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FEMAcon!
The last post I made before heading off into the wild blue yonder for AnimeFest, I mentioned that on a whim I was going to pack for an extra day and hope I could find someplace to stay Friday night if it seemed that it would be better to do so than go home and come back Saturday morning, because Dallas was supposed to be receiving 25K refugees on Saturday, many of who would be coming to the Reunion Arena next door to the hotel.
This proved to be a good idea. Not because of the refugees, but because it turns out FEMA was using the hotel as a staging area for California Task Force 5, Nevada Task Force 1, Washington Task Force 1, and a few random teams. At 11:30 AM I managed to score the next-to-last parking space in the nearby $8/day lot (glad I didn't have to resort to the $18/day valet parking).
I ended up paying $32 for parking, but last year the gate attendant misread my ticket and only charged me $8, so I can't be too annoyed that I paid the proper amount this year. Plus it got rid of all the $1 bills I had.
Back to the con. Lots and lots of search-and-rescue guys (and a few women), a number of dogs - search-and-rescue dogs, not cadaver dogs, someone told me - and, reportedly, one search-and-rescue parrot. The person who claimed to have seen it said it was sitting on its handler's shoulder, saying "Awk! Need a rescue! Awk! Need a rescue!"
There were several hundred of these FEMA-type people there - someone estimated 400 at one point, but I can't say - and some moved out and others moved in each day, but the number gradually lessened. We asked, and apparently the delay was partly due to only having logistical support for 18 teams at a time, so they rotated onto the scene in shifts, and partly due to having to suit up in hazmat gear, because the floodwaters are, basically, a toxic waste dump right now. They were iffy about sending the dogs in at all, for that reason.
The FEMA guys wandered through the con looking alternately startled and bemused, and politely confused about the whole thing and all the costumes. At any rate, I can think of a lot worse things than being trapped in a hotel with several hundred firefighters
The embarassing moment of the con (er, on behalf of someone else) was when we were crowde dinto an elevator with several of the search-and-rescue guy, and at one floor a couple in ther 40s or 50s got on and the wife started poking teh husband and saying "Now's the time to say thank you to the HEROES!! They're HEROES!!" All of us sort of exchanged eye-rolls and the search-and-rescue guys attempted to explain they hadn't even gotten to NOLA yet and weren't worthy of adoration. Gratitude and respect for doing such a dirty job is one thing, and I certainly have that, but "They are HEROES!! HEROES, I tell you!! HEROES!!" is jsut embarassing for everyone involved.
On the drive in, it took a while just to get to the hotel, since the cops were stopping and asking every driver where they were going, and directing them appropriately. That was when I decided I wasn't going home 'til Monday. A friend who drove in that night said it took two hours to get through that (only took me about 15 minutes). Found room space with friends, no worries on that.
Anyway, I'm getting even more sleepy so I'm going to make this shortish. AnimeFest broke 4000 attendees, surprisingly, (3500 last year, from what I udnerstand), and comparing the attendence of the con and my selling rate between AnimeFest and A-Kon, I sold about the same rate for both.
Saw the second half of the cosplay, which was organized even worse than usual for the con. The group that had won three years in a row lost to an excellent Malice Mizer cosplay group. I think the former winners were relying on the same sort of thing that had given them the victory in years past - a song-and-dance routine - and didn't come up with anything new, and while their costumes were nicely made, they weren't spectacular - a sailor suit uniform looks much like any other sailor suit uniform (I didn't recognize the show it came from). Whereas the Malice Mizer group did these costumes (wish I could find a picture showing all of the costumes - especially that yellow number in back, which I love), and had a choreographed dance/lip-synch thing.
[ETA: The A Fan's View guy was at AnimeFest, and here's the page with the winning costumes, where you can see the Malice Mizer people. I shall shortly be going through the cosplay pages on that site and offering commentary so you can have the exact same experience I did! I BET YOU CAN'T WAIT]
The skits were better than usual - this is cosplay, which means that isn't saying much - but all needed editing to be improved. Some of them could have been really funny if they were half the length. And the new tasteless-yet-funny way of expressing extreme anger and frustration at a situation (i.e., the cosplay) that is, unfortunately, weaselling its way into my vocabulary: "I was ready to start shooting helicopters!"
Didn't do too well in the art show, but there wasn't much action there anyway, and I had the initial bids too high for the crowd. I do NOT regret this, because they're too good to let go for a song (she says modestly), and I came home to an email about an art show at a con in a month, and hey! I've got five peices all matted and backed and ready to mail! I think I shall indulge.
I've been too immersed in BPAL. I walked into the bathroom, smelled cinnamon and vanilla, and immediately assumed a BPALer had been in there right before me to re-dose, and wondered which one it was. And then realized that I smelled it every time I walked in and that it was, in fact, the air freshener the hotel pumped into the bathrooms.
Scores:
Number of people asking me to draw a comic they'd written: 1 (Dude was actually looking to set up a team - he'd created the story but needed a scripter, penciller, inker, colorist, and editor, and wanted them all to work on spec. Uh, yeah, sure, you'll be able to put that one together.)
