Galaxycon Austin 2023 | Tales of a Con Artist

Comments · 291

• SU

  @supernovablade · 3 years ago

  Sorry that this con was such a bust. But, I will still forever be grateful that I got someone into Castoff because of this con and convincing them to come to your table.

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• IN

  @InsomniacUnicorn · 3 years ago

  GalaxyCon Louisiville was one of the WORST conventions I've ever had to deal with. I think it's just the entire GalaxyCon franchise. A massive lack of panels, poor organization, in the case of Louisiville the parking situation was NOT disability friendly unless you got there absurdly early for one of like 10 accessibility spots, and artist alley being tightly crammed together in the back of the dealers room. They make their guests charge for autographs too, even if the guest normally wouldn't. Hearing what you went through in Austin, like I said, sounds like the franchise as a whole is the problem and I wouldn't hold my breath on them changing any time soon.

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• GA

  @Garoogie · 3 years ago

  I was one of the people who chatted with you at your booth on Friday and Saturday of the con, I enjoyed myself but I could definitely see that the artists were suffering. I didn't get stuck as long in the hellish line because I had gotten my badge on Friday, but my friends did, and seeing that there were only two bag checkers was ridiculous. It definitely seemed like a con that super prioritized the celebrity guests, and honestly they did a great job from my POV with the photo ops, which seems to be their main attraction. The larger events like the costume contest and late night cabaret were also really well done. I hope, though. that if they return to that convention center they really switch up their organization. I'm not a con artist but I'm an artist who has been to a ton of cons, and I'm glad to have been able to talk to and support the people in the artist alley! It was great meeting you also, it was so wild hearing your voice in person when I listen to you while working/drawing so often. :D I'm glad you have the opportunity to take a break from cons soon, I hope you enjoy getting to rebalance everything during your time off!

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• ZI

  @zimulacrum · 2 years ago

  I’m a disabled cosplayer, and I use a walker to get around big spaces—when I was at galaxycon Austin, they refused to let me in just because I couldn’t get down the stairs and they left me out in full face paint in the 100+ degree heat for 20 minutes as I banged on the door.

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• GR

  @GREATPOWER235 · 2 years ago

  Not even lying that Galaxy con you mention ME and MY dad at <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2flchNw8dI&amp;t=1337">22:17</a> I can’t even make this up i say that with 100% honesty crazy to see when im looking up videos of the costume contests i see this video and stumble apon ur mention i was so confused for a moment like “Is she talking about us??” I go to my dad show him the clip SURELY ENOUGH he confirmed he has a slight memory of it so i was not going crazy

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• F0

  @F0rtuneLT · 3 years ago

  One thing i dont think ive seen anyone mention is how concerningly lacking the security was. <br><br>So, for those who don&apos;t know, most cons will require cosplayers to have &quot;prop tags&quot; attached to their props as a way for con security to know that what you have isn&apos;t an actual weapon. These are usually tags that are attached to your prop that cant be replicated as a way to prevent fake tags (for example some cons will coat theirs in a reflective filament to prevent it from being copied/printed)<br><br>The prop tag for GCA? a singular orange zip-tie that you can get at home depot for like $1. meaning if someone had malicious intent, all that was stopping them from doing something dangerous was a dollar at home depot to fake a prop tag<br><br>&quot;but wait&quot; i hear you ask. &quot;wouldn&apos;t they be stopped at the metal detectors?&quot;<br><br>Funny you mention that! because the metal detectors at GCA were merely a suggestion at GCA<br><br>I was cosplaying as a ghostbuster, so i had a LOT of shit on me (Proton pack, ghost trap, ecto goggles, pke meter, etc) so im used to having to take it all off for the check-in. I walk up to the table and ask if she wants me to empty my pockets (as is what you usually have to do at a con) and she says no, i then begin to take my gear off because that&apos;s what im used to doing and the lady at the table stops me and just waves me through. I step through the archway and like 7 different alarms go off because yeah I&apos;ve got 30 pounds of electronics strapped to my back/around my waist. I fully expected to be pat down or scanned with the metal detector wand, but instead the guy just kinda...looks me over, and goes &quot;Yeah ur good lol&quot; and waves me on<br><br>this was the same with <b>everyone</b>

