Location: San Diego Convention Centre
Attendance: Maximum capacity as usual, 125,000.
San Diego Comic Con International Where: San Diego Convention Centre Date: July 20th - 24th. Attendance: Maximum capacity as usual, 125,000. Con Report by Jamie Coville
Wednesday / Preview Night:
I had arrived around 2:30-ish to get my badge and discovered the line was already moving. This was different as the line normally starts letting people in at 3. Also different was numerous people along the way asking to see the bar code and ID and checking the bar code before letting people in. This sped things up a bit as people who were either in the wrong line or didn't have everything they needed were weeded out.
The line up for pros to stand in until the floor opened had moved but you wouldn't know unless you asked one of the volunteers that knew. I was directed to a guy in a beige t-shirt who was able to give me directions to where it was this year (It wasn't in the same place as last couple of years). I had friends who also got in with pro passes and they weren't told where to go at all, they were simply told to move along from where they were standing several times. They only found out when I waved them down and directed them.
There was a lot of confusion on the line itself, with almost everybody thinking it went the opposite way and going down a different escalator. The staff watching the line didn't have a walkie talkie and we only discovered the con was open when another line starting going in before us. This lead to people rushing/running when the doors opened.
When the line was let in I went to the Gold/Silver area to check out what they had. I was a bit disappointed to see some of the Gold/Silver booths were smaller this year. Bob/Robert Beerbohm had a section of paperbacks last year where I bought some stuff last year but he didn't have it this year. One dealer that specialized in underground stuff who said he wasn't coming back this year made good on his promise which was also disappointing as I typically bought stuff from him as well.
Thursday:
Prior to the doors opening I walked around outside to take some pictures of the giant advertising. I then discovered my badge went missing. Thankfully all the con required was my ID and I got another. This was crisis #1 of the day that was quickly defused.
Inside I spent much of the day attending panels.
My first panel was the Maggie Thompson Spotlight (48:46, 44.6mb).
She was interviewed by her daughter Valerie. Maggie talked about her mother being a sci-fi writer and growing up meeting and knowing the big writers and being a part of fandom. She was active in Sci-fi fans, saw Dick and Pat Lupoff at World Con in Pittsburge in 1960 when they dressed up as Captain and Mary Marvel. That made them get interested in comics and they decided to mail letters to all the people they knew who also dabbled in comics and put together the first fanzine dedicated exclusively to comics of all types. This would eventually lead to other types of comic fanzines including Paul Levitz's start with The Comic Reader.
There were many jokes about hoarders in reference to Maggie as she has kept pretty much everything over the years, from Beta tapes to Laserdisks to books and all sorts of stuff. Maggie talked about how the collection grew to the point she had a new addition put on her house - but was able to more than pay for it by selling key parts of her collection. They also briefly talked about a couple of brothers who died to their hoarding, as they were concerned about thieves and had set up traps around the house. One brother got caught in a trap and was buried in his own stuff and couldn't get out and the other was bed ridden and starved to death.
There was about 50-100 people in the audience but Maggie assumed everybody came to see the Mark and Sergio panel right after them.
I spent a bit of time on the floor, went through artists alley but a lot of people were not there and set up yet. I also went to the opposite side where there is a real mix of toys, anime, t-shirt dealers. I generally like this area because you sometime find some odd and reasonably priced stuff.
Next panel was the Roy Thomas Spotlight (53:37, 49mb)
Roy Thomas was interviewed by Mark Evanier about his career. Among the things they talked about are Roy's editing style, Conan, Barry Windsor Smith, Star Wars, Mort Weisinger, Dracula, Alter Ego, Stan Lee and more. The room was fairly full.
After the panel, crisis #2 reared it's head. I have a binder full of all the stuff I need for the convention, panels I'm attending, back up panels in case I miss one, wants lists, already have lists, maps for restaurants, hotel and flight reservations and more. That binder was missing. I followed my steps back to where I was prior to the panel and asked a dealer whose booth I was at if he saw it and he did see it and saved it for me. Whew!
