Gen Con: Hobbies and Crafts

I've been meaning to write this post for two weeks now. Of course it would help if I ever had a night at home before 9 o'clock. I'm in the middle of a busy stretch. But now I have a couple minutes. And I'm going to get this out so I can move on to other things. After all, it's been almost a month since Gen Con.

Every time we go to Gen Con, I come back inspired from all the creativity and energy I see around me. Artist's Alley is filled with incredibly talented artists and I always seem to pick up a print or two. I have more art than I have walls now. I am always in awe of how creative people are. I'll post later about the paper sculpture I purchased which hangs in my car. It's my favorite thing from the whole con.

But this year I was drawn to some of the great sewing pieces I saw and the incredibly detailed miniatures that were on display. I took more pictures of the miniatures than I should have. But I was just struck each time by how amazing they were. Miniature painting is something that I've been thinking of getting into. I picked up a starter kit last year, only to find that all the paint was too dry to work with. I would like to start painting, although looking at the ones on display is both inspiring, and a bit daunting.

Seriously, look at that detail

I loved the personality on this piece. Love this little guy. 

And of course, the dragon. Fantastic!

The sewing I took pictures of was also a bit of wishful thinking. I'm still terrified of the sewing machine. I know it will try to eat my fingers. Jess tells me that there's nothing to it, but I think she's lying. Still clearly there are plenty of talented people out there.

I think this was all hand-stitched, so there is hope. But isn't it incredible? Love me some Cthulhu.

I stopped this woman as she was eating lunch. I felt bad but I loved the skirt so much. The back was also covered with emblems. Such a simple design but such fun. I had to stop her and compliment her on the skirt. She was very gracious about it.

What I love about Gen Con is that it's not just one type of art. There are the professional artists certainly. And the creative cosplayers which continue to stun me. And the hobby enthusiasts who make and create. But there's also the creative art that just appears at the show.

The robots above were built out of Legos for a giant game of RoboRally. Some very familiar faces to make the game even more interesting.

And this octopus was created on site, out of cards, by someone who just happened to like building card structures. By the end of the weekend he was destroyed for charity. Temporary art. No wonder I come home inspired.

Gen Con...The Costume Edition

Mystery Men!

I've been back for almost a week and this is the first chance I've had to download photos and decompress from this year's Gen Con. For those of you who aren't familiar, each year Jess and I travel with my family to a gaming convention in Indianapolis. We play games, we play-test games, we talk about games, we eat lots of fantastic dinners while talking about games, and we look at costumes. Sometimes gaming costumes, most times not.

Don't know the character (anyone know?) but love the costume

We had a blast as usual. I always eat too much and don't play enough and this year was no exception. But we did end up coming home with three new games to try, some books from our favorite webcomics, and some cool steampunk accessories. I also found a writing quill which I think will get a lot of use for drawing. I came home with a lot of energy for creating.

These guys were huge hits of the convention. Love the Lego hands on Batman

We didn't spend quite as much time with family this trip and I feel a little sad about that. While looking through my pictures from the trip there are only two with family members in them. The evenings we spent with everyone but most of the mornings and early afternoons were just Jess and I. Not that I didn't have fun, but I would have loved to play more with everyone. I've really missed gaming lately. Jess and I have decided that we'll pick one day per weekend to play one of the games we have. Otherwise they just sit and gather dust and we only play games when we're with other people.

With Starfleet Airship Division. After I took his picture he gave me some Starfleet cash

As you can see, the costumes were just as good as usual this year. Each time I go I am blown away by people's creativity. And I come back wanting to make a costume for the next time we get to a convention. I had tossed around the idea of a simple Portal costume but never ended up making it. Perhaps next year. My next post will look at some of the crafts and hobbies that I was blown away by. I need to do more creating.

My mother, finds Waldo (my father). His costume was a huge hit. People even chased him down the street for photos. 

The man in the suit and tie is supposed to be Tony Stark. He had the arc reactor in his chest (although the blue glow didn't come out in this photo) and would toss out cheesy lines as each person took a picture. He was hilarious. 

New Books!!!

I walked away from the convention quite a bit poorer and a majority of that money was spent on...can you guess?...books. Shocked, aren't you? I have a bit of a book addiction. But there were tons of books that I wanted to buy and almost all of them were at a fantastic price. So I splurged. And came home with a couple new reads.

First up was a beautiful Art of Bone book done by Jeff Smith. If you don't remember, I mentioned my love for the comic series in this post. I read the Bone series nearly addictively, moving from book to book. I even made two library trips, the same day so that I could keep on reading. So this book was a great find and for a very decent price. I love art-of books.

The next title on the list was the second book of the Mouse Guard series. I'm not sure how I missed that it had come out already. I read Fall many years ago and have been eagerly awaiting Winter to see what happens. When I was walking through the convention hall on the last day I spotted a copy and promptly bought it. And then moved it to the top of my stack of books to read.

The Mouse Guard stall was doing a "buy one get one free" deal so I also got to pick up a second book. I looked through their interesting titles but decided on a Field Guide for a graphic novel series called Berona's War. The salesman described it to me as Spy Versus Spy meets Looney Tunes. With that kind of description, how could I possibly pass it up? After I finally get to read the field guide I'm sure I'll be tracking down the original series as well.

But my last and most exciting purchase was two books from the Looking for Group webcomic. I've been reading Looking for Group for a while now and love it (I posted on that one here). I also read the author and illustrator's other comic Least I Could Do. So when I found out that they would be having a booth at Gen Con I knew I had to stop by. Jeff went a little fanboy standing in front of Ryan Sohmer and Lar DeSouza and I have to admit that I was a bit excited. It was a bit of a thrill to meet the creators of not one but two of your favorite comics. We bought Books 1 and 3 (I already have 2) and also picked up a stuffed Richard and Bunny (yes he's supposed to be riding the bunny. If you read the comic you understand). It didn't hurt that the guys were incredibly nice. Both of the editions were signed and I walked away a very happy fan.

