Vividcon 2012 Con Report
So this year at Vividcon was one of the best years ever for me. This got pretty long so kudos to everyone who reads the whole thing. And even if I forgot to mention you (sorry!), I loved getting to see everyone and thanks to everyone who made this such a fantastic con for me!
So no matter how many times I say I'm going to be all catch up on sleep before I go to Vividcon, I somehow always manage to go in with a sleep deficit. Oops. This time it was just a lot of packing catchup and working out (I'm trying to build up my arm muscles for gymnastics). I woke up early (not early enough) and took the Flyaway bus from Union Station to LAX and went through the usual 15 minute check in/security there. In the middle of the security line, I got a new vid idea: a PERFECT vidsong for Carrie that captured exactly what I wanted to say about her while being super emotional to boot. It'll probably be the most emotional song I've ever vidded and a song that I connect the deepest kinetically as well. Anyways I spent the entire travel time listening to it on repeat and DYING to vid it. Which I could do as I had the source on my laptop from marathoning episodes 3-12 of Homeland on Tuesday (GREAT DECISION). So I started clipping on the plane (unfortunately I didn't have the song on my computer) which helped a little in terms of vid farr. I got to Chicago around 4:30 but I had to run an errand (which I'm not going to get into but suffice to say it was not a great start to my Vividcon) so I didn't get to the hotel until around 8:20pm. There I met![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
pharis and then checked into my hotel room and dropped off all my stuff. Then I went down to registration where I saw a bunch of people hanging out. It's amazing that I still get nervous but there you go. I remember seeing kuwdora and um...other people? I'm blanking. I know I was disappointed that they had shut down registration early but thank god, I was still able to get my registration packet.
I went down to Outback Steakhouse to find people to eat with (since I hadn't eaten in like 8 hours...) where I foundelynross, killabeez and wickedwords and had a great dinner with them. We talked about books, Game of Thrones (!!! my fandom), Narnia, jobs and just vidding in general which was a great way to kick off the con. Then I went to the Mystery Vid Party where I saw elipie, laura47, cherryice, rhoboat and later on bradcpu, millylicious and laurashapiro. It was so great to catch up on everything and freak out over all the awesome looking vids in the VVC packet. At some point, I left to go to my room where I talked with talitha78 which turned into an epic conversation about my Premieres vid, my (crazy) trip to Yosemite and life in general which was really great in terms of catching up. I went back to the room party but it had died so I went out in the lobby and found elipie and laura47 watching Teen Wolf which of COURSE I had to join. It was a lot of fun to squee about Stiles, Derek/Stiles, make fun of Scott and learn some epic reveals. We had a great discussion about life, friends and the life and it was just a great time getting to hang out with friends. I don't remember anything after that so I'm assuming I was smart and went to bed early so I could catch up on my sleep before the crazy lack of sleep times really started.
The next morning I woke up and went down to breakfast where I briefly met with a bunch of people (it is generally impossible to list all the quick times I hugged and/or briefly talked to people, sorry). I do remember having breakfast withbutterfly, thirdblindmouse and revolutionaryjo which was a lot of fun. Then I went upstairs and met with a LOT of people who I'm totally blanking on at the moment. It's always a little overwhelming but fun. Ohh right, I got to meet kiki_miserychic!! Who is awesome and also got to see obsessive24 and dragonchic. I remember jetpack_monkey, bradcpu, absolutedestiny and me were all talking together at one point as well and Game of Thrones and my continuing efforts to try to get bradcpu came up. Also had a Game of Thrones conversation with danegan and sweetestdrain (who thank god I didn't spoil with my accidental slipup).
Then came time for History of Vidding where we watched Club Vivid vids! Which was lots of fun especially hearing about the origin of the Joxer dance. Next I went to the Vividcon Quiz Show where they had everyone divide into teams based on your Hunger Game District and I ended up withsisabet (who tried to recruit everyone to our team) andheresluck in District One. I wish I had prepared better but considering all my VVC DVDs were stolen, I think I did pretty good and we ended up in third place overall. Next I had lunch at the DELICIOUS Thai place with deejay, brimtoast, jackiekjono, rokikurama and rhoboat which was a lot of fun. My Chicken Pad Thai was just as amazing as I remembered, mmm I miss that place. brimtoast had to switch seats so she could sit next to me and we could talk about GLEE and Kurt/Blaine and Jesse St. James and so much Glee love. So much fun!
I had to leave early so I could make it to Structure of a Vidshow as I wanted to learn more about that and take notes. It was a really interesting panel and helped give me some insight into the process for Premieres and CVV. I talked with a lot of people in between panels but I have almost no memory of them individually so I'm not going to be able to remember much of those. Next was WIP It Good which was fun in terms of commiserating on why WIPs get stuck. The best part was seeingtrelkez's Highlander vid which had all the black space filled in with text of what was going to be there which was HILARIOUS. I need to start doing that with my WIPs. Then I went to the Myers-Briggs panel which was especially interesting because I was OBSESSED with that when I was 16-18 so I have a lot of advanced knowledge of the topic. I was surprised the room was so full of TJs but considering it's Vividcon, it makes a little more sense. Next I sacrificed Also Premiering for Vid Your Id because that panel was MADE for me this year (because of my Premieres vid). It was as I expected, hilarious, with sisabet bringing down the house and showing everyone trelkez and dualbunny's ids. trelkez's "Nice and Slow" X-Men First Class vid premiered and it was AMAZING. I so loved that panel and it remained in discussion at VVC once it was over.
