The Only Con Tee I Trust Black Cotton, Water-Based Prints

ok so my whole thing with con tees is I want to carry less, I cosplay Hinata from Haikyuu and Kenma and I also do this dumb Aoba Johsai variant, and between wigs and test makeup and props and a camera bag I am not also babysitting a fragile print, I just can’t do it. My current go-to is a 180g black cotton blank from a Taobao shop, ¥58, 14cm crow print on the left chest and a 26cm Karasuno mark across the back, water-based screen print, thick black base, no polyester sublimation. Boring, sure. Survives a Comiket queue, also yes.

The hotel sink dye thing was Aoba Johsai seafoam green, I rinsed the wig in the sink and thought I was careful and the white towel turned mint, wait no, I mean the towel turned mint, not the wig, the wig was already seafoam green, that’s the whole problem, so now no loose dye near anything white. And I still have a con photo where a glossy transfer on my old tee caught the flash and turned into a white block on the back, not vintage, just a flash grenade. That’s why I only do thick black-bottom silk-screen now.

Complaints? Why does every local print shop default to polyester sublimation for anime art, it feels like plastic and smells like a gym bag after one August Comiket. I don’t even know why they do that. I also fix my own stuff mid-con, safety pins at the collar, double-sided tape on a seam, black cotton thread if a print edge lifts. At a campus con last month the left sleeve hem opened while I was carrying a prop box, so I taped it and pinned it and kept moving, sad little repair but it held.

Oh right, also phone batteries at cons just die before noon for no reason, you’re not even using it and it’s at 3 percent, which is stupid. But yeah, back to the shirts.

And my anti-mainstream opinion is white tees are not the clean con blank, everyone acts like white is safe but a white T in a Comiket queue is just a sweat map with a print on it, I don’t care how breathable the blank is, for me it’s black or bust, the print still has to be water-based and matte though, if it shines under phone flash I’m not buying it.

Anyway. My safety pins are in the camera bag side pocket right now and there’s black cotton thread stuck to the tape roll.