The convention itself was also great and my most successful to date! I took last year off after somewhat dismal sales in 2012 and planning my wedding in the beginning of 2013. But the Society of Illustrators seems to have taken complaints from the past to heart and lowered the entrance fee to $5 which I think had a LOT to do with the increased foot traffic this year. It seemed like the curtain dividers between the tables also made the armory less cavernous.
The giant Charlie Brown balloon was a topic of discussion and photos of it took over my Instagram and Twitter feeds.
There were little pop-up galleries right near the entrance which I didn't get nearly enough time to explore.
I'm totally going to grab a photo of my table mate Alison Wilgus and I from the MoCCA review at Comics Worth Reading since I didn't get any with my camera phone.
Speaking of Comics Worth Reading, Johanna Draper Carlson purchased the very first copy of Cooking Up Comics in print!
I gave away a bunch of stickers to backers of The Collected Counter Attack! who were all so nice and interested in the progress of the book. A number of Cooking Up Comics readers stopped by to say hello and it was nice to hear people mentioning that they'd seen my work in the wild at Bluestockings Bookstore or that we'd met at another convention in another city. I also saw a lot of Sketchcrawlers and former animation co-workers who I haven't seen in years. I got a surprise visit from Ashley, my print specialist from Print Ninja who was here all the way from Chicago! Print Ninja is the company that will be printing The Collected Counter Attack!
Cartoonists and friend stopping by on Sunday including Patricia Burgess, Steve Flack and Zack Giallongo.
It's always great to meet fellow cartoonists in real life that I know online like Connie Sun, Ashley Quigg, Evan Palmer and Alina Chau. I also got to meet several Twitter friends including Carlos who was rocking an awesome Cat Bus shirt:
MoCCA this year was also a great showcase for new talent by soon-to-graduate cartoonists like Olga Andreyeva, (aaa I don't remember your name!), Molly Ostertag and out of town talent like Philadelphia cartoonist Carey Pietsch who drew the wonderful DDLL poster this year. Sorry about the blurry photo ladies!
The very stylish Emma T Capps who is not only a cartoonist but designed and made her own outfits for the convention!
It was lovely to chat with my fellow vegetarian Cliodhna Lyons who had an adorable accordion book of dragons among other works and came all the way from the UK.
I didn't get away from the table much on Saturday, so I did a quick round or two on Sunday to say hello. I met Sung Yoon Choi who does cooking comics of Korean-American dishes!
Jennifer Hayden and Glynnis Fawkes' table.
More Queens-based cartoonists! Ashley Quigg, Patricia Burgess and Daniel Vasquez.
Marguerite Dabaie with her great patterned pillows and coasters and comics about the silk road.
Cary Pietsch and Claire Folkman at the Dirty Diamonds table. Go check out their Kickstarter for a women's comic anthology!
And finally, my trades and comic purchases from the weekend. I had a really small spending budget this year but I'm quite happy with what I got. I also had a few short interviews at the convention, I'll link to them when they're online. Thanks again to everyone who stopped by and especially to those who bought comics!
