Anime Boston 2007
Another successful year of my favorite (well, not like I have much to compare it to) anime convention. AB2007 topped 11,000 attendees, a figure that doesn't include the hundreds of staff, dealers and VIP guests. Considering the growth from 2006's 9,500 attendees, these numbers are encouraging for the vitality of New England's largest anime convention.
AB07 was the 5th year for the New England Anime Society's big 3-day event. To celebrate this momentous landmark, the year's theme was Matsuri (a japanese festival). Decoration, art design and publications all featured items associated with the traditional festivities... yukatas, sake, rice balls, tanabata trees and even cherry blossoms.
I arrived early on Thursday morning and for the first time ever, my hotel room wasn't ready. I suppose since it was like 8am, it's highly understandable. Eric needed help unloading his car, so I went to the Hynes front entrance to help him... only to find out he wanted to meet me at the Sheraton entrance. Argh! After getting what he needed, we met up with Doug and all 3 of us went to get our badges at registration, then headed to conops in room 208. Sam Pinansky joined us shortly after while others trickled in one by one. The truck arrived soon after and AB2007 was on it's way to being officially assembled. The day was long, but went by pretty quickly. Before I knew it, it was already 4pm. We did have one major incident on Thursday. During Main Events set-up in the auditorium, one of the contractors hit the sprinkler system which caused it to literally rain inside the Hynes. For about 3 hours, the fire alarms were going off. I was able to take some photos and videos. Luckily no one was hurt and no equipment was ruined. I was able to fit in a quick tour for Kristen, Louis, Doug and Kim, but unfortunately I only had time for one.
I didn't get to go up to the hotel room until late afternoon. Once again, we were facing to the South. At least from our room, we could see past the South Tower a little more. I believe this is the highest up I've been, too. I was in room 2234 with Eric and two other guys I didn't know. Unfortunately, given our schedules, we didn't even get a chance to really talk much. Oh well. We attended the staff meeting where we all debated the proper spelling of "Oscar Meyer"... to which I exclaimed "to the internets!!" After the meeting, Kristen, Louis, Eric, Kim and I scoured the city for food. Our traditional Applebee's was closed (waaaaah!!) but luckily Uno's was open until 12:30.
Friday morning is always a welcome sight. I crawl out of bed around 9am and exit the elevators to the hustle and bustle of hundreds of cosplayers getting their registration badges. Right away I spotted plenty of excellently-crafted outfits. Truly the best way to start a weekend; it's assurance that there are plenty of dedicated individuals out there coming to our convention. When I made my way to conops, the staff was wide awake and up to their zany antics as usual. Kristen, Nick and Mary had things will underway. I didn't stick around long since my duty is mainly at night, so I try to take things easy in the mornings. I made my way to Opening Ceremonies. Andrea and Keith were up first to start the con. There was an entertaining in-house video made starring A-Chan and B-Kun. I was one of the few people to notice that the fire alarms can be seen in the background... oops. Even B-Kun didn't notice it until I told him about it later in the weekend.
Friday's are usually a good day for cosplay. I took a decent number of photos. I got one or two Haruhi Suzumiya's, Katie's Naruto girl, and Dan's Darth Vader. I also got to take a quick walk through the Dealers' Room where the FUNimation reps had a Shin-chan cosplayer running around causing trouble. It was hilariously amusing, especially when he dropped his pants and shook his butt at people. Friday night was the night of the Cherry Blossom Ball, so the conops crew was dressed quite elegantly. Sarah, Lupe, Kim, Doug and Nick all looked quite nice in their respective dresses and suits... and Sarah with her $250 shoes. sheesh. Kristen and I poked our heads in for a minute, but couldn't go in because of our attire... well, no one stopped us. On our way to the dance, we passed another Haruhi cosplayer in the secret hallway. We spoke with her for a little bit in between photographs. I asked her what happened with the MOHS photoshoot scheduled "by the fountains" that morning. She said since the Christian-Science Church had their fountains down for repair, they needed to find another place to meet. Unfortuntely for them, the relocation didn't go so well.
