Can you make it to Angeles? I’m kinda limited as to anywhere outside that city.
Wow that’s like an 8 hours drive from here.
I’ll PM you about that.
Finally ready to talk about Saturday and Sunday at the con. I spoke a lot about the DMC4 / DMC Anime panel at the show in the DMC4 hype thread so if you want to read about that you can just check posts #324 and #325 on this link -
http://forums.shoryuken.com/showthread.php?t=138184&page=13
So here I’ll take about everything else. 
Saturday the first thing I did was comission Omar Dogan to draw me a big 10 x 15 sketch of Blair from SF EX! He had lots of drawings in front of him that he had to do so he said it would take a while. I left the SF EX strat guide that I brung with me with Omar so he could use it as reference. At the end of the day there was Blair in all of her glory! :lovin: I didn’t have anything large enough to carry it home with me at the time so Omar even held the drawing for me until I could come back with a mini portfolio case to protect it, so I picked up the drawing on Sunday. PS have I ever mentioned that STUDIO UDON RULES on this forum? :tup:
I picked up some Capcom related fan stuff too! An artist named Noah did an awesome Morrigan print in color that I got for 12 bucks! I got a chibi vinyl image of Felicia from another vendor. Oh and SNK’s not left out here as I got chibi vinyl images of Kyo, Iori and Shiranui Mai! A fan did a pretty cool Gotenks of Dragon Ball Z fame bookmark too. Man fans rock!
They were selling Japanese games and systems right at the show for people who didn’t want to treck on over to Chinatown ha ha! On the floor they had a Super Famicon with an old school 2D Gundam Wing Fighter! Only one controller but what can you do… I played with Heero, in one game I beat up the other 4 Gundams, Zechs, Lady Unne and Noin and I got up to the final boss Zechs in his Wing Zero mech and he kicked my ass because of course he had a serious case of cheesey boss syndrome but I’m not bitter or anything…
Event time! I attended the Peter Fernandez (Speed Racer) and Corinne Orr (Trixie) panel. Whoa I didn’t know that Trixie did the voice of the Snuggles Bear for 18 years and that Peter Fernandez was Benton Tarentella on Courage the Cowardly Dog man you learn something new everyday.
Next I went to the Kobun Shizuno panel, he directed G.I. Joe Sigma 6, Evangelion 1.0 You Are Not Alone and one of the Fist of the North Star recent anime movies in Japan. We were the first to see a trailer of his brand spanking new anime called Cross Climb! It’s about a girl who wants to improve her love life, so she goes into some virtual reality program where she lives out her life as some crazy cyborg girl who hunts down monsters and robots and that’s supposed to improve her life… Well it’s from Gainax and you know they are out of their freaking minds anyway… 
Cosplayer and animator Aimee Major Steinberger had a slide show of her trip to Japan with her friends and promoted her new book that was just about that and even included a map of all the places she went and stuff. The book also had cute little drawings of all of the stuff she saw. This was all very “Kawaii” heh heh!
Lastly on Saturday I went to check out some more anime so I went to the Clamp (X 1999, Card Captor Sakura, Magic Knight Rayearth) double feature. They showed 2 movies, Tsubasa and XXXholic! Sadly there was something wrong with Tsubasa as at a certain point in the movie it would just freeze towards the end, getting boos from the crowd. They quicky ran to get another copy of the flick, and that one freezed up too! All of their copies of Tsubasa were messed up! So they apologized and said they would show Tsubasa at another event (Maybe AnimeNext? Well I’m not going there I spend too much money at these things…) and they showed XXXholic which was the longest of the 2 features. XXXholic is really freaking funny! :tup:
That’s about it for Saturday. I’ll talk about Sunday next!
Man, I used to love playing that game. That and TMNT: Tournament Fighters were my favorite SF rip-offs. I think Endless Duel was my first experience with super jumping in a 2D fighter. I can’t even remember what it feels like to be a super jump virgin anymore.
So did you dress up and cosplay, sano? I could imagine you as a pretty spot-on Barrett from Final Fantasy VII.
sano is black?
I think so. I’ve never met him in person so I just assumed, as any good SRKer would.
