole con, so if you want to shoot or anything, feel free to drop me a line through email, dA, Twitter, or whatever and we’ll set something up, or maybe I’ll just run into some of you readers around the con.

While you guys are at Fanime, swing by the Artist Alley and check out Ejen Chuang’s booth. He’s a photographer who spent 2009 traveling to conventions all over the US to photograph cosplayers, and he’s turned them into a very cool book called “Cosplay in America”, which he’ll be selling at the con.

Oh, yeah… OTACOOL 2! I ended up getting two pictures in the book. Maridah’s Saber is on the front cover and is the title page for the “worldwide cosplayers” section, and DayDreamerNessa’s Emeraldas is on the back cover and in the book. I’ll be the first one to admit that it’s the cosplayers’ awesome work and not my photos that got them in there, but it still feels cool to see my cosplay stuff published, and the printer did a great job, the photos in the book (that includes everybody’s, not just mine) are reproduced beautifully.

I’ll be at Animation on Display at the end of this month, at the Hotel Kabuki in San Francisco, CA. This hotel is a great location for anything “traditional Japanese” – Sengoku Basara, Samurai Champloo, InuYasha, stuff along those lines, and there’s also plenty of opportunity for more SciFi-esque stuff down in the parking garage, as well as a shopping area that’d be great for a contemporary setting. Shoot me an e-mail or message me on dA if you’re interested in doing a shoot!

Hi, and welcome to CosplayShots. I’m Maxim Stensel, sometimes known as Max Archer, and if you’ve found this page through one of my profiles on another site, thanks for coming!

CosplayShots may be a new name, but I’ve been on the convention scene for over eight years now, and have been shooting professionally outside the fan community for over five years.

Well, the new site is up, and CosplayShots is now in “business”- that’s in quotes because my con photography is, and always will be, a free service.

So, if you’re interested, take a look at my “About” page, and send me an email, I welcome the opportunity to shoot with more people.

Welcome to CosplayShots! If you’ve ended up here after typing maximstensel.com/cosplay, rest assured, you’ve found the right place.

Over time, I will be opening up  the option for people to make accounts here so you can comment on photos of yourself or your friends. There will be special benefits to joining, update alerts, and the ability for users to have input on shoots and future projects.

Add CosplayShots to your bookmarks. You never know when it’s going to be your face up here.