You've got your mother in a whirl ('cause) she's not sure if you're a boy or a girl.

[hazelchaz]

Like many of my friends from animelosangeles, I'm getting ready for Anime Expo. A lot of L.A. fans are heading up to "Baycon Jr." but I'll be down here in Long Beach.

Tomorrow evening (Thursday) I plan to stop by the Hyatt and give the front desk a 2-lb. box of See's Chocolates, to encourage them not to mess with the blocking on my room and ask for an early check-in. Then I'll head up to LASFS, pick up Christian, do the Coral thing for a couple of hours and then print off a "Peanut Butter Jelly Time" poster or two at the house when I drop him off.

Friday morning it's off to the con. And I've learned that there's apparently a free wi-fi hot zone in downtown Long Beach in the Pike/Convention Center area, so I hope to post a message on the animelosangeles forum when I'm all checked in...

I'll be spending most of the days (Fri/Sat/Sun) in my room. It'll be a daytime open room party -- a mock con suite -- and if all goes as planned, I'll have a room on the same floor as the front desk and not far from the elevators. (I'll also have five roommates, but I'm trying to convince most of them to shower at night so that the bathroom's clear for library_lynn in the mornings.)

That's the daytime. Friday night is the "Anime Conventions Mailing List" dinner. As most-local person on the list attending, I'm organizing it. (ACML is the anime equivalent of the SMOFS mailing lists. There are a handful of us in common on both lists.) At this point we're the only two folks from a California convention going to the dinner. There are people from Anime Evolution (Vancouver B.C.), Anime Vegas, El Paso Anime Convention, Otakon (Baltimore), Sakura-Con (Seattle), Kevin from Robotech and Lynn and myself from animelosangeles (assuming Lynn makes it out to Long Beach after work in time).

And Saturday night is the Masquerade Ball. I've been in contact with the lead DJ in charge -- "DJ Jinrei", who's in charge of our Saturday night dance next year at Animé Los Angeles! He's tentatively accepted my offer to take and print instant "prom photos."

I did this four years ago at AX's "Starlight Fantasy Ball," and I did something similar at two weddings and Torcon 3. This time around I'm printing on bigger cards, instead of the little business cards. Last time at AX 2003, I only had 30 photos from the formal dance, so I'm not anticipating a huge rush of people interested in the photos. (I'll make sure I have card stock for 100, just in case.)

I've sketched out the frame that'll print around the photo. I've also whomped out new software to handle it. (Lots of use of GD and I dump everything out to the printer using LP. If anyone out there is horribly interested, I can share the source code or OS/X executables.) My new printer is a lovely beast, but printing out lots of high-resolution images using a USB link just takes too long. So I've set up my programs to reduce the photos to 200 dpi and print them that way. In my tests tonight, I was able to process and print 20 photos in under ten minutes, so I'm confident it'll all work on Saturday.

I'll also have model releases for the subjects; they can sign the release and opt-in for having their photos on my website, in which case they can download the high resolution versions after the convention; or they can opt-out, in which case I'll delete their photos as soon as practical and they'll just get the printed ones on-site.

(Oh, and I don't have anything emotionally invested in being the man behind the camera. If there's an accomplished photographer who wants to hang out at the dance Saturday night, I'll take care of the computer end and let you do the shooting. And if you've got a backdrop? Big win all the way around...)

I'm also considering offering envelopes and selling stamps for people who'd like their photo mailed instead of waiting around for them. But seeing as how quickly the photos print on my fab HP 2605, I'm not sure there will be a lot of takers for the stamps. (The envelopes might go quickly, as a convenient way to protect the card.)

Sunday night, the masquerade, at the Long Beach Arena. I know people who'll be on the stage, so I'm hoping to check it out if there's room.

Ribbon note: if you're not on my "ribbons" mailing list, you might be interested to know that the weekend after AX/Westercon is when I'm sending in my next ribbon order, and that's the one to get in on if you want ribbons for NASFiC or Worldcon.

EDIT: I re-uploaded the sample to show an actual photo instead of the colored background. If you don't see fairegoddess's smiling face above, please reload. And here's another sample with two other friendly people to show how it looks sideways.

Comments

Re: "BayCon Junior"

[hazelchaz]

We can wing it -- get me a min/max range, and fine tune it when you get back.

Chaz