I-Con Rundown / Wrap-Up
Mar. 29th, 2010 09:54 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chuckroHad a delightful time at I-Con, which was fortunately back at SUNY Stony Brook this year. My only disappointment was not getting to do a panel with Bob Greenberger this year. Other than that, it was a really nice con experience.
- Heroes and Villians got an impressive audience--maybe 25 people--which was great, considering I was worried it'd be me in an empty room. Not actually that many comics fans in the audience, so we actually bounced through a lot of media, talking about comics, anime, TV shows, and movies. At the end, a gentleman who run a school of game design gave me his card and ask me about being a guest speaker. I don't know if anything will come of it, but it was very flattering.
- Comic Trivia also went off well. We got 15-16 people, and three teams worth stayed through the entire two hours. Most of the categories went over well (especially since we didn't have any really crazy fanboys, so I could allow a "liberal" grading policy for correct answers), and we ended up with a tie for the grand prize, so pretty much everybody walked away with some good stuff. If I do it again next year, my "potporri" questions need to be easier, I need to focus the "modern" categories a little more towards the last 2-3 years, and I should consider adding more questions that you can answer whether you've read the comic or watched the cartoons. Also, buttons are apparently really popular prizes.
- They put us in an auditorium for How to Pick Up Chicks and Gamer Sex 369. We needed it--we probably had a hundred people show up for the latter panel. How to Pick Up Chicks was a little weak; we focused a bit too much on our research and not enough on audience participation and funny anecdotes. Gamer Sex seemed a smashing success. And both panels ended with people coming up to ask us for private advice, because apparently we're authoritative. Hopefully we were helpful?
- The Revolving Door of Hero Heaven was an hour of three guys randomly bitching about comic books. I'm pretty certain we didn't make any points or come up with any useful conclusions. I'm pretty sure everyone in the room, including the panelists, was entertained. (I'm not the biggest fan of Dominic Deegan ever, but Mookie is a really nice guy and great to do panels with. He has a good patter and is easy to set up a banter rhythm with.)
- We attended an "Eye of Argon" reading Keith DeCandido and Jody Lynn Nye ran late Saturday night. I got past the first cut, and Jethrien managed second place overall, until some really bad alliteration took her out of the game. It was hilarious. Also, there were egg creams.
- Jethrien will be posting pictures of her costume at some point, which included the corset we commissioned from![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
mithrigil, a bustle skirt and sleevelet she made herself, and a mini top hat. And fishnets, because those are always a fan favorite. Many, many people stopped her to take her picture, and for good reason.
- There was a lot of good cosplay this year--I think the cosplayers actually outnumbered the non-cosplayers on Saturday. Standouts included a really good Black Canary (who was one of our fans who came to several of our panels), an amazing Prince of All Cosmos, an intricately-done Vincent (FF7), and a number of impressive steampunk oufits.
- Marc Gunn puts on a good show, but I think he was actually better as half of the Brobdignagian Bards--his stage persona works better when he has someone to be his straight man. Also, when you do a couple of hour-long concerts by yourself, your ability to enunciate tends to falter. Problematic when you're doing funny songs you want people to understand the words to.
- Charisma Carpenter has an exceptionally nice "con persona". She's not quite the stand-up comic Robert Picardo is, but she comes across as very sweet and exceedingly gracious to her fans and coworkers. And she is vehemently opposed to ever appearing on a reality TV show.
- I managed to escape the dealer's room having only spent $28. I got four books, (Devilish Devices, Cloud Warriors, The S&S Ravenloft DMG, and the Dragonlance Campaign Setting; and a copy of Brain Quest from the used DS bin. And Jethrien got me goggles to wear on my top hat for the Steampunk World's Faire.
- Oh, yes, the Penny Dreadfuls were totally pimping the Steampunk World's Faire, because steampunk has exploded into popularity in the last couple of years. We've had our tickets for about a month, planning to rent a car to drive down to it.
- Heroes and Villians got an impressive audience--maybe 25 people--which was great, considering I was worried it'd be me in an empty room. Not actually that many comics fans in the audience, so we actually bounced through a lot of media, talking about comics, anime, TV shows, and movies. At the end, a gentleman who run a school of game design gave me his card and ask me about being a guest speaker. I don't know if anything will come of it, but it was very flattering.
- Comic Trivia also went off well. We got 15-16 people, and three teams worth stayed through the entire two hours. Most of the categories went over well (especially since we didn't have any really crazy fanboys, so I could allow a "liberal" grading policy for correct answers), and we ended up with a tie for the grand prize, so pretty much everybody walked away with some good stuff. If I do it again next year, my "potporri" questions need to be easier, I need to focus the "modern" categories a little more towards the last 2-3 years, and I should consider adding more questions that you can answer whether you've read the comic or watched the cartoons. Also, buttons are apparently really popular prizes.
- They put us in an auditorium for How to Pick Up Chicks and Gamer Sex 369. We needed it--we probably had a hundred people show up for the latter panel. How to Pick Up Chicks was a little weak; we focused a bit too much on our research and not enough on audience participation and funny anecdotes. Gamer Sex seemed a smashing success. And both panels ended with people coming up to ask us for private advice, because apparently we're authoritative. Hopefully we were helpful?
- The Revolving Door of Hero Heaven was an hour of three guys randomly bitching about comic books. I'm pretty certain we didn't make any points or come up with any useful conclusions. I'm pretty sure everyone in the room, including the panelists, was entertained. (I'm not the biggest fan of Dominic Deegan ever, but Mookie is a really nice guy and great to do panels with. He has a good patter and is easy to set up a banter rhythm with.)
- We attended an "Eye of Argon" reading Keith DeCandido and Jody Lynn Nye ran late Saturday night. I got past the first cut, and Jethrien managed second place overall, until some really bad alliteration took her out of the game. It was hilarious. Also, there were egg creams.
- Jethrien will be posting pictures of her costume at some point, which included the corset we commissioned from
mithrigil, a bustle skirt and sleevelet she made herself, and a mini top hat. And fishnets, because those are always a fan favorite. Many, many people stopped her to take her picture, and for good reason.- There was a lot of good cosplay this year--I think the cosplayers actually outnumbered the non-cosplayers on Saturday. Standouts included a really good Black Canary (who was one of our fans who came to several of our panels), an amazing Prince of All Cosmos, an intricately-done Vincent (FF7), and a number of impressive steampunk oufits.
- Marc Gunn puts on a good show, but I think he was actually better as half of the Brobdignagian Bards--his stage persona works better when he has someone to be his straight man. Also, when you do a couple of hour-long concerts by yourself, your ability to enunciate tends to falter. Problematic when you're doing funny songs you want people to understand the words to.
- Charisma Carpenter has an exceptionally nice "con persona". She's not quite the stand-up comic Robert Picardo is, but she comes across as very sweet and exceedingly gracious to her fans and coworkers. And she is vehemently opposed to ever appearing on a reality TV show.
- I managed to escape the dealer's room having only spent $28. I got four books, (Devilish Devices, Cloud Warriors, The S&S Ravenloft DMG, and the Dragonlance Campaign Setting; and a copy of Brain Quest from the used DS bin. And Jethrien got me goggles to wear on my top hat for the Steampunk World's Faire.
- Oh, yes, the Penny Dreadfuls were totally pimping the Steampunk World's Faire, because steampunk has exploded into popularity in the last couple of years. We've had our tickets for about a month, planning to rent a car to drive down to it.