I came in at the end of a Panel for MAD Magazine. I was there long enough to hear Keith Knight say that reading MAD made him smarter and thinks it's great that they go against the trend of society getting dumber. MAD also gave away bookmarks for the ipad.
I attended the spotlight on Paul Levitz panel, but sadly my recorder did not record it. Paul had two people interviewing him, Mark Evanier and Marv Wolfman. Marv asked most of the questions as he was very familiar both with Paul and his upbringing as they both lived in the same area of Brooklyn, NY growing up. Paul talked about his youth, saying he was a reader of almost everything and spent a lot of time in a nearby used bookstores. He said his mother always encouraged his reading and drove him to the bookstores as it was good for him. He said he was big into technical stuff, he learned Fortran and the punch card networking system. It was his goal to go into IT, get his degree at MIT and work at IBM or TIME.
Paul said he started doing the fanzine's at the age of 14. He and a friend took over for Maggie Thompson's fanzine Comic Art and began doing the Comic Reader. Marv talked about how he met Paul when he came in for a tour of DC Comics. Paul had then mentioned he was doing a comic fanzine. Marv had also done fanzines at 14 and went over to his house to help him out. Marv said Paul was like a younger version of him because he also walked into DC on a tour at age 14 and was doing fanzines at that age too. Mark mentioned that Paul's fanzine came out regularly as well, which was unusual. Paul said it only came out late twice, once when his uncle had convinced him his local printer was ripping him off and also the last issue was late.
Paul eventually went to his local university and got a business degree. He had worked part time at DC to help pay for it, eventually he dropped out to do full time work there, figuring the work experience was better than the degree. He said he would have worked at Marvel if they would have let him work part time at the beginning.
Mark mentioned that Paul and Alan Light were the only two who made money doing fanzines. Mark talked about the changes in how editors treat creators after he and Jeannette Khan took over. Said Murray Boltinoff felt he needed to keep freelancers thinking they just barely made their work good enough to get published - to keep them in perpetual fear of losing their job to try in an effort to always get the best work out of them. Levitz said Khan was a very moral person and made the changes that were considered minor now but were major then, like creator credits and royalties and so forth. Evanier wanted to know if any of the old editors fought against these changes and Levitz said no, but some felt it was a lot of extra work over nothing and it wouldn't improve the industry. Levitz believes the creative renaissance of the 80s that improved the industry is due to the changes made in the mid/late 70s.
They also talked about how most freelancers today wouldn't put up with the treatment the previous freelancers did. They mentioned that those that suffered through the great depression were willing to withstand a lot of abuse to keep their jobs. Outside of writing Paul is doing some teaching now, mainly because freelance writing is a lonely profession. He said he's thinking about writing a prose novel, but he would have to write it on spec and try to sell it and he's not sure if he's willing to do that or not.
The next panel was Indie Comics Marketing 101 (54:03, 49.4mb)
On the panel is Sam Humphries, Laura Hudson, Ben McCool, J.K. Parkin and it's moderated by Chip Mosher. They talk about Sam Humphries successful launch of Our Love is Real and Ben McCool's cross country signing tour. Chip Mosher, Laura Hudson and J.K. Parkin with advice on how to market to comic book news sites. The room was nearly full for this panel.
Friday:
Right off the hop was The Black Panel - Dwayne McDuffie Tribute (1:19:39, 72.9mb)
Dwayne McDuffie was a very intelligent well loved writer, editor, producer of comic books and animation. He is best known for Milestone Media, Static Shock, Justice League Unlimited, Ben 10, Damage Control, Deathlok and more. He died suddenly earlier this year and this panel comprised of his friends and colleagues to talk about Dwayne. On the panel were the co-founders of Milestone Media Denys Cowan, Derrick Dingle and moderator Michael Davis. Derek Diggle and Reggie Hudlin took turns participating via skype. Also on was Peter David, Keith Knight, Reggie Hudlin, Phil LaMarr and Matt Wayne. Keith Knight came in a bit late. They all talked about Dwayne's intelligence, generosity and creativity. Towards the end they invited fans who had experiences with Dwayne to speak about them and a few people who are now professional writers spoke of how Dwayne took hours of his time to critique their work and how he helped them become the professional writers they are today.
