Thank you FanimeCon!
This is the first time we have attended this convention, we leave San Jose tired but with great memories, lots of pictures and many many hours of video.
The panels we attended were very good and had lots of information, the panelists really know their stuff.
The exhibition room was of a decent size and we found several goodies could not resist buying.
Artist Alley was huge! If you couldn't find something you like, you weren't looking.
We could not attend the AMV contest, maybe next year.
The masquerade only lasted one hour and a half but the performances were really funny, well executed and the costumes were great.
The overall feel of the convention was really relaxed and laid back, attendees were pretty much left by themselves. Besides staff members located at the entrance of event's rooms and at the information desk, you would rarely see a staff member or a security personnel walking around the convention floor.
Suggestions:
1. Please, get more printers for next year and a barcode system. 6+ hours of wait time for badge pickup is ridiculously long.
2. Always check your sound equipment before you have to use it. During opening ceremonies is not the time to figure out which microphone works and which one doesn't. Always have a wired microphone tested and ready to go.
3. I feel really bad for the performers at the masquerade. They put many weeks, if not months, preparing their costumes rehearsing their lines, going over their movements again and again, just to have their whole skit blown out by someone at the sound table who doesn't know the difference between the play and the stop buttons.
Also number the entrants and announce who was in the skit at the end of each skit or walk on. This will buy you time if the next skit drops out or needs time to set up.
4. People at the information desk should know at the very least the major event times and places. They should know stuff!
5. The Program Guide is very nice and high quality and almost useless.
While the Pocket Guide contained the name, date, time and location for a panel, the Program Guide only contained the name of the panel and a small blurb about it but no date, time or location for it.
There is no easy way to find a panel from the Program Guide to the Pocket Guide and vice-versa.
Nevertheless, we had lots of fun and we will back next year.
A Great Time at FanimeCon
Day Four at FanimeCon
Today FanimeCon was in full force.
Cosplayer running around all over the place, lots of panels to attend and of course the Cosplay Spectacular (aka the Masquerade)
Today we attended several panels: Female Characters in Anime, How Anime gets Made, Sewing your First Costume and Armor for Beginners. Very nice panels with lots of information,
All around the Convention Center there were gatherings of Cosplayes and a walls of photographers taking pictures and asking for different poses from them.
Kim and I agree that the level of difficulty and detail for the costumes on this convention is up to par with other conventions. FanimeCon's cosplayers holds their own.
The masquerade was held at the San Jose Civic Center, just across the street from the Convention Center.
The majority of the skits were very funny and the costumes were very nice as well.
The only problem with this event were the on going technical problem with both the lighting and the recorded soundtrack for the skits.
It was not until about the middle of the masquerade that the problems went away. I have to say that the fans attending this event were super cool about the problems riddling the performance of the cosplayers.
Rock, Paper, Scissors, Airship, Tentacles
Rock crushes Scissors
Scissors cuts Paper
Paper wraps Tentacles
Tentacles crush Scissors
Scissors pop Airship
Airship bombs Tentacles
Tentacles eat Rock
Rock hits Airship
Airship burns Paper
And always, Paper covers Rock
Steampunk Decision
Day Three at FanimeCon
Today we spent most of our time at the Clockwork Alchemy convention. This is a steampunk convention held at another hotel but you can attend with your FanimeCon badge.
That convention is way smaller than FanimeCon but the level of costumes for the cosplayers and the hats, goggles, weapons and general accessories that you can buy at the dealers room makes up for it.
Then, we did a quick pass at Japantown to get some rice balls and to eat some noodles.
Back at FanimeCon we saw the second movie for the Berserk series and just like the first movie, they just left us hanging for more answers.
After a nice steak dinner we are watching Summer Wars at an outdoor theater.
Remember, you can see more pictures here: http://www.tentaclecouple.com/fc-13-at-con-photos
Clockwork Alchemy
Today we decided to take a little detour to the Clockwork Alchemy convention. This is a steampunk convention held at the Doubletree hotel near to the airport and your FanimeCon badge grants you access to it as well.
The costumes are amazing and the dealers room have some fantastic props and accessories to help you create the unique style you are looking for.
Dealers Room
Death Ray Gun
Mummified Fairy
Bracelet
Cosplayer
Ring of Fire
Trying a New Hat
Day Two at FanimeCon
Today was a very educational day.
Since this is our first time here. It took us some time to get our bearings and figure out where are the Halls and where are the Salons, but we got it.
We attended the opening ceremonies, a panel, visited the artist alley and the exhibition hall. This is definitely a smaller con that we are used to.
It might not have 44k attendees or a dozen guests of honor, but there is plenty of people all over the convention, plenty of cosplay, the exhibition hall an artist alley are quite large and we are ha having fun.
Tonight we escaped the convention and walked a couple of blocks to the Camera Cinema 3 theater, to watch the original Ghost in the Shell movie in the big screen.
By the way, you can see all the pictures we have posted from the con at: http://www.tentaclecouple.com/fc-13-at-con-photos
At the Convention Center
Plenty of Cosplayer
More Cosplay
SteamPunk Cosplayers
Cowboy Bebop
GITS at the Movies
Day One at FanimeCon
This is our first time attending FanimeCon at the San Jose Convention Center. We usually stick to our four main conventions (Comic-con, AM2, Anime expo and Dragon con), but this time around we had more freedom of movement and we decided to give it a try.
Their list of events has several of the classic attractions like masquerade, anime music videos, guest of honor panels, signings and so on. Their panels are really heavy on cosplay and steampunk related topics and I am curious on several of them.
There are plenty on attendees for this convention, we started making a line to pick up our badges at 6pm, by 9pm, we were half way down the line (still outside the hotel) and the line behind us kept on growing.
We entered the hotel at 10:30pm, went upstairs just make another line inside a ballroom with at least 600 other people.
There was no bar code on our confirmation email, that could explain the slow line movement we are experiencing.
This reminds me of Dragon Con, two years ago we waited for about 6 hours to pick up our badges, that year they didn't have bar codes either, you had to line up in front of a desk based on the first letter of your last name and they looked up your registration inside binders... terrible system.
Last year at the same Dragon Con convention they used bar codes and the whole process only took 5 minutes from beginning to end. Technology is a wonderful thing.
Is midnight, and we just left one ballroom to enter another one. Fortunately this one has the registration desks at the end of them.
We got our badges at 12:20am. Total waiting time: 6 hours 20 minutes.
Next stop, Denny's. See you in a couple of hours.
In line for Pre Registration
Hundreds of People with the same idea
Panoramic View, Outside the hotel
Panoramic View Inside the Ballroom
Enter Registration, then Pick up Badge
Pick up Badge by Name
Badge Printing Station
We Got Them
Hello FanimeCon!
We are in the beautiful city of San Jose, California waiting in line to pick up our badges. Where are you?
Pre Registration Line at FanimeCon