My first anime convention! Anastasia and I attended Jacon this year in Orlando, Florida. Jen had previously made me aware that she was going for part of it and knew that I was keen on going to a convention, so thank you to her for letting me know about it.

The first thing we did when we arrived after running around and finding a park was more running around! We ran to the registration (up some stairs and around a bit in one of the buildings) and then ran some more to go find Jen. Jen was waiting in line for the Animusical, which we all then went to. This was an absolutely fantastic production of anime-meets-show-tunes put on by a local anime fanclub Wasabi Anime. I felt privileged to attend, as it was the last Animusical that they are going to do. The whole thing was a fabulous experience, with lots of people dressed up and acting on stage as anime characters lip-synching to various songs from musicals, show tunes and just popular songs. Great stuff.

Over the course of the next couple of days, Anastasia and I took our time wandering around the convention. There were plenty of people cosplaying (dressing up as and sometimes behaving as) various characters from lots of different anime. Naruto and Bleach were both crowd favourites, it would seem. Lots of Bleach characters. We went through the dealer room, which had lots of nifty merchandise for our perusal and purchase. We ended up getting some little Fruits Basket plushies, some manga, a katana and some ramune and pocky for consumption as we walked around. Oh, and a Urahara hat. Um, and a Hitsugaya pin. Did I mention I now own a katana? It’s supposed to be a replica of Ichigo’s Bankai katana (from Bleach), however it doesn’t have the red underlining, it has black… makes it more ninja-esque. Still very cool, if not strictly accurate. Anastasia and I also took a few strolls down Artists’ Alley, where they had a bunch of people doing and selling art. Some were good, some were pretty average, nothing that really stood out and said “buy me!” though, you know? What we did do was get a ‘mangature’ portrait of Anastasia done – like a caricature, but in the style of manga. That’s pretty cool, actually. We also got a little mini-portrait of the two of us, which is kinda cute. ^^

Hm… the only other thing really worth mentioning is the cel-painting. Anastasia and I took a class in cel-style painting, which was pretty interesting. The idea behind regular painting is that you draw from background to foreground, but cel-style is done in reverse! Draw in the highlights and shadows, then start drawing in the base colours. Very different mind-set to do, but in the end we both had a cel-version of Sonic the Hedgehog. ^^

Thanks also go out to Sue, who let us crash at her place in Orlando while we at the con.