Fan Expo 2013: Post mortum

The set up of the table I shared with Leigh

So, FanExpo 2013 has now ended. It was a pretty good year. As usual I shared a table with the magnificent Leigh Young. We were extremely fortunate to be bookended by two other fantastic artists. Matt Ryan, on our left (if you were looking at our table):

One of the few times Matt wasn't at his booth

I ended up picking up his print of a bunch of cool movie werewolves (Chaney Jrs. Wolfman, the American Werewolf in London and Teenwolf) eating the one from Twilight, trying to figure out an appropriate place to hang that. To our right was Sabrina Parolin:

You do not take pictures of ladies at their table unless they are in cosplay, creeps.

She had a bunch of fantastic horror art. I ended up grabbing a full set of the monster stickers she brought, they're pretty boss. I really want to see some of her horror embroidery in person. Cons are always more fun if you've got fun neighbours, this is the first year we were bracketed by the fun, entertaining people who did art we enjoyed looking at. Usually you're lucky if you have one neighbour who you enjoy sitting next to for four days (or even 2 days as so many cons seem to be.) Even more amazing it was the first con either of them attended and they seemed to know all the proper con-etiquette! (They didn't sit in front of their table, they didn't sit on the floor in the middle of the area between the two rows working whatever it was they were selling, never had more than three people in their booth space, didn't let their friends block their neighbour's tables while talking to them, didn't try to scam power from people who paid for it, never looked bored or desperate when there wasn't a crowd in the row.) I hope if I'm ever at another con they're at I'll be in the same set up as this.

The atmosphere of the con was a little weird year this year since they had utilized the entire Metro Toronto Convention Centre, and made the bizarre decision to house all the celebs in their own little autograph area in the north building and put the entirety of the rest of the convention in the South Building. For the most part this eased up the congestion normally encountered on the convention floor. But it meant the there was no way for anybody to  know how busy the autograph lines were nor which celebrities were actually available for autographs. Especially since FanExpo made the great decision to only have announcements telling us that the show floor was going to open in 2 hours, the show floor was about to close in 15 minutes, or that the show was closed and everyone should finish their purchases and leave.

I did manage to catch Phantasm director Don Coscarelli at the Rue Morgue booth. I got him to sign one of my Tall Man prints.

We discussed the merits of releasing a full cut of Phantasm 1 ("Only the Phans would be into seeing that. It wouldn't be a very good movie. There's a reason editing exists.") At which point Little Miss Risk (who was in American Mary, I think, I haven't seen it yet) commented on how funny it was that Coscarelli was so candid about his film making.  Whether or not the whole thing was a dream ("We shot four endings, two are in Phantasm, one is in Oblivion and one hasn't been seen.") He was very evasive about the existance of any footage for Phantasm 5 ("We have to do one.") There weren't many people around when I got his autograph so I got to have a pretty decent chat with him.

He ended up asking for a copy of the Tall Man to give to Angus Scrimm so of course I gave him an extra one.

Don Coscarelli with my Tall Man

I also managed to catch Lloyd Kaufman (director of Toxic Avenger) on the last day of the con as he was about to leave (never knew when or where he was thanks to the lack of announcements.) He signed one of my Toxic Avenger prints: 

LLoyd Kaufman, as classy as you'd expect!

He seemed to like what I drew, told me to tweet a picture of it and he'd make me famous. 

Lloyd with two ladies who come to my table every
convention I've been to where Troma has a presence
I don't think I've ever gotten their names but they are
hilarious and awesome.

Chatted with Mike Mignola  for a short while on Saturday, he didn't seem that keen on doing big conventions anymore. Said there were too many people which makes it hard to control everybody. I over heard a terrible story about him having a problem getting to a panel he was supposed to give. You'd think the Con would take care of their guests, especially their guests of honour, make sure they can get where they need to get to when they need to get there. Sadly this wasn't the first time I've heard a story involving a guest being miss handled (another one involved a person who was supposed to have a panel not being allowed into the con and just going home.)

As for cosplayers, there was the usual mix of characters from cartoons I've never heard of, characters from video games I've never seen, out of shape super heroes, people wearing less clothes that they probably should be wearing, little kid Indiana Joneses and male princess Leias. Didn't take many pictures of them 'cus the booth directly across from me was for something called Gay Nerds so every picture looks like I'm labelling the cosplayer a Gay Nerd. I did take this one of the most awesome Joker costume I've ever seen.

