Our First Weekend With the Cosplay Community

There's a moment at every con when you find out whether you belong there. Ours came when someone walked away from the cosplayer booths with one of our collectible cards in their hand, and then went looking around for something to put it in.

We hadn't said a word about protecting the cards, storing them, or treating them like collectibles. They took one look and just knew. We were still working out how to explain the thing, and the cosplay scene had already figured it out for us.

That was ConCrunch 2026 - 28 to 30 August, Gabriel Loci, Prague - our first full weekend inside this community. We went in as newcomers. We came out with a list of people we want to keep working with.

What we brought

Creator Cards, making their official debut in cooperation with ConCrunch.

It's a cosplayer's own collectible card: same size as a Pokémon or MTG card, metallic foil, laminated, numbered inside a collection, limited to a run of 150. The front is a photo of a cosplayer. The back is their bio and a QR code that leads to their profile.

We didn't bring mock-ups. Thirteen sets were already printed and sitting on the table.

We also brought a lucky wheel. Anyone who stopped by could spin it for a discount on their own cards, with a few prizes mixed in. If you turned the wheel, your discount is live.

Three days of standing in one place, talking

Cosplayers asked us things we weren't ready to answer. We listened, and some of it has already made it into the product.

The question that came up over and over: can we go in on this together? So we changed it. The minimum order is still 150 cards, but how those 150 are divided is flexible - between different designs, different people, or both. Three of your own designs at 50 pieces each. Two at 75. Or one run split across three friends, so everyone walks away with their own card and nobody funds the whole thing alone. That idea came from the con.

Others asked whether they needed a new photo taken on the spot. They don't. One cosplay photo you actually like is enough, and an older one is completely fine. A few had turned up without a photographer lined up and wanted a proper shot anyway, so we arranged shoots.

And more than one person told us they'd collect these the way they collect Pokémon cards. Hearing that unprompted, from people holding the very first printed run, is a memory we'll keep for a while.

Why it clicked

We think it's simpler than we'd been making it.

A fan queues up to meet a cosplayer, tells them the costume is unbelievable, takes a photo, and then leaves with nothing. Or with a print that's rolled up in a backpack by lunchtime. There's a gap there, between the moment and anything that survives it.

A card fits in a wallet. It survives the backpack. It can be signed, which turns a nice photo into proof of an actual meeting. And because it's numbered inside a collection, it has somewhere to belong.

We didn't have to sell any of that. The scene got there on its own, hunting for sleeves.

The bigger Whaleden picture

There's one connection we're especially excited about. Whaleden develops original comic characters and worlds, which opens the door for cosplayers to officially bring some of those characters to life - in shoots, at conventions and beyond.

Creator Cards are one way into the cosplay community for us. Our characters are another. Over time, we'd love to see those two worlds meet.

If you want your own card

You can order your Creator Cards at collect.whaleden.com/collectibles/creator-cards. Fill in the form, send us a photo you love, and we handle the design and production. $60 for 150 cards, foil, numbered, yours. At the end of the order there's an optional step where you can add sleeves and hard holders.

Production takes two to four weeks, so if you're aiming at a specific con, order about a month ahead.

We want to come back. To ConCrunch, to more cons, to the photographers and organisers and cosplayers we met over those three days. You're all people we want to keep working with.

If you were with us at ConCrunch: thank you. It was a good weekend because of you.