Conventions

Day two and attendance is up a bit. I'm hearing a couple long time residents talking about how much larger the crowds at Wonder Con were, the last couple years it was in this venue. To me, it looks about right for the first year of a new show. the amount of space to move around on the floor is roughly what you'd be looking for at a business to business show (as opposed to consumer shows, where you pack them in like sardines). You could add maybe 20% before it started getting to be annoying trying to move around the floor.

The Image Expo grown into a roughly the sort of Friday crowd I'm expect to see at a Chicago Show, relative to the size. Two or three big lines and milling about for everyone else. Yes, Friday is always the best day for mingling at a show. A few more photos:

Image Expo is a go. Looks like a relatively quiet Friday at a regional con, so far. Which is to say it's going to be better access for the fans. When I arrived about 45 minutes before opening there were maybe 50 people already in line waiting to get in. With the gates open, I'm seeing a steady trickle of people arriving. Not preview night at San Diego, by any stretch of the imagination, but the Chew booth got bull rushed by at 15-20 people as soon as the doors open. A couple pictures from before the opening bell:

Only days ago we were speculating with an industry pal on what had ever happened to Morgan Spurlock's documentary about the San Diego Comic-Con, which was filmed with some fanfare in 2010, had a splashy tie-in book last summer, premiered at the Toronto Film Festival and then went silent.

If you're going to be in the Bay area tomorrow through Sunday, you might think about dropping by the Oakland Convention Center for the Image Comics Expo. This is a combination 20th birthday party for Image Comics and a sorta/kinda replacement for Wonder Con, which has moved to Anaheim this year while the Moscone Center in San Francisco is undergoing a remodeling.

They're the sites of the continental US's two biggest comics pop culture explosions. And neither one is nearly big enough.

According to the organizers themselves, the key factor in Comic Con’s 2010 decision to spurn suitors from  Anaheim and Los Angeles, and to stay in San Diego (at least through 2015) was the stated commitment of local hotels to not gouge future visiting Con-goers with jacked up rates during the Con.  It was, however, the promise by local politicians and hoteliers to pursue an ambitious expansion of the San Diego convention center (already bursting at the seams from the 125,000 capacity of the Con) that was expected to lock down Comic Con in San Diego long term.

Kids in India don't read comics either. Or so says this story on the just concluded second annual Comic Con India:

The major con season for 2012 kicked off with MegaCon in Orlando. And so did the con news tidbits season.

This year's Hoteloween—the day hotel reservations become available for the 2012 edition of the Comic-Con International: San Diego—is March 29th, but it's already running a little differently. Perhaps hoping to develop a better model than the recent all-or-nothing stampedes, Con organizers seem to be doling things out in timed-release fashion.

The first ever Image Expo is shaping up for the end of next month with the addition of Ed Brubaker, whose FATALE recently launched and has sold out. This is really looking like a zeitgeisty kind of show -- Image is scooping up formerly exclusive mainstream writers like a rescue boat in the North Sea, and the lineup of guests includes many with passionate followings.

Last week's Angoulême festival extravaganza wrapped up with the presentation of the Grand Prix to Jean-Claude Denis, whose career goes back to the '70s but is perhaps best known in France for Luc Leroi. The Grand Prix is presented for a lifetime body of work—Denis is perhaps less well-known than some other winners, at least in the US. He was presented with the award by last year's winner, Art Spiegelman, as shown in the above video.