Next I went to help setup withbradcpu, millyicious, jetpack_monkey and a bunch of other people as well. It's also interesting to setup for Club Vivid and see how our epic dance party gets constructed. Then I went back to my room to change and talked with my wonderful roomies talitha78 and par_avion a bit. I unfortunately had costume issues this year so neither of my ideas worked out but next year I have an epic costume planned. I wanted to be Arya but I didn't want to spoil my Challenge vid so yes...I sacrificed for the greater good, I hope you're happy Vividcon. Then I went downstairs and admired people's costumes before we were allowed to eat the delicious hors d'oeuvres. For the first time we had a place to sit so I went to eat dinner with serrico, laura47, elipie, amnisias, jetpack_monkey and some people I'm totally blanking on right now. serrico and I had a lot of fun talking The LA Complex (Tariq!!) and I think the unusual conversation of vidding came up ;) I was trying to get drunk before my vid so I had a couple drinks but I ate too much unfortunately and I was feeling really full so it really hard.
Seeing everyone was both overwhelming and amazing as people had some fantastic costumes this year. I remember talking torevolutionaryjo (as Leslie Knope!!! I died a thousand happy deaths), thefourthvine, giandujakiss (who I finally got to meet!), millylicious (Black Widow!), bananainpyjamas, NC, jarrow (as Toby from Arrested Development hahaha) , ohvienna, hollywoodgrrl (so much Game of Thrones vid excitement! plus some Jaime/Cersei and other GoT talk) and so many more I'm totally forgetting. Finally it was time to DANCE so I went out to do the Joxer Dance with everyone. This year like the last few I paid less attention to the vids and more on the people as having to leave to get drinks, check the playlist, talk with people and go the bathroom makes me let having to see ALL the vids go. But there was some amazing vids starting out with bironic's Spaceships vid and so many others. I was freaking out about my vid being on but hollywoodgrrl's Game of Throne vid, Heads will Roll came on right before mine so I was too busy dancing happily and DYING FROM LOVE to get too nervous for mine which seemed to go over about as well as I hoped.
I remember talking briefly withastolat and her amazing Thor costume, shati (yay first time!), klia, bradcpu, jescaflowne (Another Sunday love!!), futuransky and then I couldn't stop talking lolachrome about Glee and even missed a vid. Speaking of Glee, one of my favorite moments of CVV/the con was all of us Glee fans ("there are dozens of us! dozens!) getting together to dance with jarrow for his "I Wanna Dance" vid which was AMAZING and wonderful to share the love with a group of fans. Also kudos to ua_the_terrible because he was dancing hardcore! The last songs were as always the highlight which started out for elipie's What Makes You Beautiful vid which I had SO much fun yelling out the lyrics to, Closer which NEVER gets old, Take Me Out jumping around and neverending songs of Evil Love Shack of Darkness and Stop the Rock. It was all super amazing. And then we had epic Avengers cosplaying pictures and reduxes of the amazing going ons on the dance floor. And I showed dualbunny my cat pictures as she wanted cats!
After talking to people for a bit, I headed to watch amazingly hilarious Karaoke vids and talk Channing Tatum and other things withsisabet, trelkez, dualbunny, sweetestdrain, absolutedestiny, elipie, braver_creature, cappylicious and others? Everyone was preeeetty drunk lol but it was fun especially hearing about the cold, cold nights. Then I went up to bessyboo's room and hung out with her, elipie, laura47 and others I didn't get the lj of. There was douchebro vidding in the background, Olympic talk, Broadway talk, rl stuff, Hipster Law Firm, LA vs MN/East Coast and a lot of other things. Finally I forced myself to go to sleep around 3am or so.
So I woke up on Saturday earlier than I thought I would so I decided to watch HEADS WILL ROLL as many times as possible. That's when I found out how many little things and awesome things she had included and I was blown away all over again how much I love the vid and MY SHOW. That put me in a good mood and I couldn't wait to gush about it tohollywoodgrrland then while waiting for the elevator, I saw her! So I started squeeing all about it and I was getting all excited for her Bran vid premiering in the first vidshow. I then went to the Typography Panel as I need to improve that in my vids which helped a lot but I had to leave early to see the BRAN VID. I left a little too early but it was amaaazing and so pretty and I loved that vid. Afterwards I talked to hollywoodgrrl, ohvienna and obsessive24 about how much I loved it and found out there are EXTRAS on the blu-ray that are very relevant to future Game of Thrones vids from me. Then I went to the Let My Lyrics panel go which was a really interesting look at instrumentals and made me want to vid them especially listening to all the instrumentals (and vidding them to GoT in my head because that's where my mind is right now).
Next I went to the Teen Wolf lunch party which was HILARIOUS. We watched a bunch of vids for it including the blooper reel, a hilarious medley with Hungry Like a Wolf, a Lydi vid (there are girls?! haha), a funny Stiles vid, a Jackson vid and boyslash vid with a lot of pairings in it ie just my thing. There was a lot of laughing, let me tell you, it was fun watching in a group. A great job was done byelipie, brimtoast and laura47 in organizing it, providing delicious food and working on convincing people to watch it (and vid it). Then I went down to Vidding as a Second Language which started a little late due to tech troubles (boo) so I had fun talking to bradcpu and thirdblindmouse about The Hunger Games, Game of Thrones and other things I'm forgetting. The panel was really interesting (this is a theme of panels) and I got to see buffyann!!! Which was so both wonderful and sad, I wish she had been here. Then was the Vidding Horror vidshow which was way more relevant to my interests than I expected and gave me a lot of great ideas for future vids.
I also became obsessed with my Carrie Homeland vid idea during this time and couldn't stop listening to it and thinking about it. I talked tojarrow before his panel about Glee (Dianna desktop picture of pretty!), The LA Complex and maybe something else and then listened to one of the most useful panels for me which I couldn't wait to apply to my own vids. Then there was the Forever Reblog panel which was AMAZING if only for the hilarious fanart pictures talitha78 had up playing that would randomly cause people to burst out laughing (also nsfw some of them). It was great to think about more wider issues of vidding in fandom and gave me a lot of thoughts on pushing vidding forward and what new artistic directions fandom is going in. It was super inspiring and I was excited about the direction the OTW was going in and how I could help contribute.
