Draft con report for Baycon 2007
May. 30th, 2007 07:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
julesjonesDraft con report behind the cut. I will add more detail from my notes of some of the panels later, but I wanted to get this stuff down while I can still remember it.
Friday
The con moved to a new hotel this year, though still one within easy commuting distance for me. I don't sleep well in hotels and I'm not much of a party animal, so I normally commute if it's easy to do so. The new hotel turned out to be a warm but easy walk from the Hayward Park Caltrain station, though it would have helped if Yahoo had not shown the station a block away from where it actually is. It's definitely on the cosy side for a 2,000 member con, and a contender for "most confusing hotel layout" (*lots* of people were making Escher references by the second day), but otherwise very nice.
Got there in plenty of time to sort out getting my badge printed with the correct name and wander around for half an hour trying to locate the various rooms in an unfamiliar hotel after many years in the Doubletree. Even ran into David Friedman and family, which was the point at which I realised that I had completely forgotten to wear my rasfc cat vacuuming badge. Did a quick tour of the art show before the first panel, which was a mistake, as I managed to find reasons to ignore what I'd said about not buying any more art.
Went to the panel on the seven basic plots, in part because the panelists included Terry Hickman from the Speculations Rumor Mill and David Freidman from rec.arts.sf.composition, so it was a likely gathering point for people from both groups. And indeed I found![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
yourbob in the audience, and Bill Swears arrived at the end of the panel. Not much to say about the panel itself, other than it was fun.
Talked to Terry, Bob and Bill for a while afterwards, then did a tour of the dealer's room. Caught up with Bill again after the panel he'd gone to at 4pm, and we had dinner in the California Grill after doing some wandering around looking for other people we knew. We did catch up briefly with Dorothy Heydt before dinner, but she was on her way to her room for a much-needed nap, so could only talk for a minute or so.
Saturday
ritaxis was staying with me on Saturday and Sunday so we could commute together, and picked me up on Saturday morning so that I wouldn't have to take the train when lugging bits of paper. I had to get to the first panel slot of the day, because I was part of the Broad Universe Rapidfire Reading at 10 am. For a few days I'd thought I was going to be the reading after a spate of Broads not being able to make it to the con, but Terry joined up the week of the con, so I wasn't all on my lonesome. We alternated with excerpts from my gay fantasy novel Spindrift and excerpts from her straight sf novella The Battle for Newhome. Terry's is very good and you should buy a copy (ritaxis and I both did).
We gossipped about CafePress for a while afterwards, thenritaxis, hrj and I headed off to the 11: 30 panel on small press publishing by Marty Halpern, acquisitions editor at Golden Gryphon. I appear to have taken a reasonable number of notes for this one, which I'll transcribe later, but as usual Marty gave a great panel. He's knowledgable, friendly, doesn't diss other people, and when he wanders off on a tangent he still makes sure to return to answer the original question.
After the panel we had lunch in the California Grill. Having eaten there several times during the con, I can say that the food wasn't the greatest, but the service was pretty good and with having set up a barbecue outside as well, they actually had enough seating -- something of a sore point with the previous hotel. Afterwards we did the dealer's room and the art show, and simply hung out for a while. I gave in to temptation and after a certain amount of dithering put in a direct sale rather than a minimum bid on a print I'd taken a fancy to. It was a fairy bearing a strong resemblance to a female version of one of the characters in my urban fantasy WIP, and I decided that I liked it enough to pay the extra tenner to secure it there and then. (The next day I put in a minimum bid on another print by the same artist, and won it.) It's going on the wall above my computer while I write. the book. :-)
The afternoon panel of choice was "Poisoning -- new twists on an old ploy", with some interesting discussion on how to poison your characters in various situations, inspired by the recent fatal poisoning of a former Russion spy with Polonium 210. A couple of useful reference books were mentioned, which I'll add when I've double-checked the titles.
We headed into San Mateo for dinner, and simply stopped at the first Chinese restaurant we found. It turned out to have only opened a couple of months earlier, so the owner was interested in hearing how we'd found it. When we told her, she said they'd had several groups from the con wander in already. The wonton soup was excellent, though the main course and service were less so. I'd go there again, but it wouldn't be my first choice.
