WONDERFEST 2004
Ok here is my tale from Wonderfest2004
First, the trip there wasn't too bad. Hit a major downpour just
as we got close to the hotel. Could barely see past the hood of
the truck. Nothing like last years major traffic jams thankfully.
Got checked in (darn it 4th floor again. Liked it better on the
1st floor last year). Got unloaded and unpacked.
Headed downstairs and got our badges and contest entry forms.
Ordered pizza for diner. Filled out our entry forms and decided
which demos we wanted to see while we ate.
This took us close to 7 PM, so we headed down for the lounge. Sat
in the lobby for a little bit and hooked up with a few friends
from the board. Then the Lizard Lounge opened and we headed in.
Ran into some old friends we have met in past years, and hooked
up with some board members we haddn't met before.
 Back along the wall from left to right, we have Branes, Qtan & Superelvis. In the front is Nightowl, then Hooty, Harry Hammock, and I am not sure who the gentleman is that is standing on the right. |
 Ratman, Branes, Qtan, and Nightowl |
 Here is another shot except this time, I am in it too. |
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 Crazy Joe cutting a rug. |
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This year, they did something different. They had a band play in the Lizard Lounge. The band wasn't too bad, but they were way too loud. I was there to visit and meet people, but with the band playing, I couldn't hear a thing. So after a little bit of the band, Britny and I moved out to the lobby. Hung out there for the rest of the night. Got to sit and visit with a bunch of people.
Saturday morning, we got up, grabbed our
entries and headed for the contest room.
After we got them all entered, we headed for the lobby to wait
for the dealers room to open. At that time, the line was almost
up to the lobby. By the time the room did open, the line was
almost to the resturant!
When we finally got to the dealers room, the place was packed.
Stopped at the PL table and got our goodie bags and badges.
Managed to get a quick view of most of the tables before we had
to leave for the first demo we wanted to see.
The demo was "Washes & Drybrushing". Never too many
demos on the basics. I even managed to pick up a new technique
for washes at it.
Then it was back to the dealers room again. We thought about
checking out the contest before the next demo, but the line was
way too long to even think about that. So we just walked around
the dealers room taking pictures and checking out all the cool
stuff. Lots of great kits to think about, but I wanted to check
it all out before deciding what to spend the meager amount of
money I had with me on.
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Next it was off to the "Thinking
Outside the Box" talk by Chris White. Another cool hour
spent.
Since we were already upstairs, and the line was short, we took a
quick look around the contest room. Place was still pretty full.
On to the next demo. "Fleshtones 2.0". Didn't know how
handy this would be. Really didn't think it would be too useful
since I don't really use my airbrush much. But after one of my
purchases during the weekend, I'm gonna have to get comfortable
with mine. Way too big to brush paint.
Back to the dealers room again. Actually bought something on this
trip. Jayco had a baggie with a couple of tombstones the upper
half of a zombie, and a skull for only $15. Couldn't pass that
up. I know I will find a use for them somewhere.
After the room closed, back to the room to rest a little and eat
some dinner.
Saturday night we hung out in the lobby yet again. We didn't have
tickets for the movie, so after we ate, we just hung out with
whoever we ran across. After the movie goers got back things
livened up a bit. At 11 we went upstairs to check out the
"Chiller Cinema Live". Was pretty cool. The place was
packed.
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I have never seen the upstairs theater so packed. They showed the She Creature, hosted by Doctor Gangrene with special guest Bob Burns. They also showed a bunch of clips that Bob brought along of some of the test shots and stuff that had been done for some of the movies he worked on. It was hilarious. Bob's commentary during the clips had me almost rolling on the floor. At the end of the features, the Doctor had Bob try some of his experimental concotion. Which caused Bob to start turning into the She Creature himself :-)
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At the show we also ended up hooking up with this crew-
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From left to right : Don, Bill, Brian, Chinxy, and Otto |
Little did we know at the time, but running into these guys would forever change the way we remember this years WF. More on that later.
Next, after the show, we swung over to
the Cult-suite for a while.
We missed out on Marta being there earlier in the evening. We did
show up towards the end of one of the movies though. Not sure,
but I think it was Battle Beyond the Stars. After that, we got to
see the Merriman out-takes. For anyone who hangs around on
Steve's board, and knows the history of Dave Merriman, it was
absolutely hilarious. LOL
Shortly after that, things started breaking up in the suite, so
we headed back down to the lobby.
