iron city comic con was great! it was a very TMNT weekend lol
i wasn't crazy busy but it was steady on sat and decent on sun
didn't sell out of anything and sold an equal amount of non tmnt stuff too
LOOOOOTS of danny phantom fans still out there so i need to make more DP stuff lol
there was so much turtle merch, but non of rise so i think that's the niche i'm gonna fill but i also had some people wanting 12 tmnt stuff
understandable, it did get 5 seasons and was a lot of people's first tmnt version so i need to do some more 12 designs
def want to do iron city again
it was a very well oiled and tightly run con
I am so delighted to be able to say I was an artist in Destrehan Louisiana’s first ever Comic Convention! I’ve done lots of shows in Louisiana- from Mechacon to Louisianime to NOCAZfest, but being from St Charles Parish, Destrehan Comic Con is dear to my heart. Check out my recap for this fantastic little show!
Nattosoup (Becca Hillburn) talks about Imaginacon, a one day library fandom convention in Gallatin, TN. She discusses how smaller cons are a great way to get started, especially for artists who have difficulty getting into conventions.
I was going to wait until I got more pictures back, since I was making my friends with better cameras take pictures to send me later, but hey I can share those later and still do a convention recap that no one cares about!
So anyway, cosplay and conventions used to basically be my life, and that was pretty much all I did in my free time, but it's been a few years since I really got excited for a convention. Washington Summer Con seemed like a kind of small whatever con, (With weirdly big stars though?) but I figured it'd be fun to see my friends, and I mean I need to do something with all the costumes I own sometimes, right? Well actually this convention was amazing, and I had more fun there than I often do at bigger more established ones, so hey, definitely going back next year! It was so much fun to see my friends, meet new ones, and just everyone there who I talked to was so so nice! The whole thing felt super chill, and it felt like all levels of cosplay were appreciated, not just really good ones.
It was different than I'm used to because I drove there partially in costume every day, rather than getting a hotel, but I even managed to get dressed as Amarthiel in my car, so now I feel like I could do this more whenever I don't wear anything too crazy.
Day 1 was short so I just did lazy science officer. Day 2 I was Amarthiel, which is always a fun one. Changing in my car, and using my car window as the mirror to make sure my costume looked ok was something, and I somehow didn't take my mask off the entire day, so when we were walking to our cars in the evening and I finally did, everyone was like woah, you have a face!
And because it was very hot and in the sun, I decided to be very smart and wear a cosplay I made from upholstery fabric and a shawl on day 3, but we mostly stayed inside, thankfully, so it wasn't that bad!
There was a huge Star Trek presence with actors at the convention, so my wonderful friend Sebastian and I were Spock and the Romulan Commander form the Original Series. I made this costume literally 12 years ago, and still managed to fit into it somehow, and I had forgotten how much fun this one was. It led to so many great Star Trek conversations with people too, and I couldn't get over how nice everyone was, and how much I enjoyed talking to them, since I have a hard time being social.
Soooo now just trying to get used to real life once again, but I'm excited for the next convention, if I can motivate myself to actually start on new costumes early!
Whoo, 3rd QuadCon of the year for @lechevaliermalfet and myself! This one was held at the Peoria RiverPlex, which is where the 2019 events were held. Like the one we attended in September, this one was basically mostly a dealer event. A cosplay contest and gaming tournament were on offer, but no panels. Unlike the one in September, this one cost admission - $3 each.
Like they’ve done in the past for the paid events, we received stamps as proof of paid admittance. This time, they actually placed our stamps on the inside of the wrist - not a bad idea, since it meant the stamp didn’t wash away as quickly.
One thing that the RiverPlex offers as a venue is a fair amount of space for spreading out attendees/dealers.
The downside to this is that when attendance is lower, it really stands out. QuadCon has said before that their events usually draw between 600-1000 attendees. From what was overhead at the event, attendance this time around was under 400. It’s possible that pandemic concerns played a factor, of course.
We wandered the event, shopping, and saying hello to folks we knew, including our friend @artbyquinton
The cosplay contest was held on the risers, as they’ve done in the past. On the one hand, this means that most people watching from the surrounding area have a good chance of seeing the participant. On the other, it can be a crowded space.
There were no judges this time around, so winners were chosen via random number. At the end of the contest, all participants - and any other cosplaying attendee - were asked to participate in a group photo.
The cosplay contest area was also the same area being utilized for the video gaming - they just paused during the contest.
Other than that, not much to say about this QuadCon. And it was Pokemon Go Community Weekend, so there were definitely gym battles, etc.
The first QuadCon event in Peoria for 2022 is slated to be at the mall again, so I imagine that one will be a shorter recap as well.
Two weeks after we attended Anime Iowa, @lechevaliermalfet and I were at Anime Magic in Rosemont, IL at the Crowne Plaza O’Hare.
Once again, since I had no vacation time with job, we got up there late on Friday. Checking in was simple, but despite having been to the hotel for TFCon 2018, we found it a bit hard to navigate the convention center portion.
Part of the difficulty was due to a lack of signs - I was using the map from the con site on my phone, but there were really too few signs out to make things easier to spot. This was fixed by Saturday, however.
