DragonCon 2012 The Year of the Puppets
Sep. 6th, 2012 07:53 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
puppetmakerPuppets and DragonCon have gone together for me over the years like Peanut Butter and Jelly. Some of my best and most memorable experiences at DragonCon have puppets involved in them. This year was no exception and probably more so than any other DragonCon before it.
I am putting the rest of this entry behind the cut so I don’t overwhelm the reader with too much at once.
This year was the first time that we had a Puppetry Track at DragonCon. I have been advocating for one for over 20 years. I managed to get a panel or two here and there on different tracks through the years. The past couple of years I have always had at least one puppet related panel as part of the costuming track. But two years ago DragonCon met Bob and Carl: the Sci Fi Janitors on DragonCon TV and things changed rapidly. Last year Beau Brown, Matt Nitchie and Patrick Freedman got DragonCon to give them a room for a late night adult Puppet Slam. It went over so well that this year, they got their own track of Programming with Beau as the Director of the Puppetry track.
Beau and his crew did such a lovely job with the track. We had diverse programming and some seriously kick-ass shows going on and we had the Puppet Slam Sunday night/Monday Morning. I was lucky enough to do a couple of panels during the weekend for the track which were all well attended and a lot of fun. More on that later in this blog, but first here are the other things I did for DragonCon.
For the costuming track I moderated a panel on “Creating on a Shoestring Budget” with my fellow panelists John Stump, Tracey Carlson, Chip Malinowski, and Paige Smith. They did a good job of giving people lots of ideas on how to do costumes on a budget. I got the idea about half way through to have an audience member tell us their dream costume that they were not quite sure how to make. The panel had a lot of great ideas of how they might go about it.
I also did the Friday Night Workmanship Costume Call as the head judge. I knew I was in good shape when I found out that I had Freddy Clements, Cheralyn Lambeth, Scott Merrill, and Pamela Cole as my fellow judges. We have done this before together and we make on heck of team. I have been so lucky in who Lee gets for me.
That was the hardest judging I have ever done. The contestants didn’t bring their A game, they brought their A+ game making it that much more difficult to pick our winners. It use to be that we could walk in, take a look, and figure out which ones had a leg up on the competition. Not any more. We saw so many lovely costumes and such wonderful tricks and methods used. We learned new things as the judges. Eventually winners were picked and awarded. But it was a tough call all the way down the line. When we did the “Meet the Winners” the next day, we talked about how difficult it had been and what we looked at. The winners presented their costumes and talked about them at length.
I did a panel on book covers for the Young Adult Track. It was an interesting discussion on how book covers come into being and how covers are chosen. Good crowd with good questions.
The rest of my time was spent very happily in Puppetland.
My first panel was “Not Da Muppets” about things that Jim Henson did that were not Muppet related. I showed the audience “Timepiece” which a majority had not seen the whole thing. I had a couple of other videos but I didn’t have the right connector to my computer which I should have checked when I got a new one So Patrick Freedman and I figured out how to transfer my power point presentation to the other computer so I could use my visuals. So many kudos to Patrick for giving me a save on that one. The audience was very interested and I could have gone twice as long as I did.
Then was the Puppet Slam. I must give on the top of all this kudos to my team that brought this to life Rachel Wyman, John Hudgens, Jamie Kamin, Cheralyn Lambeth, and Hannah Miller. And special Thanks and lots of love to my husband Peter David for singing live the song so that we could do this. And yes there is a video that a fan took that you can view here
Sunday morning I had a Fraggle Rock panel and I was honored to be joined by Heather Henson who talked about Fraggle Rock and things that happened around Fraggle Rock. We got off topic once or twice but Heather has her father’s natural storytelling ability so everyone enjoyed hearing them. I learned new things about the conception of the show and the show runners.
Sunday afternoon I join Elizabeth Steed Vitale of Puppatoons doing a panel on “Puppets on a Budget”. We built puppets out of recycled objects while we talked about how to build fabulous puppets for not too much money. We also emphasized that there are things that you don’t skimp on like tools and adhesives because those can make or break your ability to build a puppet. I really enjoyed the panel and I hope that we can do it again next year.
There was also Sean’s kick-ass party and the usual Chicken and Rib night with some interesting conversation among interesting people. I caught up with my friend Stephanie and Sean’s friend (and Steph’s brother) Peter. Peter Linz is Walter from the Muppet Movie among many other Muppets and puppets over the years. We caught up on about 20 years worth of news.
Now onto some Photos and a few stories with the photos
First the Art Show went very well. I sold two Phluzzies and made a lot of people smile.
My set up at the Art Show this year.
(for the VI: These are the puppets I had the art show this year. They are on a table covered with a white table cloth. The table has a black table skirt.
From left to right: Quentin Collin: Pink Puppet with brown hair and brown muttonchops. He is wearing a brown suit. Phluzzie #1 has yellow head and arms with red hair and red body. It has ping-pong balls for eyes on the top of its head. Vincent (from the TV series Beauty and the Beast). The puppet is golden brown with a lion-like face. He has a black cape with a cowl on his head. The left sleeve is various colors of leather stitched together. Phluzzie #2 has a green head and arms with a blue body and hair again there are ping-pong balls for eyes on the top of the head. Barnabas Collins: This is a white skinned puppet with white vampire fangs in his mouth. He has a red waistcoat and a green cape on.)
