Focus on: London Super Comic Convention 2013

My pass, complete with Black Canary nail art...

So this weekend I travelled down to London for my very first London Super Comic Convention.

The Boy had gone last year as a surprise stag do weekend with his best man and absolutely raved about it so I knew I had to get down to London this year and get my geek on.

Still relatively in it's infancy, this was only the second convention and despite a few little kinks needing ironing out it was fantastic.

Held at the London Excel Centre, a huuuuuuuge venue in the Docklands, the convention took place in a large exhibition hall.

We decided to go to the con around lunchtime, having looked at the program and deciding we'd rather be there all afternoon and then nip to the pub after the con rather than get there for the opening. It really felt like we'd made the right decision as there was absolutely no queue at all when we arrived! The ticket staff were really friendly and efficient and I got my pass and fab goodie bag quickly and headed on in to the rest of the hall.

Goodies....

The first thing we came across, randomly was a group of girls offering massages.  I'm not so sure about that one - it was a little confusing.  Although it didn't really have the whole icky booth babe vibe about it, it did just seem a little weird... 

A little bemused, the Boy and I went on in to the rest of the con ready to sample of the geeky delights on offer before us.  There were loads of indie comics stalls as well as the usual big name publishers and and vendors. The indie stalls were really high quality and I got to see a lot of comics I wouldn't otherwise have come across.  I also bought a couple of zany titles that I'll be reviewing later in the week as well as my very first 2000AD anthology - Judge Anderson 01.

There was also an amazing stall selling vintage movie posters and had to physically restrain myself every time I walked past an original 1977 Star Wars poster in Thai. I needed it so very badly, unfortunately my bank balance needed staying in the red just a little more. I didn't even dare to look at the many silver age comics! Next time though, next time...

The con itself had a really relaxed vibe about it and it was so nice to come in and take my time looking at everything without being ridiculously crowded or feeling rushed.

A very blurry shot of the 2000AD Judge Dredd Panel

There were panels on offer although not as many as I would have expected from a major convention.  Although I'm not a huge Dredd fan the only panel I found appealing was the 2000AD Judge Dredd one with John Wagner, Brian Bolland and Alan Grant among others. I must admit I enjoyed the panel as the writers and artists were entertaining and honest about their opinions and processes.  The addition of the cosplaying Judges was a nice touch as well and they stayed in character throughout.  But while this panel was interesting, the other panels bit wishy washy sounding and there weren't very many compared to other cons I have been to.  I think that this is a definite area for them to work on - if BICs in Birmingham could pull in bigger panels then a London convention certainly should be able to.

Something that worked really well was the seperate section for the portfolio reviews for artists and it seemed to be really useful and well organised.  There seems to be a lot of portfolio reviews for artists at cons which is fantastic, but as an aspiring comic writer it would be fantastic to have something for us wordsmiths too!  Maybe something where we could run pitches past people or a page of script of something?  I suspect that this would be just as popular as the artists reviews and feedback is so important for anyone looking to develop their skills!
 
All in all, the con was really enjoyable. I loved seeing the range of cosplayers and met some wonderful kooky and creative people.  I'll definitely be going back even if it is just for the one day, it was worth the trip!