Colossalcon 2012

[madmantheo]

Room rates have come out for Colossalcon, so its time to see who all is wanting to attend.

Colossalcon is in Sadusky, OH on June 7-10 (yes, that includes Thursday) at the Kalahari Resort. Its a great con that several of us have been attending for the last 4 years, and our group has been growing bigger and bigger. Along with the convention, the hotel also includes a waterpark, and our rooms will come with a number of complimentary passes for it.

One nice perk about this convention is that we have been running panels there for the last couple years (10 hours last time) and have free rein to run pretty much whatever we want. What that means for you is that if you agree to work with us on (some) of our panels, you can easily get your badge for free. Once panel submission is up and we get our panels confirmed, we can post a list of them on here so that you can see which ones you might want to take part in.

This convention is my personal favorite to attend, and each year it has been better than the last.

We're going to reserve our hotel rooms very shortly (to make sure we get nice rooms), so be sure to post in here if you want to attend. I'm currently debating between two rooms, and whichever we choose will likely depend on how many people want to attend. Prices for the hotel will likely be in the $30-60 range, but the potential high cost is mitigated by earning a badge for free doing panels and the presence of a kitchen in our room to cut down on food costs.

If you have any more questions, feel free to ask.

Attending
Proctor
Chapel
Ian
Andrew G.
Wes
Ben
Chris
Sam (f)
Alex
Sam (m)
Avram
Andy
Phillip
Sahvannah
Sarah
Anthony



Update: Reserved a Combination Suite for the weekend. 1 king, 2 queens, 1 queen sleeper sofa, full kitchen and dining area. And with the number of people we currently have, it'll be $55/person. Factor in free badges with 4 hours of panel work, that equals a great deal.

Update 2: Assuming all people who've said they're coming or are interested in attending follow through, hotel prices are looking to be $40-45 for the weekend.

[chapel]

I have to echo proctor here. Last year Colossalcon over took Ohayocon as a great anime convention to have people go to. Running panels last year was great and this year it will be better and we will be running more; hopefully.

I plan on attending, but that is a given.

It also stands to note the Kalahari just recently completed a GIANT addition to the hotel that was made possible by the number of people attending Colossalcon. How could you not go after hearing this news? Also on Sunday from about 8 until 12 they have a "flea market" that allows the attendees to sell some of their old anime items.

Oh and if you come to Colossalcon, in the morning(s) I am making pancakes!

[Jingle Scott]

Waffles>French Toast>>>>>>Pancakes>Tim Tebow

[BeyondTheReptar]

I'm up for the challenge, put me on the list. also could you throw out some of the ideas there are for panels I'd like to help out with some.

[SCPX]

I'm not on the list? I should be able to make it, provided nothing comes up.

[ThundrNeon]

Add me to the list. It sounds like a great time after just coming back from Ohayocon. I'd be willing to make curry for one meal during the con plus it's been many years since I've been to Cedar Point. I'll try to be useful for as many panels as needed ^^.

[chapel]

Some and most definetely not all of our panels for colossalcon are:

Anime Deadliest Warrior
Anime Rant
Best and Worst Villians
Anime Taboo (new this year hopefully)
Otaku Court
Otake Night Court (18+ Edition)
Everything for Big Fire: A Giant Robo Panel
Ian does a panel over the creator of Ranma 1/2
Ian does a panel over the works of Mitsuru Adachi

Quite a lot more and I am sure I am forgetting and sorry Ian I tend to forget names unless they are in front of me

oh and if chuck cooks dinner and I cook breakfast that leaves lunch at the combination Taco Bell/Long John Silvers

[madmantheo]

Here's the list of panels we'll be applying for this year at Colossalcon (as soon as panel submissions open):

Easy Participation
Otaku Court (2hrs)
Otaku Night Court (2hrs)
Anime Rant (1hr)
Best Anime Ever (2hrs)
Worst Anime Ever (2hrs)
Anime FML (1hr)

Panels Requiring Work
Anime Deadliest Warrior (2hrs)
Bad Anime That Could've Been Good (1hr)

Limited Participation
Best and Worst Anime Villains (1hr)
Best and Worst Anime Heroes (1hr)
Anime Taboo (1hr)
Anime Front Porch (2hrs)
Everything for Big Fire!: A Giant Robo Panel (1hr)
Satoshi Kon Retrospective (1hr)


If things are like the last few years, you earn a free badge by doing 3 hours of panels. Assuming we get all of our panels accepted, there'll be 21 hours of panels to choose from. Some like Otaku Court are easier to participate in, and we'll be able to sign on more panelists for it. Its best to look for your panel hours in those, and we'll do our best to spread people between them. Several of the panels are smaller affairs or already prepared, so we'll have a limited number of people participating. If you're interested in helping with one those, talk to me, Ian (for the Rumik World or Short Program), or Chapel (for Anime Taboo).

The two panels that will require some amount of work to join are Anime Deadliest Warrior and Bad Anime That Could've Been Good. Deadliest Warrior is of course the most work intensive, requiring us to set up battles, the participants research their warriors, produce video clips and images, and possibly rehearse with their partner. We certainly welcome several people as expert participants (lightens the individual workload), but be prepared to put in some time to working on it. Bad Anime That Could've Been Good requires some work, seeing as the idea of the panel is to describe a series, talk about where it went wrong, and then create a replacement storyline idea that would improve the anime. This is a new panel as well, so things will be a little rough in the planning stages when it comes to number of shows to be discussed and times.

If you're interested in assisting with panels (particularly certain ones) post here or talk to me at club meetings. Our goal is to achieve enough hours to be labeled as Special Guest Panelists (there was a group like that a couple years ago) and to take over this convention. More information will come up as we move closer to the con.

[ThundrNeon]

Hmmm, I've been thinking since we got a nice room with a kitchen that it would be a shame to only make 1 dinner and 1 breakfast in it. I'm proposing to make nearly every breakfast and dinner. This would make the overall food monies for the trip really cheap for the 4 day con. Chapel has volunteered to make pancakes and I've volunteered to make curry. I'm thinking of making a lineup like this:

Breakfast:
Pancakes (Chapel)
Bacon and Eggs with toast or bagels (I'll see if I can get a major load of free bagels from Panera Bread) (ThundrNeon a.k.a. Chuck)
Coffee cake (I'll be making this from srcatch) (ThundrNeon)

Lunch:
Bought or skipped during the con unless someone wants to make Bento Style Lunchboxes

Dinner:
Curry (Made with Beef for Avram) (ThundrNeon)
Spaghetti (ThundrNeon)
Stir Fry (ThundrNeon)

If everyone likes this idea then we can work on adjusting a full menu during one of the later Club meetings. That way we can sort out ingredients, etc or even decide if someone is brave enough to make Bento Style lunchboxes for 3 days. It would also be a good time to add if anyone going has food allergies or dietary restrictions to work around. (example: I can't eat sausage or if one of my parents went they have a major mustard allergy) (For reference I can probably work around being vegetarian, but I can't do Vegan)

Feel free to leave a post or see me during Thursday night PAC (I'm usually in the other room for most of the night).

[madmantheo]

For lunches, we could always bring fixings for sandwiches and/or rice balls. Those would be relatively easy to make and carry to the convention center. Something light for us to eat between major meals.

And of course, we have our Thursday tradition of getting dinner at the wonderful Taco Bell/Long John Silvers combo restaurant, fulfilling man's neverending quest to eat tacos and hush puppies in the same meal. There's also a nice Chinese buffet down the road a little ways that we usually hit up once as well.

Money saved from food costs can then of course go to dealer's room and/or alcohol!