Some of the usual problems occurred with this panel. It was late getting started and there were technical problems in getting the audio/video working. Moderator Davis announced at the end of the panel that he is creating a fund with FAN (Fandom Advisory Network) and Final Draft (screen writing software) that they will buy the 8th version of the software for them. This version has a new comic writing feature. They gave away 2 copies of the software at random, Micheal also gave away two tickets to a party. The room was full for this panel.
Next panel was The Gene Colan Tribute (44:56, 41.1mb)
Marv Wolfman, Roy Thomas, Dean Mullaney, Andrew Farago, Steve Leialoha, Glen David Gold and moderator Mark Evanier gather to talk about Silver Age artist Gene Colan who passed away earlier this year. The panelists talked about those that inked him, his drawing style, him working as Austin Adams at Marvel and more. This was in one of the larger panel rooms and it was about half full.
The Golden Age of Fanzines (1:14:35, 68.2mb)
On this panel are the pioneers of comic fanzines and organized fandom. Panelists include Maggie Thompson, Richard and Pat Lupoff, Richard Kyle, Paul Levitz, Roy Thomas, Jean Bailes and moderated by Bill Schelley. Each talk about how they started their fanzines started. A lot of the audience were fanzine publishers as well and they asked questions about other fanzines (Rocket Blast Comic Collector in particular) and thanked the group for doing fanzines and welcoming them into their world.
That 70's Panel (45:24, 41.5mb)
Creators from the 70s gather to talk about their work at that time. Moderated by Mark Evanier, the panelist are Roy Thomas, Walter & Louise Simonson, Len Wein, Mike Royer and Joe Staton. Mark asked about their first work in comics, how long they felt the comic industry was going to last (many assumed it would be dead in 5 years), what career they might have pursued if the comic industry did collapse, their views on older artists that was still working, Warren Publishing (Jim Warren in particular), Star Wars, Manhunter and more.
There was a really funny moment when Mark mentioned how San Diego wouldn't be doing Gold/Silver panels anymore due to a lack of creators of that time period being alive and able to attend the panel. He said San Diego tires them out quickly, at which point Roy Thomas (who is 70s) head dropped with a loud "THUMP!"
ComicsPro: So You Want To Be A Comic Book Retailer? (1:21:24, 74.5mb)
Moderated by Joe Field, retailers Portlyn Polston, Jennifer Haines, Chris Brady and Diamond outside Sales Manager Dave Hawksworth give a brief rundown of their experience and answer questions from existing and aspiring retailers on starting up a comic store or improve a store. Among the topics covered are getting female readers, stocking back issues, digital comics, percentage of sales on comics vs trades and other topics.
Friday night was the Full 2011 Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards (3:09:55, 173mb)
It was held in the Indigo Room at the Hilton San Diego Bayfront.
Introduction by Masters of Ceremonies Bill Morrison. He was assisted by the lovely Kayre Morrison.
The welcome was done by Jackie Estrada, Eisner Awards Administrator.
Presenters included Robert Ben Garant & Thomas Lennon, Joëlle Jones, Gerry Alanguilan, Jill Thompson, Phil LaMarr, Dave Gibbons & Jonathan Ross, Lance Henriksen, Anina Bennett & Paul Guinan, Glen David Gold & Patrick McDonnell, Ian Boothby, Joe Hill & Gabriel Rodriguez, Greg Rucka and Walter & Louise Simonson.
The Russ Manning Most Promising Newcomer Award was presented by Chris Bailey. The Bill Finger Award was presented by Mark Evanier. The Spirit of Comics Retailer Award was presented by Joe Ferrara. The Bob Clampett Humanitarian Award was presented by Ruth Clampett. Sergio Aragones presented the Hall of Fame and Maggie Thompson did the Memoriam.
Winners can be found at the Eisner's webpage.
