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For those of you who go to other conventions, how does the registration process work?  Are the wait times as long as Fanime?

The other cons I go to have massive rooms of people handling registration complete with barcodes and scanners and printers.  Not 3 booths staffed with about 5 people.  If Fanime's going to make picking up badges a requirement at con, there really needs to be more people handling it.

[4) For the attendees: Pushing all the hotel elevator buttons is fucking infantile so knock it off. Also, stop leaving bottles of pee everywhere. At the Fairmont, we kept seeing bottles of pee in the elevator, under tables, in corners. If you guys keep this crap up, the hotels will stop working with Fanime.]

I've been going to Fanime for almost a decade now.

1)  Registration was completely disorganized and ridiculous.  We pre-reged and waited for over 2 hours for our badge.  We missed everything we wanted to see on Friday.  Plus they lost my badge, which for me, is the whole point of pre-reging, to get the nice plastic badge, and not the stupid generic printout badge.  Also, because onsite was so out of control, my friend who can only attend one day, could not get any tickets at all, and was therefore unable to attend Fanime.  We travel over 300 miles to attend Fanime and being forced to have to spend time away from the con so we can also hang out with our friend was aggravating.  Please make single day passes available online AND mail out badges.  Or something.  Friday was a complete bust.  By the time we got our badges, it was dinner time, and we were starving, so yeah.  Friday we spent ZERO time at con, minus the reg line.  A complete wasted day.

2)  Schedules coming out the day before the convention was unacceptable.  I'm in charge of planning everything and seeing what there is to do, and having it come out the day before was ridiculous.  I had to stay up extra late researching anime titles and panels and people to see what we wanted to do.  Please make schedules available at least 1 to 2 weeks before the con.

3)  People blocking hallways and aisles and stairs to take pictures.  More off limit photography areas would be nice so that we can actually move around. I'm about ready to give up and photobomb everything by cutting through.

4)  For the attendees: Pushing all the hotel elevator buttons is fucking infantile so knock it off.  Also, stop leaving bottles of pee everywhere.  At the Fairmont, we kept seeing bottles of pee in the elevator, under tables, in corners.  If you guys keep this crap up, the hotels will stop working with Fanime.

5)  Good things:  anime selection, problems with equipment seemed to be handled quickly. Artist's Alley was amazing.  Despite Friday being a waste, we still managed to do more than 2011, so that was great.

It's just a little over three weeks left til the con; are there any more guests to announce, or is there just the one?

Hopefully you reinvite Gilles Poitras back as a GoH. We attended his Manga for Grownups panel last year and loved it! I also ended up with a mile long shopping list...  I just love his depth of knowledge and I actually learn stuff from his panels.

Redline, like someone mentioned above, would be amazing.  I'd love to see that.

I put this on the video thread, but I'll put it here, too, if you are still taking requests: 

Antique (Korean movie, based on Antique Bakery)

Level E

Wandering Son

Moribito

Antique Bakery

Eden of the East

Toradora

Antique (the K-drama movie)

4) Badges had to be in their big sleeve plastics (My friend couldn't go into the Raves without it.)

Just want to comment real quick here: no they didn't. I went all weekend with the badge itself attached with a clip I brought with me, as I don't like using lanyards or those big builky holder things.

Yes they did.  My friend didn't like it around his neck, so he clipped it to his belt loop instead (still completely visible, and faced out), and they wouldn't let him in the Dealer's Room.  It totally pissed him off.

PROS:

Artist Alley rocked this year.
FMV voting format was excellent.  I like being able to have a list of the FMVs so that I can try to find them later (although I'm having terrible luck with that so far)
FMVs were back in the Civic Center.
FMV categories were a decent length (e.g. not 20 action videos, like last year, which was extremely tiresome)
Pre-Reg line went smoothly.

CONS:

Dealer's room was disappointing, although I did like the kimono booth.
Anime schedule was weird.  Absolutely everything interesting was shown in the early morning (like 8 am or earlier).  I realize that's my preference and whatnot, but yeah... that was strange.  We actually ended up watching NO anime (at the con) this year due to weird scheduling.  Watched anime instead in our hotel room.
Press registration closed an hour before regular registration (which is when we told him the deadline was) so my friend couldn't get his badge.  Nobody working knew why it closed early either, which made him extremely angry as he was bounced from four different people.  So basically he couldn't do anything all night.
Bishie bingo attendees don't know wtf a chair is for, i.e.: you SIT in it so that people BEHIND YOU can SEE.  If you're a 6' guy, why the fuck do you need to stand on a chair?  Also they created a fire hazard by rushing the center aisle.  Everyone was standing on a chair, which made seeing the front impossible.  Ended up yanking a chair off the end and dragging it to the side aisle because I couldn't see a damn thing.  It would help if the strippers had a stage to stand on.  They did this one year; I'm not sure why they stopped.

