If you're looking for a last-minute idea for a Halloween costume, Google might just have you covered. That's because the tech giant's Frightgeist search trend data has revealed the fancy dress outfits Americans have searched for most this year. Top of the list are Ken and Barbie from the Box Office smash Barbie movie, which was released to huge fan fare back in July and has grossed more than $1.4 million (£1.1 million) worldwide. There are more than 900 costumes on Frightgeist but the company Visual Capitalist has put together an infographic showing the top 27 most searched. Scary: Google's Frightgeist search trend data shows the fancy dress outfits Americans have searched for most this year.

The feature image for this post is a piece of art I dreamed up, but I didn't create it. I suppose you could say I commissioned it, in a matter of speaking, but the artist is an AI, and the only instructions I gave it were, "An octopus wearing a Captain America costume." You might notice right away that it's not exactly the costume of the first Avenger but rather an octopus who appears to be the captain of a ship and also has red, white and blue body paint. This was one of six paintings the AI called DALL-E 2 created for me. DALL-E 2 is the brainchild (or perhaps BRAINIAC?) of OpenAI, which describes it as such: DALL-E 2 currently has some limitations.

Additive manufacturing is one of the most important technological advances of the 21st century. It's revolutionized the way we build everything from airplanes and wind turbines to medical implants and nano-machinery -- not to mention the tidal wave of creativity unleashed once the tech made its way into the maker community. In Cosplay: A History, veteran cosplayer and 501st Legion member, Andrew Liptak explores the theatrical origins of the craft and its evolution from costuming enthusiasm to full-fledged fandom. Liptak also looks at how advances in technology have impacted the cosplay community -- whether that's the internet forums and social media platforms they use to connect, the phones and cameras they use to publicize their works, and, in the excerpt below, the 3D printers used to create costume components. Excerpted from Cosplay: A History - The Builders, Fans, and Makers Who Bring Your Favorite Stories to Life by Andrew Liptak, published by Simon & Schuster.

In 2002, veteran Capcom game director Hideaki Itsuno – then working on a pitch for an original action-RPG that later turned into Dragon's Dogma – was called upon to get an ailing Devil May Cry 2 out of the door. It sold decently, in the end, but was widely regarded as a critical flop. "When it finished up, they all realised they could have done better," explains Devil May Cry producer Matt Walker (and Itsuno's translator for this interview). "So he and others at Capcom said, we're going to take all of our collective knowledge on how to make a good fighting game, a good action game, and put everything we can into making Devil May Cry 3. "And if this isn't received well, if this doesn't sell well, that's it. We'll just have to quit Capcom, and do something else." For the person helming one of the most outrageously hyperactive action game series out there, Itsuno is rather reserved in person. But his passion for action games is intense. Devil May Cry 3 was a massive success, and this year's Devil May Cry 5 has been celebrated as a return to form for the whole genre. "We didn't look at other action games for DMC5," Itsuno explains, "though one thing we did do was look at Monster Hunter World, which was a massive effort for Capcom – it made a lot of improvements to make it easier for people to get into." Instead, he says, they focused on what was great about Devil May Cry in the first place. "What makes action games fun hasn't changed in 30 years," explains Itsuno. "You come up against a challenge, and maybe you don't beat it the first time, but you know what you did wrong.

Each July, some 130,000 fans from around the world descend on the San Diego Convention Center for four days of vendor exhibitions, celebrity appearances, sneak previews of new movies, cosplay, and just general all-around geeking out. Founded in 1970, Comic-Comic International has grown into one of the world's largest such festivals--a must-attend event for lovers of superheroes, science fiction, and fantasy. For photographer Angie Smith, attending Comic-Con for the first time, the spectacle felt overwhelming, yet welcoming. "There's a real community energy--you feel like you can walk up and talk to anyone," she says. "People were there for a lot of different reasons, but the main one was to meet other people, network with other people. Everyone talked about the connections they'd made in previous years, people they keep in touch with and see every year when they come back."

Science-fiction film costume designers create sartorial future worlds and, if they get it right, can influence current trends along the way. Here, we ask a few forward-looking costume designers to describe their favorite piece from each of their current films and, interestingly, the choices were anything but outrageously fantastical -- they ranged from the lovely and nostalgic to the manly and the fussy. Luis Sequeira's favorite costume is Elisa's (Sally Hawkins) enchanting dream-sequence dress. Set against the film's lush, dark, moody world of the early '60s, the black-and-white dream sequence "is pure light and love," says Sequeira. "It was amazing to create something so opposite to the rest of the film."

It's hard to come up with ideas for Halloween costumes, especially when it seems like all the good ones are taken. And don't you hate showing up at a party only to discover that there's *another* pajama cardinalfish? I train neural networks, a type of machine learning algorithm, to write humor by giving them datasets that they have to teach themselves to mimic. They can sometimes do a surprisingly good job, coming up with a metal band called Chaosrug, a craft beer called Yamquak and another called The Fine Stranger (which now exists!), and a My Little Pony called Blue Cuss. So, I wanted to find out if a neural network could help invent Halloween costumes.

Last month, Northern Virginia residents were startled to see a grey Ford Transit Connect van motoring around their neighborhood--without a driver inside. OK, not quite: Further inspection revealed that there was a driver inside but that he was concealed inside a costume that made him look like an empty car seat. Virginia Tech Transportation Institute took credit--nay, responsibility--for car seat man but wouldn't reveal more. Today, we know the truth. Car seat man was part of a Ford-funded study by researchers at the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute into how autonomous vehicles will interact with humans on the road.

HAVANA – Cuba may be one of the world's least connected countries but that is not stopping the Japanese subculture of animated movies, manga comics and video games from spreading feverishly among its youth. More than 1,000 otaku (geeks), or fans of such fantasy worlds, descended on Havana last week for the country's third otaku festival, defying the sweltering heat to sport the costumes of their favorite characters. Some performed scenes from animated movies on stage, while others belted out songs in Japanese with Spanish subtitles projected in the background. Others did role-playing dance choreographies. A prize was awarded for best cosplay, or role-playing in costume, and for best manga drawing.

Wonder Woman can still draw a crowd. After this weekend's debut of the long-awaited Wonder Woman (played by actress Gal Gadot) the WonderCon panel "She's Finally Here! Wonder Woman: Her Fandom's Perspective," was packed to the gills (some attendees started waiting 30 minutes before the scheduled time) with people ready to discuss the new Diana Prince. And if the stakes weren't high enough for this character, just read at what the panel was previously labeled in the paper WonderCon program, "Wonder Woman: Will She Finally Be Done Right?" Moderated by Jessica Tseang, the lineup featured Steven L. Sears (executive producer, writer "Xena: Warrior Princess"), Lisa Klink ("Star Trek Voyager," "Roswell"), Barbra Dillon (managing editor of Fanboy Comics), Eric Diaz (writer for Nerdist, Topless Robot), Michael Fitzgerald Troy ("Going Gaga!," "Adele #1," Prism Comics) and Drew Johnson (who worked with Greg Rucka on DC's "Wonder Woman"). So what did this panel of experts think about "Batman v Superman's" new Wonder Woman? See more of Entertainment's top stories on Facebook Here's what the pop culture experts had to say.