000105 - Supanova '06 Sydney

Knight-Edge pin-up by Jon "Red J" Sommariva

Supanova '06 Sydney came and went by pretty quickly. Had a pretty great time and was able to say "hi" to both new and familiar faces.

Got into Sydney on Friday noon after a somewhat turbulent drive from my dad to the airport back in Melbourne. After a short wait at our hotel, I checked-in to a tiny but comfortable room then got a light lunch (had some takoyaki balls and hontou pancakes) and head to Olympic Park. The train trip took longer than I remembered and after setting up the artist alley table, I was pretty much pooped.

Saturday, got to the convention like about 15 minutes late but all was good and didn't take me more than 5 minutes to have my table ready. Said hello to my cool neighbours, Marcelo "Diabla" Baez, Douglas "Laika, Checkmate Wordsworth, etc." Holgate, and Mark "Sureshot" Selan. This year, we had for sale Knight-Edge #1, #2, #3, Knight-Edge poster, and the new Shiranui! Situated near the end of the exhibition hall, my table faced the Nickelodeon booth and directly diagonal to the food area / try-hard cosplay Jedi fighting hangout area. Convention traffic grew after 11am. Craig "Finch" Phillips also arrived later and was Marcelo's table partner. Sales were both brisk and steady for the day with the new Shiranui selling surprisingly well. Food purchased within the convention was predictably expensive and greasy. Chris Wahl, David "Knee Pockets" Tang and Matt "Stikman Comics" Huynh dropped by during the day as well. The day ended with a drink down at the local hotel bar where surprisingly a lot of the Artist Alley exhibitors were present. I met quite a few new faces but mainly caught up with Danny McGillick.

I got back to my hotel room and watched Takeshi's Castle on Channel [V]. Then I went to a local Japanese restaurant, which I had been before in the city (sorry forgot the name). Had quite a feast and also drank some sake! I got back to my hotel room and watched the second half of Austin Powers 3: Goldmember on TV and was too stuffed to go out again.










Sunday, predicably, was a more slower and quiet day at the convention. From past experience, Sunday attendees tend to be more family day outs, meaning the convention is a means for families to have something different to do on a Sunday and they're not really there to buy anything. Unless you're inclined to really push and sell your product(s), (which I'm never really good at) you'll mostly get "grazers". So I tend to use the quieter moments to go walk around and buy stuff from my fellow artist alley exhibitors and I think others do pretty much the same. I got to say "hello" to David "Storm, Black Panther, etc" Yardin and flip through some of his awesome and detailed original pencil artwork/pages. Tad "Dark Nebula" Pietrzykowski also dropped by and had a nice chat with him as well. Oh and Tim "Greener Pastures" McEwen gave me some sound advice.

After packing up, I made it back in town and had some quite yummy but quite oily Korean food at a food court in Chinatown. Then I went out and met up with Mark, Steve and team RAdelaide (Clare, Sarah, Dan and Lucas) to Alex "Applehead" Major's place. At the strangely quiet "party" were Alex, Andy "Top Cow" Finlayson, Hayden "Billy The Demon Slayer" Fryer, his gf Alyssa, and Jozef Szekeres. Later, David "Herman, the Legal Labrador" Blumenstein, Ben "Geeen Comix" Hutchings and Simon dropped by just as we were watching... Alex's short film "20 Bucks Short" debut on DVD (you all thought I was gonna say porn didn't you?!). Not much else happened, we laughed a lot at this decapitated and roasted pigeon head, we tried to all sketch in Jozef's mermaid-themed sketchbook and played Guitar Hero on the PS2 that Steve brought, while all of us were intoxicated.



Woke up the next day, a late breaky, and I was off to Kings Comics and browsing in Kinokuniya. Had lunch at the yummy Japanese noodle cafe, Ichi-Ban Boshi, next door and spent the rest of the day window shopping around the city. Walked to Darling Harbour during sunset to find a place to have dinner, all if not most were quite on the pricey side, I got really tired so just gave up and picked one. I don't know if I was just too hungry or tired but the lamb shanks I ordered were delicious though (again, I forgot the name of the bar/restaurant we ate at).















I pretty much spent all my budget by Tuesday, so it was just a quick lunch at a foodcourt in Market City, Chinatown and then headed off to the airport early.

Things I got (from Artist Alley):
- Anthology of Alvin #1-5 (thanks Lucas for the special deal)
- Azerath #1-11 (thanks Ben for the freebies)
- Checkmate Wordsworth / Spaghetti Western (flipbook Sureshot spring 06)
- Journey of the Seeds: ORIGINS
- Moshi Moshi #12 (final issue)
- O.C.D. (Occasional Comics Disorder) #1-3 + Gypsy & the Astronaut
- Pender #1
- Plump Oyster books #1-4
- Pretty Zombies #1 & 2
- Pulp Crucifiction
- Timsbly the Stereotypical Demon (unstapled)
- V.S.
- Witch King TPB
- Word Balloons #3

Things I got (non-Artist Alley):
- Blanc et Noir artbook with Obata Takeshi illustrations
- Dogs vol. 1 manga by Miwa Shirou
- Girls on Light Velocity artbook with Sho-u Tajima illustrations
- Ohikkoshi manga by Hiroaki Samura (Takei Teashi)

Things I wish I had got (if I had more moolah):
- Generations 2006
- Billy The Demon Slayer TPB
- Azerath TPB

I think I've written quite a bit for a "summary" entry and it's pretty much what I can remember in hindsight. One last note is a special thanks to Daniel Zachariou and the Supanova team for putting on another awesome convention!