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Post by Llama God on Aug 13, 2014 22:27:35 GMT
Other cons I have been do where they separate out Panels and Dealers seem to be much lower footfall/sadder places though. It is really nice having most of it in one room. That's actually a very fair point. I'm not sure what the answer to that is, really. Maybe some sort of one-way sound barrier? Selective ear-plugs? I'm not sure there's a good answer... |
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Post by duffism1981 on Aug 13, 2014 22:32:37 GMT
Hopefully the bigger hall next year may help some of the over crowding, but we won't know until it happens.
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Post by Andy Turnbull on Aug 13, 2014 23:10:40 GMT
All the smaller panels are now in the Alternative Programme Room which we've done the last few years and it definitely makes it better, and we will make sure they are all announced properly next time.
There are arguments on both sides that have merit for making a dealer/guest room and then panels all in an other room.
The sound issues we encountered on the weekend with relation to the guests not being able to hear questions will be fixed next year. All we need some monitors on the stage is all, if you noticed the speaker rig was above the seating area so the sound was going back the way from there.
Andy
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Post by Llama God on Aug 14, 2014 8:56:54 GMT
Yep, I noticed that. After being able to get myself seated in the front row I didn't understand why we couldn't hear anything. Especially during the movie screening. Then I realised where the speakers were...
But I guess there's not a lot that can be done about that particular issue, since the Hilton might object to having their ceiling re-wired. :-)
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The Huff
Thunderjet
Hufferlover
Posts: 4,243
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Post by The Huff on Aug 14, 2014 18:55:50 GMT
Enjoyed it again this year, despite my usual feeling beforehand of not wanting to leave my house on it's own for the weekend.
Everything ran to schedule this year which was great and even the bar area seemed to be better staffed. Great to see everyone again, even though there were some notable absences on the TMUK front but also managed to meet some people I hadn't met in person from here so that was a bonus.
This was the first time ever that I didn't purchase any TF toys on Saturday, but after selling some bits on the fan table, I made purchase of the Huffer/Pipes animated pack (original colours - the exclusives looked a little too Mario/Luigi for me).
Loved the panels, especially the Deaths Head one and also enjoyed hosting the first Fanzine/TMUK one with Andy. We actually had an audience which was a very good start and there are some fun plans for next year. (I was even asked to sign a Fanzine which made me feel slightly important!)
A lot of extra effort had gone into the Saturday night bash, what with the birthday theme, hats, Transformer character cupcakes and birthday cards so a massive well done to everyone there. Script reading was funny as always. Cosplay was also amazing.
One thing I did find extremely touching was when Sven was called to the stage at the closing ceremony and thanked for his contributions to the conventions over the years.
Strangely, Sunday evening was one of my favorite parts of the weekend, as everything was wrapped up and everyone relaxed and I had a chance to catch up with people properly and have fun with the usual 'toys on the table' events.
Thanks to Simon & Co for a great weekend and looking forward to next year!
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Post by legios on Aug 14, 2014 19:45:49 GMT
Strangely, Sunday evening was one of my favorite parts of the weekend, as everything was wrapped up and everyone relaxed and I had a chance to catch up with people properly and have fun with the usual 'toys on the table' events. Actually, in 2011 and 2012 that was my favourite part of things as well. I was able to kick back, unwind and fade into the background somewhat and just sort of soak up the various conversations and stuff. To go back to something Blueshift said about the current Main Stage/Dealers Room arrangement - I have the completely opposite experience in terms of being able to hear. Having both in the same room means that I can't hear a large amount of what is said on the panels, and that I have difficulty hearing customers as well. This of course could be due to my hearing being a little sub-par anyway... (Also, I'm almost Seven hundred and forty-one of your Earth Years old, this body is wearing a bit thin you know :-) ) Karl |
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Post by Bogatan on Aug 14, 2014 20:47:27 GMT
I have no idea how practical it is, but with a new hall next year, if the speakers were set up at the back of the panel area facing towards the stage then it would solve a lot of the issues
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Post by Llama God on Aug 14, 2014 22:06:05 GMT
I have no idea how practical it is, but with a new hall next year, if the speakers were set up at the back of the panel area facing towards the stage then it would solve a lot of the issues That... seems to make a lot of sense. It's kind of the inverse of what I was suggesting. But would make more sense. Of course I don't run the convention. I just like the idea. ;-) |
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Post by Andy Turnbull on Aug 14, 2014 22:41:59 GMT
Depends on the rig we get, like I said if not, we'll have a couple of small speakers on stage so the guests can hear.