Then I went down to the House O'Meat with EVERYONE ELSE IN THE CON. I even randomly metsvmadelyn in the bathroom and we started talking vidding/ We had 10 people but they ran out of large tables so we split up and I ate with pharis, elz, frost_fire17, amireal and someone else I'm forgetting. I had two drinks as I was nervous about my Premiere and wanted to get drunk before Premieres for once. It was a fun discussion about various fandoms, Game of Thrones (Jaime talk and love!!), fic and other things I'm blanking on. I left early so I could get a good seat but then I ran into fan_eunice and I couldn't resist going outside with her and talking about Homeland FEELS. So much love talking about my new current obsession and it was great discussing Carrie and Brody and their conflicted selves. I went back upstairs and talked with obsessive24 and bananainpyjamas about various things including Game of Thrones, The Wire and future vid plans and such. It was nice being nicely buzzed as I had almost no nerves then.
Finally it was time to go into Premieres! I sat next toelipie so we could cling to each other during our vids. I loved the Intro vid with the continuation of the Hunger Games theme, that was super cool. I got way more nervous for my vid then I thought especially early on but thank god the Neville vid was right before that which distracted me because I was too busy crying over Neville omg Neville!!! I was the most nervous watching my vid at Premieres because I was afraid peeople wouldn't laugh at all but THANK GOD people did as I had hoped the big con setting (and possibly alcohol consumed) would encourage it. SO glad that went over well. I will go over recs later but I was particularly blown away by Posession by bradcpu (it gave me an idea for a GoT vid I'm working on!) and obsessive24's The Lightning Strike vid which was everything I wanted from it and more with the beautiful visuals and art external source. During the intermission, I was SO happy to hear that bironic liked my House/Wilson vid as the H/W fans were the ones I most wanted to like it :)
Then came Premieres Part 2 which was the most emotional vidshow ever for me. After being blown away byhollywoodgrrl's amazing The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo vid, the No Cars Go vid made me cry SO much for being the epic all movies vid I've always wanted centered around my beloved Hogwarts. Then elipie's Huge vid made me cry and then heresluck's Wire vid just BROKE me. I couldn't stop crying until halfway through the next vid because I did not expect a kids vid and I just...gah I can't even talk about it. I barely got a break because although settiai's vid helped me recover, then the millylicious's Rachel Glee vid came on and it was SO PERFECT and the Don't Stop Believing came on and it made me cry again because that vid means so much to me in the context of my life and trying so hard and finally starting to get what I've always wanted. Then fan_eunice blew me away with her Homeland vid which just ALL THE FEELINGS for Carrie and Brody and then the last shot took my breath away. I thought Anything for Love would help but NOPE, then it brought in VVC community experience and I was laughing and crying with joy. It was just the perfect end to a glorious show. I just did NOT expect Vividcry to last into this year.
Afterwards I was pretty overwhelmed with emotion but managed to give feedback to some of the people who had KILLED me with feels and pretty and great vids. It was good to get a chance to gush tosockkpuppett about her HP vid and talk to elynross about House/Wilson and The Wire and get to talk to astolat who made my absolute favorite House/Wilson vid and who I tried to homage a bit in my last "complicate" section. Also got to talk to flummery about their amazing Once Upon a Time vid that further convinced me I needed to watch the show. Next it was time for Vid Karaoke! It was so much fun to hear some classic songs and I somehow got talked into singing Fever by Adam Lambert with elipie and laura47 which was a lot of fun. My favorites that I remember were Power by jarrow, I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For (omg I laughed so hard I cried) and of course the epic Steve/Bucky vid to It's All Coming Back To Me Now by trelkez, pipsqueaky and sisabet which was hilarious and amazing.
Then I went to the Avengers party even if I'm not a big Avengers fan (I liked it! just didnt have much feels for it), I wanted to enjoy watching it with fans. I had a great talk withcolls about her vid challenge, future vid plans and other things and then got a delicious Hulk drink from deejay. I tried to watch the movie but then I started dyyyying to vid my Homeland vid idea so I went downstairs to the lobby and started vidding it! It was a lot of fun, probably the most vidding I got done at VVC but I got about 20-30 seconds of the vid done. kuwdora joined me for a bit and I learned SHE was a Homeland fan which I was super excited about. Then I went outside to hang with laura47, elipie and cappylicious, the latter two who put on a mini-dance performance and were having fun brainstorming a Merlin vid for next yeart. laura47 and I then talked coding, startups, vacation plans, family issues and the like which was fun. At this point it was like 3am so I finally dragged myself to bed.
The next morning I knew it was Sunday because I was exhausted and at 9:30 I thought it was like 6am. I didn't have time to eat breakfast so I grabbed a bite in the con suite and headed off to vid review where I briefly talked tojetpack_monkey and echan. I was happy to learn that cesperanza was one of the Vid Review mods because she always has really insightful comments even if she talks super fast (which wasn't as bad during Vid Review thank god). I really liked this year's Vid Review, there was a lot of really great thoughts. I just thought it was funny that during my vid getting reviewed, someone was like, she vidded all the good parts, I don't know if that was her intention...and I'm like nodding SO MUCH because yesss that was exactly my intention and everyones laughing. I had a list of things I thought people would mention at Vid Review and I pretty much hit Bingo on it so that was funny. It was good to go up to cesperanza and thank her for both her great comments and amazing vid which really got to me being that I finally feel like I have a community of vidders/vidfans here in LA.
