[Groop] Calgary Con Report(& card prices)

[Conor Geoghegan]

Umm....hello there everybody,
Remember me? I'm the guy who offered lodging for the Calgary Con and then kinda vanished off the face of the internet, heh heh. Don't worry - it wasn't the Groop Members' sense of humor that scared me away (in fact, I think it would have been quite interesting indeed to try to fit 200 people in to my house, haha - and who knows, I might finally have been able to get rid of that year-old bag of minced meat stuck to the back of my freezer!). It's just that I was nearing the end of a semester at school and I have a horrible tendency during those times to go in to "horse blinder" mode, where I only focus on things I absolutely 'need' to do and even simple things like typing e-mails feel like an extraordinary amount of extra work. I did read all the Groop e-mails, though - and, as far as I know, nobody actually contacted me for a place to stay. So no worries, I hope. But if I did miss any messages from anybody, I'm extremely sorry.
Anyways - here's my Calgary Con Report so Gary doesn't yell at me anymore, heh heh:



SATURDAY
I actually had a booth at the convention because I self-publish little comic books with a group of fellow amateur cartoonist-friends, so, lucky for me, I was able to get in to the convention grounds before it opened to the public (in order to set up my group's booth).
I didn't see Mark anywhere during this time, but I drifted over to Sergio's table a few times as he was setting up (putting Groo books for sale on the table, etc.). Unfortunately, each time I went to see him, a random passerby slid in front of me and began talking to him first. So I would wait behind that person for about a minute and then eventually just return to my booth, intending to come back later when Sergio was more available.
At this point, I should mention that I am kind of a shy person (Gary mentioned this in an e-mail a while back, and it's true). In hindsight, I should have just stood in line behind any of those people and waited my turn, but I didn't really want to pressure them or make them rush their encounter and besides, I didn't really know what I would say to Sergio anyway.
So anyways, throughout the day, I left my booth a number of times to check Sergio's and Mark's tables to see if either of them was free. Unfortunately, I don't recall actually seeing Mark at his table (or maybe he was there, but he was just hidden somewhere behind the throngs of fans). Yes, throngs of fans. The convention was pretty packed on Saturday. Every time I checked, there was between 5 to 15 people lined up/waiting to meet Sergio (numbers for Mark's table depended on whether he was there or not). So long story short....I ended up not meeting Sergio at all on Saturday.
I did meet Mark, though (briefly).
Mark hosted a number of panels (3, I believe?) on Saturday. I managed to catch two of them: The "Groo The Wanderer" Panel from 1:00pm-2:00pm, and The "Writing For Comics" Panel from 2:00pm-3:00pm.
The "Groo The Wanderer" Panel was excellent - and packed. There were roughly 70+ fans in the room and only about 40 chairs or so. Mark and Sergio opened the panel with a brief history of Groo, then talked about the upcoming Groo projects and then opened the floor to questions. Nothing was mentioned that astute members of the Groop don't already know, but the audience questions were fairly interesting. One fan asked who Sergio and Mark would like to use as voice actors for the Groo cartoon. Sergio said that they would never let him pick the voice actors himself because in his mind, Groo speaks Spanish. Mark mentioned that he had a potential voice actor in mind for Arcadio, and - if I remember correctly - he said it was the same guy who used to voice the leprechaun in the Lucky Charms commercials? Haha, I might be remembering that wrong, but I think that's what he said.Another fan asked Mark and Sergio what their opinions on webcomics were. From what I gathered, it seemed that Sergio generally didn't think too highly of webcomics. As far as I remember, he felt that, instead of trying to make their comics as good as possible, many webcomic cartoonists sacrifice quality in order to stay on top of deadlines and that, ultimately, the cartoonists would be more successful if they put more time and effort in to producing a quality product. Mark was a bit more encouraging with his comments as far as I recall, but generally agreed with the sentiment. Another fan asked Sergio if he had ever met any cartoonist who "could draw faster than he could". Sergio said, yes, that he had met many - and then Mark said that Sergio was just being falsely humble, heh heh. My memory is a bit fuzzy on the rest of the audience questions.
Anyways. Once the panel was finished, Sergio returned to his table on the convention floor and Mark walked over to his second panel: "Writing For Comics".
Again, the "Writing For Comics" Panel was great - in large part, because of Mark.
For the first 10 minutes or so, Mark was the only person on stage (I later heard from a friend who was volunteering at the con that none of the panelists in the Writing For Comics Panel had actually been informed they were ON the panel; and that the only reason Mark knew he was on the panel is because he had actually been responsible and investigated it himself). So anyways, Mark took charge of the panel and began speaking to the crowd all by himself and then about 10 minutes in, 2 more of the panelists (Mike Allred and Ron Marz) entered the room and helped him out. The 3 of them told anecdotes from their writing careers, dispensed bits of advice and then answered audience questions. It was a well-done and informative discussion - but, sadly, Groo wasn't mentioned even once, heh heh.
As soon as the panel was finished, I went up to talk to Mark, but to be honest, I think I scared him a bit because I was dressed as a clown at the time (long story). Or maybe he was just in a rush - in hindsight, it's probably a bad idea to try to talk to a panelist as soon as the panel is done and they're trying to leave the room. Anyways - long story short, I didn't (really) get to talk to Mark at all.
...And that was basically Saturday. The rest of the day mainly involved me standing at my booth, periodically leaving to see if either Mark's or Sergio's table was free (they never were).



