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Cosplayers are often multifaceted people when it comes to their talents and abilities. Shannon Noelle Cosplay is one such person as a crafter of many things, mainly intricate costumes inspired by her favorite video games. Going on 11 years strong, she has a variety of works featuring craft foam, lighting, moving prop techniques, and other very detailed processes.
Credit: @framedropphotos
Shannon prides herself in her adaptability in learning new skills for each of her builds, many of which feature not only massive amounts of foam work, but also effects such as smoke auras and LED lighting for an extra dramatic flair. A prime example is her Draugr Armor Eivor, as seen in the Assassin's Creed: Valhalla game. Glowing green and emitting a slight fog, she achieves the eerie vibe straight out of the game, bringing it to life.
Credit: @xealzega
Going further into detail of her love and appreciation for the Assassin’s Creed franchise, as her very first cosplay build was an Ezio costume when she was 16, Shannon described her Draugr build as one of her favorites so far. “I wanted to remake my Ezio for my 10 year cosplay anniversary, but when Valhalla came out I immediately fell in love with the enormous amounts of armor sets available for the character. The Draugr set specifically called out to me given the eerie undead nature of a Draugr in mythology. It was a challenge I took on, and I feel I succeeded greatly.”
Credit: @xealzega
Shannon reminisced on her cosplay journey, which began with a fondness for sewing her costumes. As time progressed, she became familiar with working with EVA foam, a common medium used in costume crafting, which allowed her builds to grow bigger, quite literally. With the ability to foam craft, she was able to create pieces and props that really brought her costumes together. Along with this, she involved extra features such as motorization of props, which she implemented with the spinning staff of her Mercy cosplays.
Credit: @framedropphotos
On the subject of Overwatch, which she is “majorly inspired” by, Shannon has created a total of 6 character costumes so far from the game. She describes these works as “stepping stones” to where she is now in her skill set.
“Tracer was the very first time I had ever used EVA foam for any build, Ana taught me LEDs, Mercy taught me how to wire a motor to make her staff spin, and so on,” she said. “I fell in love with the character designs as soon as I saw the initial trailer and immediately started working on my Tracer cosplay pre-beta! I wore her to PAX East 2016 where Blizzard demoed the game; she was a huge hit with fans!”
Two of her Overwatch costumes, Widowmaker and Reaper, have even been featured in media for the Overwatch League team, Philadelphia Fusion.
Image Credit: Official @overwatchleague; Reaper worn by @xealzega
Going forward, Shannon plans to spend 2022 deep-diving back into cosplay builds, including plans to build the Hels Damnation Armor set from Assassin's Creed: Valhalla, as well as seeing convention and cosplay friends again, and continuing to share her techniques with aspiring cosplayers. Her work can be followed @s_noelle_cosplay and @noodle.crafts on Instagram.