Next was In Depth Review where we talked about two of my very favorite vids, the Homeland and Neville vid. I had SO many things to say about Homeland that even whensisabet said what I was going to say, I simply switched to something else. Then we discussed the Neville vid which made me cry even harder this time and people had great stuff to say about it and how it connected strongly to everyone because a lot of us are very similar to Neville and can relate to him a lot and we were all so glad to see him get a vid to himself. Next for Challenge I went to sit with bessyboo and elipie and talked about vids a little bit more. Finally it was time for Challenge in which I got nervous for my vid way too early and then was an emotional mess watching it because omg im so nervous and i want people to like it and yet I love Arya SO MUCH OMG. It was the most emotional vidwatching experience for me ever and again I could barely pay attention to the next vid, I was sobbing inwardly too much. I also loved the Jar of Hearts vid by jescaflowne that cracked me up so much and which I predicted 1/3 through that it needed to end on girl empowerment which it thankfully did. And watching jetpack_monkey's Jack Sparrow/Martin Scorsese vid in a con setting was SO MUCH better than in a living room, I couldn't stop laughing at it. The Jag Svar vid also had me cracking me up so much, I couldn't even deal and then I learned I was sitting next to/around the makers! It was amazing.
I was really happy with the reaction my Arya vid got, it was so surreal to finally be able to stand up and announce my name and to have everyone awwing over it. She's my girl so I was happy everyone loved her. The auction vids were all great, I particularly enjoyed Mr. Brightside as I had no idea that movie had any gay stuff in it and now I MUST watch it as the vid was really emotionally affecting. Next was Calls From the Public where I finally got a break from taking notes and started getting excited about next year's Vividcon where I volunteered withjetpack_monkey to do a comedy show vidshow/possibly panel so that should be fun. Next I went off looking for kiki_miserychic so I could show her one (haha okay more) of my Game of Throne vids and get some feedback on it (this is one that requires S4 footage so its going to be awhile). It was a lot of fun to get a chance to talk vidding with her and get some great ideas for the future.
Then I went off to the Teen Wolf episode watching party which was amazing.brimtoast led us through a long list of drinking game rules (the most given was angry face with head tilting up and Stiles making us laugh) to watch the parent teacher conference episode. I made myself delicious orage juice and tequilla and cranberry blue curuaco drinks and easily finished both of them. It was just hilarious to make fun of Scott, enjoy the boyslash and laugh a lot (especially at Stiles). Then we all started talking about the show, podficcing and various fannish things. Then brimtoast and me got excited about Jesse St. Jones so we watched Hello Twelve, Hello Thirteen and I died from the sexy. I then left to go hang out and watch vids with bananainpyjamasbradcpucherryicemillylicious and possibly someone I'm forgetting. Then bradcpu, cherryice, millylicious and I went up to watch the Fiasco game that obsessive24, laura47, jepack_monkeyand deejay were playing which turned out to be hilarious. I got sucked into talking about Game of Thrones with obsessive24 and enjoyed watching the crazy antics of the game (you thought twincest was only in fandom? haha).
Thencherryice, millylicious and I went looking for people to say goodbye to (I needed to give everyone hugs because I was leaving on a flight at 7am the next morning). First we met fan_eunice and sisabet and I got to talk some more Homeland and gush a little more over Becca's vid. Then we went to watch some of the Olympic Closing Ceremony with butterfly,revolutionaryjo, rhoboat, lunate8 and possibly others I'm forgetting. It was fun especially seeing the Spice Girls one of my earliest fandoms and talking Kris Allen and Adam Lambert with butterfly. Next we went back to the Fiasco room (while scaring off guys getting ice with talk of twincest) where I got to hang out with lolachrome where we had a looong discussion about Glee and other things. It was so much fun to talk Kurt/Blaine, the S3 finale, Ryan Murphy, fic and other TV shows we have in common (Game of Thrones!). I always treasure getting to have those one on one talks with people at Vividcon about fandoms/other stuff I'm really interested in and it was great to do that here.
After the game was over, I went back to watch more vids withkiki_miserychic, bradcpu, millylicious and cherryice where we watched the Also Premiering vidshow. It's so much more fun to watch with other people and share our thoughts together. Then I left with cherryice and went to her room where I talked a little with her roommate and then went down to the Captain America watching party which had finished by the time I got there. There I got to talk to NC about Harry Potter and Glee among other things. A bunch of us (svmadelyn, amireal, bessyboo, laura47 and some others I'm forgetting went down to the con lobby to talk so we wouldn't get kicked out of the room for noise (they were super strict to an unhealthy degree this year). There we talked snowy weather (and the lack of), fic, random fandoms and I don't even remember what else, I was too tired. Good pretzels though. Also trelkez, sweetestdrain and kuwdora came down to talk for a bit so I gave them goodbye hugs. Finally a security guard came and kicked us out again and told us to go downstairs so I felt like it was sign it was time to go to bed.
I went back to my room and then got like 2 hours of sleep. I packed, paid and left on the shuttle but at least getting through the airport was super fast and I had to keep checking my panel notes. I tried to get sleep on the plane but kept waking up every 20 minutes and the seat was super uncomfortable plus it was a middle seat so that sucked. I got back to LA and was at least happy to see palm trees. Unfortunately the bus to work broke down so I grabbed a cab with 2 other people who were likewise stranded. Good times. And yeah then the reality check of work came back and it finally hit me over the con was over. Next time I will learn to encode my vids before the con so I don't have to deal with hours and hours of that.
All in awesome, it was an AMAZING con, probably my third favorite one after my first two. It was great having three vids this year that seemed to get good reactions and it was amazing to be surrounded by people I loved no matter if I had just met or if I see them every year. I felt deeply a part of a community made even more apparent by the amazing LA vid community that I'm a part of and love. I loved so many new vids this year and I felt surrounded by amazing people to get to know wherever I went. It was great to reconnect with people, to laugh and cry and love all these familiar and new vids together and just have the beautiful sense of meaning and happiness. It reaffirmed that I want to keep being a part of this amazing community and contribute ALL THE VIDS I have inside me to it and keep improving my vidding skills. Once again, Vividcon is the BEST EVER! Only 362 (?) days until the next Vividcon...and I'm already thinking about vids to premiere there!
