May 25th, 2009 (11:53 am)
current mood: accomplished
We came back from Anime Boston last night and all I can say is thank goodness my job decided to schedule me to not come in today which is fine by me because I get paid anyway for the holiday! I volunteered to work Friday though since we'll be heading off to Florida for Florida Super Con that weekend and I didn't want to lose a day of pay if I can help it. So how was the show, you ask?
IT WAS FANTABULOUS! :D
It's been a while since we had a OMG! show like this. We've been doing okay at previous shows (Steel City notwithstanding) but this one was amazing. My sketches flew off the table and I got several con commissions done as well. And to think I was getting worried about the sketches being a waste of time! Guess not! :D We also brought a stack of old individual issues that we sold for 50 cents each and by the end of the con our pockets looked like we were heading to a strip club with all the dollar bills we had. The last time we went to Anime Boston we kinda had a lackluster time and couldn't understand why the artist alley was open so late until 10:30 pm. This year, we wished more shows were like this! Even thought we got into Boston 5 hours late, we were able to make it up with the 10:30 close and the Alley was busy the entire time. But also we were doing things differently this time around and it worked really well for us. And we stayed until late close both times. We were tired but it was worth it!
It also reinforced that my con sketch prices were just right. I charge $25 for the pre-made stuff and $35 for customs. Most people in the artist alley were charging $5 - $10 for sketches and I shuddered at the amount of work they had to do to make the same money I was making in less time. There were a couple of girls who whined about my prices but I wasn't budging. A pair of girls were particularly nasty about it and I just shrugged (like them being nasty would make me change my mind. Honeys, wait until you're old enough to work actual retail. ) When they left I mumbled to Jose, "Duh, my stuff is expensive because you can't afford me." I'm tired of catering to cheap mf'ers who only care about price rather than whether they're getting artwork that's actually any good.
And before anyone gets on me about "they're just kids", let me remind you that these "kids" were wearing hundreds of dollars worth of props, lolita outfits, cosplay materials and spending just as much in the Dealer's room on manga, figurines, costumes, and DVD's. And mind you, it's not like the convention was free either. But they want me to be flexible with the price of my time and markers? No. If you can't pay, you can't play. Move along.
I had one girl completely GUSH at the Chekov Star Trek commission she asked me for. (Even though I didn't think it looked anything like him because I couldn't find enough good reference from the wonky free wifi). She was excited that she could even GET a Star Trek commission at an anime show. Her friend was contemplating getting a Spock but they never came back. It was funny. I guess I stood out so much because I wasn't doing replica anime portraits. I'm glad it worked out.
So onto the art:
Sorry for the quality of the photos. The lighting in the artist alley was horrible and I kept getting shadows on everything. The first Alice piece with the cards was bought within minutes of me putting it in the box. A girl was running by, grabbed the piece and plunked down her 25 dollars without saying a word. Glad to be of service. :)
I also have a photo gallery from Anime Boston on Facebook if you want to check that out too.
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