AX Day 1: Friday July 1st, 2011 - Image Heavy!

Jul 10, 2011 23:44

Well as the subject says this is going to be a picture post from my trip down to LA for AX (aka Anime Expo) 2011. This year marked the 20th anniversary of the convention, although it didn't really seem like they did much extra for it, really the only difference was the anniversary date was printed on everything (badges, guide book, etc). But either way, with this post I plan on doing a review like I have in the past, just that unlike previous years when I went to AX I went to multiple days instead of one.

With that said I figure the easy thing to post all these pictures is doing a post for each day I went, which is basically the 1st-3rd since we opted out of going back to the con itself on the 4th. I'm hoping people will look at all of them :) Right now I'm still undecided if I'm going to split up Sunday since I have a LOT of panel pictures but for now I'll start easy with the first day, where I definitely felt like I was failing at taking pictures cause I missed a lot of awesome cosplayers before I actually had my camera out. My only real excuse is I was a little out of it after walking from the hotel during one of the hottest parts of the day.

But that's getting ahead of myself :) Now to get onto the pictures, 1 will be a repeat just cause the teaser picture had to be something fun *g*

Teaser:


AX 2011: Day 1: Friday July 1st, 2011



Okay, so I fully admit that this trip I took a few photos for my coworkers, and this is one of them. Typically I don't see a need to take crowd shots or pictures of the location but seeing as my cube buddy and boss were both giving me really wide eyed looks when I was printing the maps and schedule for the con on my lunch on my last day at work before vacation - I felt I had to. This is the ouside of the Los Angeles Convention Center where the con was held, but this is the far end of the center. With AX you can typically enter the con on either end as long as you have your badge, one end (this one) is on the exhibition hall side and the other end is where they have the panel rooms and screening rooms.



And this is a shot when you first walk into the main lobby on the exhibition hall side. Off to the left is where I completed my pre-registration and got my badge and goodie bag. The stairs leading up to the exhibition hall are off to the left as well.



My first cosplay photo of the year, and I have no ungodly idea what this is from. I just figured it was a good starting point. And just because I have to whine, the cosplayer I missed because I didn't have my camera out before this that I really kicked myself for was there was someone dressed as Lelouch (Code Geass) in full Zero costume, mask included, that looked REALLY good. I kept hoping I would see him again but no dice *pouts* Well, I missed him and there was this guy in our hotel cosplaying Roy Mustang (Fullmetal Alchemist) that I found out later was one of the artists in the artist alley at the con that I always managed to miss photographing too. Which that one was a real shame cause he looked super good in that military garb.



Alice from American McGee's Alice. I had to fangirl squee over her, she looked so great :D When I was taking a picture of her I had to laugh at the guys that were getting a picture as well. The one that took the picture told his buddies that he thought he was dreaming when he saw Alice cause he was playing the new video game for 12 hours the day before.



I'm not sure who these people are or what they're from. They were getting a ton of photo requests though over around the stairs up to the exhibition hall so I figured I'd snap a picture.



Stein from Soul Eater - and honestly one very cool chick. I got split up from my friends right after we entered the convention center and when I was trying to catch them going up to the exhibition hall I ended up spotting this cosplay. We talked for awhile, as well as her friend (see picture below) before I wandered off. She's the first girl I've met cosplaying Stein and on top of that I LOVE she was cosplaying him with his office chair :D Had some major fangirling. It's kind of funny looking back on it, most of the con I was by myself and for the first time I actually talked to complete strangers :) Go me for being a little more out going.



Grell from Black Butler (aka Kuroshitsuji). She was Stein's friend from the picture above and was super nice too. She showed me a few pictures they'd gotten earlier that morning with some other cosplayers from their fandoms on her camera. Which included someone cosplaying Grell in his church boy outfit - can I just say how nice it is to talk to other anime geeks?



After I left the cosplayers I went up to the exhibition hall and the first booth you really come into contact with is Funimation's booth. Which is really an awesome meeting point since me and my friends used this as a meeting point - not that we really met up all that often at the con.



And off to the right of Funimation was the Bandai booth which was the source of much joy for me on Sunday :D So in a weird way I'm happy I snapped a picture even though I was mainly taking a crowd shot for my coworkers. Which I should add my boss said she didn't know how she'd deal with such a big location, she said she'd probably end up in a corner crying. I don't know what her or my cube buddy thought a convention was but they both admitted on Friday what I went to wasn't what they thought.



