BBC Official Doctor Who Convention
So my brother, his girlfriend and I trekked off to Cardiff for Friday night (we saw the water tower and the Torchwood shrine :) ) and Saturday, and it was fabulous :)
There were people in show-made costumes wandering about, while we were in the queue to get in. We saw this toddler hide behind their mum's legs, at the sight of a Silurian in mask and armour. We got a bag full of goodies on registering: postcards, badge & lanyard, program, souvenir ticket and even a series 5 DVD!
Our first panel/show of the day was with Millennium FX. They did a number of shows throughout the day, talking about prosthetics and make-up. This one was "Meet the monsters". Ruari Mears was in this one, talking about playing a Cyberman and a Scarecrow. We got to handle Scarecrow and Silurian masks. And of course, all the cosplay was very good. A couple of girls dressed as Weeping Angels impressed Millennium FX enough to get them a mention on stage :)
When this foyer stage wasn't in use by Millennium FX, the Resoration Team were talking about recovering and restoring Classic DW stories.
After the make-up show, it was time to go into the theatre, for the Meet The Stars panel :) Matt, Karen and Arthur were all there, along with Steven Moffat and Caroline Skinner. Everyone was on very good form, and Karen completely yelped when a helmet-clad Judoon came on stage XD Said Judoon also scanned, and, with one gesture, insulted us, while we were in the lift, later on XD There was two particularly nice moments in the theatre. The parents of a lad with learning difficulties had arranged for him to hug the stars on stage, and Matt also offered him a jammy dodger :) Later, a kid asked how you make a sonic screwdriver, and Matt gave an answer in full Doctor mode :) After this panel, we were straight into the next one, all about making "The Girl Who Waited", as parts of that episode were filmed at our location, the Wales Millennium Centre. When Rory goes out and back in to where the Doctor is, that was one continuous shot. A girl in a Handbot costume came on stage, and talked about how they had to move.
We then had to leave the theatre, and we went straight off to see the lovely Danny Hargreaves blowing stuff up, making fake snow and setting off smoke machines. There's a man who loves his job ;) When we left, my brother said he'd wondered what Joey had been doing since "Friends" finished ;)
We went back to the foyer to catch some of the current prosthetics show, talking about casting them. It was all a bit too geeky, so we decided to, OMG, go OUTSIDE. Nipped across the square and got something to eat.
Back inside, I joined the queue for the supporting cast autographs. But the queue was moving so slowly, I had to leave it, as I had an autograph from Steven Moffat to collect at 3pm, and I wasn't missing out on that! Sue Vertue was also there. I thought it was her, but could only confirm it after the fact XD I had the bag of badges in my hand, which they both noticed. I'd spotted one girl who had been ahead of me in the queue, but as I'd had an email confirmation re my auto, was now behind, with a Sherlock Holmes bag. A guy who seemed to be in her group was getting his Sherlock DVDs signed. I managed to distribute a whole 2 badges. I asked Steven Moffat sign the program for me, and said that the Meet the Stars panel had been my favourite bit, so far. We all received a copy of a page from the 2011 Christmas special, too, which was a nice surprise! And he denies all knowledge and responsibility of/for "Sherlock" ;)
We then had nothing scheduled until the last theatre panel at 4.15pm, so there was finally time to wander round the costume and props display. The costumes were only behind rope barriers; very nice for us and very trusting of the BBC! The current TARDIS and a 1980s version were there, too. We took some silly pictures with the Silents and the Weeping Angels :) I managed to speak to Lindsay Bonaccorsi and Stephen Nicholas, showing them my Ponds prayer leaf, the now finished Sherlock Holmes-inspired version, and a few costume pictures from Hub 7. They were genuinely nice about all my things, and Lindsay suggested how I might frame the embroideries :) She'd asked if I'd thought about framing them/putting them on display, and I said I hadn't, because I didn't know how it could be done, given that they're embroidered on both sides, and have beads on them. They need to go in double glazing windows, basically. That's something I'll think about for July, so if you want to handle either of them, 11th Hour, 15-17 June 2012, Hilton Birmingham NEC, will be your last chance!
