The most recent large scale con that was attended by myself and my wife back at the start of this month. We had never been before and it's only about a three hour drive from where we live in the Pittsburgh area, so we figured why not? (the fact that a few of our friends were also going didn't hurt at all either). We were also running a panel entitled Bronies: How We Got Here but more on that later. So, here's the breakdown of how things went over the weekend (better late than never, eh?).
That said, here's a little background information about Colossalcon as a whole. Every year in Early June the event takes place at the Kalahari Resort in Sandusky, Ohio for four days (Thurs-Sun). It should be noted that this particular Kalahari boasts the largest indoor water park in the world as well. So we have very large resort, water park, a zoo with exotic animals and near Cedar Point. Not a bad location at all! Over the years the event has grown, requiring it's current location and is nearly taking up all of it as well. Over 90% of the 800+ rooms and about 3/4 of the convention space was taken up by the estimated 7200 attendees.
Okay, so there's all that boring stuff, on with the show!
Checking in seemed to be easy and we even had porter service up to our room. We did need two separate carts as well as two porters (what? We don't pack light!) to get our insane amounts of tubs, props and suitcases. Quickly everyone in our group noticed the scale of the place. This would prove to be daunting over the next few days, especially with alcohol in the system and not really having a map to work with at all. Either way the process of getting in and getting to the room was easy enough, even if we did keep getting lost every time we tried to figure out what direction the elevators were. Registration could've been a bit more sorted out and we did get a bit confused about our panelist badges, but it didn't take very long and did move quickly enough that we weren't there for an eternity like some other events out there. Though, thinking back on it, the lines could be more clearly marked for how they divided them up, maybe something they should think about for the future.
More after the break!
So, as usual we already had everything planned out for the weekend. What panels we had wanted to attend, events we wanted to check out and of course our own cosplay lists. So, naturally, we didn't do any of it. Okay, we did get to some of the cosplay we had with us and we did make it to our own panel, but outside of that? Yeah, the best laid plans of mice and men. However, the rest of our group did manage to attend a 3 hour Dr Who panel, another panel about My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic and I think one or two others. (The memory is a bit hazy since it was over a month ago now).
A little side note here, we did help run a panel as part of AlcoBrony entitled Bronies: How We Got Here and it turned into "Midnight Pony Dance Party", which we were all perfectly alright with. It definitely was an interesting time to say the least. Though, I'll save the details for that in another post, but in the light of self promotion here's how things opened up for us on Saturday night.
So, while that definitely was a highlight for our whole group, let's not forget the reason that many of us love conventions so much. The cosplay. With over 7200 people in attendance, you definitely are going to see a huge variety of it. There was something like 60-70 different photo shoots planned throughout the weekend for almost everything you could think of. I only managed to get to a couple of them, but did witness several that happened from the balcony of our room. It was also full of people doing CMV's (Cosplay Music Video) all weekend long as well.
Overall, the weekend was amazing and we've already been making our plans to attend next year's Colossalcon. If you have the opportunity, definitely should check it out if you're close by. It's definitely a very well run convention and only getting better from everyone we've spoken to. Now, back to the regularly scheduled post here...
As far as Cosplay goes, it was pretty spectacular. The thing about these larger "regional cons" is that you get such an interesting variety of cosplay from all over the spectrum. You get your truly amazing, insanely funny, and of course the "What the hell were they thinking?!" cosplay. That in mind, I don't support calling anyone out, but come on. We all do it privately and sometimes...you really do have to wonder. One of the more interesting times for us, personally, was the My Little Pony photo shoot that was done on Friday. We did try to make the one on Saturday but that wasn't exactly happening due to us having a weee bit too much fun on Friday night.
Speaking of cosplay, we know why you've all come here. Okay, maybe some of you do like me rambling on forever about things but outside of that, it's the pictures. So without further ado, have some of the cosplay that I managed to snag during the weekend!
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| The view from the balcony of our room. Quite nice, eh? |
That said, here's a little background information about Colossalcon as a whole. Every year in Early June the event takes place at the Kalahari Resort in Sandusky, Ohio for four days (Thurs-Sun). It should be noted that this particular Kalahari boasts the largest indoor water park in the world as well. So we have very large resort, water park, a zoo with exotic animals and near Cedar Point. Not a bad location at all! Over the years the event has grown, requiring it's current location and is nearly taking up all of it as well. Over 90% of the 800+ rooms and about 3/4 of the convention space was taken up by the estimated 7200 attendees.
Okay, so there's all that boring stuff, on with the show!
Checking in seemed to be easy and we even had porter service up to our room. We did need two separate carts as well as two porters (what? We don't pack light!) to get our insane amounts of tubs, props and suitcases. Quickly everyone in our group noticed the scale of the place. This would prove to be daunting over the next few days, especially with alcohol in the system and not really having a map to work with at all. Either way the process of getting in and getting to the room was easy enough, even if we did keep getting lost every time we tried to figure out what direction the elevators were. Registration could've been a bit more sorted out and we did get a bit confused about our panelist badges, but it didn't take very long and did move quickly enough that we weren't there for an eternity like some other events out there. Though, thinking back on it, the lines could be more clearly marked for how they divided them up, maybe something they should think about for the future.
More after the break!
So, as usual we already had everything planned out for the weekend. What panels we had wanted to attend, events we wanted to check out and of course our own cosplay lists. So, naturally, we didn't do any of it. Okay, we did get to some of the cosplay we had with us and we did make it to our own panel, but outside of that? Yeah, the best laid plans of mice and men. However, the rest of our group did manage to attend a 3 hour Dr Who panel, another panel about My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic and I think one or two others. (The memory is a bit hazy since it was over a month ago now).
A little side note here, we did help run a panel as part of AlcoBrony entitled Bronies: How We Got Here and it turned into "Midnight Pony Dance Party", which we were all perfectly alright with. It definitely was an interesting time to say the least. Though, I'll save the details for that in another post, but in the light of self promotion here's how things opened up for us on Saturday night.
So, while that definitely was a highlight for our whole group, let's not forget the reason that many of us love conventions so much. The cosplay. With over 7200 people in attendance, you definitely are going to see a huge variety of it. There was something like 60-70 different photo shoots planned throughout the weekend for almost everything you could think of. I only managed to get to a couple of them, but did witness several that happened from the balcony of our room. It was also full of people doing CMV's (Cosplay Music Video) all weekend long as well.
Overall, the weekend was amazing and we've already been making our plans to attend next year's Colossalcon. If you have the opportunity, definitely should check it out if you're close by. It's definitely a very well run convention and only getting better from everyone we've spoken to. Now, back to the regularly scheduled post here...
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| My Little Pony cosplay shoot. |
Speaking of cosplay, we know why you've all come here. Okay, maybe some of you do like me rambling on forever about things but outside of that, it's the pictures. So without further ado, have some of the cosplay that I managed to snag during the weekend!
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