The gentle hum of a sewing machine echoes throughout the room. Steady fingers guide the tough fabric through the machine making precise stitches, aiming for an exact look. Across the room the delicate hiss of spray paint whispers through the air, artful fingers creating props to compliment a costume. This is only a glance into a hobby that is becoming more popular among students: cosplay.

“Cosplay stands for costume play,” junior Isabella Tran said. “You pick a character and dress up as them.”

People usually cosplay when they attend anime or comic conventions, which is essentially a large group of people who gather to celebrate popular culture. Some local conventions include AnimeFest, Anime North Texas and A-Kon.

“People cosplay everything from comic books to movies to TV shows to anime,” junior Victoria Price said. “There’s a wide variety of stuff to choose from.”

Conventions are special events that only happen on certain dates of the year where cosplayers can show off their hard work.

“The main thing about conventions are the panels,” senior Hanna Mollhoff said. “There’s a cosplay competition where people compete on how good their costumes are. I’ve never competed, but it’d be cool to.”

However, the hobby can take up a tedious amount of time and money, and it is up to the cosplayer if they choose to make their costume or purchase it online. Either way, cosplayers work hard to ensure that when the costume is finished, it mirrors the costume of the character they chose.

“Cost depends on how accurate you want the costume to be,” Mollhoff said. “The more accurate it is, the more expensive the costume will end up being.”

Many cosplayers who are students had their beginnings through an anime club earlier in their school careers.

“I had a group of friends in anime club that were going to A-Kon,” Price said. “So I went in my first cosplay, and it wasn’t very good, but hey, you gotta start somewhere.”

West has their very own cosplay group that encourages students to wear their costumes every Friday. They are known as the Plano West Akatsuki, which is a term for a group of characters from the anime Naruto.

“We’re just a group of cosplay enthusiasts,” senior Victor Adames said. “We just cosplay around school and feel proud to love anime and cosplay.”

Adames started the weekly event in the middle of second semester last year with a few friends.

“I just want to get more people to cosplay,” Adames said, “as well as to make some friends along the way.”