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GREG-SPONSES 2010-01 (Jan)

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Blaise writes...

GATHERING OF THE GARGOYLES
CON-JOURNAL

DAY 1
FRIDAY AUGUST 21, 2009

Well, Greg, you asked for the con-journals to be posted. And here I am at home with the evening ahead of me, so I may as well oblige. I will be writing largely from memory, so I apologize in advance to anyone whom I may forget.

My day started fairly early--about 5AM. This was because I was house/dog-sitting for a friend. This overlapped with the first two days of the Gathering, so I had to juggle my responsibilities with the convention. That meant getting up early enough to give the dog a good, long walk and feed him before heading off to the Gathering (and this is a BIG dog, with a LOT of energy, who does NOT like being left alone).

At any rate, I managed to make it to the registration desk at a little before 10AM, and apparently became the first attendee to receive my badge! I spent the first 2 or so hours just wandering around and meeting both old friends (like Greg Bishansky) and folk I had only met online (like Harvester of Eyes).

At 12PM (after munching a bagel with cream cheese for lunch), I attended the "Drawing Comics" panel hosted by Karine Charlebois. It was an informative look at translating Greg's comic scripts to a page in a comic book. This included:
-having to turn a one-panel scene with TWO actions in the script into two separate panels.
-the importance of character positioning during dialogue.
-keeping track of where everyone is during a battle sequence (even to the point of having a map of the area so you will know where the "camera" is facing at any given time).
-the differences in layout between American comics and European comics.

After that, I really wanted to attend the "Machiavelli on 'Gargoyles'" panel, but I had too many other things to do. For starters, I had to audition for the Radio Play. True to the nature of the radio play itself, the audition sides contained BOTH "Gargoyles" and "Spectacular Spider-Man" sides. I had considered reading Brooklyn (my favorite garg), but I decided that others could do the "heroic-snarker" role better than myself, so I chose a more extreme character: the Green Goblin. The audition sheet also asked if one was capable of imitating a Spanish/Hispanic accent (I marked "No"), and if one was capable of emitting a "Ghoul Shriek" (I marked "Yes").
One fun audition and shriek later, I ducked into the Dealer's Room to pick up a copy of "Clan-Building: Vol. II." I read the darn thing until 3PM when it was time for Ben Diskin's Mug-A-Guest, which I had signed up for.

Ben Diskin is a great guy; very approachable, easy going, with a great sense of humor. He had a number of funny stories, including a voice session for "Kids Next Door" where Tom Kenny played Santa Claus (and went a *little* off book while the director and engineers weren't listening). I have to agree with Greg B., though--it's amazing that Venom's voice comes from such a skinny guy!

After heading out to Rubio's on CityWalk for a little dinner (and finishing CB:V2), I returned to the hotel and waited for Opening Ceremonies, which were running a little late. Thus, I spent the time talking with several people, such as Greg B., Phoenician, Lucas McLain (I'm sorry, I can't remember your net name!), Guardian, Matt, and others I'm forgetting, I'm sure.

Opening ceremonies were great. There was, of course, a bit of sadness that this would be the last one. On the plus side, since this WAS the last one, Greg Weisman and the members of the staff (OTHER THAN Jen Anderson and Patrick Toman), decided to break the rule that staff members could not be "Fan Guest of Honor" and gave that distinction to both Jen and Patrick for their YEARS of work to keep the Gathering going and "Gargoyles" alive.
Greg did his usual spiel about how "Gargoyles" came to be, and showed the videos he had shown for Opening Ceremonies over the years. Now, as I understand it, for the past few Gatherings, Greg would show one video one year (one version of the pitch, one version of the promo), and would show its counterpart the next year (for variety). This year, being the last, he showed them ALL! So I got to see at least one video I had not seen before: a version of the pitch read by Jim Cummings, and with some artwork not seen in the other version (the one on the first season DVD set). After these, the reconstructed "Dark Ages" and "New Olympians" pitches, and the "Bad Guys" leica reel, we saw the fan constructed animatic for the "Team Atlantis" episode, "The Last." A great deal of progress has been made since 2006 (my previous Gathering), with only a few blank spots left to fill (and it sounds like work will continue on it, with or without the Gathering). Watching the videos was kind of bittersweet, since I don't know when I'll be able to see them again.

Inevitably, Opening Ceremonies ended, and I made my way back to my friend's house to walk and feed the dog and try to get a few hours of sleep.

Greg responds...

Wow, it seems so long ago already...

Response recorded on January 06, 2010


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