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June 30 / Jeremy Dizon / Cons

SDCC Guide: A Veteran’s Perspective

As a new editor to Shortboxed, I always knew that San Diego Comic-Con would be a big topic for us to write about, thus the SDCC Guides were born. But even though it is an exciting topic to write about in hopes our fearless readers would find value in them, this year’s SDCC is special because I’ll be returning to San Diego after not attending last year. And my return will be the inaugural visit of my 16-month year old son, Aiden Marcus. This won’t be his first comic book convention, but definitely his first time in San Diego and the awesomeness that is SDCC.

I’ve enjoyed attending the show in past years and hope that what I learned from those visits is applied to my future trips. The guides that I’ve posted are learnings from my SDCC trips so there were some heartache and stressful trips. But that’s the nature of the game and if there’s some tips and tricks to be taken out of my ramblings, then by all means, apply them to your own SDCC experience.

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June 30 / Jeremy Dizon / Cons

SDCC Guide: Cosplay Photo Etiquette

A big part of any convention are the fans. These attendees pay their money to enter the convention floor and wait excruciatingly long in lines to get into panels and such. They are the heartbeat of the convention since without them, there wouldn’t be a show. A part of this group leveled up, in a way, and started to embody their favorite characters by constructing intricate costumes at these conventions. These costume players, or cosplayers, have added another dimension to the convention-going experience. And in this guide, as we countdown to San Diego Comic-Con, we’ll discuss some tips on dealing with these physical interpretations of our favorite characters.

Here we go!

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June 25 / Gene / Cons

How to Camp Out in Hall H Line for SDCC

In Norse mythology (or simply just Thor continuity in many of our readers’ cases), Valhalla is where Asgardian warriors go to in the afterlife when they have died honorably in combat – it is their reward for a life well-lived. Hall H is Valhalla for San Diego Comic-Con geeks.

We battle all night, fighting off hoards of line cutters, the growl of hunger pains, the shiver of the pre-dawn sky and the sister of death herself, sleep. For those that survive the long, grueling night, they are gifted with entering the majestic Hall H.

Many have heard horror stories about camping out for Hall H – all the questions and confusion about when and where to line up, what time you can enter, who’s allowed in and out, something about wrist bands and an unofficial line, and so on. Once you do figure out when and where the line starts (we don’t even know ourselves, and we likely won’t find out until the actual con itself), the next important thing to do is figure out how to make your overnight campout pleasant enough so it doesn’t feel like you’re sieging a castle for six months.

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June 25 / Ryan Crowe / Comics

Just the Facts: Ant-Man

Heya Shortboxers, we’re back with more Just The Facts. We’ve looked at Suicide Squad and Aquaman before. In this post, we’re going to learn about Ant-Man! The Ant-Man movie comes out in just under a month; it’s time to become more familiar with our tiny hero.

In our Aquaman post, we lamented that many people would be new to Aquaman, but Ant-Man? We imagine there’s whole new level of newness. In addition to the surprise of Ant-Man getting a dedicated movie, we were also surprised that he is played by Paul Rudd of all people! Now, don’t get us wrong, we love Paul Rudd. We just never pictured him as a superhero. Alright, that’s enough of Paul Rudd, let’s get to the main event: Just the Facts: Ant-Man.

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June 24 / Jeremy Dizon / Cons

SDCC Guide: WB Signings

For the past 5 visits to San Diego Comic-Con, I’ve focused on leaving San Diego with not only memorable experiences but also something physical that I can be proud of. SDCC exclusives fall into this category but if you’re like me, my wallet isn’t as deep as some peoples. So another thing that I enjoy hunting is autographs.

Autographs have always been a fun memorabilia item that is synonymous with conventions and the like. But I’ve had the lucky opportunity to have left San Diego in recent years with several autographs from people I consider geek celebrities. One of my favorite moments was at Nerd HQ’s inaugural year that allowed me to get Alison Haislip, Olivia Munn, Danny Pudi, Jorge Garcia, Alessandra Torresani, Joshua Gomez, and Zachary Levi‘s autographs after a super awesome panel. You can imagine that I was giddy with happiness when I met these actors and snapped a picture with Alison Haislip and Olivia Munn was the icing on the cake!

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June 16 / Jeremy Dizon / Guides

SDCC Guide: Artist Alley

We continue our countdown to San Diego Comic-Con 2015 by talking about a big part of the show, in my opinion, the artists! Comics wouldn’t be what they are without the talented visual artistry of these individuals who bring countless stories to life. They create these elaborate worlds where we can live in, interact with the characters, and see how the stories play out, albeit in the pages of the comics we read. And, San Diego Comic-Con bolsters tables after tables of these skilled artisans, creating sketches, signing autographs, and selling art fit for framing.

I tend to spend a lot of time at Artist Alley, just walking up and down the tables, seeing if anything catches my eye. I’ve fallen in love with a few artists along the way as a result of this, and as a comic fan first, if the art grabs my attention as I pass by, I’m more or less going to grab it for my Batcave wall. Since this is a guide, I’m going to try to give a few suggestions on getting the most out of Artist Alley. In the ever-capable words of Benedict Cumberbatch,

1. Get familiar with the artists

The key is to know who is going to have a table at Artist Alley. Some big names like Francis Manapul, previous writer/artist on The Flash, Joe Benitez, known for his latest creation, Lady Mechanika, and Stanley Lau aka Artgerm, known for being an awesome digital artist, have had tables in Artist Alley in years past. Artists like Stanley Lau typically will cap the number of prints he sells per customer and you can bet your bottom dollar that certain characters will sell out each day (he allocates a certain number of character prints per day in order to give patrons a chance to purchase the character they want). So if you really want to get certain prints from a certain artist, you may want to dedicate visiting them first thing! I typically follow my favorites artists via Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, and they typically will have a nifty advertisement of what they are selling at SDCC. I know that helps me decide on hitting up Artgerm before others if there’s a character print or art book that I want to pick up. You can check out the list of artist who will be at Artist Alley here.

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June 15 / Gene / Cons

How to Avoid “Con Crud”

There’s no way around it – human beings are filthy, germ-spreading animals. We use our hands to touch everything, we sneeze and cough in public, and some of us simply have bad hygiene habits. All of this gets cranked up at comic book conventions like SDCC. Imagine 130,000 germ factories all squeezed into one place, side-by-side, for four and a half days and you’ll begin to see the importance of taking preventive measures.

At a mega-con like San Diego Comic-Con, everyone is too busy and too stressed to think about personal hygiene and proper manners, so it’s up to you as an attendee to make sure you don’t catch or spread any germs, otherwise known as “con crud.” It happens to the best of us, no matter how extreme your measures are, because there’s nothing you can really do if the person sitting next to you in Hall H sneezes on your face and you have to spend the next 8 hours pressed up next to them.

One of these Hall H attendees could be Patient Zero.

Thankfully, over the years I’ve learned some best practices to at least lower the chances of catching con crud. I personally follow each of these rules myself, so they’ve been through many real-world tests:

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June 15 / Heath Lynch / TV Shows

Top 5 Things About the New Supergirl Teaser

For those who don’t know, Supergirl is coming to TV this fall and is based off the comic and character of the same name from DC Comics. Supergirl’s real name is Kara Zor-El. She is the older cousin of, arguably, the most famous comic book character of all time: Superman. She too is from the same doomed planet of Krypton and was sent to Earth for safety. She has the same powers and vulnerabilities as her cousin. This show is set to tell us her beginnings, her origin story as she becomes a hero all of her own. As she becomes…Supergirl.

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