Vancouver Comic Con - Pencil Stabbing Goodness

The Vancouver Comic Con was held on August 26 and September 9.

The next Comic Con is on November 4, 2007, 11:00AM-5:00PM at Heritage Hall 3102 Main Street (times tentative).

I went to talk to the artists. I don't know how many people claim this justification for geeking out all day with the medium epitome of ultimate geekdom, but it was my truthful reason. I draw comics, and to keep if fresh I talk with other artists.

August 26 was rather excellent for this. The dealer tables were minimal and set up in the middle of the room. The artists had arranged themselves around the edge (the room being quite small, there is space for barely 40 tables in Heritage Hall). My partner and I did the rounds and chatted with individuals from Vancouver, Toronto and Seattle.

As with most things, there was some good stuff, some mediocre stuff and some truly horrendous work. One guy made comics entirely about this misogynistic ninja a la White Ninja comics, but taking itself far too seriously. He sold his comics for about $1 each, but as I watched him during the day, he seemed to make most of his money off of buttons he had made.

Some of highlights of the day were, of course, The Radar Friends and the Sonar Gang (I am quite biased about this being a highlight, my partner's best friend is one of the artists in the Sonar Gang). I bought myself a DnD/Adventure themed compilation of theirs and giggled girlishly while reading it.

I spent a bit of time chatting with the creater of Cinema Sewer, a zine/comic about the history of some of the dregs of pornography. Now, I'm not the kind of person who shies away from these topics, sex and pornography are a huge part of western culture and need to be discussed, analysed and enjoyed. I picked up the latest issue of Cinema Sewer, which has a fantastic article about a porn star in the 90's turning neo nazi "white trash". Another favourite article was the short illustrated history of Western themed pornography.

My next stop was to a rather shy comic book artist who wrote a variety of short stories and graphic novels. He told us of his recent life in Toronto (he being a Vancouver native) and that he has a habit of rolling 2D6 (for the non-DnD players, two regular six sided dice) at the start of every day to see how it would go. I asked him what he would do if he crited (rolled 2 sixes) and he laughed at the possibility. At the end of his laughter, he said he would go and try to pick up girls in the most serious voice ever. That, of course made me laugh. On the flip-side, if he critically missed (rolled 2 ones), he would call in sick to work and crawl back into bed.

The Vancouver Comic Con had the effect on me that I hoped it would. Seeing other artists doing what they like to do and offering the results for other people to enjoy got me off my ass and drawing. After spending a year sitting on the fence of my artistic desires, it's nice to jump back in full tilt and create something new. My perspective is completely different now than it was a year ago, and I find myself being particularly engaged in short story comics rather than long, epic narratives. There will definitely be some images to show in the near future.

Come on out to the next Con on November 4, I bet you'll see me there!