It’s been, to say the least, a long day. Having had 3 hours sleep apiece for the previous 2 days, and having slept at 4am last night, there was little preparation in terms of rest hours for STGCC 2011. Not that I’m complaining – a lot of it was spending time with our special guests like CB Cebulski, or whipping things together in preparation of this weekend. So when I dragged myself awake at 830am after having spent the night digging through my tons of comics trying to finding issues for signing today it was with much difficulty that I managed to stumble awake. Pardon my memories if I do forget anything – but what I’d like to do is to mention some highlights of today. I’d do it with pictures, but I think I’ll do a quick sum up, and tag on some pictures later. Hopefully through this you’ll see something that you’d be reminded to do tomorrow!
It’s always great to bump into artists at the artists alley – they might usually be busy with a sketch, and some of them are not the most talkative people, but all in all each and every one of them are excited about their art, and love to share it with like-minded people. The worst thing to do to an artist, I gather, is to stare at his art from far away. Go up, and get to know them better, and sometimes they’ll throw an extra bonus into their sketch, or you just end up learning a lot about their passion and what drives them. It’s educational and it’s inspirational. I spent quite a bit of time with Sonny Liew, Kelvin Chan and Wendy Chew and stole some time from Stephen Segovia, Troy Chin, Leinil Yu and a few others – each and every one a pleasure to spend time with. In the end we managed to figure out that Wendy really loved Disney princesses (or at least a change), and we got the most cute Snow White and Jasmine. Ended up paying for quite a few sketches and quite a few new books.
But let’s not forget the writers. I had the chance to speak with Kieron Gillen at length throughout the day and while he can be taking the mickey out of things sometimes, more often than not you get to really see into how the man ticks. It also helps that he’s both charming and self-deprecating, and at the end of it all it was nice to get something special signed by him – getting something rare that nobody gets them to sign, or just something silly can sometimes end up in you getting something awesome in return. Paul Levitz is also just amazing to talk to – there’s a reason why this man has been doing what he does for such a long, long time. Ask the right questions, and you’ll see a torrent of wisdom pouring out, something even Sonny Liew was raving about later. He has seen it all in comics – and him helping to bring in Alan Moore into DC back then? That story was just amazing.
Speaking of writers and artists, having the panels at a separate hall was a great idea.
I love, love, love the Hot Toys booth. The Marvel and DC booths were a huge leap ahead of last year, but Hot Toys set the standard for future booths to come. I don’t have many pictures of it right now – but I bet a quick search will bag you tons of effusive love for it, and amazing pictures of the booth and the dioramas hosted. It kinda reminded me of the Sideshow booth last year at SDCC, except that wasn’t as well done as this. Kudos!
Merchandising wise, the merlion Captain America cover was great to get, but what was really special to me was getting my hands on the myStamps at the Singpost booth. It’s not exactly the most practical of items, but it’s really, really well done. Seeing it once at the media preview was awesome, but seeing it once again sold it for me. Exclusives are always fun, but do take close looks at the various stalls, it might not always be a steal, but there’s always an off chance of finding something cool there. I’ll be doing more hunting tomorrow.
Maybe all this seems more like “ways to see a con” rather than “super cool things I did and stuff woot woot”, but do pardon my seeming lack of enthusiasm. I had tons of fun today, and when I settle down properly tomorrow I’ll really get to digest how awesome today was.