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• UF

  @ufoesferico1050 · 3 years ago

  The way you described the layout of the con is exactly what they do to small artists in the cons in my country, especifically in my state. They always put the original and small artists at the end and far from the areas of interest, but the pirated merchandise and questionable articles are always visible and occupy most of the con. So unfair, ugh :(

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• LO

  @lotlhito · 3 years ago

  omg Tales of a Con Artist is such a clever title

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• GO

  @gojifanpat · 3 years ago

  I love how the title of this series is <b>&quot;Tales Of A Con Artist&quot;</b>

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• EL

  @ellaart7083 · 3 years ago

  Waiting in a line in Texas heat sounds like actual hell. Great vid, star

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• SP

  @Splat654 · 3 years ago (edited)

  I am actually happy whenever i see people openly talking and discussing bad conventions because i had a terrible experience regarding this theme. I am from russia, and in the past, long before the war, &nbsp;i went to a local anime festival as a cosplayer (small town, not much of festivities or even anything to do). It was my third fest after visiting Baltic state and going to great conventions there. I knew our local festival was bad so i didnt have high expectations. But it was worse than i imagined. Afterwards i was advised, by people from my friend circle, on reaching out to administrators and telling them all problems that i had notice and sharing my ideas of improvement for their event. Worse mistake of my life. I did just that, foolishly thinking, that their festival is so bad, because they either dont have money or ideas to improve it. This is not how it works. If organization consistently making the same mistakes for years and arent changing anything about their event, they are most likely can but do not care to improve. They have a comfortable position of cashflow from audience of children that come in every year and no competition in the town. Admins of the festival that i mentioned, acted incredibly creepy on me. They fisrt pretended to be interested in my critique, let me write and send it to them, and then went on harrassing me on every point that I&apos;ve mentioned, plus my age, life experience, ect. Somehow they scared me with this technique of &quot;luring in and then attacking&quot; so much, that I &nbsp;was scared that if I would go somewhere else in town in my costume i could get in trouble. Because the way they went berserk on me signaled that the guys are kinda insane, thus you dont know what these people are capable of. There were only 2 of them but it was enough to scare teenager me. I still get triggered whenever i randomly see their faces or names in our town&apos;s articles. But I desided on not posting publicly about my situation with this fest, for the sake of my mental health. Still i feel sorry for overall situation. I know that lots of other kids and teenagers were verbally harrassed by these admins. And more concerning things happened. Yet, they still doing their thing, and organising their events. Maybe other people just didn&apos;t share their stories or commented on the festival, keeping it to themselves, like me. As i know, the rare ones that did comment and leave any form of criticism received the same harrassment i endured. <br>Still, it&apos;s a little festival organized by local bonkers in a middle russian town, a country with a lack of any regulations. It&apos;s unlikely that anything is even possible to be done about that. That&apos;s why i let that go. But in any other places, you should always share and speak openly about terrible treatment on conventions, because unfortunately silence about bad treatment serves as permission to this treatment to continue and then grow into something more. Just like it probably happened with the festival that i have mentioned.

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• HE

  @hellotanibelle · 3 years ago

  Take this as hearsay, but I&apos;ve been selling at cons for 10 years now so I know people who run shows and hear what they talk about.<br> <br>So con runners who focus mostly on guests and seem to ignore everything else are doing it because when they sign these contracts with celebrities they guarantee $X for the guest to earn via autographs &amp; photo ops, and anything over that they(the con runners) take a percentage of it. I&apos;ve heard as low as 10% but as high as 35%. <br><br>It ends up netting them SO MUCH MONEY, they honestly don&apos;t care if vendors or artists or even attendees had a good time. They think their celebrity pull will be so good they bet on a fresh wave of people to come in. They use vendors and artists to just pay for the rental fee of the convention center, staff pay, and celebrity guest hotel rooms/flights. <br><br>The shows that focus on fostering community are the ones to attend nowadays now, the cash cow shows (which are MOST comic cons) don&apos;t care about their community, only how much $$ the area will give them.

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