Wisconsin Film Fest 2014

Back on March 7, we had a little get together for former Dane101 contributors. That was one day after the Wisconsin Film Fest schedule came out. Since 2010, I have blanket-covered the festival, seeking out trailer-a-days, tweeting my p.o.v.s, interviewing, podcasting and pre- and re-viewing everything from Feeding Fish to Bellboys. With the loss of the D101 outlet, I struggle to figure out exactly what to do with my time this coming weekend.

First off, I thought I would share the movies I'm interested in attending:

Friday 4/4 --
To Be Takei - 4:30pm - Union South
R100 - 9:15pm - Sundance 6

Saturday 4/5 --
Tricked - 5:30 - Union South
Wisconsin Own shorts (rush) - 6:15- :LVM
Bucket of Blood - 9:30 - Union South

Sunday 4/6--
Kumiko the Treasure Hunter - 5:30 - Sundance 6
The Congress - 6pm - Oventure

Monday 4/7 --
The Congress - 6pm - Sundance 6

Secondly, here are some other movies I could be talked into:
Food Patriots
Rent a Family
Stray Dogs
Domestic
Cannibal
Burt's Buzz
Wisconsin Rising
The Lumberjack at 100
Domestic
Dostoevsky behind bars
Approaching the Elephant
Le Weekend
Coherence
The Sacrament
The Overnighters
Cheetin'

And finally, things seem to have come full circle, as it were. I am currently spending most of my free time promoting and helping produce The New World Horror, and upcoming Wisconsin-based, progressive-minded zombie flick staring some of my friends and yours from Madison and the surrounding area. Watch for our fliers at the fest!

Ohayocon 2013 - teenagers still rule the world

Last month I made my nearly-annual trek to the Columbus, Ohio anime convention Ohayocon 13 (I think I missed one or two since 2006).

I adore anime conventions. Though I've attended sci fi, fantasy, comic, writing, steam punk and a myriad of everything-sub-and-pop-culture cons, all of which have their own geeky pleasures and attractions, anime cons always seem to convey an overwhelming sense of cuteness and affection (although, humorously, I recently re-read the 2007 manga series Dramacon and chortled a bit at the multiple references to "glomping" the practice of which now a days, I'm sure due to numerous lawsuits, seems to be almost completely dead.) This may be a product of their relatively young demographic,which can also bring an undertone of adolescent immaturity, angst, drama, and "@!#$%OMG! too-many-feelingz!?>!## :-P !!"

Which, in a way, I welcome. Since I am not a pre-teen (or do you prefer tween?) or teenager any longer, I really have difficulty remembering the heart-wrenching, soul rending, all-encompassing love, hate, disdain, and rapturous glory of friendship that I know I felt at that time in my life (and have the amazingly bad poetry to prove). Chalk it up to hormones leveling out or whatever, but still, I don't think it is good to distance oneself too far from what is a huge portion of the population, as well as a great and powerful force in the world.

Honestly. Young people, especially those who go to conventions, have money and they have time--two things a lot of the rest of the population doesn't have. And they spend both very emotionally--influencing what the rest of us see, hear, and read as well as what we are sold. Along with a need to belong (to a group of people outside of their family that represents their individuality), this age group (say, 12-29), is rife with creativity, as is evidenced by the costumes, artwork, and, well, simply hilarious crazy ass shit on parade at Ohayocon.

And even if you don't watch anime, or even know what it is, there is still some great times to be had  at Ohayocon.

  

  Penguin Drum

  

Rainbow Dash

Persona 3

 Trucy Wright

Jean Armstrong

 Dark Souls

(Where else can you see a mermaid wheeled through the food court on an office chair?)

I admit, most of the images above relate to costuming, since that is one of the brightest, boldest, most colorful (and therefore most visual) examples of what I love about Ohayocon. But there was more than that.

