Click Above for my intense camera roll!!!
So I done did it, I finally got my graphic novel to a PROPER con. Not that Comic-Con is somehow improper, or "less than" Sac-Anime, far from it. It's just that since I went to Comic-Con WITH Prism comics, there was no reason for me to be AT the table the whole time. In fact, me not being there was good since it kept the diversity of different artists at the table going. It would have been unfair of me to be there from opening the closing every day. Also, I wasn't keeping track of my own finances at Comic-con, Prism was. They were counting how much I was selling, etc. At every other con, I do that shit myself. At Comic-Con, all I had to keep track of was "I brought this many books", and after I handed them off to Tara, it was outta my hands, so it felt good to be doing that shit by myself again.
In fact, NEXT Comic-Con, things might change again, and instead of each of us having one big table, we might all have our own little tables in the actual Artist alley, so this past year mighta been my LAST carefree year!!?? :D WHO KNOWS!!??
But that's neither here nor there, lemme talk about Sac-Anime and how great it was and how great all the PEOPLE were! I truly, truly love the Sacramento crowd, i cannot gush about it enough. you notice how the last few cons I've been at, the cosplay photos have been kinda lacking whereas at this con I got like... DOZENS???? That's cuz the fans who show up for Sac-Anime are SUPER fans! They're so nice and so GOOD and so easy to talk to... PLUS... they're really bringing out the top shelf cosplay game!
The Comic-con fans, first off, there's WAY too many of them. I could not possibly stop EVERY person in a GREAT costume and take a photo cuz then I'd never be moving. Also, since comic-con is so crowded, everyone's just trying to get somewhere other than where they are at the moment. It creates... tension...
So as you can imagine, photos ops are NOT as common as you'd think.
THIS IS NOT TRUE OF SAC-ANIME!
Sac Anime is well attended, but not so much so that it creates a stressful situation.
Everyone has room to walk, everyone can get to where they're going.
Beyond that, I just get to SIT there, so everyone walks by ME, and that way I can ask every passer-by with a cool costume if I can get a shot. And since we're not all stressed out from being smashed into a space too small to accommodate our massive numbers, most are willing, and happy to participate.
So THAT'S a huge part of the reason my cosplay photo roll this year is so stacked. If it weren't for that weirdly placed overhead light, it woulda been perfect. I kept forgetting it was there, and it gives every pic a kinda hazy quality. Everyone look like they're the love interest in an episode of Star Trek: The Original series. Oh well, it's not a game breaking bug by any means.
The other reason this show was so good was it was because my sales were P O P P I N G !
since this was my first proper con with my graphic novel in tow, everyone who remembered me from last year or before was SUPER stoked to get one. this is the first time I've had a new book at Sac-Anime, or any of the sac shows for awhile, since i took that hiatus last year. so this was a big deal for a lotta fans. It was also kind of a big deal for a lotta newcomers. I was shocked at how many of these books I sold to people who'd NEVER heard of me.
One of my favourite things that happens at a con is someone getting issue 1 on Friday, and then coming back on Saturday for the rest. but NOW they don't HAVE TO! Just buy a big fat book one day one, guys! It's a good, solid read and it'll last ya a lil bit :3
I still have plenty of single issues just in case. Lotta newcomers aren't THAT sure of their purchases yet, and might wanna get to know me more gradually and that's totally cool, I understand the heck outta that. The single issues will not suffer to make room for the novel. Worry not, dear ones.
The people were good, and by that i mean the people as a whole, as a concept, but ALSO the individual people were very good too! as always i got to spend time with the always amazing Danielle, without whom TransCat would have no foothold in Sac at all. I ALSO got to spend s'more time with Danielle's bf, Joshua who is just a really GOOD BOY! I don't always make friends with my friends' significant others, cuz it's always a w k w a r d if and when they break up, but this particular union gives me a good feeling and i totally support it. Joshua could not join us for most of the con, but he was kind enough to drive us back n' forth through most of it and we got to chill a lot afterwards. I ALSO got to see my wonderful Joen Jien and Conor, who showed up on Saturday.
We went and saw the Anime Music video contest on Satuday, which was, for the most part, great. There was only ONE video that I gave a score of 1 to, and it was XXXtentacion with Devilman Crybaby. An artist I hate paired with an anime I hate. BOO-URNS! I honestly could not even watch it, it made me so mad that it even existed.
One of my favourites was BTS's "Dimple" with Citrus, and there was another one that was fuckin' Despacito, but I cannot for the life of my remember which anime it was set to. Something really goddamn E P I C. Sadly, Sac-Anime does not keep a public list of what was in the contest, so i have no way of remembering.
I notice the concept of what an AMV even is has changed a lot since I started going to cons and seeing these contests. It used to be an AMV was a full song, using scenes from an anime.
That no longer seems to be the base guideline for making these things anymore.
