Dragon Con 2022: Bunny Hutch & Thursday-Friday Videos!

Happy Tuesday, dragons and (if you're like me) draggin's! I hope y'all had even half as much fun this past weekend as I did, because I'm still riding that Dragon Con high.

I'm also exhausted, of course, since John and I filmed Thursday-Sunday for 8-10 hours, then went back to the hotel to edit until 4-5AM each morning. Annnnd REPEAT.

(@Asta.Darling)

We also had three separate Epbot meetups, which let us have smaller groups with different folks each time, so we could chat a bit more. (Or try to, over the deafening DJ, ha. Next year we'll go somewhere quieter!) Huge thanks to Rebecca for putting these together, and all y'all in the FoEs Go To Dragon Con group.

Of course the scheduled meets are just for folks who want a guarantee of seeing us; throughout each day we met even more of y'all who prefer the hunt. :D (I do love hearing happy shrieks in the crowd when someone spots us.)

I was a little amazed how often I approached some jaw-dropping cosplayer to ask for a video, only to be told they love us/Epbot. Makes me feel like a blushing fangirl every time - "YOU know who I am??" -  and it fills me up. (Korg, I remember meeting you years ago, too, and you always make my con!)

On Saturday I scribbled in my gratitude journal, "Today made me feel like I add value to this community," which is seriously my life goal, so thanks, y'all.

Now let's get the VIDEOS. Woot woot!

John and I filmed and photographed so much this year we put ourselves at a disadvantage editing-wise: so much content, it was impossible to crank out quick daily videos like we did in 2019. BUT. We do have the first 3 up! And John's working furiously at this very moment to get Saturday done, which will be our longest - and best - yet. Sunday will be epic, too. So definitely go follow the Epbot Youtube channel to see those as soon as they go up.

For now, though, let's watch these in order. I recommend sound on, because we worked really, REALLY hard to incorporate the music, not to mention the Bunny Hutch song is a chill bop.

Thursday:

Watch for Chopper's little wave, Pizza the Hutt, that Bert heel click on the beat drop (SO GOOD), a phenomenal Death Claw, Cat Woman's whip hitting the lens(!!), the Monty Python French knight blowing raspberries, and of course the Star Wars boom mic operators at the end, who had us howling.

We only have a few of my flash portraits in this one, but you can see we're incorporating them more and more, since y'all seem to like them, and I friggin' LOVE them. (I edit photos while John edits the video, then after his first draft we work together on the video to polish it up.)

Next!

Bunny Hutch (Thursday night):

John and I laughed SO MUCH working on this one, and the creativity in the mash-ups is off the charts. Panning up a pair of fishnet legs to some hilarious/horrifying top half will never stop being amusing to me.

Watch for Number Five with Delores, Bunny Gonk Droid, Bunny Vecna(!!), Bunny Napoleon Dynamite (who actually did a LOT of the dance for us), Hamilton Bunnies, the "Unstoppable" Bunny with little Dino grabbers, Big Bird Bunny (the striped legs don't show, but she was awesome!), Lounge Lego Batman, Blue Bunny Ice Cream Bunny (with ice cream cone ears!), and of course watch all the way to the end for some NSFW Olaf carrot action, ermergersh. (All his buttons and carrot were Velcro, so they could mix them around like a Mr. Potato Head. Hysterical.)

I'm bummed we lost the video of this Stede Bunny; our batteries died the second we hit "record" - but at least we got this gorgeous photo:

(@AbbyDarkStar)

The Bunny Hutch party has the WORST lighting, btw, so next year we'll record outside the room instead. Hopefully my portraits help give you a better idea of some of the details.

And finally for now:

Friday:

We found a great mix of laughter, dancing, and drama with this one. Don't miss Maleficent (her portrait is almost directly off the camera, can you believe it??), spooky Over The Garden Wall goodness, the jaw-dropping, FUNCTIONAL Fallout Power Armor, the Kuzco's Poison cosplayer carrying a spinach puff purse, Asta Darling doing her entire Wind Master dance just for us (EEEE), tiny Sam who nearly gave John a heart attack, Yaya Han being the Queen as always, the Death Becomes Her group(!!), a terrifying Beetlejuice/Pennywise mashup, the Stepbrothers who brought their own photo backdrop, giant dancing Soot Sprite, the light-up skirt of my dreams, twerking Samurai Vader, my quick cameo trading with a Jawa, and of course the best, most hysterical Men in Tights group at the end.  (They go by so fast I recommend pausing to appreciate the whole group, bahaha.)

Oh, and this was a happy accident: Our top flash didn't go off for Dr.s Zed & Ned, but with some editing I ended up loving the extra creepy look:


(@emmajiqrubini & her dad @theEldernerd)

This father/daughter team has been cosplaying together for over 10 years, btw, and we love to see it. They're super friendly and fun to chat with, too, so say hi if you see them!

Cosplayers, as always feel free to download my photos of you and re-post, or screen-grab your sections of our videos to post. (I'm uploading all my flash portraits by day on Flickr, check there for yours!) Just give Epbot a shout-out/credit somewhere, if you would, since we're still very small fish in the Con Coverage pond.

Also if you see yourself in one of our videos, please comment on YT and leave your socials! I'll "heart" your comments so they go to the top of the list and others can find you. I'll also tag you individually on your portraits here and on Flickr, if I have them.

One last cool pic:

It's nearly impossible to capture all-black cosplays with black-out flash, so I love how this turned out.

If you missed my Dragon Con Stories over the weekend you can still see them in my saved Instagram Highlights on my profile page, or wait a few days and I'll get them imported over to Youtube and embed them here. It's... on the list. The very long list. Hee.

Thanks for your patience, your clicks, and your community, friends. I'm glad you're here.

And as always if you'd like to help support our offering free convention photos and videos and silliness, you can give to me and John directly through Paypal, either as a one-time tip or a monthly donation.

Or, for a free option, you can bookmark the Epbot Amazon shop, which gives us a little percentage back of anything you buy, and where I have lots of fun lists and reviews of my favorite products.

I would do all this for free, but thank you for making it so I don't have to. Love y'all.

::MWAH::