Yes... something was lacking this year for me and my friends.  We honestly spent hardly any time at the con, and more time off site.  Everything that we wanted to see was scheduled for a terrible time (4 am, 7 am), or conflicted with something that we really had to do (pick up friend at airport).  The dealer's room was less interesting (although artist's alley showed a huge improvement, and I actually spent more money there than the dealer's room).  FMVs were markedly better though than last year, and I enjoyed the new voting format.

However, overall, I still had a ton of fun because Fanime gives my friends an excuse to all get together.

I'd also like this, along with a list and links of the FMV final voting round (I'm having trouble finding some, like the Too Loud! and The Harassment of Kyon.  And who won, too!  Thanks!

Thank god.  None of this 90+ crap.  If it was that hot, I was going to say, "screw cosplay" as I'm not wearing tights/nylons/wig in summer weather.

Yay!  Thanks!  Now we can plan out our weekend.   :D

IIRC, they usually have one 13+ Yaoi Night, and one 18+ Yaoi Night (although maybe this year it's both 18+).  They definitely do show 18+ Yaoi though.

EDIT:  Yes, if you read the vid pages, Fri is all ages, and Sat/Sun is 18+.

Personally, I would like to see some 18+ yaoi and yuri. The last convention I went to had a yaoi showing and it was lame. A cute story, but oh so lame for there was no real action, just heavy hints..

Hence why I wonder where all of these people who insist " OMG11! It's not fair!! Theres SOO much yaoi EVERYWHERE and NO yuri!!1" have been living that they've never seen any AXE/TAG, Girls gone wild/sports/bottled water/Copic marker/billboards/magazine/radio show/ general media advertisement, and OH YEA ANIME and the majority of the merchandise/advertising of the booths at anime conventions.

What the hell do you want? Live hardcore lesbian action in publci everwheyre you go ( not like where far off) ..and don't answer.

You can go anywhere and find girl on girl action but oh noes! I have the knowledge's that yaoi which I could easily ignore is in my general vicinity one weekend a year. it's not fair that I should have to have knowledge of it's existance!!

The REASON why the yuri is 18+ and the yaoi isnt, is because the so called 'yaoi' is only shonen ai which tends to be just childish, suggesting and innuendoes. ( Kyoh Kara Maoh, or whatever the hell it's called, anyone?

As far as it being 'unfair your a minor, that's he rules. Deal.

This post makes absolutely no sense.  First, the person you quoted is not a minor and can see 18+ yaoi/yuri if they wanted to.  Second, the OP (who is not the person you quoted) asked to be able to see 13+ yuri, which is a perfectly valid request if there's 13+/18+ yaoi nights and only 18+ yuri nights.

My geta stash has already been raided and I'm really low on those, but hey, flip flops are good in a pinch, so bring some if you plan to buy a kimono to wear and don't have geta.

Oh, damn, I really wanted to pick up a pair of geta, too.  :(  I have a set of men's, but no women's.

Dammit, phoenixphire started a post at the same time and I can't delete this one...  Can someone merge it?

I'm assuming that the shirts will also be available at the con, since a mere fraction of Fanime attendees visit the boards.

I think I'll need to wait, because I'm not familiar with the Bella brand and might need either a Girls' Large or XL depending on the fit.

Nice job on the shirts though.  The navy looks awesome!

Thanks for getting girly shirts!  I'm very very happy!   :D

Apparently it's some rave at the Cow Palace.

http://skillsdjworkshop.com/pop08/

Hi everyone.

The seating chart has finally come out, so that's exciting. Though we were told to pick our top 4 tables so I suppose it's not truly official yet ^^

I'm new to Fanime and was curious....is the layout set up so new people are in the back and the returning veterens are up in the front? ^^

That bums me out, being in the back and frankly, I'm a little worried :-\  I do hope people come back there and have money left to spend :'(

Can any one offer some insights to what it's like selling there? And what the crowds are like in the artist alley?

Thanks! :)

I'm not a seller, but I can tell you a little bit from what I recall from a buyer's perspective.

The room is very big so there's plenty of room to move around.  Some tables do get a little crowded, but it's NOTHING like AX.  AX is INSANE.  I've always been a Fanime girl, so when I went to AX for the first time last year (Long Beach) and visited their Artist's Alley, I felt like a sardine.  I was worried my art that I was buying was going to get squashed.  Fanime's AA is much much better than that (although I still got whacked on the face by some overenthusiastic cosplayer that made me want to punch him).