While I haven't done a comparison, it felt like there were more category's for awards this year. Some of them seemed to be real hair splitting. Lots of different awards for graphic novels, international, reprint, comics, comic strips, Asian, humor, reality based, etc.. I'm starting to wonder if maybe the awards should be split in two, one for comic books and one for GNs. The Awards were more than 3 hours this year, which was longer than previous year. One major change was no keynote speaker. Overall the Eisner Awards was a bit better than in recent years due to the presenters. The boring (or bad) presenters were kept to a minimum, although the opening with Robert Ben Garant & Thomas Lennon was very long and it got less funny as it went along (mainly because of how long it was going - there is a bit of a dread when it comes to the Eisners, the longer things go, the more disenchanted people get). There also seemed to be too many presenters as well. First there was Bill Morrison as the master of ceremonies, then you had people who covered 3 awards who typically did a comedy bit, and then they introduced the presenters to each individual award.
Saturday:
There was some confusion Saturday morning involving the shuttle buses. A number of people, myself included thought it started at 7am like it did on Thursday. After a while we checked the shuttle info and saw it started at 8am. While waiting we had seen several buses go by for other routes. Yellow route bus went by 5 times coming from the con and was empty, Green we saw going towards the con twice with people on it. Then at 7:45, 15 minutes before the shuttle was supposed to start, the Pink line bus pulled up. It appeared that some routes started at 7 and some started at 8. I also felt sorry for the stop after us, as often there wasn't enough room on our bus to take all the people waiting and they would then have to wait for the next shuttle to come around. Come Sunday morning it was the same except for our stop. I was by myself and was lucky to get on as there was only 1 seat open after about a 3rd of our line up got on the bus.
First panel of the day was 50 Years of Comic Fandom (1:17:18, 70.7mb)
Roy Thomas, Bill Schelley, Maggie Thompson, Richard & Pat Lupoff, Richard Kyle and Jean Bailes talk to Mark Evanier about their start in organizing fandom. Richard (Dick) & Pat Lupoff and Bill Schelley receive inkpot awards from the Comic-con organization. They also talked about the reaction of sci-fi fandom towards comic fandom. The panelists reveal the first comic convention they've ever attended and the first fanzine they contributed to.
This panel had the same people as the Golden Age of the fanzine on Friday, except that it was moderated by Mark Evanier, the moderator of the previous panel (Bill Shelley) was a participant. Also Paul Levitz wasn't able to make it to this panel as he was double booked with the overlapping Will Eisner: Visionary Panel.
I caught the tail end of the Fantagraphics 35 years panel and was there to hear it announced that Fantagraphics will be doing EC reprints, but the books will be specific to the artists. Also, they are going to collect the underground ZAP Comix in two Trade Paper backs.
Then there was a panel named Is the Comic Book Doomed? (46:01, 42.1mb)
Douglas Wolk brings together a number of people in the industry to talk about the lifespan of the 32 page comic book. On the panel is Amanda Emmert (Retailer, ComicsPro), Laura Hudson (Media, Comic Alliance), Vijaya Iyer (Co-Publisher, Cartoon Books) and Mark Waid (Long time writer & editor). Emmert and Waid go back and forth about the viability of the monthly comic with Iyer discussing how Bone would be done if it were launched today. There is a bit of talk about why digital would replace the monthly as well.
This panel was lively as Mark Waid and retailer Amanda Emmert had very different numbers to what it cost to print a 32 page comic. Waid said it was about $1.00 - $1:10 and after selling it to Diamond at 60% of a $2.99 price point, that left the publisher about 60 cents per book, which isn't enough to pay everybody and make a living. Waid was also sure that this price would only increase as all of print media is collapsing now. Amanda believed the print costs to be much lower (she said she had tweeted a publisher she knew and they told her 70 cents during the panel, but didn't get into the details). She also pointed out that people in the industry has been predicting the death of the comic book (or the industry) for a very long time and it hasn't happened yet, she doesn't believe it's going to *really* happen this time. Vijaya Iyer (Cartoon Books) said that she doesn't know how they'd survive if they tried doing Bone today, other than to break even or lose money on the comics and hope they could make it up on the trades. Waid said the book could just be published on the web for exposure and then do the TPB, which is the way he see's it going since the web has the potential of getting more eyeballs then a monthly comic book. They had also talked a bit about how the web can't do double page splashes and that artists are limited by the screen size of the digital device. Waid thinks that's an add on to a printed book that would drive web readers to stores to buy the printed version of books they really enjoyed online. The room for this panel was about 75% full, somewhere in the neighborhood of 150-300 people.