The final and shortest day, Sunday!
After picking up my Blair sketch I attended a Tokyo Pop panel where Jo Chen, cover artist for SF and Buffy the Vampire Slayer was present. There were other Tokyo Pop artists there too but with all due respect who freaking cares JO CHEN WAS THERE! :lovin: She was pushing a manga she did years ago back in Taiwan that she is releasing in the US through Tokyo Pop. Wish I could remember the title but her B&W entires were really good! During the question and answer section I complimented her on her work on SF and Buffy and said that in the last ish of Buffy someone requested that she dosome Buffy pages. I asked her about that, perhaps even as a short back up story she wrote. Compiling things she said earlier in the show, she said that when she first came to the US she found the process to be different from how comics are created in Taiwan. Over there, the artist has a lot of freedom and does everything by themselves, the editors have a lot of power over what you do but basically you are doing it by yourself. Jo Chen said when she worked on the Speed Racer comic (And she was very respectful of the writer when she spoke) that she had disputes with the writer, like she would want to draw a car this big and the writer would want the car to very small. It’s not a process she liked or was used to so she vowed never to work with a writer again. She is doing a brand spanking new work that she will write and draw but she couldn’t give details. GO JO CHEN! :tup:
Off to the gaming room! I got to play Resident Evil Umbrella Chronicles on the Wii blasting zombies in the head with the Wii mote! A day before some of my friends told me they had the Wii Zapper but not while I was there, someone must of broken it D’OH! I played some Trauma Center sewing up bloody accidents and setting bones all on the Wii that was a riot! Other games they had were a Naruto Fighter, a One Piece Fighter, Dynasty Warriors Gundam, Tekken and KOF like I mentioned before and lots of other games I forgot to mention. They even had gaming tournies but I didn’t really mess with them since I didn’t want to miss out on watching anime, a friend of mine rose to be #4 in a Tekken Tourney! :tup:
I attended the ADV panel where they screened lots of upcoming ADV stuff. The first thing they showed was King of Bandit Jing Seventh Heaven. When they asked who was a fan of Jing my hand rose up in the air really fast since I love the manga but I don’t own any of the anime, I’ve seen some of it though it’s pretty cool. Well just because I was the first to raise my hand they gave the very first volume of the anime FOR FREE! 
ADV was giving away lots of anime for free at their panel man they just rocked! :nunchuck:
Media Blasters was premeiring a brand spanking new anime but they didn’t say what it was about. When I went in there it turned out to be some loli show about little girls being witches called Tweeney Witches! They showed the first half hour episode, it was so brand spanking new it was subtitled, no dubs yet. While I prefer to watch subs over dubs most of the time at this point I was freaking tired from getting up early to get to the con every day so with the lights out and me reading the subs I kept falling asleep ACK! It’s a good thing they showed the same episode twice in one setting so the second time I watched the entire episode good, I was awake by then. The caffeine had finally set in. :looney: Cute show!
Next I saw two episodes of the entirely CGI Gundam anime, Gundam MS Igloo. This is basically a show that focuses on Zeon and how they got their asses kicked in the OG Continuity. Wow both episodes ended with Zeon heads dying man how can you not love Gundam? :lovin:
MARVEL NEWS!!! Well kinda, Marvel did come down for a special announcement with Del Ray comics! Is this good, or bad news? I’ll leave you to decide… :wonder: Cebulski was present though. :tup:
The Marvel rep had announced that Marvel was teaming up with Del Ray comics on a special project. So the slide they showed was…
IRON MAN VS. GUNDAM!!!
You heard it here first! They showed an image of the Hollywood movie Iron Man standing next to Amuro’s original Gundam! They also said that H.E.R.B.I.E. from the old Fantastic Four cartoon was going to be involved and they showed an image of him on the screen!
Then the next screen said (Just Kidding). Lol if you’ve ever attended a Marvel panel at a con you know that they like to goof around like that. I remember I attended a Civil War panel in the past and they showed images of Abraham Lincoln.
