cons and stuff
I should post more often or something...
I've spent the last week mostly feeling like I'm dead on my feet, trying to recover from the deadly combo of AWA and NDK. After a weekend of generally being an Eve/Persona3-playing movie-watching hermit slug, I'm feeling a bit more more energized.
NDK-
NDK was 2 weeks ago, but it feels like an eternity. This was my third NDK, and still a blast to go to. It's the smallest of the cons I've been to this year, but still has several thousand attendees. Me and Kisanzi arrived at the AMV dinner at about 3:30, which had far fewer numbers compared to last year due to last-minute planning. Still, a decent turnout showed up. We met up with a few other friends shortly after. Kisanzi and TsunamiJones' AMV panel was one of the only things going on on Friday night. Despite technical difficulties (the main panel room wasn't wired for sound....WTF), the room was packed.
Saturday was the main day. The AMVs were shown in the afternoon to a completely full room. Overall, the contest was strong, with action being the weakest category and comedy the strongest. The following AMV-related events were also all completely packed, as well as the contest reshowing the next day having very good attendance. Hopefully the AMV programming can be expanded next year to include more events. There's plenty of time to fill.
Very little happened on Sunday. I managed to win a judge's choice award at the AMV awards ceremony, which surprised the hell out of me. It's also the first time I've actually physically been at a contest I won anything at, and the first time I've received anything (
booya). We took one last pass through the dealer's room, watched a bit of the auction, then headed off to dinner with some friends who were in Denver for a concert. Overall, a very good time.
Gripe session - NDK's two biggest problems by far are a lack of programming, and a severe lack of space. Two years ago was my first NDK, and it was already packed. There's next to nothing going on Friday and Sunday, while both the AMV contest and the Masquerade are jammed in to Saturday afternoon+night, as well as most of the popular panels. There's a huge lack of things to do late at night. All of the video rooms go in to downtime at approximately the same time, as well as the video game room shutting down. The Karaoke room became a major gathering spot on Saturday night, with several of the guests of honor taking part. It was great seeing them interact with the fans....until the room was 'shut down' for no apparent reason. The room wasn't even shut, the karaoke equipment was just taken away, essentially saying "You can stay here, just no fun allowed!". The only thing truly open 24 hours is the board gaming room, and I don't have the patience for a 2 hour game of Catan at 2AM while wasted (maybe we should have tried Munchkin, the game of making up shit as you go...).
AWA-
I had a great time at AWA! This was my first time going, and it's always interesting to see how every convention has its own feel. It was great seeing a bunch of people from ACen again, as well as meeting a few new people. One of the downsides was that there were just way too many people to spend any decent amount of time with. Of the 80+ editors, I probably only hung out with 20 at most.
Initially, it seemed like the weekend might be off to a disastrous start, with us missing our plane flight on Thursday (we really didn't count on the half-an-hour walk to the airport from Row Z in the distant parking lot), but fortunately there was another flight with plenty of room a couple hours later. In the end, we made it in time to catch the last half of the dinner or so.
Ayumix was cool, and AMV Hell 4 was the highlight of the convention. I would have liked to have gone to the dinner that night, but Hell videos are best watched with a giant group, and this was the last time that was going to happen until con season starts up next year. The room was packed, and apparently packed again for the reshowing. I'm expecting the biggest complaint about it to be that there may be too many inside jokes for some people. I wish I could have seen VG4, but we had been sitting down for a long, long time at that point. Iron Editor was fun to watch (this is the second one I've seen). Both videos were impressive, and the expanded Lucky Star dancing was a great way to finish off the event.
The awards ceremony was very cool, though it would have been nice if the full Masters showing was split off from the rest of the awards. Three hours of videos without a break is too long.
AWA has a great venue. It's big enough for the size of the convention, it's located near several hotels, and it actually has tons of options for food nearby. Somehow, it seems like most convention centers manage to have nothing but a single fast food place located within a mile.
My biggest problem during AWA was that I was still practically hung over from NDK. I'm not exactly a social person to begin with, and feeling completely drained before AWA even started didn't help. I felt decent Friday, but by Saturday I was completely wiped out, and I just wanted to be back home on Sunday morning. On the plus side, seeing a bunch of great videos is always the best motivation to start editing again (I've been slacking hard the last few months...obviously).
8 months to ACen....
Current Mood: words 
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valion's journal