As good as Friday's cosplay is, it's nothing compared to Saturday's. This is the day of the Masquerade, but it's also the day with the highest attendance, so cosplayers bring out their A-game. I got photos of dozens of great cosplayers, especially of excellent renditions of MOHS characters. I made a trio of girls exceptionally happy when I saw them walking up to me and coralled them to stop and said "oh my god, I HAVE to get a photo of a Magical Play cosplay group." The girl dressed as Padadu was pleased that at least one person recognized them. Nothing makes a cosplayer happier than being recognized.
Saturday was also packed with plenty of industry panels:
- Geneon (10am): upcoming shows in my mind are Rozen Maiden, Black Lagoon, and Higurashi. They also announced that they licensed Zero no Tsukaima, which they are going to call the Familiar of Zero. Sounds lame... wouldn't Zero's Familiar be better?
- ADV (3pm): it was just a Q&A session. No one really asked anything I found useful or interesting. David Williams did a great job fielding questions though. Quite generous of ADV to give out plenty of swag though. Free DVDs!!!
- Bandai (4pm): the regular guy didn't show up, so his rookie assistant had to run the panel.
The other big event of my Saturday was attending the Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya dub-"premire" with Corey. There is a lot riding on this title, so I'm pleased to say that the english voice cast does not disappoint. I noticed a few differences from the fansubs, but who's to say which is right? I'm not one to complain about stuff like that anyway. I only saw the first 3 episodes because the cosplay group I wanted to photograph got up to leave, so I had to chase them out. Corey said that they started to air episode 4 after I ran out of the room, but then cut it short since they were only supposed to show the first 3. I made my way to the Dealers' Room again and managed to grab a totally cute Anna Karuachi plushie. I made her the ConOps mascot, though a lot of people made jokes about me planning on spooning her that night. Ewww... con-funk on Anna? no wai!
Saturday night was when we had the Masquerade. I didn't get to sit and watch since I was on-duty at the time. Lupe and I decided to take a walk over to check up on it while it was early in the show. We saw the first act, which was the Mario Brothers quintet playing acoustic versions of the theme music. Soon after that, we were having line and seating issues, so I had to swing back into staffer-mode and handle the trouble there. Pete was doing line-control, so he and I did some teaming up to keep things running. Before I could head back, I was stopped by Cat Girl Express and asked to help locate the Masquerade Staff. Since the CGX girls are so incredibly kawaii, it was my pleasure to assist them. Plus it was a great excuse to go backstage to see the cosplayers awaiting their turns. I noticed that there wasn't any Haruhi bunny girls, so I knew that my chances of seeing someone perform "God Knows" was very low. I went back to ConOps soon after, only to be quickly called back in a rush after Mike Lee announced that he needed the Hynes Nurse to the backstage area of the Masquerade. I was amoung the first on scene along with Doug where we found a young girl who had fallen from the stage and hit her head. She was injured but not excessively.
Tradionally, late-nights on Saturday at Anime Boston is when the hentai comes out. And along with hentai screenings comes the Hentai Dubbing Panel. Earlier in the weekend (must have been Friday night), I went up to Kristen's club level suite and saw her boyfriend, Dan, lounging in a robe and pajama pants. He was the guy with the Darth Vader costume, so I told him that if he put the Vader helmet on himself dressed like he was and then went down the Hentai Dubbing Panel, there's no way he'd be passed up for being chosen. Turns out he was brave enough to do it and of course, he was selected to play. Everyone wanted his photo. The only bad thing was the assclown he was partnered with was a total... assclown!! Not only that, but the microphone couldn't pick up his voice through the helmet, so no one could hear him. The audience ended up booing, but not AT him, but because the skit wasn't panning out as well as everyone would hope with those two elements screwing things up.
