Post: Ohio Con 2012

Hello everyone! I am back from Columbus and what an amazing weekend it was! This year I brought Mike Roll and his adorable little zombie girl, Apooka, with me.

FRIDAY: I was able to come in Friday for preview night which was a little evening pre-con con. I was able to get some sketch requests that night and a lot of the VIP'ers purchased prints from me which was nice because I had restocked with the new 11x14s. I also got a lovely note from Drew Blank who knows about my utter love and affection for How I Met Your Mother.

It's always a pleasure chatting with that guy.  I like it so much I asked him to write the foreword to HEART. Speaking of, when I went to check in the hotel, there was a package there waiting for me containing the first shipment of 72 books!  I couldn't be more excited.

SATURDAY: This was the MEGA SUPER…and I really do mean SUPER. I was technically flying solo this weekend.  My better and way prettier half of the crime fighting duo, was spending time with her family at EIU this very same weekend. So I had to handle the business side of things too: keeping track of inventory and sketch list, money handling, learning how to add, square transactions. It was pretty chaotic but I felt I had a good handle on it. 

This was only the second con I offered up the cardBORED sketches and the appeal is really building. People like how different it is and really dig the way the inks pull a lot of texture from them. The amount of sketches vary through out conventions but I am noticing as I produce more work for the table  that the sketches are starting to even out with the amount of business I get from my books.  That's a good thing as I am getting more people flipping through the books.  Don't get me wrong I love drawing for people and it's something I will favor over doing the sales pitch over and over again.  It's nice to see them finding their level and it made it a lot easier for me running the one man show.

It was also a big print show.  I sold out of all my TMNT prints that I made for the Fanfare last year and the Avengers one selling well. I didn't bring that many WIWL books with me because I really wanted to push HEART and Playing the Alphabet so by the time Saturday had come to an end, I was already down to my last When I Was Little Too. It was a good feeling.

The lovely Lora Innes stopped by to say hi and congratulate me on HEART which she got to scope out the night before with Trevor Mueller's copy. She also brought a fellow Paper Winger with her, Scott Hoffman, who was interested in talking children's book shop with me. He was a nice guy and even picked up a set of the WIWL books before he left. I didn't bring that many WIWL books with me because I really wanted to push HEART and Playing the Alphabet so by the time Saturday had come to an end, I was already down to my last When I Was Little Too thanks to Scott. It was a good feeling.

Yay! Paperwings' connections being made at conventions. Before Lora left I gave her Nicole's Mulan sketchbook and asked her to do a li'l something something with it.  She gladly took the book and looked wide eyed when I told her it was about Mulan. Later on Lora sent me a tweet to come by and pick up the sketchbook and she presented me with this: 

 *photo courtesy of Lora's twitter

It was incredible! When I showed Nic she loved it, laughed cause she knew the scene that she drew.

It picked up quite a bit by mid-afternoon but I elected to dive out for a few minutes to meet my favorite Superman ever, Dean Cain. As I was walking back from the restroom I noticed he had just sat down at his booth and the line didn't start forming yet. So I rushed back to the table and grabbed my Season 1 dvd of Lois and Clark. I walked right up there, shook his hand and chatted about his new show, Stars and Stripes. Just enough time to soak it all in before the next group of people came his way.  As I made my way back to the table I went straight for the Photo-Ops booth and purchased a ticket for a photo.  I was totally geeking out and it's something I never really do at conventions any more.  I'm so numb to it seeing all these celebrities walking by amongst the comic crowd. But this was Dean Cain and growing up he was my Superman. How could I not geek out about this. I thought as a token of my appreciation for all the work he did on the show I would give him a World's Finest print.

Later on when I walked up to him to get my picture taken. I handed him the print whilst at the same time trying to form words that sounded awkward and mumbled but to the tone of, "Hey I got this print for you." He felt humbled by it and he really dug it.  He said so. He's Superman. He doesn't lie. The whole experience was a blur but it was really cool to meet him and he was very gracious about the whole thing. The cherry on top of the cake was that after he was done and I was long gone back at my table working on another sketch request, he walked by my table to tell me again how great the print was. Then we did the most epic of handshakes and we both went about our business. Superman acknowledged me, he called me by  my first name and said he liked something that I had done. Right then and there, I felt like the coolest kid on the planet.

I didn't need to sell anything else that day, but I did and I was riding that high.

I still am.

SUNDAY: Miker and I got an early start because we needed to get into the good parking lot across the street so it wouldn't be such a haul for us later carrying all our things. We got in early and scoped out some of the artist alley and table booths. Got to snap some sweet photos of the Ecto-1 and some Dr. Who stuff. When the show opened it was pretty slow in the beginning.  (My theory is that everyone was watching the new TMNT show on Nickelodeon.)

Anyway, the show picked up right around noon and I got a lot more cardBORED sketch requests in.  I also sold the last WIWL2 which made table room for more copies of HEART.

Rachel, another con buddy I met at my first MOC, stopped by my table and dropped off some mini cupcakes, another convention highlight.  It's always great to see her and her family at the show. They stopped by again later in the day and picked up some more coloring books for their son, Jonathan, as well as a copy of Heart. It got really slow the last two hours so I used that time to walk around and I spotted Humberto Ramos deep into a Spiderman sketch cover. I ended up getting his new Art N' Out: Sabotage book and told him how much of a fan I was and that I donated to his Fairy Quest Kickstarter. I was pretty tired towards the end but managed the 6 hour drive by myself without any real long stops.

This show has always been a favorite of mine and I was glad I got to bring Miker with me.  Hopefully next year, the great Joe Foo will come with us and dominate.  Thanks for having me Columbus we will see you next year!