Nerd in Bloomers

Aaaaand now it’s bedtime, because my legs are in a world of hurt and I like sleep.

So here’s the scores:

Location: 9/10. It was inconvenient to have to come out of the direct-from-the-station entrance and have to go around the block, but I understand the need to have people without con identification only entering one set of doors. They gave out wristbands instead of badges, which was convenient for cosplayers (I usually bring a springy badge clip for hiding purposes, but I didn’t need it). The tickets had a smartphone scan system that was very convenient for check-in. The separate lines were not well marked, however; I’d recommend con staff take a trip to a craft store and get some cardboard/foam board for a ‘LINE ENDS HERE’ sign.

Staff: 10/10. They were all really well informed, the convention center staff was very nice and courteous. They enforced rules without being power-hungry, like I’ve seen at other cons. Wizard’s volunteer staff was very nice as well, and they were easily identified by their shirts. When one didn’t know the answer to a question, there was always another staffer within twenty feet who did have an answer. Pretty darn efficient running for a medium-large con.

Out-of-costume attendees: 7/10. I lost track of how many adorable kids Serena and I got our pictures taken with (one of them, an eight-year-old girl, was dressed like Black Widow, and she was adorable!) and everyone who asked to take our picture was very courteous. However, there was a much higher percentage of people who took my picture WITHOUT my permission than at the other cons I’ve been to in the past decade. Now, I kinda understand it when you’re in a reg line or a panel line or something, but I draw the line when you are supposed to be a PRO PHOTOGRAPHER with a nice flashbox on top of your camera. I’m looking at YOU, bald guy with the glasses and the short, fat crony you had with you… and douchebag on the train home who took my picture on your iPhone and sent it to one of your buddies (don’t think I can’t tell what my wig/headpiece looks like from a couple seats away. You ain’t fooling NOBODY when you use the “I’m going to kinda take a picture of myself but then snap one of you over my shoulder with the phone-front camera” technique).

In-costume attendees: 9/10. I’m really impressed with the ratio of in costume to out of costume attendees, I’d say one out of ten attendees was suited up as someone. By and large, the costumes were pretty good, too. I only saw a few half-assed attempts. Most of the costume contest entrants (they had over 130 sign up, but I’d say only 80-90 actually did their walk-ons) were pretty good too… but more on the costume contest later.

Panels: 10/10. Granted, I only got to go to the Chris Hemsworth Q+A, due to the Trek Captains panel being the same time as the general cosplay photoshoot, but that particular panel ran quite smoothly, even if it did end too soon. I’m suprised the giant room they had wasn’t full, but apparently it was for the captains panel (which my cousin went to). I was within TWENTY FEET of Chris, which made me really happy, even though I could only get crappy photos on my brother’s good DSLR.

Vendors: 9/10. I’d have liked to see more artist’s alley vendors that weren’t just local comic artists (hats, plushies, trinkets, etc.), but that’s not to say the local talent was lacking. I was really pleased by the number of artists that asked Serena and I to stop for pictures while they were tending their tables. The collectibles vendors weren’t terribly overpriced, though with the measly $20 in my pocket I couldn’t have hoped to get anything from them anyway. The comic vendors were already running sales by Saturday, so I was pleased by the selection of cheap comics, even if I didn’t buy any of them. Some great clothing selections too (if only I had $50 for a Trek bath robe!), and other miscellaneous shops (I wanted the Voyager and Enterprise mission patches SOOOO BAAAD).

Cosplay photoshoot: 6/10. There were a LOT of DC characters there, because they probably knew about it coming into the con, but the photoshoot itself was only posted on the Saturday itinerary for so long (I checked back Friday night just to make sure, and it wasn’t there!), but there were literally twenty or less Marvel (after I left the room to run around the con for a few minutes, yelling at other cosplayers to get them to show up). It ran the same time as the Star Trek Captains Q+A, which was extremely bad planning on the photoshoot organizer’s parts. This problem could have easily been solved by shifting the shoot to just an hour earlier, and even changing the room it was in to do so. No, we did not need that room for that. We could have used the Grand Ballroom instead - bigger room, better lighting, more space for all of us to be in. The main photographer, it seemed, had never run a large scale shoot before either, because there was a lot more arbitrary yelling on his part than there needed to be, and a lot more arrogance than could ever be needed. There was no set beginning or ending of the shoot, so many of us were left to wander around the room while the local superhero group took over the space for their own pictures.

Costume contest: 1/10. Yes, I have a GARGANTUAN beef with this costume contest and the way it was run. I have been to backwoods college cons with a better costume contest than this. Allow me to list the ten reasons I was annoyed, in sequential order:

1. The people running it were not con staff, they were a local group. Ok, I’m fine with that… except when you make it extremely difficult to sign up. No online rules for entry posted, no online application process (so you didn’t have to sign up at the con), the application sheet was FAR too small to put your name AND the name of your character (god forbid you had a group!), and it was extremely difficult to locate the booth for the cosplay group to sign up in the first place… and hard to get their attention to sign up when you finally found it.
2. They were still setting up the room after the designated contest time had started. I’m sorry, emcee, but nobody cares that you’re still putting duct tape arrows on the ground, and we sure as hell don’t care about what else you’ve done with duct tape. Moreover, there was no rhyme or reason for all of the stops you had to make on the path up to the stage, and nobody was guiding us through the process so there was a HUGE backlog next to the stage… there goes your nonexistent process.
3. I have never, NEVER seen an unthorough judging process in my life. I have competed at multiple cons, yes. Not a single one of them was a walk-on where you just kinda had to hope for the best. We were not pulled aside into a separate room for a blind panel to discuss costume construction, not asked to provide reference photos… What’s the worst, I think, is that the people in storebought costumes were in the same category as the people in homemade ones. (I’m not knocking on storeboughts/comissions/thrifted, but there IS a difference in craftsmanship/preparation, and some people that were in storeboughts really pulled it off well - they should have had at LEAST a Best Storebought Costume - Male and Female distinct awards.)
4. There was NO check-in when we got to the room. Every other contest I’ve entered - even high school anime clubs, for Odin’s sake - has had someone with a clipboard that you walk up to and say “Yep, I’m here!”. As many as fifteen people who’d signed up to compete were not there to, and the judges and emcee were extremely misinformed when we got on stage. The person in linecosplay horde in front of me was #13, and I was #22.
5. The contestants were not in order in our designated seating, so to combat this, they told us to find our own order and stand in the back of the room, for as long as two ungodly hours for some, until we got to walk down the “runway” aisle in the middle of the room. Photographers were practically in your face because there were no staffers to keep them back while you walked down… and god help you if you were a female entrant, because some of them were seated on the floor specifically aiming for upskirt shots. I had the benefit of a cape, but some other girls didn’t have that luxury.
6. When we got on stage, we had the apparent option of grabbing a handheld mic and doing… something. Of course, they hadn’t mentioned a single blessed thing about this beforehand, so those of us without a “performance” were forced to compete against those that did. There should have been a “showmanship” division separate from the “walk-on” division.
7. The judges on stage didn’t ask a single question about your costume, just your name and character so they could write down some arbitrary numbers. I’m sorry, but how exactly can you judge my costume when you don’t know the hours of planning it took for me to assemble this thing? How can you judge my costume when you haven’t given me more than two seconds to explain what stitches I’ve used where, fabric choice, accessory making, how much I’ve injured myself AND my sewing machine while doing this, and how I curled my own wig? Yeah, no. Not much of a judging process at all.
8. As soon as I got offstage, I went and returned to my seat. That couldn’t have been said for other entrants after me, though. They all rallied around the offstage area on one side, being generally loud and disruptive, and even interrupting other contestants’ walk-ons, which I’m sure must have messed up their individual scores. The only exception, of course, was the martial artist dressed as Kato who asked a Superboy to join him on stage so he could kick a cigarette out of his mouth as part of his demonstration. This whole problem could have been solved with assigned seating for the contestants.
9. Some of the winners of the categories they had (which were also unknown to us entrants until all the walk-ons were completed) left before awards were announced, which caused much snafu with the runners-up and honorable mentions. One of the main winners had even left and never recieved her award, I don’t think. On top of this, they didn’t even have enough prizes for everyone to go around (when you have a Best Duo/Group category, you kinda have to plan for at least five group members… not fair to the three lovely ladies dressed as retro-style Batman villainesses who had to split one prize between the three of them!)
10. The emcee was the WORST POSSIBLE EMCEE I have ever seen. On top of being unable to keep the contest working in some semblance of order, he was the most unprofessional, rude and absolutely inappropriate people they could have picked to run this. As I understand, he is the general emcee for all of Wizard’s conventions. I 100% believe that this man should get fired, for reasons of: racism (No, pulling black jokes at a PoC Batman is NOT OK), homophobia (I don’t care who you are, but you do NOT use the word “faggot”, no matter what context), chauvinism (It is ALSO not ok to be hitting on, offhandedly propositioning OR stating your own AROUSAL when it came to female contestants, no matter the amount of clothing on their bodies), inappropriate language (listen, buddy, you check your curses at the door when you realize that there are children competing and in the audience - don’t say anything you wouldn’t say in front of your grandmother)… I don’t think I need to go on, because there’s bound to be a video of this guy’s unprofessionalism somewhere. Wizard needs to kick this guy’s butt to the curb.

The ONE point I gave for this costume contest was because the people who did win the awards definitely deserved them. Sorry, that’s your only saving grace.

Overall: I’d give Philadelphia Comic Con 2012 a 6/10. The tops of my thighs are still burning and forcing me to walk like the QWOP guy runs, but in a good way… however, I can’t overlook the sheer unprofessionalism of this costume contest, especially when I attend cons for the cosplay portion of them.

Pictures to come.

I might not be on later, so here’s a gifspam to detail just how spastically excited I am 8D

Time to go upstairs, grab my super glue, and put these nails on so I can get used to wearing them and not kill everything with my nails tomorrow

random happy note: I know a bunch of people going to the con that I can hang with!

• my cousin (obvi, Serena in her Loki costume!)
• my uncle (who’s not the dressing-up type)
• a couple people from the local bronies group
• quite a few local lolitas (so I can meet them before the beginning-of-July meet, and I won’t be so awkward panda)
• my friend Mira and her beau (she’s bringing artwork)
• the guy who runs the boardwalk collectibles shop

I wonder if anyone else I know is going?