Sunday was another ho-hum day. I woke up later than I had wanted to, which was especially worrisome since I wanted to be ready for the Charity Auction at 10am. I could go into dramatic detail here about the whole ordeal involving my leaving early during the boring stuff, then forgetting to return, only to come back one of the last items, but to make a long-story short, I ended up randomly bidding on an item and winning it for just $50. Purchased on behalf of Anime-Source.com, I won the original storyboard script to the Ranma 1/2 OP4, signed by director Junji Nishimora. Sweet! I brought it down to conops and just casually mentioned it. Everyone in the room essentially jumped out of their skin and was like "holy shit!!!" They were amased that such a valuable piece of anime history went for so cheap. heh heh heh, my gain.
The rest of Sunday just kinda drifted by. Human Cosplay Chess was the only major event, but I didn't have much interest in it. It sure made things quiet for the rest of the con. I didn't get to take many photos since people are usually winding down and get generally lazy with their outfits.
The post-con pack-up went rather well. We had issues with the truck not starting, so we were running behind schedule. I was on truck-duty, along with Eric, Nick, Pete and Kristen and nearly a dozen others. After everything was settled, we made our way to Good Time in Somerville, an arcade-bar with duckpin bowling, laser tag, go-kart racing, and video games. We played laser tag twice. Both times was blue-shirts versus the orange/red-shirts and both times, blue pwnd orange.
That's my weekend. Actually, it's about half the weekend. So much goes on during these conventions that it's near impossible to keep track of everything that happened. I made dozens, maybe even hundreds of jokes and comical comments with my fellow staffers, I wish I could recall them all. The weekend is a lot of work, and the preparation for it is even more. Why do I do it? It's something to strive for. It's labor. It's blood. It's sweat. It's tears. The whole process is a roller-coaster ride, but after everything is over, I can stand with my friends and co-staffers and all together we can proudly say "it was a success."
To all my friends, thanks for everything.
Special shout-outs, hugs, kisses and happiness to:
- ConOps: Sarah, Kristen, Lupe, Louis, Nick and Corey
- Security: Doug, Eric, Pete, Anna, Shamus, Vu, James K., Fedora (there in spirit)
- Operations: Mary, Lauren, Ian, Elliott, Cat Girl Express (Charlene and Lillian)
- Elsewhere: Melissa, Jeni D., Mike L., Christian D., Sam P.
that's everyone I made a special connection throughout the year.
and to everyone, I say....
same time, same place, next year?
AB07 was the 5th year for the New England Anime Society's big 3-day event. To celebrate this momentous landmark, the year's theme was Matsuri (a japanese festival). Decoration, art design and publications all featured items associated with the traditional festivities... yukatas, sake, rice balls, tanabata trees and even cherry blossoms.
I arrived early on Thursday morning and for the first time ever, my hotel room wasn't ready. I suppose since it was like 8am, it's highly understandable. Eric needed help unloading his car, so I went to the Hynes front entrance to help him... only to find out he wanted to meet me at the Sheraton entrance. Argh! After getting what he needed, we met up with Doug and all 3 of us went to get our badges at registration, then headed to conops in room 208. Sam Pinansky joined us shortly after while others trickled in one by one. The truck arrived soon after and AB2007 was on it's way to being officially assembled. The day was long, but went by pretty quickly. Before I knew it, it was already 4pm. We did have one major incident on Thursday. During Main Events set-up in the auditorium, one of the contractors hit the sprinkler system which caused it to literally rain inside the Hynes. For about 3 hours, the fire alarms were going off. I was able to take some photos and videos. Luckily no one was hurt and no equipment was ruined. I was able to fit in a quick tour for Kristen, Louis, Doug and Kim, but unfortunately I only had time for one.
I didn't get to go up to the hotel room until late afternoon. Once again, we were facing to the South. At least from our room, we could see past the South Tower a little more. I believe this is the highest up I've been, too. I was in room 2234 with Eric and two other guys I didn't know. Unfortunately, given our schedules, we didn't even get a chance to really talk much. Oh well. We attended the staff meeting where we all debated the proper spelling of "Oscar Meyer"... to which I exclaimed "to the internets!!" After the meeting, Kristen, Louis, Eric, Kim and I scoured the city for food. Our traditional Applebee's was closed (waaaaah!!) but luckily Uno's was open until 12:30.