Andy
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Sept 5, 2014 10:34:08 GMT
Thanks for all your comments guys. As Andy said, we are working on the announcements system at the moment which will not only cover everything taking place in the Main Hall but all of the Alternative Programme Rooms as well so we've pretty much got this nailed down already.
With the physical programme, we found that the old system of printing them for the packs simply wasn't working or was cost effective for us. We produced packs for all our attendees containing passes, a programme and welcome letter and we found that most attendees took their passes out and either discarded the rest or looked at their programmes once or twice and then forgot / lost their programmes.
Producing the packs cost us a fair amount with the cost of the printing for the programmes and letters, and the cost of the envelopes and labels not to mention the time in putting them all together and over the weekend every year we had a steady flow of people come to us asking if we had programmes available or saying that they lost theirs. Even when it came to the packs when we had random prize draws with winning tickets in them, people contacted us after the con when they only looked in the packs when they got home and found winning tickets for prizes that needed to be claimed at the con!
What we are doing is returning to a physical edition of The Cybertronian Times for 2015 (Issue 15 will be emailed out to everyone shortly) and this will be a hybrid magazine / programme for the weekend having the full programme plus a map. It will also be online far sooner this year for those of you wanting a digital copy for your phones / tablets and we're aiming to have it ready a few months before the con. We're working on this already and we've got quite a few items locked in already including a few panels, guest talks and most of the Saturday night programme so it's looking pretty good so far!
The split hall question... this is something that we've thought about for a long time! I will be honest though and say that out of all the events we've run as an organisation overall for the last 25 years, only two have been in a split hall format (not counting Alternative Events rooms) - our Star Trek convention in 1996 and Auto Assembly 2004 and both were a disaster.
I'm not saying that this is something that we will rule out completely and it is something that we ask ourselves on a yearly basis. The main issues for us are maintaining the atmosphere for the convention, ensuring that people don't miss out on panels and all our programme items (that includes dealers, guests, staff and all our attendees), making sure that the halls aren't too over crowded, being able to afford our AV set-up (these costs have shot up by a massive amount over the years!) and staffing.
From a technical stance, if we had a separate panel and dealers room, to be fair to everyone I believe that at the very least we would need an audio feed from what would become a "theatre" into this room but ideally a video feed so no-one would miss talks. Otherwise it could result in dead time for the dealers room during key panels / events. Possible but that becomes a cost issue.
Staffing wise, we would basically need to double our door staff for the weekend as we'd need two lots of volunteers to check on the doors all weekend and a second AV team to oversee another sound desk and there would an additional logistical issue as the only hall we could potentially get from the Hilton would be the King's Suite - our current Saturday Night hall... this would mean a very tight turnaround from theatre to party from the end of the day Saturday to the night time and back again before the start of Sunday. Not impossible, but whether there would be additional costs again I don't know.
Finally are our Registration and Control Desks. The 2015 plan puts them in the Foyer area for our new Main Hall but having a split hall raises one question... where would these go if we have two halls in use? A daft point, I know but something that could take a lot of thinking about if people are spread in different parts of the hotel.
As I said, it's not beyond the realms of possibility but we're always open to comments, suggestions and ideas to make tweaks and changes and we've still got a year to add new ideas... although if anyone has any ideas for things for the Alternative Programme Room slots are filling up already so we have a feeling that this will run out of capacity sooner rather than later for 2015!
Simon
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primenova
Fusilateral Quintro Combiner
Posts: 6,057
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Post by primenova on Sept 5, 2014 11:48:52 GMT
You should see how they did it at Bristol comic expo. Talks in 3 rooms at the hotel the a 10 minute walk round the corner for the dealer hall & they had signing area. But that hall is being turned into a train station now. I know we'll not have that issue with AA.
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