Who should we run into down there?
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Yeah, these guys again.
And here is where it gets really weird.
For some ungodly reason, they had a casting of THE FOOT with
them.
I would add captions to these pics, but I
figure it would be more fun to let your imagination just run with
it.
I will just say that Scott seemed to have a really unhealthy
fixation with THE FOOT.
Sunday morning we were back in the lobby
again waiting for the dealers room to open. Ran into THE FOOT
crew again. They were taking even more pictures of the foot, and
for the "How much we miss Ed" thing they were doing :-)
When things opened up again, we headed to the dealers room first.
It was cool, there weren't many people in there yet. Noticed
little red dots on the entry forms for Britny's Godzilla, and my
MOM Frankenstein. [high five]
Took a bunch more pics.
Then we headed to the next guest talk. "Making Faces"
with CSI's John Goodwin. Really cool watching him do make-up on
people in the audience. You know, cool stuff like bullet holes in
the head, cuts. One of the WF staff even had her face done up to
look like the She Creature. The whole time he was talking about
all kinds of neat stuff about working on a TV show.
We had to cut out early though, to catch one of the must-see
demos for us.
"Working with Watercolors". This was truely awesome.
Learned some great stuff that I plan on putting to use right
away.
Back to the dealers room again. Had kinda made up my mind on a
few things, but of course the kits I decided I wanted were
already sold out. :(
Oh well, you snooze you loose. I did swing by Cult's table and
grabbed the Aurora Model Kit Guide.
Hung out a little over at Randy's table checking out the
chainmail.
Found a few other kits that I started thinking about getting.
Britny took off for a demo on eyes. I had already seen it last
year. Really good.
We met back up at the awards ceremony. Got a good shot of Brit
getting her Certificate of Merit.
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After the awards ceremony, we made
another pass through the dealers room while we waited for the
line to clear out so we could get our entries. I picked up a
Reagan bust, and the Hard Hero 1:6 King Kull (huge kit).
Then we grabbed our contest entries and took them back to the
room. After the dealers room closed, we went out looking for
somewhere to eat. Couldn't find a Dairy Queen, so we settled on
McDonnalds.
After that, we headed down to the lobby (yet again).
I brought my Aurora Model Kits Guide. So I could look through it
when things were slow. Turned out to be pretty popular. Lots of
people thumbed through it while we were sitting down there.
Chinxy kept kicking himself for not buying it when he had a
chance (Steve sold out of them at the show).
Somehow, I got drafted to help load up the mummy display after
the show. (told you hanging out with those guys would cause
trouble :-)
Funny thing too. I never even made it into the special displays
room. Just didn't seem like there was time. Even though, I do
like the Creature and LIS, they aren't high enough on my priority
list to make the displays a "must see".
As you can see from the second row of pictures, Scott was in his
usually form.
And of course we had to take a moment to show how much we missed
"Dice" this year :-)
Spent the night hanging around the lobby
again. Was amazing how many people couldn't belive that Britny
was only 13. They were all wondering why we weren't in the
lounge. When I explained that she wasn't old enough to go in,
their jaws usually dropped when they found out her actual age.
:-)
Swung by Cult's but it was kinda dead. Watched a couple of eps of
Futurama then went back to the lobby. Caught Phil and a bunch of
others just before they went into the lounge. They said to hang
around, because there was going to be a group photo around 1 AM.
The group photo was huge. Also kinda funny. We were all a little
loud and rowdie. Then while in the process of setting up the
shot, the top of the podium got knocked off and papers went
everywhere. All this kind of attracted the attention of security.
There was this skinny short Barney Fife looking guy in uniform
standing by the front desk looking sternly at us. Really kind of
absurd when you think about it :-)
After that, I ended up standing around talking with Wayne, and
Camper. Britny looked like she was falling asleep on the couch so
we headed back to the room.
Monday morning we packed up. Loaded
everything into the truck, then headed back to the lobby.
Ran into a few people. Said our good bye's. Ran up to the Jayco
suite and said good bye to those guys. Stopped at Steve's again,
but there was no answer. Don't know if he left early, or if they
were still having breakfast.
Made another couple rounds, said good bye to a few more people,
then left for our trip home.
Already making plans for next year!