The evening panel of choice had to be "Alien Sex". This year Patrica McEwan took the theme of "the battle of the sexes", and discussed the mating strategies where males and females of the species have different goals, and try to maximise their own best interests. As ever, this was a wonderful panel for thinking about how to create alien-feeling cultures by looking at examples right here on earth and considering how intelligent species with that reproductive strategy might behave.
Sunday
Sunday was the day for failing to get into panels through not getting there before the room had filled up. However,ritaxis and I did get to Ctein's panel on "digital restoration for (not quite) dummies", which was most excellent, and if I start getting into restoring some of the old family photos I'll be very tempted to buy his book.
The next panel we actually managed to get to was "fight scenes for writers and artists", a live action exercise on blocking out a fight scene, with audience participation. This one was well worth while, demonstrating that you need to think about how the physical conditions will affect the way things play out.
The evening panel was "editing: when fixing wrongs don't make it right", which I remeber as being interesting, but haven't taken any notes for. Yes, I know some of you will be cursing me. Marty Helpern of Golden Gryphon, and Norman Sperling of The Journal of Irreproducible Results, not always agreeing with each other, but doing so in informative and entertaining fashion.
ritaxis and I went to loiter with intent outside the California Grill, where we found a queue that included another party of two, Patricia "Alien Sex" McEwan and friend. ritaxis pointed out that we'd probably get served quicker as a party of four, which proved correct when one of the staff came along the line asking what size our parties were, and the newly formed party of four was seated immediately. Excellent conversation ensued. After we'd finished eating we finally caught up with Hal and Dorothy Heydt, who must have come in to eat not long after we did, and we went to their room to see the latest MMPORG they're involved in. Rather nice LoTR-based game with pretty, pretty graphics.
Monday
There were panels of interest, but nothing that was a must-see.ritaxis and I spent some time talking to Terry, and then we all went to the art show pickup, as Terry and I both had art to collect. To file under "the things you see at cons" -- small child practicing her knife throws with a rubber knife, under instruction from her mother in the art show queue, with even smaller child carried by mother in sling, but intently focused on what big sister was doing...
And so it ended, with Terry carried off by her son so that she could be put on her plane home, andritaxis and I heading to Trader Joe's for some food before heading home. I had a great time -- and didn't get food poisoning or toothache, yay!
Friday
The con moved to a new hotel this year, though still one within easy commuting distance for me. I don't sleep well in hotels and I'm not much of a party animal, so I normally commute if it's easy to do so. The new hotel turned out to be a warm but easy walk from the Hayward Park Caltrain station, though it would have helped if Yahoo had not shown the station a block away from where it actually is. It's definitely on the cosy side for a 2,000 member con, and a contender for "most confusing hotel layout" (*lots* of people were making Escher references by the second day), but otherwise very nice.
Got there in plenty of time to sort out getting my badge printed with the correct name and wander around for half an hour trying to locate the various rooms in an unfamiliar hotel after many years in the Doubletree. Even ran into David Friedman and family, which was the point at which I realised that I had completely forgotten to wear my rasfc cat vacuuming badge. Did a quick tour of the art show before the first panel, which was a mistake, as I managed to find reasons to ignore what I'd said about not buying any more art.
Went to the panel on the seven basic plots, in part because the panelists included Terry Hickman from the Speculations Rumor Mill and David Freidman from rec.arts.sf.composition, so it was a likely gathering point for people from both groups. And indeed I found
yourbob in the audience, and Bill Swears arrived at the end of the panel. Not much to say about the panel itself, other than it was fun.Talked to Terry, Bob and Bill for a while afterwards, then did a tour of the dealer's room. Caught up with Bill again after the panel he'd gone to at 4pm, and we had dinner in the California Grill after doing some wandering around looking for other people we knew. We did catch up briefly with Dorothy Heydt before dinner, but she was on her way to her room for a much-needed nap, so could only talk for a minute or so.
