Convention Photo Round-up: Supanova & Sakura-con

Four straight weeks of illness.
2,000+ photos to edit.
30+ hours of flight time.
Travels to other countries.
Three conventions…
…and somehow I am still alive.

I write this to you in my pajamas, glasses askew and hair tousled. I have a gross infection in my left eye that makes photo editing and writing super hard, no doubt something I picked up from nerd germs at one of the three conventions I have recently attended. I am still jet lagged – my body desperately wants me to sleep all day and stay awake all night, like some sort of cracked out drug addict. But yet I am vigilant, working in photoshop until my eyes bleed and typing while my fingers cramp up and complain.

Basically, feel special.

My last month has been absolute madness. Well, that is actually how the majority of my life usually feels, but the last four weeks in particular have been crazy. Why, you ask? Well, I visited my first english speaking foreign country: Australia. It was half for pleasure, half for work… but in my line of work, the work is just as fun as vacation time. I attended two conventions over in Kangaroo land: Supanova Brisbane & Supanova Melbourne. Somehow I convinced the coordinators that I was cool enough to be some sort of psuedo guest, and therefore I got to hang out in the green room with the likes of Tom Felton (ohmygod Draco Malfoy) and Chris Claremont (I accidentally talked about dirty X-Men fanfiction while he was sitting right in front of me. Foot, meet mouth.)

I spent the majority of my time at both conventions slinking around with my camera, stalking cosplayers per usual, and pretending I belonged behind various comic book artist's booths. Australian conventions are very similar to American conventions, except that both conventions were at fairgrounds and mostly took place outside (I hissed like a vampire whenever the sun dared touch my transluscent skin).

Upon my return home (and after hugging over 9000 kangaroos and koalas), I promptly dragged my sick and jet lagged self to Seattle's Sakura-con, an incredible celebration of Japanese culture, anime, and manga. If any of you have read my previous articles you'll know that manga rivals American comics on my list of "favourite things", so therefore I was pretty excited. Sakura-con is a giant convention – the biggest anime-centric one in the Pacific Northwest – and the quality of the cosplay is mind blowing. For example: At most conventions I will make a personal goal to go on a "cosplay safari": That is, I run around the convention for a few hours each day and photograph EVERY COSPLAYER I see, good or bad. At Sakura-con, it's about 85% cosplay, so it's incredibly overwhelming and I usually just end up shooting cosplay I find amazing, quirky, or unique. I spent a lot of time this year doing piles of photoshoots with my talented friends, buying things I didn't need in the dealer's room, and looking for the odd comic book cosplayer. I had a great time.

As usual with all three of these conventions my camera was fastened to my side, and you, readers, get to reap the benefits. Behold.

Supanova Brisbane:

 

  

Supanova Melbourne:

 

  

 

Supanova Guest Antics/Green Room Nonsense:

 

  

Sakura-con Randomness:

 

  

 

Sakura-con Cosplay Photoshoots:

 

  

Despite my intense love for conventions, I've decided to cut my schedule down this year since I seem to be perpetually exhausted and ill. I'll see all of you at San Diego Comic-Con, but until then, except lots of ranting articles about the comics and manga I will FINALLY have time to read.

 

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