So no matter how many times I say I'm going to be all catch up on sleep before I go to Vividcon, I somehow always manage to go in with a sleep deficit. Oops. This time it was just a lot of packing catchup and working out (I'm trying to build up my arm muscles for gymnastics). I woke up early (not early enough) and took the Flyaway bus from Union Station to LAX and went through the usual 15 minute check in/security there. In the middle of the security line, I got a new vid idea: a PERFECT vidsong for Carrie that captured exactly what I wanted to say about her while being super emotional to boot. It'll probably be the most emotional song I've ever vidded and a song that I connect the deepest kinetically as well. Anyways I spent the entire travel time listening to it on repeat and DYING to vid it. Which I could do as I had the source on my laptop from marathoning episodes 3-12 of Homeland on Tuesday (GREAT DECISION). So I started clipping on the plane (unfortunately I didn't have the song on my computer) which helped a little in terms of vid farr. I got to Chicago around 4:30 but I had to run an errand (which I'm not going to get into but suffice to say it was not a great start to my Vividcon) so I didn't get to the hotel until around 8:20pm. There I met
pharis and then checked into my hotel room and dropped off all my stuff. Then I went down to registration where I saw a bunch of people hanging out. It's amazing that I still get nervous but there you go. I remember seeing kuwdora and um...other people? I'm blanking. I know I was disappointed that they had shut down registration early but thank god, I was still able to get my registration packet. I went down to Outback Steakhouse to find people to eat with (since I hadn't eaten in like 8 hours...) where I found
elynross, killabeez and wickedwords and had a great dinner with them. We talked about books, Game of Thrones (!!! my fandom), Narnia, jobs and just vidding in general which was a great way to kick off the con. Then I went to the Mystery Vid Party where I saw elipie, laura47, cherryice, rhoboat and later on bradcpu, millylicious and laurashapiro. It was so great to catch up on everything and freak out over all the awesome looking vids in the VVC packet. At some point, I left to go to my room where I talked with talitha78 which turned into an epic conversation about my Premieres vid, my (crazy) trip to Yosemite and life in general which was really great in terms of catching up. I went back to the room party but it had died so I went out in the lobby and found elipie and laura47 watching Teen Wolf which of COURSE I had to join. It was a lot of fun to squee about Stiles, Derek/Stiles, make fun of Scott and learn some epic reveals. We had a great discussion about life, friends and the life and it was just a great time getting to hang out with friends. I don't remember anything after that so I'm assuming I was smart and went to bed early so I could catch up on my sleep before the crazy lack of sleep times really started.The next morning I woke up and went down to breakfast where I briefly met with a bunch of people (it is generally impossible to list all the quick times I hugged and/or briefly talked to people, sorry). I do remember having breakfast with
butterfly, thirdblindmouse and revolutionaryjo which was a lot of fun. Then I went upstairs and met with a LOT of people who I'm totally blanking on at the moment. It's always a little overwhelming but fun. Ohh right, I got to meet kiki_miserychic!! Who is awesome and also got to see obsessive24 and dragonchic. I remember jetpack_monkey, bradcpu, absolutedestiny and me were all talking together at one point as well and Game of Thrones and my continuing efforts to try to get bradcpu came up. Also had a Game of Thrones conversation with danegan and sweetestdrain (who thank god I didn't spoil with my accidental slipup). Then came time for History of Vidding where we watched Club Vivid vids! Which was lots of fun especially hearing about the origin of the Joxer dance. Next I went to the Vividcon Quiz Show where they had everyone divide into teams based on your Hunger Game District and I ended up with
sisabet (who tried to recruit everyone to our team) andheresluck in District One. I wish I had prepared better but considering all my VVC DVDs were stolen, I think I did pretty good and we ended up in third place overall. Next I had lunch at the DELICIOUS Thai place with deejay, brimtoast, jackiekjono, rokikurama and rhoboat which was a lot of fun. My Chicken Pad Thai was just as amazing as I remembered, mmm I miss that place. brimtoast had to switch seats so she could sit next to me and we could talk about GLEE and Kurt/Blaine and Jesse St. James and so much Glee love. So much fun!I had to leave early so I could make it to Structure of a Vidshow as I wanted to learn more about that and take notes. It was a really interesting panel and helped give me some insight into the process for Premieres and CVV. I talked with a lot of people in between panels but I have almost no memory of them individually so I'm not going to be able to remember much of those. Next was WIP It Good which was fun in terms of commiserating on why WIPs get stuck. The best part was seeing
trelkez's Highlander vid which had all the black space filled in with text of what was going to be there which was HILARIOUS. I need to start doing that with my WIPs. Then I went to the Myers-Briggs panel which was especially interesting because I was OBSESSED with that when I was 16-18 so I have a lot of advanced knowledge of the topic. I was surprised the room was so full of TJs but considering it's Vividcon, it makes a little more sense. Next I sacrificed Also Premiering for Vid Your Id because that panel was MADE for me this year (because of my Premieres vid). It was as I expected, hilarious, with sisabet bringing down the house and showing everyone trelkez and dualbunny's ids. trelkez's "Nice and Slow" X-Men First Class vid premiered and it was AMAZING. I so loved that panel and it remained in discussion at VVC once it was over.Next I went to help setup with
bradcpu, millyicious, jetpack_monkey and a bunch of other people as well. It's also interesting to setup for Club Vivid and see how our epic dance party gets constructed. Then I went back to my room to change and talked with my wonderful roomies talitha78 and par_avion a bit. I unfortunately had costume issues this year so neither of my ideas worked out but next year I have an epic costume planned. I wanted to be Arya but I didn't want to spoil my Challenge vid so yes...I sacrificed for the greater good, I hope you're happy Vividcon. Then I went downstairs and admired people's costumes before we were allowed to eat the delicious hors d'oeuvres. For the first time we had a place to sit so I went to eat dinner with serrico, laura47, elipie, amnisias, jetpack_monkey and some people I'm totally blanking on right now. serrico and I had a lot of fun talking The LA Complex (Tariq!!) and I think the unusual conversation of vidding came up ;) I was trying to get drunk before my vid so I had a couple drinks but I ate too much unfortunately and I was feeling really full so it really hard.Seeing everyone was both overwhelming and amazing as people had some fantastic costumes this year. I remember talking to