Saturday
ritaxis was staying with me on Saturday and Sunday so we could commute together, and picked me up on Saturday morning so that I wouldn't have to take the train when lugging bits of paper. I had to get to the first panel slot of the day, because I was part of the Broad Universe Rapidfire Reading at 10 am. For a few days I'd thought I was going to be the reading after a spate of Broads not being able to make it to the con, but Terry joined up the week of the con, so I wasn't all on my lonesome. We alternated with excerpts from my gay fantasy novel Spindrift and excerpts from her straight sf novella The Battle for Newhome. Terry's is very good and you should buy a copy (ritaxis and I both did). We gossipped about CafePress for a while afterwards, then
ritaxis, hrj and I headed off to the 11: 30 panel on small press publishing by Marty Halpern, acquisitions editor at Golden Gryphon. I appear to have taken a reasonable number of notes for this one, which I'll transcribe later, but as usual Marty gave a great panel. He's knowledgable, friendly, doesn't diss other people, and when he wanders off on a tangent he still makes sure to return to answer the original question.After the panel we had lunch in the California Grill. Having eaten there several times during the con, I can say that the food wasn't the greatest, but the service was pretty good and with having set up a barbecue outside as well, they actually had enough seating -- something of a sore point with the previous hotel. Afterwards we did the dealer's room and the art show, and simply hung out for a while. I gave in to temptation and after a certain amount of dithering put in a direct sale rather than a minimum bid on a print I'd taken a fancy to. It was a fairy bearing a strong resemblance to a female version of one of the characters in my urban fantasy WIP, and I decided that I liked it enough to pay the extra tenner to secure it there and then. (The next day I put in a minimum bid on another print by the same artist, and won it.) It's going on the wall above my computer while I write. the book. :-)
The afternoon panel of choice was "Poisoning -- new twists on an old ploy", with some interesting discussion on how to poison your characters in various situations, inspired by the recent fatal poisoning of a former Russion spy with Polonium 210. A couple of useful reference books were mentioned, which I'll add when I've double-checked the titles.
We headed into San Mateo for dinner, and simply stopped at the first Chinese restaurant we found. It turned out to have only opened a couple of months earlier, so the owner was interested in hearing how we'd found it. When we told her, she said they'd had several groups from the con wander in already. The wonton soup was excellent, though the main course and service were less so. I'd go there again, but it wouldn't be my first choice.
The evening panel of choice had to be "Alien Sex". This year Patrica McEwan took the theme of "the battle of the sexes", and discussed the mating strategies where males and females of the species have different goals, and try to maximise their own best interests. As ever, this was a wonderful panel for thinking about how to create alien-feeling cultures by looking at examples right here on earth and considering how intelligent species with that reproductive strategy might behave.
Sunday
Sunday was the day for failing to get into panels through not getting there before the room had filled up. However,
ritaxis and I did get to Ctein's panel on "digital restoration for (not quite) dummies", which was most excellent, and if I start getting into restoring some of the old family photos I'll be very tempted to buy his book.The next panel we actually managed to get to was "fight scenes for writers and artists", a live action exercise on blocking out a fight scene, with audience participation. This one was well worth while, demonstrating that you need to think about how the physical conditions will affect the way things play out.
The evening panel was "editing: when fixing wrongs don't make it right", which I remeber as being interesting, but haven't taken any notes for. Yes, I know some of you will be cursing me. Marty Helpern of Golden Gryphon, and Norman Sperling of The Journal of Irreproducible Results, not always agreeing with each other, but doing so in informative and entertaining fashion.
ritaxis and I went to loiter with intent outside the California Grill, where we found a queue that included another party of two, Patricia "Alien Sex" McEwan and friend. ritaxis pointed out that we'd probably get served quicker as a party of four, which proved correct when one of the staff came along the line asking what size our parties were, and the newly formed party of four was seated immediately. Excellent conversation ensued. After we'd finished eating we finally caught up with Hal and Dorothy Heydt, who must have come in to eat not long after we did, and we went to their room to see the latest MMPORG they're involved in. Rather nice LoTR-based game with pretty, pretty graphics.Monday
There were panels of interest, but nothing that was a must-see.
ritaxis and I spent some time talking to Terry, and then we all went to the art show pickup, as Terry and I both had art to collect. To file under "the things you see at cons" -- small child practicing her knife throws with a rubber knife, under instruction from her mother in the art show queue, with even smaller child carried by mother in sling, but intently focused on what big sister was doing...And so it ended, with Terry carried off by her son so that she could be put on her plane home, and
ritaxis and I heading to Trader Joe's for some food before heading home. I had a great time -- and didn't get food poisoning or toothache, yay!