SUNDAY
I was regretting not having met either Sergio or Mark the day before, so I decided that, today, I would take Gary's advice and overcome my shyness and actually talk to them.
I went to Sergio's table early in the morning (Mark hadn't arrived at the con yet). There was already a line at Sergio's table, but I figured, this time, I would actually wait in line and meet him.
When I got up to meet Sergio, I kinda stumbled over my words and said I didn't really know what to say, other than "I really like your stuff", heh heh. Sergio was beyond friendly; he told me just to say whatever I wanted. So I can't remember the exact "order" of events that followed (it's unimportant anyway), but I bombarded him with all sorts of questions - mostly art-related, like "how he draws", "can I see what pen he uses", "how does he take care of his wrist", etc., etc. - and then eventually he asked if I was an artist myself. I had a comic in my hands that I had drawn, so I showed it to him. My artwork is fairly amateurish, but Sergio was very encouraging and helpful and again, beyond nice. Eventually, the line behind me began to get pretty long, heh heh, so Sergio asked if I'd like to sit beside him so we could talk some more after he had talked to the people behind me.
...To be honest, I was kind of in shock. But I took him up on the offer and for the next 2 hours I sat beside him at his table. He pretty much had a steady stream of fans visiting his table the whole time, but whenever the line did die down, he would turn to me and give advice on how to plot stories and in general, how to get better at making comics. Some of his fans brought some really obscure work for him to sign (some of the most obscure: a copy of "The Wild and Wacky World of Sergio Aragones" and a copy of "Smokehouse Five" - neither of which I had ever seen before). I was able to watch him do a few sketches for people too; it's amazing to see how little penciling he does and how that looseness/sense of freedom helps create his style of drawing. All in all, Sergio is a frickin' awesome person.
At around Noon, he had to go to a panel and I had to get back to my booth (I hadn't been there all morning), so we parted ways. I wrote down some quick notes to make sure I didn't forget some of the things he said.
For the rest of the day, I alternated between my booth and quickly checking to see if Mark was around (unfortunately, though, I didn't see Mark at all that day).
As the con was closing, I went back to Sergio's table and thanked him very much for all his help and advice. Again, he was beyond friendly. I can't say enough good things about him. He gave me some last bits of advice on story-writing, which I wrote down, and then he had to leave. I told him that if I ever see him again, I'll have a book of short comic stories completed.
And then the con was over.




So yeah, that's my "Calgary Con Report". To be honest, I feel a bit silly documenting all these events, but you guys are hardcore Groo fans, sooo you're actually interested in this kind of minutia, haha....right? Hopefully it wasn't too boring or self-indulgent - I tried to focus mostly on the Groo-related stuff.Mark mentioned that he didn't really enjoy his time at the con, and I'm sorry to hear that. In hindsight, I should have been more proactive myself in actually meeting him and trying to ensure that he had a pleasant experience. Lesson learned. I'll try to remember that for next time (if there ever is one).
As for myself, I'm still kinda walking on air from the whole thing; still somewhat in disbelief in regards to my encounter with Sergio. I went to San Diego 2 years ago with the express purpose of meeting the Groo Crew, but in the end, ended up only talking to each of them for about 20 seconds because I couldn't think of much to say and I didn't want to hold them up. So, truly, I'm extremely grateful to the Powers That Be for the fact that Sergio and Mark, at least, were able to come up to Calgary.
I guess I'll stop there. In order to improve my story-writing, Sergio advised that I look in to the works of "O. Henry", so I signed out some O. Henry story collections from the library and I'm slowly working my way through them right now. I'm gonna start working on that book of short story comics soon.
So yeah. I tend to be fairly quiet with regards to the Groop, but rest assured everybody, I'm still here, reading all the Groop e-mails, heh heh. Talk to y'all later!
-Conor














From: grossfamm at comcast.net
To: groop at groo.com
Date: Tue, 28 Apr 2009 19:37:27 -0700
Subject: Re: [Groop] Calgary Con Report(& card prices)










Well, I am getting back into my (bad) old habits of 
multiple posts in one day.  
 
But I just had to say to No Way, Thanks for the Con 
Report!  And you do have a way cool fiance, even if she doesn't know how to 
operate your camera.  (Believe me, I can relate!!  I'll bet she could 
operate my scanner.  I'd call her to find out, but i don't know how to 
operate my daughter;'s cell phone.)  
 
OK Connor!  We know you were there and we 
expect a Con report.  Or next time We WILL show up and eat all of your 
food!
 