Alphones from Fullmetal Alchemist at the Funimation booth. And no this isn't a cosplayer but a statue they had for photos and promoting a new FMA mobile game they were promoting. Me and my friends actually decided to use Al as our meeting point since he's so big. I think we met there once over the whole weekend? *face palm* Most the time we ended up meeting at the hotel room to go out to dinner.



Close up of Al - which yeah, he was really cool :D



And the game promotion stand that was off to the left of Al. They had iPads that you could see the game on since it looks like it will be for iPads, iPhones, Facebook, and other mobile devices. I haven't read too much on it yet but I took one of the promo flyers they were handing out for it.



After deciding the meeting point with my friends the first booth I went to was the Bandai/Aniplex booth to see what information they had on the Durarara!! autograph session since everything I read about online said it would require the purchase of one of the DVDs from the booth. When I went over there they had a bunch of the staff, these aren't random cosplayers, dressed up as Durarara!! characters standing in front of their big promo screen. So naturally I took a picture :D From the left to right we have: Shinra, Celty, Mikado, Anri, Shinra, Shingen, and a misc girl at the end. Honestly I think the girl at the end was getting her picture taken with the group.



Close up of Shinra & Celty *hearts* So after snapping these pictures I went to the DVD stand and ended up finding out that you would need a ticket for the autograph session but you'd get one if you bought one of the Durarara!! DVDs from the booth, well that and they gave you a promotional poster as well. So I ended up getting part 1 of the anime on DVD, again (although my friend is buying it off me to complete her set), and got the free poster and a ticket for the autograph session. I listened to some other people asking about it as well and found out the tickets wouldn't be available the whole time - which made me happy :D So that was my first con purchase, and I almost passed on a bag but the guy that rang me out told me it was promoting my show so I took a bag, good thing since it has one of my favorite characters on it :D



After making my purchase I was wandering down the side of the booth and found something really cool. First here's the poster I got for free (minus the damage) with my purchase but it was hung up on these two long autograph tables. Well the studio, Aniplex, left out autograph mats for all the voice actors that would be coming to the panel on Sunday. All the mats were cut around a picture of their character and they were just out for fans to sign to the actors. Honestly I thought it was really neat and since two of my favorite characters voice actors were going to be there I signed one :) I ended up signing Shinra's because Shizuo's was really really full already.



Pictures of the mats.



And the rest of them. The one I signed is the third one in from the left.



Shizuo from Durarara!! This was the first fan DRRR cosplayer I ran into :) Although by the end of the weekend I saw a bunch. While I feel I joined a new cult with how into DRRR I've gotten it's a very big and loving one :D



Now one difference that I noticed this year is some artists were actually out in the exhibitor areas even though the artist alley was HUGE this year. In all the years I've gone to this con there has never been this many artists, I didn't even visit all of them - which I'm sure my wallet is very happy about. I'm usually really picky about not taking pictures in the artist alley, cause I don't want the artists thinking that you're 'stealing' their work, but since this was in the main lobby I didn't feel as bad. Though can I just say that my whole "no pics in the artist alley" is probably how I missed the really good shot of getting the hot Roy Mustang cosplayer *face palm*



And since I take some wallscroll pictures every year I kinda kept that up :) Junjo Romantica *hearts* Which I think this and the new backpack they released for the show are the ONLY things I saw merchandise wise for it this year :(



Durarara!! - cause you know, my newest fandom and all :) After going to AX the last few years (4 I think) I'm realizing it's always easy to see what my newest fandom(s) are based on my pictures.



Holo from Spice & Wolf.



Another Durarara!! sighting.



And this Durarara!! wallscroll came home with me :) I ended up buying it before I headed back to the hotel on Saturday, so I didn't have to carry it around too long. Because it goes the long way I don't really have a place for it yet, since my one long wallscroll in my room I'm not ready to replace yet. But it has Shizuo (guy on the right) on it which is all kinds of love :D Although I have to admit that I found a regular up and down wallscroll online that I wish had been at the con cause I would have gotten that one. I'm kinda thinking I might order it online anyways :) I have a Death Note one I want to swap out... ;)



Euphy and Suzaku from Code Geass. I actually caught Euphy earlier but she was on the other side of the hall then I was, I somehow managed to run into her again later when she was with her Suzaku, so the picture gods were with me on this one :) I thought it was interesting cause I've never seen someone doing Euphy from when she is killing all the Japanese, so I gave her props for originality.

Please do not hotlink.

And with that ends post 1. Stay tuned for day 2 to come soon :)

[Edit:] Day 2 can be found here.

kuroshitsuji, photos, code geass, fullmetal alchemist, ax, soul eater, anime, durarara

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