Collab - Verbeke Cosplay Day (2026)

Allow me to sum up a few ingredients that make several (outdoors) costume events very enjoyable: No rain + casual strolls through a gorgeous location + drinks with nice people + casually making a photo of a splendid or funny or catchy constume + decent food + things to do/see + musical (re)discoveries + some more wine, whisky, or mead.

The annual cosplay day at the Verbeke Foundation, one of the strangest (yet fascinating) musea in Belgium, had yet again many of those ingredients in its recipe. So thank you Geert for putting this together. 

▶️ All photos can always be found on/downloaded from my Flickr and here in this Album!
▶️ A "How to download stills from Flickr" tutorial was posted here.
▶️ Some highlights might go to Instagram, Threads or Bluesky.
▶️ A video might go to Clapper & to Tiktok
▶️ Buy Red Cathedral a whisky on Ko-Fi
▶️ Updates are on THE Facebook. 
▶️ The Youtube channel has no new content (often Sony camera tips)
▶️ Give a follow to this young creative foundation: Deep Red Noise vzw/asbl 

Or rather: give a follow & like everywhere.

The 2026 photo gallery (Click on the arrows on the side to scroll): 

Update: 5% of all stills have been edited & uploaded  

While you patiently wait for me to edit all photos, you can watch some of the 360° videos we made during a few selected geek fairs, or listen to the #page1project where I read the 1st page of books I like, or you can take a look at some old photos.

Because, apparently yes, I had made a few costume inspired photos before this day.. Even some at Verbeke Foundation itself. Surprise-surprise!

A 2023-2024 photo gallery (Click on the arrows on the side to scroll):  

How did I discover cosplay?

▷ For me photography started in 1996. Newspaper- & VIP-work were the first jobs. Did plenty of gigs featuring fast(looking) cars, and for organisations aiding wildlife in the early-to-mid 2000's.
▷ It wasn't until September 16th 2006 that I discovered cosplay while making a report on a gamesfair in Paris. Up until then I had only met paid models/actors/actrices cosplaying videogame characters on the big games fairs like ECTS London.
▷ In 2008 I had doubtlessly the first ever book dedicated to European cosplay published. 
▷ Shortly after, I organised the official cosplay photobooths on FACTS, and on other (less long-lived) events for Aztek-TV. Got to say hi all over Europe on the big cosplay events. Back when geek fairs were still the Wild Wild West instead of corporate money-grabs.
▷ It's véry véry véry rare to see me be fully satisfied with an image. I've been trained to see all errors in the making or editing.. and I notice every single one in my own shots.. but then I think: Meh, I'm only human.

A gallery with some post-C19 cosplay samples: (Click on the arrows on the side to scroll)

The AI dilemma 

Actually, I did not take any normal cameras to this cosplay shoot day. Instead I use prototypes of the Paragraphica and the GenPiCam, cameras that supposedly scan the area and then use that information to create a prompt that allows an AI to construct its version of the scene. Luckily the cosplayer I gave this remark to, was an intelligent person that understood the heavy dose of grinding cynism. 

But let's admit one thing: all video-editing and photo-editing software and even our cameras (or cellphones) themselves are using AI.

Earlier this month, during an existential crisis caused by the clash between a desire to experiment with new technologies and the many doubts about my own work compared to the full AI-creations currently dominating every aspect of the internet, publicity, and socials, my final guess was that the added value of human photo/videographers will solely become ”Seeing things, or seeing-things-in-a-way, non-creative people and their AI tools did not think of.” 

And I don't know if that's enough to keep me motivated in a demotivating world. 

The state of the world 

We all see and feel that the world is broken. 

Authoritarianism is flourishing, sponsored by the billionaires behind corporations succesfully trying to reshape the world, grabbing what they want and lying about it without any meaningful pushback.

Education has often been a tool of obedience, indoctrination, meant to form worker drones, instead of a way to intellectual enrichment, knowledge and openness, and now is one of those eras. Knowledge and openness are considered dangerous by autoritarians.

A new era of techo-feudalism is robbing the poor of every protection the previous generations had fought for, because politicians will do anything their sponsors demand. Plutocracy, nepotism, kakistocracy, oligarchy, and even kleptocracy are everywhere.

Ordinary people, both poor and middle class, are the victims of seemingly-out-of-control price hikes, total enshitification, fast rising costs of basic living, and the push towards models of streaming-leasing-renting-subscriptions to prevent the common person from owning anything.

One crisis after another brings fear and doubt, leading to tribalism; people desperately search for a tribe, a group in which they hope to feel safe, even if the price for that imaginary safety is high. Sometimes it costs them their dignity, their identity, their home, their friends or former beliefs in goodness, fairness and acceptance.

A toxic manosphere is turning young men into a brainless and spineless mass that can only repeat the few highlighted bulletpoints they received in their latest influencer video. 
Feminism, diversity, equality (& equity) and inclusion are the 1st victims of a worldwide outbreak of religious extremism. 

Wildlife, plants,.. all of Nature is being annihilated for greed and profit, eventhough a few good people continue to fight and protect.
Natural recources are being destroyed and plundered to make things that improve nothing, that nobody needs, so handy marketeers can come up with ideas to create a hollow, unquenshiable craving for it and the company can make money of it.

The greed and desire for ever increasing profit is ruling every aspect of most contemporary human societies. Companies don't make products anymore, all they want.. no: need to do is make money for shareholders. 
The quote that summarizes it best: General Motors is not in the business of making cars. General Motors is in the business of making money is attributed to Thomas A. Murphy, who was the CEO of GM from 1974 to 1980. So no, enshitification did not start in 2020, but around that time we entered the final rapids before the abyss.

The majority of internet posts and reactions at this point in time were not made by real humans, proving that the worldwide availibilty of communication and knowledge did not uplift humanity as some optimists had predicted.

The arts and journalism are being both flooded and silenced by AI-spam and corporate take-overs of all major news outlets. A handful of people decide what truth you hear and see. The Truth has always been: "The lie most people believe.", but now it has been even more twisted into: "The lie a handful of superwealthy tell you to believe through all channels of media, social media and publicity." 
Or rather: it's like that again, because the idea that a repeated lie becomes accepted as truth has been around since the Roman emperors and was perfected by Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels. He often paraphrased saying "If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it". It relates to the "illusion of truth" effect, where familiarity is mistaken for truth. And we are all living in that illusion of truth.. willingly, as if we unconsciously have chosen to remain inside the Matrix.

"No AI was used in this listing," I wanted to say .. but even that's not true since my brain doublechequed quotes & statements and the consulted search engines all use AI in their answers. So even creating this list had datacenters consume vast amounts of water & energy and heated the area surrounding the datacenters. Mea culpa.

It's time to touch some grass instead of staring at an editing screen. 

Namaste. 

A direct link to this article: https://tinyurl.com/Verbeke26