A blog about technology, photography, and stuff

Monday, September 29, 2014

Long Beach Comic Con 2014

Over the weekend I attended Long Beach Comic Con (LBCC) with my first press pass. It's been a while since I've attended LBCC, two years to be exact. Back then I only went on a Sunday, but this year I attended on a Saturday to get a more full experience.

What I enjoyed about LBCC is that it's a small con without the hassle of a big convention like San Diego Comic Con. You get the cosplay, a variety of panels to attend, and a decent amount of vendors, artists, and mini-celebrities. Parking is in the range of $5-10, which is not bad at all.

If you are really into buying comics and goods, there are plenty of bins and deals to be had.

If you have kids, the place is incredibly suited for kids to walk around and have fun. Parents need not worry about it being so crowded that their kid will get trampled on-- there's actually plenty of room to walk around.

If you are there cosplaying with friends, the lighting for photos is actually pretty good. There's a spot by the escalators that has some nice backdrop colors (see my pictures below of Poison Ivy and Elsa). There's also tables and chairs to sit, relax, and eat at. Just outside there's a lot of room for running and group shots. I also loved how the organizers put up quite a few walls with LBCC logos for photo-ops. Every single one was utilized in and out of the main floor.

This year there was a proposal that took place too: Joker proposes to Harley Quinn

The only minuses I found is that the food and restaurant options are a little limited. I would love to see food trucks there in the future-- although I'm not aware of any regulations preventing them doing so. The restaurants across the street are somewhat limited. Pretty much everyone goes to eat at Islands and CPK, which does cause some wait time to get a table.

Long Beach Comic Con resembles a great tradition of what a comic convention should be. It's great for families with kids, cosplayers, artists, and of course comic fans. It's a good size convention that offers exactly what they advertise-- a fun time for all.

Pictures

Below are some of my favorite pictures I took. Full album can be found on my Facebook page and on my Flickr.

The entrance to the convention. The main floor is actually down the escalator.


Joe Field at the "And the Geeks Shall Inherit the Earth" panel


Arrow and Black Canary


A very large Chewbacca


Poison Ivy


A family that cosplays together


Kids playing with LEGOS. I know kids find sitting in this fun, but I see it as nothing but pain. Haha.


The best Elsa cosplayer I've ever seen. Cosplay by Paulinha Silva.


The best Loki cosplayer I've ever seen. Cosplay by Loki Hates You.


The best Mystique cosplayer I've ever seen. Cosplay by @GripGoddess.

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Monday, September 22, 2014

Building my own Photography Site

A few weeks ago my SmugMug account expired and I didn't bother to renew it. This is where my photography website, Sunpech Photography, used to be hosted. I wasn't fully utilizing it to make sales nor was I pushing it very much to friends, family, and even clients. So I couldn't justify spending any money on it when I'd rather make sales on 500px and 500px Art.

Surprisingly my account was discontinued almost immediately and I whipped up a decent site in less than 24 hours along with appropriate DNS changes just so I didn't have an ugly 404 page.

Motivations

Besides saving money I have other motivations to building my own site almost from scratch.

I felt I could build my own photography site the way I wanted it-- for basically free. So in a matter of a few days I completed a lot of what I wanted using Ruby on RailsHerokuAmazon Web ServicesTwitter Bootstrap, and Font Awesome. With TB the site is well equipped to be mobile and tablet friendly.

I've been promoting sales on 500px Art, but that may change in the future. With 500px going through some internal changes recently, I need to protect any SEO karma I've built. I want to be able to simply change the buy print link en masse rather than fixing them one by one-- which I have to do for this blog.

New Website

I'm happy to announce that I have launched it in it's current state, which I deem ready for public consumption. I still have some features I want to add such as multi photo uploads, better social media linking, and client login. But at it's current build it's usable for my needs.

My renovated photography site: http://www.sunpechphotography.com


Screenshot of the new photography site