Event - Elftopia 2024
Elftopia is the only outdoors fantasy Summer event aka Renaissance fair in Flanders. Every year I say: "This was my last visit to Elftopia." And yet every year somebody convinces me to go say Hi-with-a-camera.
Before I tell you why, a few useful links:
▷ All photos can always be found on/downloaded from my Flickr and here!
▷ A "How to download stills from Flickr" tutorial was posted here.
▷ Some highlights might go to Clapper & to Instagram or even Threads.
▷ Buy Red Cathedral a whisky on Ko-Fi
▷ Updates are on THE Facebook.
▷ Give a follow to this young creative foundation: Deep Red Noise vzw/asbl who will soon bring you #TheRed360 (incl. a new Tiktok account)
Update: 100% of all stills have been edited & uploaded
(Sorry if you had to check the gallery again every few days, because YES; I edit slowly).
The longer version of the video can be found on Clapper & on Tiktok .
Some random △/▼ points:
△ The weather: dry, sunny, warm.. maybe too warm for some, but luckily not as warm as the days after the fair, nor as warm as in 2022. (But I would have loved it if the fountain behind the castle had worked)
▼ The price for mead.. are you for real? (And no wine? Or am I mistaken?)
△ The people.. without the cosplayers these events are nothing, so luckily they show up faithfully. I was positively surprised by the number of Castlefestians & Trollians present at this Elftopia, those people are always good for a joyful atmosphere.
△ Rosecreek Riot was very promising and played a good set, but programming them at a time when 70% of the visitors is already gone is sad for the band.
▼ A BIG no-no is the meadow at the far side of the bridge.. Due to the potholes and other anklebreaking traps, this might be considered an adventure trip for a party of rogues, or rangers, but most definitely unfit as an event ground.. and deadly for wheelchairs & crutches. So most of that meadow was left unexplored: sad!
△ Made much more pictures than during Castlefest.. I was much more focussed and I did spend less time drinking mead, enjoying bands, and strolling over the grounds,
▼ Cellphone reception and cellphone internet connection are disastrous. The latter is a humongous problem for all the mobile payment apps (retailers, food trucks, personal refunds,..). This is something that can be easily fixed & improved.
△ Letting kiddies win the cosplay contest. It brings them joy.
▼ Activities.. I won't repeat myself anymore. Some have been added: good, but still..
△ Some awesome costumes, even some 100% not caring about the temperatures.
△ Got to park next to the entrance, unlike most people who apparently had a rather long walk to end the day with. However, I completely understand that the village inhabitants are sick & tired of people parking all over the village.. Hence: Good that they have more dedicated parking lots.
▼ Why is the price of parking tickets creeping up at such a rapid rate?
△ Crew & vendors were very nice & helpful.
△ Nobody refused when I wanted to make a picture.. 1 cosplayer even chased a cellphonographer away who tried to shoot from behind my back. Damn right!
▼ Accessability for disabled visitors is véry limited. Please go visit Castlefest and see how they resolved this issue.
◭ Not complaining about the toilets, but are they really all in one place instead of scattered over the grounds? Just asking for a friend with crutches..
△ Did I mention the people? Let me mention them again because they're the only reason I'm breaking my promise of not-going-again year after year.
This video for Instagram was shortened to 90 seconds.
The longer version is on Clapper and on Tiktok
While you wait for me to select & edit instead of enjoying the Summer weather and working on new videoprojects, check out some old stills from Elftopia:
(Click on the arrows on the side to scroll)
Elftopia 2022-2023
Elftopia 2016-2021
Some of my favorite cosplay shots from the post-Covid era.
Evidence that cosplay has been around for a rather long time.
Direct link to this article: https://tinyurl.com/elftopia2024
Namaste & hope to see many for the #TheRed360 project I'm doing with Deep Red Noise vzw