Number of people with a vague publicity type of agency who wanted to know if I had any projects that needed to be shopped around and couldn't understand the words "MY WRITER'S AGENT IS TAKING CARE OF THAT FOR US THANK YOU": 1 (I actually know the guy, and it's an actual small business that he's doing, but from what I understand, he's trying to do an agent's job without actually being an agent or having the sort of contacts an actual agent has, and I would so not touch that with a ten-foot pole. He's got a background in marketing.)
Number of people who wandered through with a puzzled look and asked me what this costume stuff was all about: 5.
Number of Inu-Yasha cosplayers: too many to count.
Number of Sesshoumarus whose butt-armor I fixed for them: 1
Number of times that I ate at the hotel restaurant alone and was shoved way off in a corner where the servers couldn't notice me: 3
----
That's it for now. More as I remember it.
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rachelmanija - Nobody wanted to pick up the Project Blue Rose flyers from my table while I was there, but every time I dumped them on the freebie table, they vanished in a matter of seconds. Seems nobody wants to admit they're interested. XD The stack on the table also seemed to diminish mysteriously when I wasn't looking. THINGS TELOPHASE SHOULD NOT HAVE TO TELL YOU
1) DO NOT set the items you are carrying on top of the artwork! Additionally, do not set your soda on top of it, or sit on it, or get your grubby fingers all over it. I didn't have to deal with the soda or sitting, another dealer I talked to had that happen, but I resorted by Sunday morning to making a sign telling people not to put their stuff down on it. I talked to a dealer who had someone ruin a poster with the condensation on a soda can.
2) Do not interrupt a cosplayer who is in the middle of buying something to ask them to pose for you. I promise you, they will not teleport away the moment they are finished buying, and if you wait fifteen seconds you will be able to ask them then.
3) If you are buying a $10 commission, don't wax on about how much you like detail and how much of it you want, and list it out in excruciating detail. At $10 you're getting simple picture and you're going to like it.
4) Asking for a commission ten minutes before the convention shuts down makes the
telophase cranky.5) WTF are you going on about when you ask me if I "buy anime"? And then explain that you own the copyright to a bunch of stuff and are looking for buyers? I don't produce anime. I will be publishing an anthology, but you didn't even know that when you asked the bizarre question.
6) When you shove a sketchbook under my nose please explain in a clear, concise manner exactly what you're looking for from me. Are you looking for crit? For me to add a sketch? For me to praise your efforts? For me to buy something from you? And remember, the anime radio station is playing two tables down and I am old and cranky and cannot hear you unless you SPEAK UP.
7) If you want to commission fanart, please bring reference. Contrary to popular opinion, artists do not, in fact, have the physical appearance and personality of every single anime character known to man memorized. We may even not have actually watched the series to which you are referring. This is not an amazing thing - some of us have actual jobs that do not allow us to spend time watching every single series known to man.
8) Do not try to bargain for discounts or free stuff unless you're buying several things. It's not worth it to me to knock 15% off of one print for you, although I'll probably do it if you're buying 4 or 5.
9) If you see me and wave like you know me, or ask me how I'm doing, please do me a favor and assume I'm an idot at remembering people, because I am. Art I remember. Cosplay I remember. Normal human faces and names I don't. I probably won't remember you, and I certainly won't be insulted or offended if I do happen to remember you and you introduce yourself again. You probably also want to remind me if I know you from LJ, DA, or another con.
10) COSPLAYERS REMEMBER THIS: No matter how half-assed your costume is, you are memorable and we ALL will remember it when we see it again AND WE KNOW THAT YOU HAVE BEEN WEARING THE SAME THING FOR FOUR DAYS IN A ROW. And we are not thinking kindly of you for it. It's OK to attend at least one day of a convention without cosplaying; you will not lose your cosplay street cred.
11) Teeny skimpy costumes are going to attract lots of stares from people, both discreet and overt. Complaining about how guys won't stop staring at your butt when you're wearing the next best thing to a thong is going to result in me wondering what reaction, exactly, you thought you were going to get from it.
12) If you get geta for your costume and haven't practiced wearing them a LOT, you are going to stagger around and fall down a bunch and we are going to find that immensely amusing. You get points for costume accuracy and sympathy for sprained ankles, but it's still funny.
13) Do not stand in clumps right in front of the end of the escalator. When the escalator delivers the next load of people directly into you, you are not allowed to grumble at them.
14) No, the merchandise is not free. I don't know where people get the idea that it is, and why they look so offended when you tell them the thing they just picked up and are starting to walk off with is $10. It's not like the HUGE HONKING PRICE LIST ON THE TABLE is there or anything.
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Sadley i have no experience with Malice Mizer, (besides Illuminati, and oggling Gackt in his Vanilla music video *drool*), I have no idea who's who ;-;
Was this Sesshy a male, or female?
Project Blue Rose?
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2) Male. :D Will post if I figure out which of the metric buttload of Sesshoumaru coplayers on A Fan's View was him.
3) Project Blue Rose (http://www.livejournal.com/users/rachelmanija/175644.html). :D