The vendor room, or dealer's room, was ripe with licensed material, video games, manga, DVDs, imported goodies and more. I ended up getting a Chi shirt whereas my sister bought the most Ah-Dor-Ah-Bul notebook from TastyPeachStudios.com. If anyone wants to get me their Fat Pegasus Tee, I will wear it.  This place had cats made of mochi. Meowchi.

But wait, there's more! Ohayocon also had an Artist Alley, which was fairly thriving. I will admit to being a person who does not purchase a lot of art for arts sake. But if you have any peripherals, i.e. jewelry, bookmarks, comics etc. I may be tempted. I am also a self-declared button whore.  I was lucky enough to find two pretty amazing... God I don't know what to call them, franchises?

One is Prince of Cats, a webcomic that uploads multiple watercolor pages per week. WATERCOLORS! Some webcomics struggle to upload a single penciled page every 7 days! (Not that I'm dissing them; I haven't posted a blog about this convention and I went to it over a month ago.) Prince of Cats is mostly a relationship tale between two queer boys in their final days of high school. The twist is that Lee (above) saved the Princess of Cats and therefore was granted one wish. He has yet to make said wish and so, until he does, he has gained the ability to understand the language of cats. The artist's kickass postcard marketing collateral lead me to her site, where I've been following the story (which only started posting in 2012, but has an active fan base and a number of collections for sale.)

Another was Tokyo Demons, a  multifaceted creation which includes a written story, serialized audio show and YouTube channel, book and ebook, as well as posters, pins, a card game, a video game and, um, more. Pretty incredible. My husband bought the fully voiced audio book (!) which we listened to driving back to Wisconsin. The story follows Ayase, a girl with a very strange secret, and Jo Oda, a self-centered pickpocket who is drawn into a convoluted and complex plot he didn't ask for and doesn't really want to deal with.So far my favorite character is Miki Morikawa, a young, incredibly bright nerd who swears like a sailor, leads an inept street gang, and is voiced by a woman.  Daniel Ozimek is pretty cool tool.  

Lianne Sentar and Rebecca Scoble, both involved with Tokyo Demons and former employees of TokyoPop have recently launched Chromatic Press which has some pretty cool stuff going on so you should check it out.   

Panels play a big part of Ohayocon. I find the quality to be hit or miss, and this year was no exception. I attended a Persona panel, which was mostly trivia (I missed the first part. There might have been more discussion, research etc. that I missed). And I did get to meet MegaTokyo artist and co-creator Fred Gallagher, but his panel was so low key I could hardly hear him. I give him a pass, and I won't post the awesome pic of me standing next to him while he was wearing a full body kitty cat costume because he tweeted he was embarrassed by it (then why wear it, Fred?).

The best panel I attended was one about the Ren'Py game engine, a program that helps developers create a video game, namely, a visual novel. A visual novel is a style of game that can be as simple as a story book you click through. The panel was put on by the writer and artist of OTChi Kocchi, a recently released visual novel game set in a pharmacy school. The presenters really laid out the process and it looks pretty simple. The fact that they had never made a video game before also gave me hope of maybe someday making my own. They also handed out free cds of the game (Act I), which is also available for free download on their site.

Finally of course, was the comradery. Because it doesn't matter if you're 17 or 70, hanging out with people-- friends, family, and strangers, who laugh at the same things you do, introduce you to new and innovative experiences, and create an environment where you can feel free to be whoever you want to be, is something pretty magical. Overall I had a blast, and returned home inspired, with my muse raging to create.

... although I still don't get Homestuck.

(pic from http://rebloggy.com/post/homestuck-update-homestuck-update-upd8/34933222090 )

Note-my full Flickr set is here.

"They Might Be Giants Cosplay?"

My husband is a big fan of They Might Be Giants, as am I (as evidenced by my vanity plate.)

We both enjoyed their album Join Us and the videos posted on You Tube in answer to a contest to create a music video to the first song: Can't Keep Johnny Down. The winner is pretty funny.

HOWEVER, the one that caught our eye was one by an artist named AKAcronny (on YouTube.) This is the video we always picture as we listen to the song.