revolutionaryjo (as Leslie Knope!!! I died a thousand happy deaths), thefourthvine, giandujakiss (who I finally got to meet!), millylicious (Black Widow!), bananainpyjamas, NC, jarrow (as Toby from Arrested Development hahaha) , ohvienna, hollywoodgrrl (so much Game of Thrones vid excitement! plus some Jaime/Cersei and other GoT talk) and so many more I'm totally forgetting. Finally it was time to DANCE so I went out to do the Joxer Dance with everyone. This year like the last few I paid less attention to the vids and more on the people as having to leave to get drinks, check the playlist, talk with people and go the bathroom makes me let having to see ALL the vids go. But there was some amazing vids starting out with bironic's Spaceships vid and so many others. I was freaking out about my vid being on but hollywoodgrrl's Game of Throne vid, Heads will Roll came on right before mine so I was too busy dancing happily and DYING FROM LOVE to get too nervous for mine which seemed to go over about as well as I hoped.I remember talking briefly with
astolat and her amazing Thor costume, shati (yay first time!), klia, bradcpu, jescaflowne (Another Sunday love!!), futuransky and then I couldn't stop talking lolachrome about Glee and even missed a vid. Speaking of Glee, one of my favorite moments of CVV/the con was all of us Glee fans ("there are dozens of us! dozens!) getting together to dance with jarrow for his "I Wanna Dance" vid which was AMAZING and wonderful to share the love with a group of fans. Also kudos to ua_the_terrible because he was dancing hardcore! The last songs were as always the highlight which started out for elipie's What Makes You Beautiful vid which I had SO much fun yelling out the lyrics to, Closer which NEVER gets old, Take Me Out jumping around and neverending songs of Evil Love Shack of Darkness and Stop the Rock. It was all super amazing. And then we had epic Avengers cosplaying pictures and reduxes of the amazing going ons on the dance floor. And I showed dualbunny my cat pictures as she wanted cats! After talking to people for a bit, I headed to watch amazingly hilarious Karaoke vids and talk Channing Tatum and other things with
sisabet, trelkez, dualbunny, sweetestdrain, absolutedestiny, elipie, braver_creature, cappylicious and others? Everyone was preeeetty drunk lol but it was fun especially hearing about the cold, cold nights. Then I went up to bessyboo's room and hung out with her, elipie, laura47 and others I didn't get the lj of. There was douchebro vidding in the background, Olympic talk, Broadway talk, rl stuff, Hipster Law Firm, LA vs MN/East Coast and a lot of other things. Finally I forced myself to go to sleep around 3am or so.So I woke up on Saturday earlier than I thought I would so I decided to watch HEADS WILL ROLL as many times as possible. That's when I found out how many little things and awesome things she had included and I was blown away all over again how much I love the vid and MY SHOW. That put me in a good mood and I couldn't wait to gush about it to
hollywoodgrrland then while waiting for the elevator, I saw her! So I started squeeing all about it and I was getting all excited for her Bran vid premiering in the first vidshow. I then went to the Typography Panel as I need to improve that in my vids which helped a lot but I had to leave early to see the BRAN VID. I left a little too early but it was amaaazing and so pretty and I loved that vid. Afterwards I talked to hollywoodgrrl, ohvienna and obsessive24 about how much I loved it and found out there are EXTRAS on the blu-ray that are very relevant to future Game of Thrones vids from me. Then I went to the Let My Lyrics panel go which was a really interesting look at instrumentals and made me want to vid them especially listening to all the instrumentals (and vidding them to GoT in my head because that's where my mind is right now).Next I went to the Teen Wolf lunch party which was HILARIOUS. We watched a bunch of vids for it including the blooper reel, a hilarious medley with Hungry Like a Wolf, a Lydi vid (there are girls?! haha), a funny Stiles vid, a Jackson vid and boyslash vid with a lot of pairings in it ie just my thing. There was a lot of laughing, let me tell you, it was fun watching in a group. A great job was done by
elipie, brimtoast and laura47 in organizing it, providing delicious food and working on convincing people to watch it (and vid it). Then I went down to Vidding as a Second Language which started a little late due to tech troubles (boo) so I had fun talking to bradcpu and thirdblindmouse about The Hunger Games, Game of Thrones and other things I'm forgetting. The panel was really interesting (this is a theme of panels) and I got to see buffyann!!! Which was so both wonderful and sad, I wish she had been here. Then was the Vidding Horror vidshow which was way more relevant to my interests than I expected and gave me a lot of great ideas for future vids. I also became obsessed with my Carrie Homeland vid idea during this time and couldn't stop listening to it and thinking about it. I talked to
jarrow before his panel about Glee (Dianna desktop picture of pretty!), The LA Complex and maybe something else and then listened to one of the most useful panels for me which I couldn't wait to apply to my own vids. Then there was the Forever Reblog panel which was AMAZING if only for the hilarious fanart pictures talitha78 had up playing that would randomly cause people to burst out laughing (also nsfw some of them). It was great to think about more wider issues of vidding in fandom and gave me a lot of thoughts on pushing vidding forward and what new artistic directions fandom is going in. It was super inspiring and I was excited about the direction the OTW was going in and how I could help contribute. Then I went down to the House O'Meat with EVERYONE ELSE IN THE CON. I even randomly met
svmadelyn in the bathroom and we started talking vidding/ We had 10 people but they ran out of large tables so we split up and I ate with pharis, elz, frost_fire17, amireal and someone else I'm forgetting. I had two drinks as I was nervous about my Premiere and wanted to get drunk before Premieres for once. It was a fun discussion about various fandoms, Game of Thrones (Jaime talk and love!!), fic and other things I'm blanking on. I left early so I could get a good seat but then I ran into fan_eunice and I couldn't resist going outside with her and talking about Homeland FEELS. So much love talking about my new current obsession and it was great discussing Carrie and Brody and their conflicted selves. I went back upstairs and talked with obsessive24 and bananainpyjamas about various things including Game of Thrones, The Wire and future vid plans and such. It was nice being nicely buzzed as I had almost no nerves then.Finally it was time to go into Premieres! I sat next to
