Otakon 2006
Alllllrighty then. Con report time!
First off, I guess, all my pics are posted here. If anyone wants bigger versions of pics of them or whatever, I can send those along XO
Friday
Rolled up to the Holiday Inn a bit after 12, to learn that their garage AND the public lot next to them were full, they said try the Mariott (? I forget what the hotel next door was), but they were full too; ended up parking at Redwood about a block away. Funfun. Got back to the hotel and met up with gaoyellow and vvalentine and proceeded to go pick up our registration at the con proper. Shortest pre-reg line EVER! According to some people, though, we just missed the rush that occurred earlier. Lucky us!
Wandered around in that first-day-where-is-everything state for a while, and popped into the Artist's Alley for a bit (I'm loving the idea of just having tables in there, presumably for gaming but also good for just SITTING). Somehow I wasn't as enthralled this year, though there was still good stuff to be found. As we were walking in, we were right on the heels of Darth Vader and a faithful Stormtrooper, so we were right in time to see this legendary duel:
Around 4:00 we headed back to the hotel to successfully check in. (I always worry that something crazy will happen, though I did confirm my reservation earlier.) Took our stuff up to our room and chilled for a little, then met up with poor treyvadi, who had to park like 5 blocks away T_T; Went with four of Liz's friends to eat at California Tortilla, which was pretty tasty, and the 80s music was great, haha XO Hmm, we had to skip the AMVs because of the timing of things, and I can't quite remember what we did for the rest of the evening... hmm... Maybe more Artist's Alley?
Saturday
Cosplay day, olé! Helped Liz into her Hikaru costume, and it was really cool seeing Lisa again, and seeing her in the Umi outfit XD They work well together:
I went as Youzen and Kari went as Riku from KH, ummm.. those aren't new costumes so no pics :P I'm very used to Youzen being totally unrecognized, but I did get a little fangirl love from a couple of girls, that was nice XD;; nyaha. Went shopping in the dealer's room, whoo! I picked up the Advent Children Cloud-with-motorcycle figure, and a Castlevania: Curse of Darkness wallscroll, among other things. I also nabbed one of the Final Fantasy boxed gashapon... I really wanted Vincent, though I would have been content with anyone in the series, so I opened it to discover I had gotten Turk Vincent, the limited figure! Sweeeeet XO This series is painted so much better than the first series... awesomeness.
Meh... K and I skipped the AMVs *again* because we were going to get in line for Kouta Hirano's autographing, but when we got there, there were already like.. over 100 people in line, and then we waited for half an hour or more (I dun remember, it felt like a long time :P) before the con staffers told us that only the people with the blue tickets were *probably* going to get signatures, and anyone beyond that, forget about it. That was like the first 50 people... wonder when THEY showed up. T_T Rar. So we left after that... sigh.
Went back to the hotel to change out of costume and saw Ross there, as well as Liz and Lisa, working on Liz's 2nd costume ^^; We went out again, perhaps to Artist's Alley? That sounds right, or I could be crazy. Kari and I went to the last bit of the ABJD panel and to the doll meetup afterwards, but then quickly headed back to meet Tony to go to the Masquerade. This year's skits were so much better than last year's ^^;; I'm really glad the Street Fighter Revival skit won big, I was worried as all the placements were announced and it wasn't up there >_< But they got best in show or whatever the overall prize is called XD There was a lot of dancing this year.. hehe.. And the Carmen Sandiego skit was just good old-school fun XO Good show, good show.
Headed back to the BCC proper to see Liz's costume and Kerry and Kelly's as well, though having not seen Fate Stay Night myself, I wasn't in much of a position to appreciate them. XD; They did look nice, though!
We skittered off to dinner at the California Pizza Kitchen with Ash, was pretty tasty but it was too late in the evening to eat much. D'oh. And that was it for the day, though I wish now I had gotten a pic of Liz in her EGL outfit XO
Sunday
Sunday's always this mash of trying to pack up, get stuff out of the room and check out, and shopping -- always with the shopping. XD; Got the first half of that finished, then paraded around in our Naruto outfits -- me as Neji, Kari as Sasuke, and Liz as Haku. Spent a bit of time taking solo pics near the photo suite:
Blurry Action Shot!
Then we meandered down to the dealer's room to do some last-minute shopping, and consequently got jumped for pictures. Given the popularity of Naruto, and Naruto cosplay in particular, I suppose it's no surprise that we ended up running into another group of cosplayers and stopped for group pics, but the group snowballed, so we retreated to a corner to take group pics of doooooom XO It was crazy XD
Orochimaru's Secret boxer shorts... ::snerk::
Kakashi wanted some dueling action, so!
There're pics of me, hopefully somewhere, paddling someone (I'm not entirely sure who, tho I think it was a Hinata.. YIKES) with an uke paddle, and getting whacked in return. Hmm. o_o
Impromptu meetups like that are the best, haven't had that much random cosplay fun since Liz and I ran into those other Saiyuki cosplayers (man.. I can't remember their names anymore =\ I want to say.. Dani and Dave?...) a few years ago. Whoo!
I did yoink 2 more FF gashapon and a KH gashapon that had been marked to half-price just because the box was dented.. I ended up with ANOTHER Turk Vincent (what are the odds?!) that I gave to Kari, a Rikku, and a Kairi (as far as KH went, I really wanted Cloud XD;).
All in all, a pretty good time XD Sunday restored my faith in cosplay being fun. But whatever I end up doing next year, I HAVE to start earlier. Siiiigh.