Back to the theatre for the last panel of the day, with the producers and directors. Steven Moffat was on stage for this one as well. We got to see the S7 trailer! Twice! Barnaby Edwards was hosting this one, and as he's a Dalek operator, he made sure everyone said their favourite monsters are the Daleks ;) Someone asked Steven Moffat the inevitable silly question about a Sherlock/Who crossover. The only way we'd get the streams crossed would be in a sketch for CiN or Comic Relief, as Sherlock and the Doctor would probably punch each other, and Sherlock has to exist in "what we laughingly refer to as the real world", anyway. Steven Moffat would say nothing about the 50th Anniversary series - "Nice try" ;)
After that, we did a lot of stupid running around the whole building, and it finally transpired that I'd got my wires crossed, somewhere along the line, about the thing we'd been doing the running around for :( Retail therapy was then called for. We looked at the convention merchandise stall and the Forbidden Planet stall. I got the last TARDIS t-shirt. It's proper 1970s orange ;) I was tempted by the busts on Forbidden Planet stall, but they were very expensive and, well, a bit creepy. The DW not-Lego was also very tempting, but I decided to stick with my t-shirt and my bag of goodies. I saw songofsong in the Forbidden Planet stall :) That was nice, as Other than a couple of Hub/Barrowman regulars, I'd not seen anyone else I know. we had a chat about the day and future con plans. We said farewell, until Collectormania Milton Keynes or 11th Hour.
It was nearly 6pm by this point, so it was unfortunately time to leave.
We had a great time. It was good to see people from behind the scenes in person. I met and spoke to Steve Moffat, Sue Vertue, Lindsay Bonaccorsi and Stephen Nicholas. The limit of 1500 people per day was right - it meant the event was not mad busy with people and that I came away far less exhausted than I do from LFCC. I've mastered the 3 day hotel cons, too.
See you at probably the last Hub/CM:MK/11th Hour/LFCC!
Pictures of goodies and embroidery to come!
There were people in show-made costumes wandering about, while we were in the queue to get in. We saw this toddler hide behind their mum's legs, at the sight of a Silurian in mask and armour. We got a bag full of goodies on registering: postcards, badge & lanyard, program, souvenir ticket and even a series 5 DVD!
Our first panel/show of the day was with Millennium FX. They did a number of shows throughout the day, talking about prosthetics and make-up. This one was "Meet the monsters". Ruari Mears was in this one, talking about playing a Cyberman and a Scarecrow. We got to handle Scarecrow and Silurian masks. And of course, all the cosplay was very good. A couple of girls dressed as Weeping Angels impressed Millennium FX enough to get them a mention on stage :)
When this foyer stage wasn't in use by Millennium FX, the Resoration Team were talking about recovering and restoring Classic DW stories.
After the make-up show, it was time to go into the theatre, for the Meet The Stars panel :) Matt, Karen and Arthur were all there, along with Steven Moffat and Caroline Skinner. Everyone was on very good form, and Karen completely yelped when a helmet-clad Judoon came on stage XD Said Judoon also scanned, and, with one gesture, insulted us, while we were in the lift, later on XD There was two particularly nice moments in the theatre. The parents of a lad with learning difficulties had arranged for him to hug the stars on stage, and Matt also offered him a jammy dodger :) Later, a kid asked how you make a sonic screwdriver, and Matt gave an answer in full Doctor mode :) After this panel, we were straight into the next one, all about making "The Girl Who Waited", as parts of that episode were filmed at our location, the Wales Millennium Centre. When Rory goes out and back in to where the Doctor is, that was one continuous shot. A girl in a Handbot costume came on stage, and talked about how they had to move.