elipie so we could cling to each other during our vids. I loved the Intro vid with the continuation of the Hunger Games theme, that was super cool. I got way more nervous for my vid then I thought especially early on but thank god the Neville vid was right before that which distracted me because I was too busy crying over Neville omg Neville!!! I was the most nervous watching my vid at Premieres because I was afraid peeople wouldn't laugh at all but THANK GOD people did as I had hoped the big con setting (and possibly alcohol consumed) would encourage it. SO glad that went over well. I will go over recs later but I was particularly blown away by Posession by bradcpu (it gave me an idea for a GoT vid I'm working on!) and obsessive24's The Lightning Strike vid which was everything I wanted from it and more with the beautiful visuals and art external source. During the intermission, I was SO happy to hear that bironic liked my House/Wilson vid as the H/W fans were the ones I most wanted to like it :) Then came Premieres Part 2 which was the most emotional vidshow ever for me. After being blown away by
hollywoodgrrl's amazing The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo vid, the No Cars Go vid made me cry SO much for being the epic all movies vid I've always wanted centered around my beloved Hogwarts. Then elipie's Huge vid made me cry and then heresluck's Wire vid just BROKE me. I couldn't stop crying until halfway through the next vid because I did not expect a kids vid and I just...gah I can't even talk about it. I barely got a break because although settiai's vid helped me recover, then the millylicious's Rachel Glee vid came on and it was SO PERFECT and the Don't Stop Believing came on and it made me cry again because that vid means so much to me in the context of my life and trying so hard and finally starting to get what I've always wanted. Then fan_eunice blew me away with her Homeland vid which just ALL THE FEELINGS for Carrie and Brody and then the last shot took my breath away. I thought Anything for Love would help but NOPE, then it brought in VVC community experience and I was laughing and crying with joy. It was just the perfect end to a glorious show. I just did NOT expect Vividcry to last into this year.Afterwards I was pretty overwhelmed with emotion but managed to give feedback to some of the people who had KILLED me with feels and pretty and great vids. It was good to get a chance to gush to
sockkpuppett about her HP vid and talk to elynross about House/Wilson and The Wire and get to talk to astolat who made my absolute favorite House/Wilson vid and who I tried to homage a bit in my last "complicate" section. Also got to talk to flummery about their amazing Once Upon a Time vid that further convinced me I needed to watch the show. Next it was time for Vid Karaoke! It was so much fun to hear some classic songs and I somehow got talked into singing Fever by Adam Lambert with elipie and laura47 which was a lot of fun. My favorites that I remember were Power by jarrow, I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For (omg I laughed so hard I cried) and of course the epic Steve/Bucky vid to It's All Coming Back To Me Now by trelkez, pipsqueaky and sisabet which was hilarious and amazing. Then I went to the Avengers party even if I'm not a big Avengers fan (I liked it! just didnt have much feels for it), I wanted to enjoy watching it with fans. I had a great talk with
colls about her vid challenge, future vid plans and other things and then got a delicious Hulk drink from deejay. I tried to watch the movie but then I started dyyyying to vid my Homeland vid idea so I went downstairs to the lobby and started vidding it! It was a lot of fun, probably the most vidding I got done at VVC but I got about 20-30 seconds of the vid done. kuwdora joined me for a bit and I learned SHE was a Homeland fan which I was super excited about. Then I went outside to hang with laura47, elipie and cappylicious, the latter two who put on a mini-dance performance and were having fun brainstorming a Merlin vid for next yeart. laura47 and I then talked coding, startups, vacation plans, family issues and the like which was fun. At this point it was like 3am so I finally dragged myself to bed.The next morning I knew it was Sunday because I was exhausted and at 9:30 I thought it was like 6am. I didn't have time to eat breakfast so I grabbed a bite in the con suite and headed off to vid review where I briefly talked to
jetpack_monkey and echan. I was happy to learn that cesperanza was one of the Vid Review mods because she always has really insightful comments even if she talks super fast (which wasn't as bad during Vid Review thank god). I really liked this year's Vid Review, there was a lot of really great thoughts. I just thought it was funny that during my vid getting reviewed, someone was like, she vidded all the good parts, I don't know if that was her intention...and I'm like nodding SO MUCH because yesss that was exactly my intention and everyones laughing. I had a list of things I thought people would mention at Vid Review and I pretty much hit Bingo on it so that was funny. It was good to go up to cesperanza and thank her for both her great comments and amazing vid which really got to me being that I finally feel like I have a community of vidders/vidfans here in LA.Next was In Depth Review where we talked about two of my very favorite vids, the Homeland and Neville vid. I had SO many things to say about Homeland that even when
sisabet said what I was going to say, I simply switched to something else. Then we discussed the Neville vid which made me cry even harder this time and people had great stuff to say about it and how it connected strongly to everyone because a lot of us are very similar to Neville and can relate to him a lot and we were all so glad to see him get a vid to himself. Next for Challenge I went to sit with bessyboo and elipie and talked about vids a little bit more. Finally it was time for Challenge in which I got nervous for my vid way too early and then was an emotional mess watching it because omg im so nervous and i want people to like it and yet I love Arya SO MUCH OMG. It was the most emotional vidwatching experience for me ever and again I could barely pay attention to the next vid, I was sobbing inwardly too much. I also loved the Jar of Hearts vid by jescaflowne that cracked me up so much and which I predicted 1/3 through that it needed to end on girl empowerment which it thankfully did. And watching jetpack_monkey's Jack Sparrow/Martin Scorsese vid in a con setting was SO MUCH better than in a living room, I couldn't stop laughing at it. The Jag Svar vid also had me cracking me up so much, I couldn't even deal and then I learned I was sitting next to/around the makers! It was amazing.I was really happy with the reaction my Arya vid got, it was so surreal to finally be able to stand up and announce my name and to have everyone awwing over it. She's my girl so I was happy everyone loved her. The auction vids were all great, I particularly enjoyed Mr. Brightside as I had no idea that movie had any gay stuff in it and now I MUST watch it as the vid was really emotionally affecting. Next was Calls From the Public where I finally got a break from taking notes and started getting excited about next year's Vividcon where I volunteered with
jetpack_monkey to do a comedy show vidshow/possibly panel so that should be fun. Next I went off looking for kiki_miserychic so I could show her one (haha okay more) of my Game of Throne vids and get some feedback on it (this is one that requires S4 footage so its going to be awhile). It was a lot of fun to get a chance to talk vidding with her and get some great ideas for the future.Then I went off to the Teen Wolf episode watching party which was amazing.
