Things started off on a hectic note this morning. I overslept, so Michelle and I rushed to get to the convention center in time to set up the table for the opening crowds. I forgot my badge, so I had to cab it
back to the hotel, then back to the center
again! Rrrrghh.
The crowds outside were crazy - I wove my way through them as best I could until I got bogged down in a mass of people outside door D. If you've seen the sequence in
Empire of the Sun where Shanghai is being evacuated... well, a little like that. I don't do all that well in crowds, so the oppressive mass began to get to me. Fortunately, I realized that the crowd was primarily guest-tag wearers, so I slipped out and ducked into a far less congested door just a little further down.
Mattel has a couple of convention exclusive toys that I wanted, so after checking in with Michelle, I headed over to their booth to see if I could snag a Giganta figure set, or maybe the Lightning Storm McQueen. It took me a little while to realize that there was a single line for two purchasing stations, but I found the end of it and settled in. To their credit, the Mattel folks repeatedly announced that you would need tickets to purchase any of the exclusives - and
that required waiting in
yet another line in the autograph area. It was certainly better to learn that at the end of the line than at the register, but I decided it was too late in the morning to wait in two lines for toys that might still sell out (for the day) before I got there. I bailed and went back to the Red Window table. Maybe tomorrow!
Anita definitely needed more dealers'-room-wandering time today, so I manned my end of the booth and Michelle helped Scott and Bill out until Anita arrived. Sales were still good, though the older, cheaper T-shirts continued to outsell the new version (I think the bright orange was a great design idea - it allows the beaver to be printed on the shirt with only two colors - but bright orange clothing may have too much of a prison-jumpsuit vibe for most shoppers). The watches continued to sell well - we may have misplaced a couple, but all of the rest sold today - the first item I've sold out at a convention!
Once Anita arrived, I got to hit the dealers' room for about ninety minutes. My camera crapped out early in the day, so I was a little more vulnerable to the spending bug. Over the whole day, I picked up one of Sideshow's companion sets to their vinyl Jabba The Hutt figure - it contained secondary creatures (like Salacious Crumb) that'll accent Jabba's throne nicely. I picked up two more vinyl toys from Super 7, a small Sculpey® monster from a table-ful of similar characters, a Frankenstein Jr. bank (Funko just got it in today), Toynami's con-exclusive Santa Robot figure, and a blocky resin figure of a design-y scientist whose name escapes me at the moment.
Sadly, I didn't get back to the booth in time to see my friend/famous animation blogger
Jenny Lerew, whom I'd been looking forward to seeing again - I think it's been quite a while. I tagged Anita, and she got to run off and play. I minded the store and
took pictures from the table.
A lot of old animation friends dropped by to say hello and buy swag - I drew a few quick sketches, too. When things were quiet, I focused on
a larger sketch that a friend of Steven Ng requested. He wanted
Toy Story characters combined with
Kiki's Delivery Service characters, which was more than a little intimidating. Miyazaki's drawing style is beautiful, but it's not a particularly forgiving one. If you're not a strong draftsman... it's gonna show. Big time. Fortunately it went rather well, and my 'patron' was very pleased! Instead of payment, I asked that he make a donation to the Sierra Club. Aren't I wonderful?
Michelle went to a painting/drawing lecture by Steve (
Nexus) Rude - happily for her, she got in the front row, and had none of the problems that I'd experienced the previous day. She really liked it. I do think she wound up going up to the room a little over an hour early, so I guess that's the moral of that story!
Anita came back as I was finishing the sketch, so we tagged out again - once she was finished helping Bill with his cash box's handsome tally, I was able to go shopping and chatting again. As with yesterday, floor traffic was noticeably better in the late afternoon, so I was able to relax and complete a sweep of the whole dealers' room (if you don't do anything else, I think you could do it in two full days). I picked up some of the swag I mentioned earlier, and drooled over some original art - an old
Peanuts Sunday strip I read as a kid (if you've got a good memory, it deals with Snoopy and a crossing signal). Only $55,000! Sigh.
So that was the day! I wandered and shopped until the dealers' room closed, then the three of us went back to the hotel room. Michelle whipped up a tasty spaghetti dinner from the groceries we'd bought earlier, and I watched a little television before uploading (and tweaking) the day's pictures from both of our cameras.
I only missed one picture because of my battery problem. Or maybe I should say...
costume. I call him "Warhol Spider-Man".
I'm sitting there, reading a free book I got from the Minx table, when this guy walks in. It's an African-American guy in a Spider-Man suit. So what, right? It's Comic-Con.
But instead of the old-school
red costume with
blue accents, this guy has a
turquoise costume with
hot pink accents. He's not wearing a mask, or carrying one. He comes off looking like a Spider-Man for another planet, maybe in a parallel universe. It's like one of those Warhol prints with four Marilyn Monroes on it - the shapes and forms are correct, but the color is straight out of a broken television set, or when you throw the Photoshop 'Hue' slider all the way to the other side.
The suit is professional-looking, but it's
tight. Like I-don't-think-he-was-wearing-underwear-tight. You could pretty much see...
everything.
It would've made a hell of a photograph!
Labels: after work projects, comic con, comic con 2008, comic con diary, conventions, costuming, day to day, happy beaver, jeff pidgeon, sdcc
My friend Greg Dykstra sculpted this cigarette accessory, which I've been poring over for the last few weeks. I'll be having it cast as part of Frank Kozik's Angry Beaver variant figure!
The thought is to have the vinyl drilled and add the cigarette during manufacturing so I won't have to make a special mold. I've tested it on a defective toy here - that's why the eyes look so odd.
