アニメ Republic

Well I have managed to avoid posting anything for over two months now, so I figured it was about time I updated the site. With that in mind it is a good time to do a quick round up of the major summer cons for this year.

The first of which was Anime Expo back in July. When I was not helping out at the Anime Los Angeles table in the dealers room or hanging at the evening Anime Los Angeles party suite I was either waiting in line for something (though the only really long line time wise for me was the AMV contest) or trying to avoid buying something. I did manage to dodge the bullet and escaped the dealer’s hall with only a couple of small purchases.

Anime Los Angeles had a pretty big presence at AX this year. My only regret is not staying up at one of the hotels thus having to bail out early each night. There was the familiar white ‘ALA’ tent over the table in the dealer’s hall where we sold badge ribbons to help cover the cost of the ribbons given away for free at ALA. Chaz also put on a really sweet room party each night in which people were invited to hang out and have dinner. This was real hot cooked food, not your ‘chips-in-a-bowl’ type of thing. We had a little adventure on Saturday night (I think) when Chaz asked myself and Steve to go on a supply run. Not knowing the area very well did not help as we darted around downtown LA in Chaz’s Scion (aka: the Saltine). While we didn’t get exactly what we were looking for, at least we didn’t hit anyone.

I think if we have the same situation next year in regards to Anime Los Angeles’s presence at the con, I will try and get a room up there for the main nights of the con. That way I can hang out longer and maybe have a whole conversation with Rich (who was admittedly working the con, so timing is something of an issue). Otherwise it was actually a pretty good con for me. The LA convention center is certainly growing on me as a new home for AX. And you know they are booked there through at least 2012 even though they like to make this big “announcement” at the end of each year.  Yeah, like they are signing contracts for the LA convention center for the following year that same weekend! Right.

A couple weeks later we went down to San Diego for Comic Con. Too many people, WAY too many people. We drove down and back each day as hotel rooms, while available, were $350/night and up. Sure, they are nice hotels, but I’m not spending that amount for a con hotel 1 ½ hours from our front door. Did I mention there were too many people? Yeah, well I only managed the dealer’s hall one day. Though I did actually get some cool (and oddly cheap; legit, I checked) Ikki Tousen figures from the UART table so that was cool.

Not sure what our plans will be for next year. We keep saying this is our last year, this is really our last year, this time we really mean it, etc. It will be a challenge though if there is no big draw (this year it was the big LOST panel mainly, though the True Blood panel was cool too). We’ll have to see what happens next year.

Last weekend was the Anime Los Angeles picnic at Yorba Regional Park which pulled in close to 100 people by the end of the day. The weather was great and so was all the food people brought. I got to talk with a couple people who offered to help out in this year’s anime video room as well so that was cool.

We now steam forward into the fall/winter season. I may head up to PMX depending on time and what kind of presence ALA will have there. Definitely will be at LosCon in November as we are hoping to do a ‘LOST’ themed room party and it looks like I will be helping in some fashion with either or both the anime video programming and anime panels for that con.  Then we power on ahead to January for ALA 6!

More as I get creative.

Enjoy!!

This past weekend was the 20th year for Project A-Kon in Dallas, TX. It was held at the fine Sheraton (formerly the Adam’s Mark) in downtown Dallas where it has been for the past several years. It’s been getting a little crowded, but fortunately there has been a little down-turn in the anime industry and of course economy as a whole so it seemed to me at least that there were not too many more people than last year, if not about the same. I think many cons will start to see their attendance levels hitting a plateau and perhaps even lowering a bit in the coming years. They would be wise to plan for such possibilities.

Thursday was my travel day which started with the plane trip from Orange County to DFW. The flight was thankfully quite pleasant if not that roomy. As fun as it is, I can’t afford to spring for the First Class seats anymore in these trying economy times. I ran into one of the folks from Bandai’s card game division who happened to be on the same flight heading to the con and we ended up sharing a cab ride into the city. That was cool because I got to learn about another part of Bandai, make a contact for possible activities at Anime Los Angeles and also saved on the cab fare.

Getting to the hotel and checking in was pretty hassle free. It really helps if you don’t “fan-out” on the hotel staff. Standard room in the North tower, the only drawback being that it was on the 29th floor and as the con got underway so did the wait time for an elevator. I headed over to pick up my badge which didn’t take that long all things considered. Meet up with long-time friends Mike and Alicia and ended up spending the rest of the evening chatting in the lounge on the 38th floor.

Friday started late since we didn’t turn in until after 2 am but that was okay since there wasn’t too many panels I wanted to see. I ended up meeting another friend, Rich, in line waiting for one of said panels. Turns out we were in the same line for several minutes about 6 people apart before we realized it. Friday was another late night taken up in part by what has become something of a tradition for Rich and I. We find a table and a couple of chairs somewhere in the con with no signs or other identifiers and just sit there casually chatting. Invariably people will start coming up to us asking various questions about where things are, what times things are at and other info desk type questions. We’re cool of course and try to help out as best as possible because it’s the right thing to do, but it’s still fun.

Saturday was more of the same, including an even later start to the day allowing for the even latter crash time the night before of about 4 am.  We hung out in the 38th floor lounge for a while before heading to the hotel room to watch the cosplay on the con TV channel.  The channel was a little on the sketchy side due to some tech issues on the hotel side of things. But it was good for mocking. Then we went back down to the con to check things out and watch people hang around taking pictures and other fun stuff. We sat around the convention center for a while before heading back to the hotel room for a bit. I then headed back down to video room 3 where the Classic Anime Fest was running. This was the same one I had helped run last year since the person who normally does it wasn’t able to make it back then. That ended around 6 am which makes it the latest I have stayed up at a con in many, many years. I did think about just staying up but ended up crashing for a few hours before getting up and heading down to the con registration desk to see about getting a membership for next year. Since I was rather late I ended up with number 11.

After checking out of the hotel I hung out for a brief period before heading back to DFW for the plane ride back to the OC. Fortunately I was able to hone in on someone’s Super Shuttle ride, so that trip only cost me $17. The plane trip back was okay except that it was a full row this time. I really feel sorry for the guy in the middle seat, that’s why I try and book my seats early.

Project A-Kon will return in A-Kon 21 : Revenge of the Penguins to be held May 28 – 30, 2010 once again at the Sheraton in downtown Dallas, TX.

Enjoy!!

Anime LA starts this Friday (Pre-reg pick up will begin on Thursday night for those who arrive early). Of course be sure to check out the Anime Video Room while at the con. I have a lot of cool stuff planned on the schedule, plus a number of “interesting” items that may show up after hours.

Enjoy!!

Added Anime Los Angeles to the Conventions list. Anime LA is January 2-4, 2009.

Enjoy!!