New York Comic Con: Days 2 & 3

Photos for Saturday & Sunday Here

Saturday

I got the to Javits Center on Saturday morning just after 10 AM, and pretty quickly I realized that I should have gotten up earlier. There was an insane amount of people milling around, and the lineup in the Queuing Hall (still love that they actually call it that) was huge.

On Friday, I had noted that there were large gaps of space between the areas the line was moving in, making for about five columns of people snaking their way around the room. On Saturday, there were no gaps, and there were probably at least eight or nine columns, and they were moving veeery sloooowly. It took 46 minutes from the time I entered the Queuing Hall to the time I stepped onto the floor of the convention. On reflection, I guess that's actually not too bad, given the numbers.

The first thing I did was go straight for the Oni Press booth: I had decided to get the Scott Pilgrim books, having heard enough good things about them to want to give them a go. I ended up buying all five, after a moment's hestitation. The guy at the booth said "Just so you know, we'll probably be completely sold out of the newest volume before the day is out." I'm betting he was right. I did some looking online later, and apparently the newest volume is basically selling out everywhere.

After a few more minutes of wandering around, I hustled down to the panels area for my first panel of the day, which was "Writing for Comics and Other Media". I got there early to make sure I'd get in, plonked myself down on the floor beside some other folks, and pulled out the first Scott Pilgrim volume. I burned through it in the 25 minutes or so before the panel, and quite enjoyed it. Weird and funny -- perhaps a bit "indie cute" at times --and just overall entertaining.

Once we got into the room and got settled, the moderator spouted off some snappy patter and plugged his series of photo reference books for comic artists; a bit of verbal spam, but I didn't fault him, since, as he said, he was doing the panels for free, and the books are what lets him come to conferences and feed his kids. Also, he was short and to the point, and frankly the books looked good.

Once the panel itself got going, we were introduced to Christos Gage (who had been on the other Comics Writers panel on Friday) and Marv Wolfman, comics legend; Crisis on Infinite Earths, anyone? Heh. Anyway, it was a great panel, and a took a lot of little notes here and there with some good tips and information.

Once that panel was over, I stayed where I was, since the next panel in that room was the Comic Editors Panel. It was moderated by Glen Heardling, a Marvel and Wizard Magazine editor, and on the panel was Mike Marts (Batman editor for DC), Nick Lowe (Marvel editor), Scott Allie (Dark Horse Comics editor), and Rob Levin (VP of Editing at Top Cow). This was also a great panel, full of great info about how to approach editors, good ways for both artists and writers to present their work, and even some tips for those who are interested in becoming editors themselves. Lots of notes taken.

After the editing panel, I wandered the floor for a while again, going up and down the aisles of Artists' Alley, and trying (successfully) to keep myself from dropping a lot of money on commissions and original comic art pages. It wasn't easy, as there were some fantastic pieces both on display and in-progress.

I went back to the panels area for one last session that afternoon, "Breaking In and Staying In". This panel was held by Andy Schmidt (former Marvel editor, current IDW editor and the guy behind Comics Experience classes) and Michael Siglain (mondo DC editor). It was pretty good -- not quite as great as the editors' panel, but part of the reason for that was because the editors' panel had covered a lot of the same ground. That said, these two guys certainly had some great tips and suggestions for the audience. More notes!

It was just before 6 PM when the panel ended, and I was going to head home at this point, but decided to hit the floor for one last swoop. I ended up going by the Marvel booth, where they were just about to start a big giveaway session. There was quite a crowd shouting and waving for the items as he hadned them out. I didn't get any really cool stuff like figurines or shirts, but did get several comics, so cool enough!

Sunday

On Sunday, the line was a lot shorter, but it still took almost thirty minutes to get inside. There were tons of people with little kids, many of whom were in costumes. Lots of tiny superheroes, and even one wee Optimus Prime. Heh.

When I got inside, I wandered the floor for a bit, and while I was walking past the Penny Arcade booth, I stopped and said hello to Tycho, since I had scurried away without speaking to him after getting my sketch from Gabe on Friday. I told him the strip was great, and that I liked his writing, he said "thanks" and off I went.

I went by the EA booth and hopped on a Dragon Age demo again, this time playing all the way through the sequence they had set up. What an awesome game. I can't wait for it to come out this fall. The rep wouldn't, of course, commit to any specific release info, but he did say that if I can run Fallout 3 pretty well, that I "should" be able to play Dragon Age just fine. Yay!

I went downstairs for the writing panel, and got right up front so I'd be able to hear (this was a bigger room than the other I'd been in). As the various authors showed up, one suddenly caught my attention: Amber Benson, aka Tara on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Cool. I had read on Twitter that she was coming to the convention, but hadn't realized that she'd be on one of the panels I was going to (this one didn't list participants). It was a good panel, in general, and as usual I got some good notes, but having a huge panel of eight authors can be a bit detrimental ... too many people answering questions sometimes. Still, lots of notes again.

From that panel, I went to a Marvel 70th Anniversary panel tha was supposed to be about upcoming projects. There were a lot of Marvel creative types there, though mostly writers I think. One project that got mentioned early on was one called Pet Avengers, written by Chris Eliopoulos, all about various Marvel animals... wacky! The other highlight of the panel for me was that Bill Hader and Seth Meyer of SNL showed up as surprise guests: they're writing a Spider-Man one-shot called "The Short Halloween". At the end of the panel, I went up to Hader and told him that I really liked the Vicent Price Special skits, and hoped to see more. He and Meyer shared a look and a chuckle and he said "You might get one next week." Keen.

After that panel, I gave one last cruise around the show floor, and stopped by the Marvel booth for another crazy giveaway time, but ended up pushing my way out of the madness, as it got a little too intense for me to take, for the sake a free comic or two.

Anyway, it was a great weekend, and I had a lot of fun. My resolutions for next year's NYCC (October 2010) are to either get some of the guys from SJ to travel down here for the show so I've got some nerds to wander around with, and/or to have made some headway about getting some work in the industry so I can get in with a Pro pass. ;)

That's it for me from the NYCC!