Vintage Anime Convention Camcorder Footage

The roughly mid-90's and earlier (generally pre-Toonami, pre-anime boom) era of anime & manga fandom: early cons, clubs, tape trading, Nth Generation VHS fansubs, old magazines & fanzines, fandubs, ancient merchandise, rec.arts.anime, and more!
SteveH
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Re: Vintage Anime Convention Camcorder Footage

Post by SteveH »

davemerrill wrote:that A-Kon footage is great. First shot is of Neil Nadelman, second shot is Alec Orrock selling his FSTS zines, then further along is Pam Buck doing her anime con game show.

That A-Kon is the one where Saturday night we engaged in a water gun fight and got busted by con security and one of the con security persons and one of the con guests had a physical altercation, which put a pall over the remainder of the weekend for us. Don't shoot water guns indoors, kids
Man, the whole kangaroo court they held over that action, the so-called fight, that was some fandom bulls**t stuff. Security was acting like it was some royal court and I was NOT authorized, not until I pulled the "hey, I helped create the EDC (white lie but Derek DID ask me about a lot of crap) and Meri is my personal friend" card did I get to see her and managed to inject a tad bit of sanity into the whole thing.

And yes, I was a terrible person and had packed an impressive Super Soaker in my luggage for just such an activity.
davemerrill
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Re: Vintage Anime Convention Camcorder Footage

Post by davemerrill »

you know, any rational adult would have made both parties apologize, shake hands, and go forth and sin no more. But NOOOOO, the egos of Dallas Fandumb Movers & Shakers had to be massaged and it turned into a People's Tribunal full of people who weren't involved giving solemn testimony about events they knew nothing about.

This is the kinda thing I talk about when I talk about how the convention was staffed and managed largely by people who didn't care that much about Japanese animation, they were just there for the convention because that's what they did, go to conventions. Meanwhile the attendees and guests were all excited and happy to be at a JAPANESE ANIME CON, for pete's sake, weren't many of those around - and the staff was looking at us like we were freaks and weirdos for being into this "japanimation" thing. Particularly the security staff, who were a bunch of Dallas area gamers and Klingons aggrevied that these out of town weirdos were behaving as if we didn't know Granthor The Mighty and Thag The Unwashed were BIG NAMES in the Dallas Fandom! Didn't we know?

Sorry, I'm venting. That convention should have been a big wake-up call for us, and it kind of wasn't.
SteveH
Posts: 645
Joined: Thu Apr 25, 2013 10:30 am
Anime Fan Since: 1979/82 (depending)
Location: Michigan and the Sea of Stars
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Re: Vintage Anime Convention Camcorder Footage

Post by SteveH »

davemerrill wrote:you know, any rational adult would have made both parties apologize, shake hands, and go forth and sin no more. But NOOOOO, the egos of Dallas Fandumb Movers & Shakers had to be massaged and it turned into a People's Tribunal full of people who weren't involved giving solemn testimony about events they knew nothing about.

This is the kinda thing I talk about when I talk about how the convention was staffed and managed largely by people who didn't care that much about Japanese animation, they were just there for the convention because that's what they did, go to conventions. Meanwhile the attendees and guests were all excited and happy to be at a JAPANESE ANIME CON, for pete's sake, weren't many of those around - and the staff was looking at us like we were freaks and weirdos for being into this "japanimation" thing. Particularly the security staff, who were a bunch of Dallas area gamers and Klingons aggrevied that these out of town weirdos were behaving as if we didn't know Granthor The Mighty and Thag The Unwashed were BIG NAMES in the Dallas Fandom! Didn't we know?

Sorry, I'm venting. That convention should have been a big wake-up call for us, and it kind of wasn't.
20/20 hindsight is absolute. :)

I had not keyed in that security was (in some part) Klingon Diplomatic Corps or similar. That explains so much. I recall here Midwest-Land the Dorsai Irregulars had some troublesome members who thought way too much of themselves, their importance and their authority.

Warning signs? Screw that. We had Waffle House, we had the hotel, we were young(ish) and dumb and I got me pics with goddamn Kei and Yuri and life could NOT have been better. :) (wait, was that when or was that AWA and oh god, it's happening the memory is going)

I mean, my whole life is a constant "If I knew then what I know now" but there's not too much I would do different were I able to go back there/then Quantum Leap style.
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