Now I've been trying to get my husband to go to an anime convention called Ohayocon since I started going myself about 6 years ago. This year, I finally convinced him, with the caveat that I would dress as the Skullivan.

This is how much I love my husband. 

He made all the costumes himself. And so I now have a pair of bunny slippers and some neat skeleton tights. Score.He looked up a how-to on papier-mâché (mostly guys making Deadmau5 heads). We found that the fewer the layers, the more flexible and therefore less likely to crack the head was. 

       

  

Here is another video just for fun:

Gathering of American Gods Costume Party

I did the above sketch after the weekend. I am not saying it is any good (click for large view) but I just had to do it.

















My day Saturday started early, transporting Golden Tickets which would be given as souvenirs to each of the people who would win rides on the carousel by the end of the day. They had been signed by Neil and were also signed by Sue, the President of House on the Rock. I admit, I felt pretty special.
















Much of my day was spent at the Scavanger Hunt table. At first we didn't know what to expect as far as people participating in and completing the hunt. There seemed to be a lot of people interested, and someone posted on Facebook Friday night that they were stumped by some of the clues. I had one participant stop by early on Saturday to ask about the final clue, and felt bad I couldn't tell her much. I wondered if I should have given more hints - what if no one completed it??

I need not have been worried. Our first completed hunts started coming in at Noon. They had worked all night and planned out the lay of the land to find the best route to get all of their stamps. All in all we think 1/3 of the attendees completed the hunt, with about 200 being turned in fully completed. And - the girl who stopped by first thing to ask the questions? She was one of the winners (even without my help)!

















Neil was about. Here he is talking with Dawn of the Spring Green Chamber of Commerce about the raffle.

















The real party got started Saturday night, of course, as school buses began vomiting up costumed characters to participate in the contest. The Welcome Center soon filled with gods of all shapes and sizes.

















After grabbing a drink, many headed over to the tent, where the contest was taking place. The line of participants snaked off into the twilit night.















And on into the tent itself. Here you can see a "Mr. Wednesday" front and center. I thought he'd be shorter.















Some of the assorted crowd. There were about 200 people who entered the contest, but a lot of people were there just to gawk.
































Trooper that Neil is, he had each participant parade before him and tell who they were. Then he called a list of finalists forward. Finally, he had to decide on his 8 winners. Which he fudged and called 9 :-) I feel for him - it had to be one of the hardest calls.















And I WISH I had a list of the winners. I know, above, Morgana (who had an amazing leather mask and hand sewed feather cape), the Nameless God, Dr. Horrible, Anansi (dancing in front of the line - holding 2 tigers balls), and the Ms. Liberty on stilts all won.























White Buffalo Woman and the Nameless God.






















Cthulhu drinking a Spotted Cow.























Possibly the only Shadow I saw, tied to the World Tree.






















Bast.























I loved these two - these were the guys I had such a problem finding in my registration database! They dressed as the 'Bog brothers - Czernobog and Bielebog.


Then, it was on to the Carousel!


















The winners of the scavenger hunt were already there, the winners of the raffle soon to follow.

















The House on the Rock staff were there to assist people with boarding and disembarking. There were certain animals that could be ridden. The carousel was never made to be ridden (it only stops and starts once a day), and so a lot of prep was given to making sure it would survive the number of rides we wanted to give. The luck of the gods, and perhaps the spirit of Alex Jordan, were all there that night.
























The crowd watching the rides.























Other events included food, bands, tarot card readers and magicians.
















Little Red Wolf from Madison drew a crowd in the Organ Room.






































Finally, just because I wanted to, I've saved my favorite moment of the night for last. I was in charge of collecting about 1/2 of the raffle winners and had the chance to talk with them before escorting them to the crazy loud and crowded carousel room (that's actually when I took most of the stand alone costume pics above). The guy below had just gotten married and was on his honeymoon. I got a short little video of him just as he rides past his wife and blows her a kiss (she's video taping him.) Ah me.






















On my drive home at nigh about 2am, I spied the last quarter harvest moon rising. Good night!