What they are doing for real, Marvel is working with Del Ray on producing manga based on X-Men. First up is a shojo (manga for girls) based on the X-Men written by Raina Telgemeier (a friend of mine) who writes the scholastic Baby-Sitters Club books and her husband is helping out with the writting too… Darn it, always forget his name sorry… There’s an artist lined up for it but I can’t remember that person’s name either. Hey how’s my reporting? 
Anyway the story is about Kitty Pride being the only girl at an all boys X-Men Academy. They showed VERY BISHONEN (Pretty boy) Images of Magneto and Wolverine, but they were preliminary since it is very early and the final versions may not look like that. They showed a Jean Grey that was rocking a gothic lolita look lol! Well I did take a picture of bishonen Wolverine and I’ll be sure to toss that up soon ha ha!
The second manga they are working on is a shonen (boys manga) on Wolverine. This Wolverine manga would be in a seperate universe from the shojo X-Men one. They really didn’t have anything to show on this since it was really early, just the announcement. Anyway both of these works will be 2 volumes long.
Since Cebulski was there I asked him about the old Spider-Man manga by Ryoichi Ikegami (Crying Freeman, Mai the Psychic Girl) that he was translating in English in the past, basically I was wondering if it was coming back or not. He said that they had a problem with the manga, before it was canceled because the subject matter became too adult oriented for Marvel’s tastes at the point of the story they got up too. In short I kind of got a big “I dunno let’s see maybe through Del Ray” type of answer, ah well least I put it out there… Then to turn the tables I congratulated Cebulski on his work on X-Men Fairy Tales and Spider-Man Fairy Tales since I love those works and asked him what’s next for that franchise. He said that he is going to write Avengers Fairy Tales later on in '08 and they will be based on classic American Fairy Tales, I don’t remember the 4 stories he named but I do remember Pinnochio, I thiiiink he said Dumbo too but I’m not too sure…
The last thing I did on Sunday was attend the Udon Panel but I’m sure by now you all know about the SF2 Turbo and SF3 comics so I’m not going to go into all of that to save some time lol! I did ask Zub a bit about the HD SF2 Turbo game, mainly if they are going to get rid of Master Bison and Cammy being lovers in the new ending, giving a few people in the crowd a few laughs ha ha! He said he hadn’t seen Cammy’s ending yet, but he saw Zangief’s and he can confirm that 'Gief will not be dancing with Gorbachev which seemed to get a mixed reaction from the crowd.
That’s all she wrote. THIS CON RULED! Pictures coming soon!
I didn’t cosplay and I’m Latino man! I think I would make a good Barret though. I mean, his adopted daughter was white right? Yeah we Latinos are all mixed anyway. :lol:
I know, I was just reliving the days when I thought you were the guy behind you in that picture from that one issue of Street Fighter… That really excited black guy who was looking at your butt - that’s who I thought you were. You should cosplay as Darth Vader next time.
Did you get Jo Chen’s phone number, player?
Dammit, you got me excited with that Iron Man vs. Amuro Rey cocktease. I think that could be funnier than New Avengers/Transformers any day of the week.
sano is wetback? good. so am i
I didn’t get Jo Chen’s number lol!
I think I was the only one who was excited about Iron Man vs. Gundam for 2 whole seconds until I saw H.E.R.B.I.E. man that’s what you call a buzz kill. :looney:
I can’t believe i just looked ta every damn pic sano took!
:lol:at the kid next to soundwave
Sano hit me up when the next con rolls around.
wow that is nothing new! Teenage girls chasing after boys fighting evil for love of these same boys.
Vader at Baltimore Comic Con 2007 (yeah it is pretty bad but i tried with the camera phone)
Since you were talking about an anime con sano. I assume that you have attended at least one of the otakons that happens in baltimore every year?
Nah man, I haven’t attended a con outside of NY since one of the ones in Chicago, it was a Wizard one, what was it '99 or something? It was a long time ago. I’ll head over to San Diego one of these years, '08 is out unless I win a contest I entered to get in for free lol! '09 is really possible though, have to see what happens. In '08 I want to visit Japan again so chances are I’m gonna do that instead, but who knows.