In a line up for the CBLDF: 25 years panel I talked with a couple of guys who were in line ups to get tickets for next years show. They mentioned the con had limited to 3000 tickets per day, per type of ticket. They also said they had to be at the hotel at 6am, wait for 4 hours and one guy was still just after the cut off line and had to kick up a fuss before they sold him the ticket.
CBLDF: 25 Years of Protecting Creativity (52:01, 47.6mb)
Charles Brownstein gives a history comic book censorship and the Comic Book Legal Defence Fund. He outlines the major cases the fund has been involved in over the years and their results. Charles mentions that there is a worrying trend of censors targeting readers instead of retailers and publishers, but wrapping up their objections as child pornography to tarnish the reputations of those who purchase the books of which they do not approve of.
Brownstein reading off a power point presentation that played as he went along. He skipped one part about California vs. video games but went back to it during the Q&A part. It was very cool in the room as cold air was blowing into it the entire time. At the beginning of the panel there was about 25 people in the room, but it had doubled towards the end.
I walked in about half way through the Peter J. Tomasi spotlight where it was just Peter answering questions from the audience. Almost all of the questions centered around Green Lantern and the storylines going through it.
Next up was the Walter and Louise Simonson Spotlight (1:16:13, 69.7mb)
Scott Dunbier interviews Walter and Louise Simonson about their careers. Walter talks about drawing and eventually writing and in particular talk about the Alien adaptation Graphic Novel/Album with Archie Goodwin published by Heavy Metal. Louise talks about her time as editor of Warren Publishing and Marvel. She also talks about Power Pack. At the end of the panel one lucky fan wins an Artists Edition of Walt Simonson's Thor.
The panel started a bit late as there were some tech issues in getting the power point to come up on the projector.
I grabbed some dinner and then went to the Fandom's 50th Meet and Greet. I got to talk with some Richard Kyle about Beyond Time and Again GN he had co published. He mentioned there was a 1200 print run, he had originally sold 1,000 of them and had to slowly sell the remaining 200 of them. He said he did pay the creator George Metzger the royalty for the the full amount. Jackie Estrada had her collection of fanzines on display on a table for everybody to see. There were also displays set up with pictures and articles relating to comic fandom. The meet and greet had food and drinks and after a bit a giant cake was rolled in with the 50th Fandom anniversary logo that was used on all the con promotion of the event. Along with the cake, a collector who had a really good copy of the original Alter Ego #1 gave his copy to Roy Thomas.
Sunday:
During the line up to the Jack Kirby Tribute panel some of the con staff began enforcing a "no sitting" rule for line ups. The Fire marshals said sitting on the floor while waiting in line was a fire hazard and wanted a stop put to it. People were quite ticked as line ups can be quite long. There were at least a couple of conversations that went like this: Attendee: "You mean I have to stand for 45 minutes?" Con Staff: "Yes." If this still stands next year and is fully enforced, whomever designs those big bags might want to make them a bit smaller and add hard plastic legs on the side and a seat part on top so it can easily be converted to a place to sit. Either that or the con management might strongly insist on seating along the walls. My feat ache enough as it is, I'd have to stand the entire time I'm waiting for a panel, that would be worse then walking the floor.
I also overheard somebody say half of con security didn't know about the temporary stickers that people could get allowing people exhibitor access to help load/unload before & after hours.