She could actually peel her face off!

She had all the hooks and strings and stuff like in the comic but she left them off while she was wandering the con because it made peeling the face off difficult and it was more fun to creep people out by doing that. There's a Doctor Strange I've seen a few years in a row now that I think is the most amazing Doctor Stranges, I'd take a picture of him but I think in most peoples view I'm digging his get up ironically. In all seriousness he is exactly how I like to imagine the real Doctor Strange would look. I'm sure if you've been to Fan Expo you've seen him. He is AWESOME.

Got to catch up with a few people I see every con, which is always fun. DM from TheAvod.com swung by and we discussed how Elysium is a remake of Johnny Mnemonic with dust, a theory I came up with while discussing the movie with another of my con pals earlier in the day. I demanded that she watch the Laid To Rest movies. We discussed movie making with a friend of hers from the accountants perspective, which was more hilarious than it sounds. Never could find my pals Sara Deck or Dan Soelberg. (My sister did, bought one of his books) The craziest thing is, Alan Graves, the guy who put together the Zombook, which I have a piece in, dropped by the table, he's from England (and has a very strong french accent) just to say "hi", make sure I got my copy of the Zombook and to buy one of my art books. It was nice to put a face and voice to the name. If you don't have a copy of the book you should get it, its full of awesome zombie art from an awesome list of artists including me.
 It seems no matter what's on the map there are times where people and their tables are just invisible. I found Mike Rooth before the show started, went looking for him once the people were let in and I never could find him again. I had already found him once that day! WEIRD!

Overall the show seemed to go well for almost everyone in my gang. I look forward to seeing if there's any changes to the organization of the thing next year. I'll probably (86% sure) do it again.  I'm also planning on hitting another con or two in the coming months in Toronto so you might have a chance to catch me at one of them if you are hoping to pick up one of my art books (if I've got any left by then or any of the Monstar prints.

OK enough of this. Gotta do some art to put up here for all the people who have just discovered this blog after picking up a card at the con!

And if you missed it  the New art book is now available through Etsy: HERE!

FanExpo 2012: a post-mortum

So that was FanExpo 2012, eh?
I wouldn't say it was the best FanExpo Artist Alley experience I've had. It seems more and more the organizers are trying to squeeze artist alley out of the convention, instead of being along the back wall of the convention hall we were pressed up against one of the food courts which I guess brings some traffic in to the folks that are on that end and its a good entry place for people to hit Artist Alley but it still seems weird to me.

Table I was sharing with the incredible Leigh Young was in an area behind the CTV booth an area I've always found to be a dead zone, people tend to think that's the end of everything and turn back to the main floor. All weekend people seemed to be avoiding the row we were in, at least the people who were looking for art. It was like we had the plague! We were sitting in between a Makeup school and a horror author from Quebec. ("Hello are you into horror books? This is my first novel its a vampire novel. This is my most recent book. Its an urban fantasy time travel story. It starts in 2007 but the bulk of the book is set in 1957. It then goes back to 2007. Its got Lovecraftian elements and is also a horror story. This book is seven stories, two novellas and five short stories. They're all set in the fictional town of Bitternest ..." I heard this so many times I don't think I'll ever forget).

Somewhere behind us was a guitarist who played his guitar all weekend selling his CD.
I never need to hear that music again. Which is too bad because it had a kind of Surf sound to it which I usually like but after four days hearing the same music 6 to 8 hours a day it gets a little old.

Across the aisle there was a booth for a Canadian web series that's coming soon. Its called Scream All you Want. The video they were showing on Thursday made the show look pretty creepy. But not in a good way, it seemed to just be a loop of images alternating between young ladies sleeping and some creepy looking dude in a hoody and dark glasses standing in front of a building. They eventually switched the video so I went to talk to them about what the show is and it sounded pretty cool. Its about paranormal investigators trying to figure out whats causing as string of mysterious murders around town. I look forward to checking it out when it finally starts up.