We then had to leave the theatre, and we went straight off to see the lovely Danny Hargreaves blowing stuff up, making fake snow and setting off smoke machines. There's a man who loves his job ;) When we left, my brother said he'd wondered what Joey had been doing since "Friends" finished ;)
We went back to the foyer to catch some of the current prosthetics show, talking about casting them. It was all a bit too geeky, so we decided to, OMG, go OUTSIDE. Nipped across the square and got something to eat.
Back inside, I joined the queue for the supporting cast autographs. But the queue was moving so slowly, I had to leave it, as I had an autograph from Steven Moffat to collect at 3pm, and I wasn't missing out on that! Sue Vertue was also there. I thought it was her, but could only confirm it after the fact XD I had the bag of badges in my hand, which they both noticed. I'd spotted one girl who had been ahead of me in the queue, but as I'd had an email confirmation re my auto, was now behind, with a Sherlock Holmes bag. A guy who seemed to be in her group was getting his Sherlock DVDs signed. I managed to distribute a whole 2 badges. I asked Steven Moffat sign the program for me, and said that the Meet the Stars panel had been my favourite bit, so far. We all received a copy of a page from the 2011 Christmas special, too, which was a nice surprise! And he denies all knowledge and responsibility of/for "Sherlock" ;)
We then had nothing scheduled until the last theatre panel at 4.15pm, so there was finally time to wander round the costume and props display. The costumes were only behind rope barriers; very nice for us and very trusting of the BBC! The current TARDIS and a 1980s version were there, too. We took some silly pictures with the Silents and the Weeping Angels :) I managed to speak to Lindsay Bonaccorsi and Stephen Nicholas, showing them my Ponds prayer leaf, the now finished Sherlock Holmes-inspired version, and a few costume pictures from Hub 7. They were genuinely nice about all my things, and Lindsay suggested how I might frame the embroideries :) She'd asked if I'd thought about framing them/putting them on display, and I said I hadn't, because I didn't know how it could be done, given that they're embroidered on both sides, and have beads on them. They need to go in double glazing windows, basically. That's something I'll think about for July, so if you want to handle either of them, 11th Hour, 15-17 June 2012, Hilton Birmingham NEC, will be your last chance!
Back to the theatre for the last panel of the day, with the producers and directors. Steven Moffat was on stage for this one as well. We got to see the S7 trailer! Twice! Barnaby Edwards was hosting this one, and as he's a Dalek operator, he made sure everyone said their favourite monsters are the Daleks ;) Someone asked Steven Moffat the inevitable silly question about a Sherlock/Who crossover. The only way we'd get the streams crossed would be in a sketch for CiN or Comic Relief, as Sherlock and the Doctor would probably punch each other, and Sherlock has to exist in "what we laughingly refer to as the real world", anyway. Steven Moffat would say nothing about the 50th Anniversary series - "Nice try" ;)
After that, we did a lot of stupid running around the whole building, and it finally transpired that I'd got my wires crossed, somewhere along the line, about the thing we'd been doing the running around for :( Retail therapy was then called for. We looked at the convention merchandise stall and the Forbidden Planet stall. I got the last TARDIS t-shirt. It's proper 1970s orange ;) I was tempted by the busts on Forbidden Planet stall, but they were very expensive and, well, a bit creepy. The DW not-Lego was also very tempting, but I decided to stick with my t-shirt and my bag of goodies. I saw songofsong in the Forbidden Planet stall :) That was nice, as Other than a couple of Hub/Barrowman regulars, I'd not seen anyone else I know. we had a chat about the day and future con plans. We said farewell, until Collectormania Milton Keynes or 11th Hour.
It was nearly 6pm by this point, so it was unfortunately time to leave.
We had a great time. It was good to see people from behind the scenes in person. I met and spoke to Steve Moffat, Sue Vertue, Lindsay Bonaccorsi and Stephen Nicholas. The limit of 1500 people per day was right - it meant the event was not mad busy with people and that I came away far less exhausted than I do from LFCC. I've mastered the 3 day hotel cons, too.
See you at probably the last Hub/CM:MK/11th Hour/LFCC!
Pictures of goodies and embroidery to come!