Friday morning is always a welcome sight. I crawl out of bed around 9am and exit the elevators to the hustle and bustle of hundreds of cosplayers getting their registration badges. Right away I spotted plenty of excellently-crafted outfits. Truly the best way to start a weekend; it's assurance that there are plenty of dedicated individuals out there coming to our convention. When I made my way to conops, the staff was wide awake and up to their zany antics as usual. Kristen, Nick and Mary had things will underway. I didn't stick around long since my duty is mainly at night, so I try to take things easy in the mornings. I made my way to Opening Ceremonies. Andrea and Keith were up first to start the con. There was an entertaining in-house video made starring A-Chan and B-Kun. I was one of the few people to notice that the fire alarms can be seen in the background... oops. Even B-Kun didn't notice it until I told him about it later in the weekend.
Friday's are usually a good day for cosplay. I took a decent number of photos. I got one or two Haruhi Suzumiya's, Katie's Naruto girl, and Dan's Darth Vader. I also got to take a quick walk through the Dealers' Room where the FUNimation reps had a Shin-chan cosplayer running around causing trouble. It was hilariously amusing, especially when he dropped his pants and shook his butt at people. Friday night was the night of the Cherry Blossom Ball, so the conops crew was dressed quite elegantly. Sarah, Lupe, Kim, Doug and Nick all looked quite nice in their respective dresses and suits... and Sarah with her $250 shoes. sheesh. Kristen and I poked our heads in for a minute, but couldn't go in because of our attire... well, no one stopped us. On our way to the dance, we passed another Haruhi cosplayer in the secret hallway. We spoke with her for a little bit in between photographs. I asked her what happened with the MOHS photoshoot scheduled "by the fountains" that morning. She said since the Christian-Science Church had their fountains down for repair, they needed to find another place to meet. Unfortuntely for them, the relocation didn't go so well.
As good as Friday's cosplay is, it's nothing compared to Saturday's. This is the day of the Masquerade, but it's also the day with the highest attendance, so cosplayers bring out their A-game. I got photos of dozens of great cosplayers, especially of excellent renditions of MOHS characters. I made a trio of girls exceptionally happy when I saw them walking up to me and coralled them to stop and said "oh my god, I HAVE to get a photo of a Magical Play cosplay group." The girl dressed as Padadu was pleased that at least one person recognized them. Nothing makes a cosplayer happier than being recognized.
Saturday was also packed with plenty of industry panels:
- Geneon (10am): upcoming shows in my mind are Rozen Maiden, Black Lagoon, and Higurashi. They also announced that they licensed Zero no Tsukaima, which they are going to call the Familiar of Zero. Sounds lame... wouldn't Zero's Familiar be better?
- ADV (3pm): it was just a Q&A session. No one really asked anything I found useful or interesting. David Williams did a great job fielding questions though. Quite generous of ADV to give out plenty of swag though. Free DVDs!!!
- Bandai (4pm): the regular guy didn't show up, so his rookie assistant had to run the panel.
The other big event of my Saturday was attending the Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya dub-"premire" with Corey. There is a lot riding on this title, so I'm pleased to say that the english voice cast does not disappoint. I noticed a few differences from the fansubs, but who's to say which is right? I'm not one to complain about stuff like that anyway. I only saw the first 3 episodes because the cosplay group I wanted to photograph got up to leave, so I had to chase them out. Corey said that they started to air episode 4 after I ran out of the room, but then cut it short since they were only supposed to show the first 3. I made my way to the Dealers' Room again and managed to grab a totally cute Anna Karuachi plushie. I made her the ConOps mascot, though a lot of people made jokes about me planning on spooning her that night. Ewww... con-funk on Anna? no wai!
