Another Anime Convention 2026, Friday Part 1
This year I returned to Another Anime Convention to be the official cosplay photography studio service for the con, as I did last year. Unlike last year, AAC in 2026 moved back to its longest-running hotel location, what is now the Doubletree by Hilton in Manchester, NH. For the past couple of years the con was held at the Westford Regency in Westford, Mass., but that hotel is now torn down.
The Doubletree is a great location for a convention, because it is connected on the southwest side to the Center of New Hampshire convention hall and on the north by the Armory convention hall. That gives any convention or trade show two large rooms in which to set up vendors and exhibitors, and all of the hotel event space in between for panels and large seated events, like AAC’s Cosplay Masquerade contest.
On Friday, the panel rooms and spaces like the Manga Library and the Videogame Room opened at 11 a.m. and the Dealers Room opened at 2 p.m. I got to the hotel early and set up in the exact same space I used in 2017, the last time the convention was at that hotel, by 9:30. I took a photo of the setup for Instagram, and by 10:45 I had enough time to post it. Seriously one of the wildest early rushes I’ve ever had. At times I had cosplayers waiting two to three deep.
Quickly the crowds slowed down, but still I managed to get nearly twice the number of photos as last year for Friday. Part of that is definitely due to the studio location this year, but some undoubtedly due to what seemed like a bigger crowd. Even though I had animesucks as my table assistant all weekend, on Friday I didn’t go get lunch from the staff Green Room, possibly because in my downtime between photos I was chatting with cosplay friends I hadn’t seen in years, or in some cases, a decade. A worthwhile trade, I say.
Cosplayers in this first of two Friday galleries include animesucks, catboykaisercos, ndiaz.cos, colossal.manatee, bythe_outsider, doodncoovoo, dolphinsensei, ardyn_cosplays, fawni.fluf, notcharmed4, minkthesatyr, silverfalconcosplay, apocalypse.unicorn, gogglecandy, mecharatcos, macy.salls, memelord_mc_dabberson, cubcosplay99, mllextine, charmingashenprince, magicalwarriorscosplay, pandamonium_cosplay1282, dom207.cos, and many more.
We use Smugmug to present cosplay photo galleries. To view the entire gallery, just click on the image below. If you are pictured in any of our galleries, feel free to download the images and use them non-commercially on social media, with appropriate credit.
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Also, High-res images for sale is back!
If you are pictured in any of our galleries and want the high-resolution (3200 pixels at its widest by 300dpi) download for yourself, we can make it available via a private Smugmug link, for $10 per image. Just send an email to editor AT nerdcaliber.com. Currently limited to only photos taken by FirstPerson Shooter (aka Rodney Brown).