First off, I guess, all my pics are posted here. If anyone wants bigger versions of pics of them or whatever, I can send those along XO
Friday
Rolled up to the Holiday Inn a bit after 12, to learn that their garage AND the public lot next to them were full, they said try the Mariott (? I forget what the hotel next door was), but they were full too; ended up parking at Redwood about a block away. Funfun. Got back to the hotel and met up with gaoyellow and vvalentine and proceeded to go pick up our registration at the con proper. Shortest pre-reg line EVER! According to some people, though, we just missed the rush that occurred earlier. Lucky us!
Wandered around in that first-day-where-is-everything state for a while, and popped into the Artist's Alley for a bit (I'm loving the idea of just having tables in there, presumably for gaming but also good for just SITTING). Somehow I wasn't as enthralled this year, though there was still good stuff to be found. As we were walking in, we were right on the heels of Darth Vader and a faithful Stormtrooper, so we were right in time to see this legendary duel:
Around 4:00 we headed back to the hotel to successfully check in. (I always worry that something crazy will happen, though I did confirm my reservation earlier.) Took our stuff up to our room and chilled for a little, then met up with poor treyvadi, who had to park like 5 blocks away T_T; Went with four of Liz's friends to eat at California Tortilla, which was pretty tasty, and the 80s music was great, haha XO Hmm, we had to skip the AMVs because of the timing of things, and I can't quite remember what we did for the rest of the evening... hmm... Maybe more Artist's Alley?
Saturday
Cosplay day, olé! Helped Liz into her Hikaru costume, and it was really cool seeing Lisa again, and seeing her in the Umi outfit XD They work well together:
I went as Youzen and Kari went as Riku from KH, ummm.. those aren't new costumes so no pics :P I'm very used to Youzen being totally unrecognized, but I did get a little fangirl love from a couple of girls, that was nice XD;; nyaha. Went shopping in the dealer's room, whoo! I picked up the Advent Children Cloud-with-motorcycle figure, and a Castlevania: Curse of Darkness wallscroll, among other things. I also nabbed one of the Final Fantasy boxed gashapon... I really wanted Vincent, though I would have been content with anyone in the series, so I opened it to discover I had gotten Turk Vincent, the limited figure! Sweeeeet XO This series is painted so much better than the first series... awesomeness.
Meh... K and I skipped the AMVs *again* because we were going to get in line for Kouta Hirano's autographing, but when we got there, there were already like.. over 100 people in line, and then we waited for half an hour or more (I dun remember, it felt like a long time :P) before the con staffers told us that only the people with the blue tickets were *probably* going to get signatures, and anyone beyond that, forget about it. That was like the first 50 people... wonder when THEY showed up. T_T Rar. So we left after that... sigh.
Went back to the hotel to change out of costume and saw Ross there, as well as Liz and Lisa, working on Liz's 2nd costume ^^; We went out again, perhaps to Artist's Alley? That sounds right, or I could be crazy. Kari and I went to the last bit of the ABJD panel and to the doll meetup afterwards, but then quickly headed back to meet Tony to go to the Masquerade. This year's skits were so much better than last year's ^^;; I'm really glad the Street Fighter Revival skit won big, I was worried as all the placements were announced and it wasn't up there >_< But they got best in show or whatever the overall prize is called XD There was a lot of dancing this year.. hehe.. And the Carmen Sandiego skit was just good old-school fun XO Good show, good show.
Headed back to the BCC proper to see Liz's costume and Kerry and Kelly's as well, though having not seen Fate Stay Night myself, I wasn't in much of a position to appreciate them. XD; They did look nice, though!
We skittered off to dinner at the California Pizza Kitchen with Ash, was pretty tasty but it was too late in the evening to eat much. D'oh. And that was it for the day, though I wish now I had gotten a pic of Liz in her EGL outfit XO
Sunday
Sunday's always this mash of trying to pack up, get stuff out of the room and check out, and shopping -- always with the shopping. XD; Got the first half of that finished, then paraded around in our Naruto outfits -- me as Neji, Kari as Sasuke, and Liz as Haku. Spent a bit of time taking solo pics near the photo suite:
Blurry Action Shot!
Then we meandered down to the dealer's room to do some last-minute shopping, and consequently got jumped for pictures. Given the popularity of Naruto, and Naruto cosplay in particular, I suppose it's no surprise that we ended up running into another group of cosplayers and stopped for group pics, but the group snowballed, so we retreated to a corner to take group pics of doooooom XO It was crazy XD
Orochimaru's Secret boxer shorts... ::snerk::
Kakashi wanted some dueling action, so!
There're pics of me, hopefully somewhere, paddling someone (I'm not entirely sure who, tho I think it was a Hinata.. YIKES) with an uke paddle, and getting whacked in return. Hmm. o_o
Impromptu meetups like that are the best, haven't had that much random cosplay fun since Liz and I ran into those other Saiyuki cosplayers (man.. I can't remember their names anymore =\ I want to say.. Dani and Dave?...) a few years ago. Whoo!
I did yoink 2 more FF gashapon and a KH gashapon that had been marked to half-price just because the box was dented.. I ended up with ANOTHER Turk Vincent (what are the odds?!) that I gave to Kari, a Rikku, and a Kairi (as far as KH went, I really wanted Cloud XD;).
All in all, a pretty good time XD Sunday restored my faith in cosplay being fun. But whatever I end up doing next year, I HAVE to start earlier. Siiiigh.