The annual Jack Kirby Tribute (1:04:15, 58.8mb)
On the panel was Walter Simonson, Erik Larsen, Mike Royer, Richard Kyle and UK Celebrity Jonathan Ross. Moderated by Mark Evanier, the group talk about Jack and his inkers. Among them was Vinnie Colletta, Mike Royer, Joe Sinnott and Steve Ditko. Jonathan talks about his love of Jack Kirby and his desire to do a documentary on him (talk of his documentary on Steve Ditko popped up). They also talk about his DC work and the redrawing of Superman. Several people made announcements of upcoming Jack Kirby work coming out, including a movie about the time Jack helped the CIA rescue American hostages in Iran.
Richard Kyle talked about Street Code, a short autobiographical story Kirby that he had commissioned in 1980 but couldn't finance publishing until the early 90s. There was also some talk about Kirby's Superman and if any original Kirby Superman art exists. Erik Larsen didn't get a chance to contribute much, but in answering a fan's question he said he wakes up every day wishing he was Kirby and disappointed when he looks in the mirror and see's he's not Jack. The room was about half full, but had filled up towards the end.
Next was the The Philippine Invasion (41:16, 37.7mb)
Philippino artists Ernie Chan, Alex Nino, Tony DeZuniga and Gerry Alanguilan are interviewed by Mark Waid about their getting started at DC Comics. Nino talks about switching from DC to Marvel in order to get the "real" page rate for artists at the time. He also talks about the freedom they at DC because his work was more suited to horror, which wasn't popular in their local comic market. They discuss how the comic industry reacted to the Philippino artists when they started. Gerry talks about his working for DC today. They also talked about Nestor Redondo and how he influenced all of them.
The panel's audience was primarily Philippino and the room was jam packed.
And finally the last panel I attended was the Richard and Pat Lupoff Spotlight (47:04, 43mb)
Moderated by Maggie Thompson, Richard and Pat Lupoff talk about their lives before getting in comic fandom. Pat reveals about how they met and became a couple. Richard (Dick) talks about his life prior to fanzines, being an Army Lieutenant and working for IBM. He also talks about the productions of the fanzines. How he met Otto Binder and also a great story about mystery writer Don Westlake gave him an essay to print in which he told off the science fiction editors that he had worked for previously. I should note that Donald Westlake is the writer of the Richard Stark's Parker stories that Darywn Cooke is adapting for IDW. This panel was sparsely attended, Maggie Thompson joked that because all those that would have come have probably gone home already.
After this panel I went out to mail off any books I didn't want to lug home to myself. I then went around the Gold/Silver area to ask dealers how they did. Only 1 dealer said they did better this year than last year and he was very specific about why. He said he sold 3 big books and that's what put him over. He said the rest of his sales were down and it appeared the low to mid grade collectors just weren't buying comics. Every other dealer said they did the same or less than last year. One retailer staff member said that the talk among the dealers is this was a slow show. One of the dealers that didn't do so well was very angry at the con management. He felt they no longer cared about them, only cared about the Hollywood/TV stuff. What he and other dealers kept hearing was their customers saying they aren't going to come back next year. The amount of hoops to jump through to get tickets was no longer worth it. Some of the customers are older and rather buy tickets at the show, but couldn't do that because of limitations and line ups. He felt the con had to proactively work to get their customers into the convention because between rising table costs, rising ticket costs which means less money for people to spend at the con and smaller audience they are really feeling the pinch now. One wished the con attendance dropped by 10,000 next year to teach them a lesson. There was also talk of a few dealers not showing up next year either.
I enjoyed the convention this year. I feel I spent too much time doing panels though and just barely got the chance to walk the entire floor once. There were a number of people I typically see, say hello to and have conversations with but just didn't catch up to them this year. That said, I felt I learned a lot of stuff about the origins of comic fandom which was a big plus for me. Another change I liked was they kinda kept the panels sort of segregated. Last year there would be video game or other non-comic panels either before or after the comic panels. This year it felt like they picked rooms for comic panels and just did them there one after another. This helped it feel more like comic-con as long as you stuck to comics stuff.
Anyways, I'm looking forward to going again next year.
Links for Photos:
Regards,
http://www.TheGraphicNovels.com
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