Orochizoolander I’ll hit you up man! The NY Comic Con is in April, try to get your tickets before then because those tend to sell out.
I’ll definitely be hitting that up as long as it’s not the same weekend of MWC, I believe they are in the same month.
the only reason i ask cuz the otakon is one of the larger ones out there. Downtown Baltimore is crazy packed and there is no room at all. At times a number of the local clubs have parties during those days. Im going in 08 and this is a first time for me. The funny part is this thing has been going on since 94. I was unaware of this thing until 05. Anyway this pic is from last year
You’ve played Metal Gear Solid before right? You have to of heard about Otacon man he got his name from the con!
Yeah I doubt I’ll ever attend Otacon or at the very least not before I hit up San Diego, but you never know I guess.
Take lots of pictures if you go! :tup:
Here’s my pictures from the NY Anime Festival!
First up are the sketches I got from Studio Udon. Two from Omar Dogan. Saya from Namco x Capcom!
And Blair from SF EX!
From Joe NG, I got a sketch of Mukuro AKA Kenji from Warzard AKA Red Earth!
Big up to Joe Zub of Studio Udon for signing his Makeshift Miracle book for me and giving me a sketch of the main character Colby!
Now for stuff made by fans! Here’s an awesome print of Morrigan from Darkstalkers I got from a female artist who goes by the name Noah!
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM05.jpg
I also got a vinyl sticker of Felicia of Darkstalkers!
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM06.jpg
SNK has fans too! Some vinyl stickers of Kyo, Iori and Mai!
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM07.jpg
The Anime Festival con did share space with Wizards of the Coast so a shout out goes to the people who attended that event. I’LL PLAY SERRA ANGEL IN ATTACK MODE!
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM08.jpg
AND I SUMMON SERRA ANGEL TO THE FIELD!
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM09.jpg
Hey now we can’t have a convention without an official NY Anime Festival Con mascot. Designed by Shi Yaun Kuang this is Libby, a chibi kimono wearing version of NY’s own Statue of Liberty. Libbie, get it! :lovin:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM10.jpg
Yeah Libbie protect my comic book collection when I’m not around! 
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM11.jpg
CAPCOM CAME DOWN WOOT WOOT! :rock:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM12.jpg
Devil May Cry 4 flyers they were handing out at the show!
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM13.jpg
Pictures of the booth space they shared with ADV. You could play both the Devil May Cry 4 demo on either the PS3 or the 360 and they had Zack & Wiki for the Wii inside this booth too!
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM14.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM15.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM16.jpg
SNK was also in the HIZOOOOOUSE! :tup:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM17.jpg
They had wall projectors running so these are giant sized images of Virtua Fighter 5, KOF 11 and Tekken 5 that people were playing at the show! :wow:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM18.jpg
Godzilla Unleashed was also available for play. You know I can’t resist taking a picture of Gojira and his peeps. :lovin:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM19.jpg
A picture of a Death Note Wall Scroll only because I love the Death Note manga and anime. Besides, Misa’s not ugly. :lovin:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM20.jpg
Marvel has teamed up with Del Rey manga to create a shojo (girl’s manga) of X-Men and a shonen (boy’s manga) of Wolverine. Here’s an early conceptual image of Bishonen Wolverine for the X-Men Shojo.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM40.jpg
A whole lot of cosplaying! :nunchuck:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM21.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM22.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM23.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM24.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM25.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM27.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM28.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM29.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM30.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM31.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM32.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM33.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM34.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM35.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM36.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM37.jpg
Gotta wrap things up with Capcom cosplayers. First is Chun-Li!
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM38.jpg
Finally, it’s Cammy hanging out with Ingrid and Hermit! Hermit hails from the manga/anime/Capcom produced fighting game entitled History’s Strongest Disciple Kenichi. LOL the Hermit cosplayer was surprised I knew who he was, I was the first to ID him. HOT DAMN NOW THAT’S SOME HARDCORE CAPCOM LOVIN’ FROM COSPLAYERS!!! :lovin:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v729/futaenokiwami/AM39.jpg
That’s all I got. Hope you enjoyed! 
man, I love those sketches, Sano!