You can now use a partial song, or a snippet of a song. you don't even necessarily need to make a thing that resembles a music video, some people made little shorts that could have easily acted as promos or long commercials for the shows they were made out of. Kind of creative, actually. ALSO, not all of it was anime. Some of it was American animation, like Teen Titans or the Tangled animated series. One of the guys who entered a video didn't even use a song, he used the audio from the Avengers: Infinity War trailer, and made a short using characters from a bunch of different shows, including Dragon Ball Z, Sailor Moon, Cowboy Bebop, Evangelion, etc.
all in all, the contest was great, some definite losers in my eyes, but for the most part, everyone created something that was at least entertaining to watch. someone even submitted a Naruto video with a Coldplay song that LOOKED like an artifact from 2005, but I still liked SEEING it, despite it's cheesiness.
I gotta say tho, the highlight of the night was the fuckin' cosplay dance party that took place on the roof. Me and JJ and Connor walked in on it going down, at first it was just one guy in the middle with a circle around him, busting out, showing off his moves. he was GREAT! I got some on film, but I sadly didn't even get the best of it.
Then after that a BUNCHA people came into the circle, cosplayers and non-cosplayers alike. We mostly danced on the outskirts of the circle. I was super tired and NOT dressed for dancing at all. i was in my "sit at my table all day" clothes, and since I wasn't staying in any of the hotels attached to the convention center, I didn't have access to a quick change of clothes :(
but it was fine, we had fun mostly watching and participating in the background.
I wish i had come outta my shell sooner, so I could join in on cool shit like this. I'm in my damn 30's and I'm TIRED all the time, you son'sabitches!
Perhaps next year i won't be such a dang B L O B .
The con ended on a high note. I held off on wandering around the Exhibit Hall until the VERY END! I knew i was gonna drop a lotta cash once I did, and i absolutely, positively had to pace myself. i'm glad i did because every couple steps i took, i found another damn THING that I'd been looking for for YEARS at a TOTALLY REASONABLE PRICE!
To the dude selling the comic book TMNT action figure set, thank you for having a good looking set, all together, and all complete, for a reasonable price. I've seen people sell this set for outrageous amounts, and I've seen people break up this set and try and sell 'em for cheap. you were the best of both worlds, thank you!
To the dude selling the Final Fantasy x-2 Play Arts figures, i am SO glad these finally came down in price. There's one other booth who still carries these, and they're trying to sell'em like the game is well loved or something :P (spoiler alert, it's definitely a black sheep of the series). I've seen Yuna and Rikku go for something like $100 each before but you were TONS more reasonable. I wish I'd gone through more of your Final fantasy stuff, but I was motivated to move FAST because another girl was there eyeing the same figures I was, and I wasn't about to let her snatch 'em out from under me.
Next year, maybe!
Lastly, to the dude selling the Watchmen figs, I dunno what to tell you, dude, I robbed ya! Rorschach hardly ever dips below $25 and he's mostly over $50. Manhattan hardly ever dips under $100! I don't think you had a clue what you had and that's okay, not everyone can know everything, I am just glad i was in the right place at the right time, before one of your collector pals came up to you and was like "bro what are you DOING???"
Maybe the Doomsday Clock comic is making this figures drop in price? I dunno, all I know is there are three Dr. Manhattan movie figs up on ebay right now, one is $125 and the other two are like $110. I got mine for $20 and I'm a happy little clam.
And lastly the dude selling Marvel Legends, thanks for not trying to jerk me around over the new Psylocke. She's BRAND NEW and people are treating her like she's a rare variant from 20 years ago. There are two of these girls, the blue one and the purple one, no one can seem to agree on which one's the "rarer" one, but i don't really care, I just wanted A Psylocke, and to not be jerked around over it.
I did get jerked around by ONE person, but I walked outta her shop ASAP as soon as I figured out what was going on. She was selling the new Corrin from Fire emblem Figma. this figure is less than a year old at this point and this nerd was trying to convince me $160 was a "reasonable" price for her because she was "out of print" already.
Duh, dummy! ALL the figmas are out of print as soon as they come off the production line. They hardly ever to multiple runs of figures, unless they wind up being super duper popular, like Link or Samus. "Out of Print" doesn't mean anything for Figmas. As soon as she said the price I set her down and walked away, she shouted after me "VERY POPULAR! WON'T FIND IT AGAIN!", at which point i hopped on my phone and checked ebay, and found a couple dozen Corrins for in between $100 and $35. I don't think i'm in any danger of never seeing her again :P I'm just not gonna buy her at a con. I didn't antagonize her over it, though. I know she's just trying her best to make her booth profitable. Still though, that's a HUGE markup on a still pretty new figure, yikes.
That's basically the long and short of my adventures. i'll be back in the con game mid October for Yume-Con and Sac-Con! Have fun in the mean time, nerds <3 p="">
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