John Meets Jack
(For the VI: on the left is my Captain Jack Harkness puppet which had pink skin, brown hair, a grey coat, blue shirt. On the right is actor John Barrowman who played Captain Jack on Dr. Who and Torchwood. He has black hair and is wearing a green polo shirt.)
OK this was one of those adventures that I alluded to earlier. We went to the walk of fame to see some friends and I brought the puppet in case John B was there. We lucked out because his handler was nice and understanding of the situation we were in because of panels and the like. We told her that all we wanted to do was give the puppet to John and that’s it. No pictures no autographs. We waited a bit while he finished up with the person in front of him and then walked up and his face lit up when he saw the puppet. He picked up a pen getting ready to sign it when we informed him that no, this was HIS puppet. He was like a kid at Christmas. He put the puppet on and started playing around with it. The line waiting for his autograph was amused by the impromptu puppet play they were seeing. Peter said that he knew that he shouldn’t be doing this but John was being so darn cute so he took a couple of photos. We chatted quickly and I got a big solid hug and a thank you. Later John B introduced me to his husband Scott who also loved the puppet. I think next I am going to make a puppet for Scott.
Captain Jack and Captain Jack
(for the VI same people and puppets as the previous picture but they are both saluting and John has his Captain Jack face on)
Me and the 11 Doctor Who puppets I built along with Rachel Wyman, John Hudgens, Jamie Kamin, Cheralyn Lambeth, and Hannah Miller. This was taken before the show started.
(For the VI: I am in the lower right corner of the picture. Most of the picture is taking up by pink puppet heads with various hair and costumes on them)
Heather Henson and me after the Fraggle Rock panel
(for the VI: Heather is on the left and I am on the right. Heather is very festively dressed with a blue bow in her hair, a blue dress with puffy white shoulders. She is wearing a very lovely blue butterfly necklace. I’m kind of blurry but wearing a black shirt and my badge.)
From left to right: Peter Linz, Bill Harrison (tech gawd of DragonCon) and me. We entitled this picture as Three people who use to work at the Center for Puppetry Arts and have known each other a really long time
(for the VI: Peter is wearing a purple shirt, he has curly blond hair and a blond beard. Bill is wearing a red Fez on top of his head. He has on a white shirt, a red vest, and a red cravat. His badge is around on his neck. I am wearing a black shirt and a black bowling shirt with grey trim and it says Kath over the pocket.)
I am so very grateful for all the cool experiences I had at DragonCon.
I am putting the rest of this entry behind the cut so I don’t overwhelm the reader with too much at once.
This year was the first time that we had a Puppetry Track at DragonCon. I have been advocating for one for over 20 years. I managed to get a panel or two here and there on different tracks through the years. The past couple of years I have always had at least one puppet related panel as part of the costuming track. But two years ago DragonCon met Bob and Carl: the Sci Fi Janitors on DragonCon TV and things changed rapidly. Last year Beau Brown, Matt Nitchie and Patrick Freedman got DragonCon to give them a room for a late night adult Puppet Slam. It went over so well that this year, they got their own track of Programming with Beau as the Director of the Puppetry track.
Beau and his crew did such a lovely job with the track. We had diverse programming and some seriously kick-ass shows going on and we had the Puppet Slam Sunday night/Monday Morning. I was lucky enough to do a couple of panels during the weekend for the track which were all well attended and a lot of fun. More on that later in this blog, but first here are the other things I did for DragonCon.
For the costuming track I moderated a panel on “Creating on a Shoestring Budget” with my fellow panelists John Stump, Tracey Carlson, Chip Malinowski, and Paige Smith. They did a good job of giving people lots of ideas on how to do costumes on a budget. I got the idea about half way through to have an audience member tell us their dream costume that they were not quite sure how to make. The panel had a lot of great ideas of how they might go about it.
I also did the Friday Night Workmanship Costume Call as the head judge. I knew I was in good shape when I found out that I had Freddy Clements, Cheralyn Lambeth, Scott Merrill, and Pamela Cole as my fellow judges. We have done this before together and we make on heck of team. I have been so lucky in who Lee gets for me.
That was the hardest judging I have ever done. The contestants didn’t bring their A game, they brought their A+ game making it that much more difficult to pick our winners. It use to be that we could walk in, take a look, and figure out which ones had a leg up on the competition. Not any more. We saw so many lovely costumes and such wonderful tricks and methods used. We learned new things as the judges. Eventually winners were picked and awarded. But it was a tough call all the way down the line. When we did the “Meet the Winners” the next day, we talked about how difficult it had been and what we looked at. The winners presented their costumes and talked about them at length.
I did a panel on book covers for the Young Adult Track. It was an interesting discussion on how book covers come into being and how covers are chosen. Good crowd with good questions.
The rest of my time was spent very happily in Puppetland.