(Tabletop gaming had a great sign up from the get-go, probably provided by the host group)
BUT we did find it! And collected our badges, as well as our physical copies of the map and daily schedules. As you can tell in the photo below, the schedules were not bound together - they were also double-sided.
Anime Magic was requiring masking for all non-vaccinated attendees - and you had to prove vaccination status if you didn’t want to wear your mask. Both @lechevaliermalfet and I are vaccinated, and we visited Con Ops to have our badges marked, though we ended up opting to stay masked all weekend anyway.
If you squint again really hard at the photo above, you might see the tiny highlighter slash that marked that my vaccination status was confirmed.
Course, we also got trading cards out of the deal, so there was that.
Since we didn’t have a huge interest in most of the events going Friday night, we decided to unpack and then wander the hotel to soak up the vibe and better familiarize ourselves with the layout for the weekend to come.
Our hotel room was on the 12th floor and I’m actually a bit happy with the sunset photo I snapped from our window Friday evening. Even if I wasn’t actually trying to get the sun to look that way.
It was weird to be so close to the Donald E. Stephens Center without planning to enter it, after such a long time away. Just saying.
One thing to note about the Crowne Plaza that proved a point of conflict soon after we got there: the only guest elevators for the building that went up to the rooms were separated from the con area by walkthrough area that also connected to the hotel’s little convenience store.
And there happened to be a dance practice of some sort that went on for quite a while Friday night.
Now, this group was talented and they were definitely getting people in the area fired up.
But this wasn’t a big space. I snapped a photo before it got too crowded, but it quickly filled with people trying to watch. And you still had a lot of people trying to get through just to be able to get to their rooms.
I did hear complaints from some older people who had to struggle through the crowd - I don’t know if they were there as attendees of the con or guests of the hotel.
I don’t know when the dancers left, and we didn’t see them in that space for the rest of the weekend, but we did catch glimpses of them down more isolated halls, so perhaps hotel or con security convinced them to move along? I couldn’t say.
While wandering, we did briefly dip into Kohei’s Friday performance before returning to our room.
In the room, we goofed off watching one of the many ghost hunting shows you can find on cable, before eventually getting off our butts and heading down to Oriana’s Drag Race.
Oriana is a well-known Midwest drag queen and I just have to say that her events are always worth attending, whether it’s an informative panel on wig care, a geekout fandom panel, or a kickass drag event.
Since this was Drag Race, in between performances from Oriana and her fellow queens, con attendees strutted their stuff for the chance to perform in Saturday’s Drag Show.
One particular contestant stood out, and it was extremely clear - before the race was over - that they were going to win. Which, of course, they did. But I gotta give props to all the contestants, because it’s hella brave to get out there and put yourself forward like that.
When the Drag Race was done, we were also done for the night.
Saturday was off to a great start with the Right Stuf industry panel. And if you are local to the area, they mentioned that they’re hiring! We got updates on the current licensing projects for Nozomi Entertainment, got the usual demonstration of Right Stuf’s excellent packing methods, and – of course – there was a prize drawing.
Maybe @lechevaliermalfet and I should make sure we always go to the Right Stuf panel at Anime Iowa. In 2019, he got the Gundam Wing set. This year, I won a Sayaka Miki figure!
After the panel, we wandered back to the room for me to put away my prize. As we did, I noticed just how long the registration line was getting.
Thewere a limited number of day passes for the con on Saturday, but I’m not sure they had enough for everyone in the line! Hopefully some of those folks were just picking up pre-registered weekend badges and no one went away disappointed. But I can’t say for sure.
Once the figure was safely stored in the room, we hit up the dealer/artist area. Booths were set up very well to encourage both traffic flow and social distancing.
We walked away with a few blind bags and some art. Our merch was safely returned to the room and after finding no afternoon panels that caught our eye, we decided to explore the park behind the hotel. Because yes, that area was really a park.
It’s really a pretty area to walk around in. And of course, it was popular for photography - we saw a few different people shooting in that area over the weekend.
I of course was playing Pokémon Go a lot during this weekend, especially since the area has a lot of stops/gyms and this was before Niantic rolled back the Pokestop distances.
Between shopping, walking in the park, PoGo, and food, we passed the afternoon and early evening.
We did also explore the area of the con that we hadn’t on Friday - aka the video rooms and the art show. And while we did stop by the AMV room and noticed an Evangelion AMV playing, we didn’t linger.
We didn’t opt to bid on anything at the art show this year, though.
And then it was time for our other 2 panels of the day.
First up was a panel we’d attended before: Bad Fanfiction Bingo. My card by the end was pretty full.
After that - and I do not have any photos - was an 18+ guest panel. I will always recommend 18+ voice actor events, even if you don’t know the guests in question that well. Because they will be a hoot.
I nearly cried laughing a few times during this. I was lucky enough to be the last question of the panel and all I will say about is that @lechevaliermalfet reacted with a “Where the hell did that come from?”
My Anime Iowa 2021 Coverage
1. Cosplayers of Anime Iowa