Costumes

Inspired by all the amazing Victorian and steampunk costumes I saw this week (like the beauty above) I picked up a sewing pattern for an outfit. We won't be going back to Gen Con for another two years most likely, so I should have time to brush up on my stitches. I haven't done a ton of sewing and my preference is for hand-sewing, so this should be a bit of a challenge. But I have to try. Isn't that red one just lovely? Now imagine it with a pair of goggles and a steampunked pistol.

The Best Week in Gaming

I got back in town last night after spending the week in Indianapolis, IN for Gen Con, "the best four days in gaming". It's a convention for games and gamers. There are video games, role playing games, miniatures games, board games, and any other type of game you could imagine. It's a weekend filled with geek t-shirts, cool costumes, and the sound of dice. For me, Gen Con lasted a week. And it lived up to its name. This week has been a fantastic week of gaming and geekery.

Some well-known characters

The trip really started last Tuesday, when our friend Jon and my brother John and his family arrived in town (we had three Johns/Jons in attendance, which was a tad confusing sometimes). After dinner we headed home to start the gaming right. Our friend Jon had brought down a ton of board games which we made good use of. We spent the entire week playing board games, playing role playing games (D&D, Shadowrun), and walking around the convention hall. Oh yeah and a lot of eating (if you're ever in Indy stop by Palamino for fantastic meal).

The group at dinner at the beautiful Old Spaghetti Factory.

Games conventions are fun because of all the great people. Almost everyone is friendly and most are doing something interesting. We demoed games, checked out some great costumes, and just spent time soaking up the energy. There were people everywhere in the convention hall, sitting down to game, talking games. Everywhere you looked were unique t-shirts and fun. And the party never seemed to stop. We stayed at the Embassy Suites which was connected to the convention center. At three in the morning there were still gamers playing down in the lobby. One of my favorite comments was Wednesday night at 2 in the morning when my friend Jon looked out the window of the room and said, "there are people still down there playing. These are my people." I'll second that, these are my people. I've come back energized and excited.

Life-sized Robo Rally, a game Jon brought but we never got a chance to play.

We spent all our time with my family and most of that was playing game after game. We wandered around the city a bit, walked a lot, attended a live action dungeon, but the rest of the time was spent sitting at a table rolling dice and laughing. My mother even joined us for a D&D run (something she's never done before). Two of Jon's games, Pandemic and Betrayal at the House on the Hill, became instant favorites with my nephew (and the rest of us). We played a great Shadowrun adventure that had most of us on the edge of our seats at the end. And no matter what we played we laughed and had a fantastic time. One of the best weeks I've had in a long time.

Spoils of DragonCon

I didn't go to DragonCon although I would have loved to. Instead my dad and my brother made the trek to Atlanta to partake in the wonderful geeky goodness. For four days they were surrounded by stormtroopers and klingons and steampunk outfits and enough costumes (and exposed flesh) to fill Hollywood for a good decade or so. I wish I could have gone but I'm happy enough to see their pictures and hear their stories.

But my dad went farther than that. I had mentioned two artists whose work I love, both of which were going to be at DragonCon. I've loved Brian Despain's work for a long time. If you've forgotten I wrote about him here. I mentioned to my Dad that Brian would be there and to keep an eye out for his work. The other artist was Bobby Chiu. I've been meaning to write about Bobby for a while now and hadn't had the chance. Dad wrote down their names and I figured that was the last of it.

My father came home on Monday and we had dinner that night. Dad was telling us all about the trip and he mentioned that he'd picked up Bobby Chiu's book Chiutensity. Half of the book includes Chiu's artwork and sketches, the other half has Chiu's partner at Imaginism Studios, Kei Acedera's artwork. Acedera's work is just as incredible as Chiu's and I'm still debating which half of the book I like better. My dad got both of the artists to sign it. I also got a number of cards from Imaginism along with a DVD of Chiu's lecture on digital painting.

Then Dad got very sad. He informed me that Brian Despain sadly didn't have a book for him to buy. He had looked at the artwork but didn't see a book and Brian mentioned that he hadn't produced one yet. So instead he had simply bought me a print! More to the point he bought the print below. You could have bowled me over I was so excited. I don't often go all fangirl but a print was well beyond my wildest dreams. I love it. My padre picked so well. I still have to frame it but I'm all ready to hang it up in my studio. I didn't get to go to DragonCon but the spoils of the convention were well beyond my expectation. Two of my favorite artist's work under my roof. Thanks Dad!!!

Wishing I was in San Diego

If I look a little green today, it's with envy. I'm wishing I was halfway across the country today in San Diego. The city itself is nice enough but the current draw for me is Comic Con. I haven't done a Con in way too long and this one interests me more than any other. I was hitting Gen Con every year for quite a while. When it moved out to Indianapolis I had to stop. Both distance and family stuff, kept me away. My brother and his family are going with my parents again this year. I'm a bit jealous of that. But the writer part of me, the webcomic addict part of me, and the serious geek in me wants to see the hugeness that is Comic Con. (the convention has been selling out for many years in a row)

The convention brings in some of the biggest names in comics along with pretty much everything else. Comics were the main focus but now the Con is much more inclusive. Films, pop culture, books.... But my interest is in the comics, particularly webcomics. Many of my favorite webcomic writers will be there. I have been glancing at their booth promotional material for weeks now in their blogs. I can already visualize my money being spent on signed books and figurines. I can imagine all the cool costumed figures and the great panel discussions. It is something that Jeff and I have talked about attending for a couple years now. And one day I'll get there. It just won't be this year.