My first panel was “Not Da Muppets” about things that Jim Henson did that were not Muppet related. I showed the audience “Timepiece” which a majority had not seen the whole thing. I had a couple of other videos but I didn’t have the right connector to my computer which I should have checked when I got a new one So Patrick Freedman and I figured out how to transfer my power point presentation to the other computer so I could use my visuals. So many kudos to Patrick for giving me a save on that one. The audience was very interested and I could have gone twice as long as I did.
Then was the Puppet Slam. I must give on the top of all this kudos to my team that brought this to life Rachel Wyman, John Hudgens, Jamie Kamin, Cheralyn Lambeth, and Hannah Miller. And special Thanks and lots of love to my husband Peter David for singing live the song so that we could do this. And yes there is a video that a fan took that you can view here
Sunday morning I had a Fraggle Rock panel and I was honored to be joined by Heather Henson who talked about Fraggle Rock and things that happened around Fraggle Rock. We got off topic once or twice but Heather has her father’s natural storytelling ability so everyone enjoyed hearing them. I learned new things about the conception of the show and the show runners.
Sunday afternoon I join Elizabeth Steed Vitale of Puppatoons doing a panel on “Puppets on a Budget”. We built puppets out of recycled objects while we talked about how to build fabulous puppets for not too much money. We also emphasized that there are things that you don’t skimp on like tools and adhesives because those can make or break your ability to build a puppet. I really enjoyed the panel and I hope that we can do it again next year.
There was also Sean’s kick-ass party and the usual Chicken and Rib night with some interesting conversation among interesting people. I caught up with my friend Stephanie and Sean’s friend (and Steph’s brother) Peter. Peter Linz is Walter from the Muppet Movie among many other Muppets and puppets over the years. We caught up on about 20 years worth of news.
Now onto some Photos and a few stories with the photos
First the Art Show went very well. I sold two Phluzzies and made a lot of people smile.
My set up at the Art Show this year.
(for the VI: These are the puppets I had the art show this year. They are on a table covered with a white table cloth. The table has a black table skirt.
From left to right: Quentin Collin: Pink Puppet with brown hair and brown muttonchops. He is wearing a brown suit. Phluzzie #1 has yellow head and arms with red hair and red body. It has ping-pong balls for eyes on the top of its head. Vincent (from the TV series Beauty and the Beast). The puppet is golden brown with a lion-like face. He has a black cape with a cowl on his head. The left sleeve is various colors of leather stitched together. Phluzzie #2 has a green head and arms with a blue body and hair again there are ping-pong balls for eyes on the top of the head. Barnabas Collins: This is a white skinned puppet with white vampire fangs in his mouth. He has a red waistcoat and a green cape on.)
John Meets Jack
(For the VI: on the left is my Captain Jack Harkness puppet which had pink skin, brown hair, a grey coat, blue shirt. On the right is actor John Barrowman who played Captain Jack on Dr. Who and Torchwood. He has black hair and is wearing a green polo shirt.)
OK this was one of those adventures that I alluded to earlier. We went to the walk of fame to see some friends and I brought the puppet in case John B was there. We lucked out because his handler was nice and understanding of the situation we were in because of panels and the like. We told her that all we wanted to do was give the puppet to John and that’s it. No pictures no autographs. We waited a bit while he finished up with the person in front of him and then walked up and his face lit up when he saw the puppet. He picked up a pen getting ready to sign it when we informed him that no, this was HIS puppet. He was like a kid at Christmas. He put the puppet on and started playing around with it. The line waiting for his autograph was amused by the impromptu puppet play they were seeing. Peter said that he knew that he shouldn’t be doing this but John was being so darn cute so he took a couple of photos. We chatted quickly and I got a big solid hug and a thank you. Later John B introduced me to his husband Scott who also loved the puppet. I think next I am going to make a puppet for Scott.
Captain Jack and Captain Jack
(for the VI same people and puppets as the previous picture but they are both saluting and John has his Captain Jack face on)
Me and the 11 Doctor Who puppets I built along with Rachel Wyman, John Hudgens, Jamie Kamin, Cheralyn Lambeth, and Hannah Miller. This was taken before the show started.
(For the VI: I am in the lower right corner of the picture. Most of the picture is taking up by pink puppet heads with various hair and costumes on them)
Heather Henson and me after the Fraggle Rock panel
(for the VI: Heather is on the left and I am on the right. Heather is very festively dressed with a blue bow in her hair, a blue dress with puffy white shoulders. She is wearing a very lovely blue butterfly necklace. I’m kind of blurry but wearing a black shirt and my badge.)
From left to right: Peter Linz, Bill Harrison (tech gawd of DragonCon) and me. We entitled this picture as Three people who use to work at the Center for Puppetry Arts and have known each other a really long time
(for the VI: Peter is wearing a purple shirt, he has curly blond hair and a blond beard. Bill is wearing a red Fez on top of his head. He has on a white shirt, a red vest, and a red cravat. His badge is around on his neck. I am wearing a black shirt and a black bowling shirt with grey trim and it says Kath over the pocket.)
I am so very grateful for all the cool experiences I had at DragonCon.
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