so uhhh yeah if you weren't aware, I did actually attend the San Diego Comic Con this year! Since it's been like two weeks since the con, I thought I might as well make some kind of post about it.

22nd
On Wednesday, I departed the fair city of St. Paul, bound for California with my dad. When we arrived, we hung around in the lobby until our traveling companion arrived from Texas: J_Seed! since we were all pretty tired (and didn't have passes for preview night) we headed to our hotel.

23rd
Thursday was probably the craziest day of the con.
Since this was our first time going, and with this year's dire warnings of oversold passes and mile-long lines, we decided being there as early as possible was the best course of action. After picking up our passes without much difficulty, J and I headed to the exhibit hall while my dad departed to places unknown. you cannot comprehend how large the exhibit hall is. In all seriousness, it's probably the largest room I've ever been in. we wandered for a bit before seeing our first noteworthy person of the day--Doug Tennapel! Tennapel is the creative genius behind one of my favorite games of all time, The Neverhood, so I was very excited to meet him. It must be said that Tennapel is massive. 6'8", to be exact. easily the tallest person I've ever met in person. damn.

we continued our trek around the hall, finding various booths and getting autographs and free stuff, before finally winding up at the Newgrounds booth, where I met a couple people, including Tom Fulp and Dan Paladin, who were very busy scribbling on everything people handed them. I can't remember in what order or on what day I saw everyone else, so at the end of this post I'll just include a list of everybody. I think we wandered around the con for a while longer before heading to a panel with Scott McCloud and Bryan Lee O'Malley, talking about Scott Pilgrim. While waiting in line, we saw a long-haired fellow in a white shirt and instantly knew it was Kirbopher! We said hello and went along our way. later, we ran into BlueHippo on our way to see John K, the creator of Ren and Stimpy. When we arrived at the room, he was talking to someone a few feet away! we waited around until he noticed us, and got to say hello to him in person. very nifty.

after that it was evening time, roughly, and so we hopped in our batmobile and drove to the beach for Pen Ward's beach party! upon arrival, the beach seemed oddly lacking in adventure, so we wandered around asking groups of people if they were there with Pen. of course none of them were, so we were a bit perplexed. then a car pulled up and a big guy with a piano-key tie and a massive beard got out. he poked at his phone for a minute, then looked up and yelled ADVENTURE TIME! it was pen ward! he was equally unsure of where the party was, but after talking for a minute we found out it was at the other end of the beach. we jogged down there and saw a much larger gathering of jolly people. after standing around for a minute, a mysterious person came up to me and asked "are you... ansel?" who should it be but squeef! we sat around and talked for a bit before we got a call from Anigen wondering where the party was. after giving him directions and taking a short walk, we met up with him and returned to the beach. then, rtilshowed up. we all sat in a circle and plotted to destroy newgrounds. as we left the beach, we said hello to nath milburn and hans before heading to the hotel.

man that took forever, and thursday was the most eventful day, so I will make the next three much shorter

24th

not a lot happened today. we walked around, maybe went to a panel or two i forgot, stopped at many booths!

25th
this day was a remarkable day because I spent a lot of it in one auditorium. Hall H is the largest panel room at the convention, and that's where the really big-name events all take place--I was trying to get in to the Disney/Pixar panel, half to see their new stuff and half just to see Hayao Miyazaki. we got there like an hour early and waited in line for quite a while before finally getting into the Warner Bros. movie panel beforehand, a happy accident that resulted in me seeing ULTRA TOP SECRET trailers for movies that BARELY EVEN EXIST YET. Movie stars, directors, etc. Finally it was over, and rtil met us in the auditorium-- as has already been discussed elsewhere, anigen skipped out on it to hang out with some INTERNET SUPASTARS. Pixar spent a lot of time bragging about their new 3D releases, and how they plan to re-release Toy Story 1+2 in 3D. Yeah, it's fascinating that you can just re-render the film using 3D technology, but really, it's not that impressive. They did show a clip from their 3D conversion of Beauty and the Beast, though, and I did find that interesting--they've gone over the original cels and worked some kind of voodoo magic to give them a three-dimensional look. Not terribly stunning, but interesting.
FINALLY they got to the part everyone was waiting for, which was a clip from their new 2D film The Princess and the Frog. it looks absolutely fabulous, and the animation work is incredible--definitely some of the most elaborate I've seen recently. pumped to see it when it comes out. Then they brought out the man himself, HAYAO MIYAZAKI. Everyone cheered, and basically anything he said was met with applause. He talked a little bit about his ideas and inspiration, and then showed a lengthy clip from his new movie Ponyo, which comes out... uh, pretty soon. That also looks beautiful. After THAT panel, there was another one, with Tim Burton discussing 9, which also looks gret. EVERYTHING LOOKS GREAT OK

After leaving the auditorium, bleary and hungry, I wandered down to the i-mockery booth and said hello to BoMToons. For those of you not IN THE KNOW, he programmed Buccaneer Battle in a week, and did a damn good job of it, too. it was nifty to meet him, finally.

Then it was time for the NEWGROUNDS PARTY. Talked to various staff members, artists, and buddies of mine, ate gross food (sorry, tom :c ) and generally had a good time. I should mention that there was a special guest there - Jhonen Vasquez! He's apparently a fan of the behemoth, and so he showed up quietly and before I got a chance to talk to him he was surrounded by people :( I caught him as he was leaving, though, and got in a quick word about how much he inspired me back in the day.

26th
this was the shortest day, since my flight left at 4 or something and we showed up at the con fairly late. I didn't even make it back to the NG booth to say goodbye to people :( J's flight wasn't until the next morning, and through a terrible chain of events he would up spending the night at the airport. SORRY, BRO :(

it was a lovely experience and i am tired of writing, maybe i will go back next year I DUNNO

oh yeah here's my list of people i met, too lazy to provide links, if i forgot you i'm sorry

NEWGROUNDS

mike
Squeef
Anigen
Kirbopher
Sucho
Egoraptor
Lazymuffin
J_Seed
Krinkels
BlueHippo
Skraggy
Tomamoto
Hans Van Harken
Swain
Tom
Rubberninja
Jonas
PrincessAurora
HispanicHamster
Luis
NegativeOne
nathanielmilburn
JohnnyUtah
poxpower
BoMToons
Dan Paladin
rtil
sugarpolyp

ANYONE ELSE

Craig McCracken
Lauren Faust
Matt Furie
Doug Tennapel
Pen Ward
John K

here is a beautiful drawing by ukinojoe, depicting the historic meeting of ansel and jseed