Saturday night was when we had the Masquerade. I didn't get to sit and watch since I was on-duty at the time. Lupe and I decided to take a walk over to check up on it while it was early in the show. We saw the first act, which was the Mario Brothers quintet playing acoustic versions of the theme music. Soon after that, we were having line and seating issues, so I had to swing back into staffer-mode and handle the trouble there. Pete was doing line-control, so he and I did some teaming up to keep things running. Before I could head back, I was stopped by Cat Girl Express and asked to help locate the Masquerade Staff. Since the CGX girls are so incredibly kawaii, it was my pleasure to assist them. Plus it was a great excuse to go backstage to see the cosplayers awaiting their turns. I noticed that there wasn't any Haruhi bunny girls, so I knew that my chances of seeing someone perform "God Knows" was very low. I went back to ConOps soon after, only to be quickly called back in a rush after Mike Lee announced that he needed the Hynes Nurse to the backstage area of the Masquerade. I was amoung the first on scene along with Doug where we found a young girl who had fallen from the stage and hit her head. She was injured but not excessively.
Tradionally, late-nights on Saturday at Anime Boston is when the hentai comes out. And along with hentai screenings comes the Hentai Dubbing Panel. Earlier in the weekend (must have been Friday night), I went up to Kristen's club level suite and saw her boyfriend, Dan, lounging in a robe and pajama pants. He was the guy with the Darth Vader costume, so I told him that if he put the Vader helmet on himself dressed like he was and then went down the Hentai Dubbing Panel, there's no way he'd be passed up for being chosen. Turns out he was brave enough to do it and of course, he was selected to play. Everyone wanted his photo. The only bad thing was the assclown he was partnered with was a total... assclown!! Not only that, but the microphone couldn't pick up his voice through the helmet, so no one could hear him. The audience ended up booing, but not AT him, but because the skit wasn't panning out as well as everyone would hope with those two elements screwing things up.
Sunday was another ho-hum day. I woke up later than I had wanted to, which was especially worrisome since I wanted to be ready for the Charity Auction at 10am. I could go into dramatic detail here about the whole ordeal involving my leaving early during the boring stuff, then forgetting to return, only to come back one of the last items, but to make a long-story short, I ended up randomly bidding on an item and winning it for just $50. Purchased on behalf of Anime-Source.com, I won the original storyboard script to the Ranma 1/2 OP4, signed by director Junji Nishimora. Sweet! I brought it down to conops and just casually mentioned it. Everyone in the room essentially jumped out of their skin and was like "holy shit!!!" They were amased that such a valuable piece of anime history went for so cheap. heh heh heh, my gain.
The rest of Sunday just kinda drifted by. Human Cosplay Chess was the only major event, but I didn't have much interest in it. It sure made things quiet for the rest of the con. I didn't get to take many photos since people are usually winding down and get generally lazy with their outfits.
The post-con pack-up went rather well. We had issues with the truck not starting, so we were running behind schedule. I was on truck-duty, along with Eric, Nick, Pete and Kristen and nearly a dozen others. After everything was settled, we made our way to Good Time in Somerville, an arcade-bar with duckpin bowling, laser tag, go-kart racing, and video games. We played laser tag twice. Both times was blue-shirts versus the orange/red-shirts and both times, blue pwnd orange.
That's my weekend. Actually, it's about half the weekend. So much goes on during these conventions that it's near impossible to keep track of everything that happened. I made dozens, maybe even hundreds of jokes and comical comments with my fellow staffers, I wish I could recall them all. The weekend is a lot of work, and the preparation for it is even more. Why do I do it? It's something to strive for. It's labor. It's blood. It's sweat. It's tears. The whole process is a roller-coaster ride, but after everything is over, I can stand with my friends and co-staffers and all together we can proudly say "it was a success."
To all my friends, thanks for everything.
Special shout-outs, hugs, kisses and happiness to:
- ConOps: Sarah, Kristen, Lupe, Louis, Nick and Corey
- Security: Doug, Eric, Pete, Anna, Shamus, Vu, James K., Fedora (there in spirit)
- Operations: Mary, Lauren, Ian, Elliott, Cat Girl Express (Charlene and Lillian)
- Elsewhere: Melissa, Jeni D., Mike L., Christian D., Sam P.
that's everyone I made a special connection throughout the year.
and to everyone, I say....
same time, same place, next year?