And in the interests of not making you all hate me 
even more by posting another message tonight, here are the results of the 9 IG 
card and Sketch card sale today on ebay:  The sketch card went for 
$625.  Pretty much within the typical price range. (It also means the 
guy selling it took a $260 loss!)  The IG cards went for anywhere from 
about $22 to $39, avergaing $28.  That's also about the norm.  As yiou 
might expect, Jim Lee's ($33), Dave Sims ($34), and Jeff Smith's ($39) went for 
the most.   So now those of you wondering about the price of IG cards have 
some idea what market price is.  At least for today. 
 
OK, I'm going to bed.
 
Gary G. 
 
 

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: 
  No Way 
  
  To: groop at groo.com 
  Sent: Tuesday, April 28, 2009 2:52 
  AM
  Subject: [Groop] Calgary Con 
Report-
  

  
    
    
      Greetings, Groop-

Unfortunately, I don't have a 
        lot to tell; I was only able to attend for a portion of Sunday.

I 
        did, however, manage to catch Sergio at his table.  As always, he 
        was a consummate gentleman- I wore my 25th anniversary hat (thanks 
        again, Gary!), and his first words upon seeing me were "Hey, nice 
        hat!".

Unfortunately, also as always, he was very busy, so there 
        simply wasn't a lot of time to chat.

A quick photo of Sergio in a 
        position that I'm sure most of you will have seen him in before- 
        
http://img134.imageshack.us/img134/6647/0904261431000.jpg- hunched 
        over a sketch, heh.

For those that are curious, in the photo he's 
        doing me a sketch of a character from the Naruto anime ("Sasuke 
        Uchiha")- it's the favourite character of one of the boys I sponsor 
        through Compassion Canada, and given that said character's (English) 
        Voice Actor was present at the con, I thought it would be a very cool 
        gift to have his favourite character (signed by the VA), done by one of 
        MY favourite artists.

And the other photo that I THOUGHT I had 
        gotten, I apparently didn't, somewhat to my disappointment- it wouldn't 
        mean a lot to most of you, but it was a shot of him and me 
        together.  Apparently my fiancee hit the wrong button 
        *sigh*

Mark, unfortunately, had had to leave before I got there, 
        and wasn't slated to return before the end of the con, so I missed 
        him.

Other than the Mark and Sergio show, there was the usual 
        parade of costumes- the 501st Stormtrooper's Calgary branch was out, so 
        there were some very impressive Star Wars costumes wandering about (I 
        spotted a Clone Trooper, a Storm Trooper or two, both Boba and Jango 
        Fett, that purple-outfitted female bounty hunter whose name I have no 
        idea of from Episode II, two Darth Vaders (one rather more impressive 
        than the other), and a Rebel X-Wing pilot), along with the usual 
        assortment of anime and superhero characters (it was with a weird 
        mixture of shame and pride that I realized I recognized almost every 
        single one that I saw, heh...)

I also stumbled upon a rather good 
        dealer out of Victoria who had a lot of classic... stuff, including 
        original Pogo collections (I didn't look too closely, being on a limited 
        budget and the books costing $35 apiece, but at a guess I would have 
        been surprised if they were any newer than 1950-something), DVDs of the 
        complete works of Tex Avery (which I snapped up immediately- I'm very 
        nearly as much a fan of Tex' work as I am of Sergio's), and a few other 
        odds and ends, including a couple of comic collections that I had been 
        wanting to find for some time (Don Rosa's "The Life and Times of Scrooge 
        McDuck" series).

I also picked up a couple of pieces of entirely 
        superfluous, but impressively large, bits of cutlery- a replica katana 
        and some sort of long blade that can become a two-ended short-bladed... 
        thing, or else have the blade come out of the opposite end of the hilt 
        entirely.  Mostly useless unless I'm planning to do what Groo does 
        best, but entertaining.

Brief glimpses were also caught of Ray 
        Park (aka Darth Maul, Toad from the X-Men films, and Snake Eyes from the 
        upcoming GI Joe film- he seems to like the Calgary Con, he was there 
        last year, too), Bruce Timm (executive producer of the DC Animated 
        Universe... I actually wanted to talk to him, and maybe snag a sketch, 
        but he was busy (borderline swamped), so we wandered off... and he was 
        gone ten minutes later.  Bah), Margot Kidder, and a bunch of other 
        people who I theoretically should have recognized but didn't 
        =P

Oh- I also got to exchange pleasantries with Gavin Blair, 
        co-creator of the seminal CG Animated series, "ReBoot", although it was 
        mostly a "Hey, I love your work, hurry up and release it on DVD" sort of 
        situation.  Apparently it's horribly tied up in some kind of rights 
        dispute, though.  Feh.

Not much else to tell- the con was 
        winding down somewhat, and my fiancee wanted to catch the reptile show 
        that same day (what can I say?  I have a very cool fiancee), so we 
        moved on.

Cheers,
David


  
  


  
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