I did get to meet John Carpenter and got him to sign a copy of my "How to spot The Thing" I did for The National Post. He seemed to enjoy reading it, but in the end he just scrawled his signature on the top of it, told me it was pretty cool and that was the end of the exchange. He really didn't seem to want to be there.
We got to catch up with our con pals Mummy's Little Monster and Ghoul Friday, as well as a couple of guys I went to school with: Mike Rooth and Dan Holst Soelberg. Found some cool art to adorn my walls. Met a few people who were fans of my work, one of whom brought a copy of the Toxie's Tromatic Tales comic I did a Toxic Crusaders Story in to get it signed. That was pretty cool.

I almost wish the convention was one day longer since things really started to pick up during the last couple hours on Sunday.

In the end I have to say it wasn't all bad. I mean how could it be I got to dress up as a Ghostbuster and strap-on a Proton-pack and pose in front of a giant Vigo the Carpathian painting.

I've been possessed by Vigo!

Yeah I'm a big nerd. 

I've got a few prints left which I'll be selling on-line and at the next convention I go to. If you're interested in picking up any of the Girls and Monsters series or the Repo-man pics drop me a line they're $25 each or 2 for $40 or the full sets for $60 including shipping.

I'll probably be opening an Etsy shop soon too to offer up some prints and art books, I'll let you know when that is.

FanExpo Fun.

So here's some of the stuff that was interesting at Fan expo. up above you'll see a photo of some sketch cards I was doodling while sitting at the table, you always need something to do in between sales and what not. I had a great time sitting next to the guys from Omake Designs, they were selling some really boss t-shirts. The son of one of them stood in front of our table staring at all my horror stuff, I figure I owe him for making people interested in my art, so "Thanks Trent!"
oh, here's some more of my sketch cards.

 Last time I was at FanExpo, I got Cassandra Peterson's Autograph, sadly she wasn't in Elvira garb, so I technically never got "Elvira's" autograph. This year she was back so I got this:

I took a quick pic of her after she signed it. Supposedly she was pretty sick the day before but she came out anyway in full Elvira regalia. She was pretty awesome to meet in character. Thanks Elvira!
And finally here's a little trivia for you. Who was the final victim of Freddy Krueger?
Give up?
It was me!

I figure since Mr. Kreuger himself, Robert England says I was his last victim (he added me to the kill count even) that makes it canon. So yep, Freddy killed me disguised as actor Robert England while I took a nap at my table in artist alley:

"AHAHAHAHAHA!"

He seemed pretty impressed that I'd take the time to map out all the kills he committed. I gave him a copy of it too. Will from Omake Designs purchased one of these prints too and managed to get to Robert England before me and he said England was taunting Lance Henrikson (who was sitting to England's left) about how none of Henrikson's fans plotted out graphics about how many people he killed.

Anyway the con was a blast, I think I might go back next year with a book of my Monstars.

And if you're interested I've still got a couple copies of the monstars prints, the Repo Man prints, and the art book. just send me an email abarr at somethingagogo.com I'll let you know how to get 'em.

FanExpo Day 2: Bat-doodle

Just scribbled this down during some free time at the con. I hope you like it. Con's going pretty good. If you read this blog swing by and say "hi".

Fanexpo 2011

So the Fan Expo is only 11 days away. I've put together a map of where you'll be able to find me and Leigh Young, if you are going to the fan expo. What will you find at my table you ask? Well, I'm getting some prints set up for sale and I'll have my artbook of course. there will also be some copies of my old comic books available I'll probably be drawing up some sketch cards, you just won't know for sure unless you swing by.

Fan Expo 2011: the artbook

What's that you ask? Well I'll tell ya. Its the cover for the artbook I'll be selling at the Fan Expo at the end of August in Toronto. If you're in town and like all that crazy nerdy stuff you should swing by my table and buy some art and comics and stuff. This book will be there and its 68 pages of monsters, girls, comics and other crazy stuff that I did in my spare time. If you like looking at this blog you'll probably dig the book too. As an added bonus these will be a limited run as I'll be drawing something in the back of the ones I'll be selling at the convention. After the convention you'll still be able to buy the book but it won't have any bonus art in it since those copies won't be in handled by me at all. More details on that later.
What's that you won't be able to make the convention and you want one of these limited run weird mind destroying books? I'll be making 5 copies available pre-convention that you can buy. It'll cost you $35 bucks and you'll have to tell me what you want drawn in it. How can you get one? Swing by my website
Something-a-go-go.com hit the contact button and send me an e-mail saying you want one and I'll give you the rest of the details. How's that sound? Yeah that's right, it sounds awesome. Thanks.