I spent last Saturday at the 4th annual Florida SuperCon and had a blast. It was my first time to the FSC, so I really didn’t know what to expect. I’m happy to report that the show was well run, and contained plenty of media guests, artists, activities, and panels to keep fans of all interest levels entertained.
If you like checking out convention photos, then you can click on the individual links in the post or here to see a slideshow of photos [with additional ones not linked below].
I walked onto the convention floor just a bit before the doors opened to find Pat Broderick setting up. It was cool talking to Pat, and refreshing to hear that he still collects art. In fact, Pat was disappointed to learn that legendary artist Gene Colan wasn’t going to be able to make the show due to health reasons. Pat had hoped to get something from him.
Dick Giordano was surrounded by fans the entire day. Dennis Calero was set up and sketching. I had hoped to get him to sign my copy of Duane Swierczynski’s Severance Package novel [Dennis did art for it] and it was the first place I ever saw his work. Can you believe that I accidentally left my copy at home? [I didn’t forget my Walking Dead hardcover and was able to get Tony Moore to sign it.] Still, it was nice to meet Dennis.
Another artist that I met for the first time was Mitch Breitweiser. Mitch was twittering from the show and cracking me up with some of his tweets. It’s also possible that Mitch has some magical powers, since I took at least one photo of him and when I got home none were on my camera!
Sean Shaw was set up and drawing when he wasn’t talking up the UFC! In fact artist alley was hopping with folks like: Saint James Comics, Derrick Fish, Chris Darden [who was painting], Alex Ferrer, Austin Janokowski, Richard Green and so many others. I picked up two Stallone sketches at the show: Andrew Charipar gave me his take on Deke from “Nighthawks” and newcomer, Cayce Moyer took a shot a Rambo.
It seemed that every third person was in a costume and man, there were some really good ones. Like this one, or this one, and especially this one. I taken more photos of the costumed guests and you can see them here.
Brian Thompson, Ted Raimi and Bruce Campbell were the main media guests. Ted Raimi did a one hour panel where he talked to the audience and then led folks chosen from the crowd to join him in a skit of “How a Movie Gets Made in Hollywood.” Bruce Campbell won the crowd over with a one hour session where he simply took questions from the audience. Talk about rapport with the fans, stage presence and great sense of humor. I enjoyed that panel more than any I’ve ever seen and I’m not a HUGE Bruce Campbell fan… or maybe I should say I wasn’t…
As you can probably tell, if you’ve read this far, I had a great day at the Florida SuperCon. I expect that next year will be even better since I’m going to try to make it for more than one day. If you can, you should too!