GenCon 06
Prior to this summer, I hadn't attended a single convention, but now I've attended two in a little over a month. We (and by we I mean Clay, Chelsea, Andrew, and myself) just got back from GenCon Indy a few hours ago after spending the day there. Not quite AX, but certainly still enjoyable.
The con seemed kinda dead at first, but once we found the few key places for our group, things went nicely. Spent the first couple hours hanging about the karaoke room where I rocked out on several songs (they had Dynamite Explosion!). Even managed to impress the people running the karaoke with the Champloo opening. Met some really strange girl there who gave us all her e-mail and contact info and took karaoke waaaay too seriously.
After that we returned to the dealer's room (where we had briefly passed through earlier) and checked in on the Kevin Sorbo autograph signing. Y'know... TV's Hercules' Kevin Sorbo; Mr. Kull the Conqueror himself. We had brought our copy of Kull on DVD just so he could get it signed; so we were stunned when we saw a sign saying he was charging $30 per autograph. Not only was that outside of any price range we'd consider, but none of the other guests were charging. We bummed around a bit and managed to come back right when he was getting off one of his breaks, meaning there was no line built up. We chatted with him a little and noticed that he several pictures from a variety of his shows and such for signing. So Chelsea asked him if the $30 was for the pictures or the autograph; the answer was both. So she asked if we had a copy of Kull the Conquerer if he could lower the price to like $15, and he said he'd talk once we came back with it. Of course, Andrew had it in his pocket, so we just whipped it out and handed it to him. He sighed in defeat and then signed the DVD jacket, adding "you owe me $15" under his signature and laughing as he said, "Now you have a story to tell on top of the autograph." That made his signature a million times more awesome. Definite high point of the con.
We also stopped on over by the White Wolf display a few times and got one of the artists to sign our First Edition Exalted core book (he had done some work on the cover and was the art layout director for the rest of the book). Seriously considered throwing down cash for the new Scavenger Lands book because it had maps of all the major cities, but $25 was too rich for my blood.
The anime con inside GenCon was also surprisingly good. We caught the last two episodes of Bastard!!, most of Oldboy, an episode of Jinki Extend, some ADV fan dubbing session, and the 13th DBZ movie. We spent the majority of our time hanging around in the halls of the Westin, migrating from room to room. The DBZ movie was the last thing we did at the con; it wasn't very good but still made for a fitting end to the con.
Now con season is totally over until at least January (Ohayocon) or more likely late spring-early summer (ACen and/or AX).
The con seemed kinda dead at first, but once we found the few key places for our group, things went nicely. Spent the first couple hours hanging about the karaoke room where I rocked out on several songs (they had Dynamite Explosion!). Even managed to impress the people running the karaoke with the Champloo opening. Met some really strange girl there who gave us all her e-mail and contact info and took karaoke waaaay too seriously.
After that we returned to the dealer's room (where we had briefly passed through earlier) and checked in on the Kevin Sorbo autograph signing. Y'know... TV's Hercules' Kevin Sorbo; Mr. Kull the Conqueror himself. We had brought our copy of Kull on DVD just so he could get it signed; so we were stunned when we saw a sign saying he was charging $30 per autograph. Not only was that outside of any price range we'd consider, but none of the other guests were charging. We bummed around a bit and managed to come back right when he was getting off one of his breaks, meaning there was no line built up. We chatted with him a little and noticed that he several pictures from a variety of his shows and such for signing. So Chelsea asked him if the $30 was for the pictures or the autograph; the answer was both. So she asked if we had a copy of Kull the Conquerer if he could lower the price to like $15, and he said he'd talk once we came back with it. Of course, Andrew had it in his pocket, so we just whipped it out and handed it to him. He sighed in defeat and then signed the DVD jacket, adding "you owe me $15" under his signature and laughing as he said, "Now you have a story to tell on top of the autograph." That made his signature a million times more awesome. Definite high point of the con.
We also stopped on over by the White Wolf display a few times and got one of the artists to sign our First Edition Exalted core book (he had done some work on the cover and was the art layout director for the rest of the book). Seriously considered throwing down cash for the new Scavenger Lands book because it had maps of all the major cities, but $25 was too rich for my blood.
The anime con inside GenCon was also surprisingly good. We caught the last two episodes of Bastard!!, most of Oldboy, an episode of Jinki Extend, some ADV fan dubbing session, and the 13th DBZ movie. We spent the majority of our time hanging around in the halls of the Westin, migrating from room to room. The DBZ movie was the last thing we did at the con; it wasn't very good but still made for a fitting end to the con.
Now con season is totally over until at least January (Ohayocon) or more likely late spring-early summer (ACen and/or AX).