As in previous years Manifest was held at Melbourne University. The buildings they use are very much past the capacity they can hold for the people that are attending. They used the same buildings as last year however moved the fan traders from beside the main theater up to behind the traders which ended up being a much better location. Niel Creek set up a cosplay photoshoot booth up in place of the fan traders and even though it was at short notice and started off slow from all reports he was happy with the results as were the cosplayers. (Photobooth Photos) One of the main benefits of the venue are the wonderful surroundings to take photos in with the historical buildings and the lush gardens/lawns. Every building has stares that you have to make your way up which is always the bain of cosplayers in difficult to move costumes. One change from previous year was that it was actually warm for once! This was good (for cosplayers that didn't have much on) but also bad for cosplayers who had planned for it to be cold and really suffered from the heat. This is of course out of Manifest's control but in a building with air con this isn't such a problem.

The contest was run differently this year and was something unique that I haven't seen done in Australia before. A prejudging was held before the contest where three judges examined the costumes for the technical prizes giving them time to ask questions and get a close look at the costumes without an audience getting restless. The contest was then held pretty much as normal with skit and group judging with the difference being no questions being asked and the contest ending on time! While the judges totaled there votes the cosplayers who didn't have a skit and were in the technical contest had walk ons so as everyone could see them and take photos. Sadly quite a few cosplayers from the technical didn't turn up at the contest as they had already been judged which was disappointing and there were issues with regular contest attendees being seated between cosplay contestants but they were the only down sides of a well run contest.

One thing that was noted was the apathy that many cosplayers held toward the contest with MANY awesome costumes not bothering to enter the contest. The two most stated reasons were that there was no great reward in entering and that it wasn't worth the trouble of losing half your day sitting around to get ready and wait for it. This has become a more common trend of late but what direction it will take from here is unknown.

With Manifest '09 coming to a close, that is the end of the convention season for me and it was a very full on year with the opportunity to see great cosplayers both old and new. The interest and talk about Manifest is still high but what direction they now take will be a large factor on its future success.