brimtoast led us through a long list of drinking game rules (the most given was angry face with head tilting up and Stiles making us laugh) to watch the parent teacher conference episode. I made myself delicious orage juice and tequilla and cranberry blue curuaco drinks and easily finished both of them. It was just hilarious to make fun of Scott, enjoy the boyslash and laugh a lot (especially at Stiles). Then we all started talking about the show, podficcing and various fannish things. Then brimtoast and me got excited about Jesse St. Jones so we watched Hello Twelve, Hello Thirteen and I died from the sexy. I then left to go hang out and watch vids with bananainpyjamasbradcpucherryicemillylicious and possibly someone I'm forgetting. Then bradcpu, cherryice, millylicious and I went up to watch the Fiasco game that obsessive24, laura47, jepack_monkeyand deejay were playing which turned out to be hilarious. I got sucked into talking about Game of Thrones with obsessive24 and enjoyed watching the crazy antics of the game (you thought twincest was only in fandom? haha). Then
cherryice, millylicious and I went looking for people to say goodbye to (I needed to give everyone hugs because I was leaving on a flight at 7am the next morning). First we met fan_eunice and sisabet and I got to talk some more Homeland and gush a little more over Becca's vid. Then we went to watch some of the Olympic Closing Ceremony with butterfly,revolutionaryjo, rhoboat, lunate8 and possibly others I'm forgetting. It was fun especially seeing the Spice Girls one of my earliest fandoms and talking Kris Allen and Adam Lambert with butterfly. Next we went back to the Fiasco room (while scaring off guys getting ice with talk of twincest) where I got to hang out with lolachrome where we had a looong discussion about Glee and other things. It was so much fun to talk Kurt/Blaine, the S3 finale, Ryan Murphy, fic and other TV shows we have in common (Game of Thrones!). I always treasure getting to have those one on one talks with people at Vividcon about fandoms/other stuff I'm really interested in and it was great to do that here. After the game was over, I went back to watch more vids with
kiki_miserychic, bradcpu, millylicious and cherryice where we watched the Also Premiering vidshow. It's so much more fun to watch with other people and share our thoughts together. Then I left with cherryice and went to her room where I talked a little with her roommate and then went down to the Captain America watching party which had finished by the time I got there. There I got to talk to NC about Harry Potter and Glee among other things. A bunch of us (svmadelyn, amireal, bessyboo, laura47 and some others I'm forgetting went down to the con lobby to talk so we wouldn't get kicked out of the room for noise (they were super strict to an unhealthy degree this year). There we talked snowy weather (and the lack of), fic, random fandoms and I don't even remember what else, I was too tired. Good pretzels though. Also trelkez, sweetestdrain and kuwdora came down to talk for a bit so I gave them goodbye hugs. Finally a security guard came and kicked us out again and told us to go downstairs so I felt like it was sign it was time to go to bed.I went back to my room and then got like 2 hours of sleep. I packed, paid and left on the shuttle but at least getting through the airport was super fast and I had to keep checking my panel notes. I tried to get sleep on the plane but kept waking up every 20 minutes and the seat was super uncomfortable plus it was a middle seat so that sucked. I got back to LA and was at least happy to see palm trees. Unfortunately the bus to work broke down so I grabbed a cab with 2 other people who were likewise stranded. Good times. And yeah then the reality check of work came back and it finally hit me over the con was over. Next time I will learn to encode my vids before the con so I don't have to deal with hours and hours of that.
All in awesome, it was an AMAZING con, probably my third favorite one after my first two. It was great having three vids this year that seemed to get good reactions and it was amazing to be surrounded by people I loved no matter if I had just met or if I see them every year. I felt deeply a part of a community made even more apparent by the amazing LA vid community that I'm a part of and love. I loved so many new vids this year and I felt surrounded by amazing people to get to know wherever I went. It was great to reconnect with people, to laugh and cry and love all these familiar and new vids together and just have the beautiful sense of meaning and happiness. It reaffirmed that I want to keep being a part of this amazing community and contribute ALL THE VIDS I have inside me to it and keep improving my vidding skills. Once again, Vividcon is the BEST EVER! Only 362 (?) days until the next Vividcon...and I'm already thinking about vids to premiere there!
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It reaffirmed that I want to keep being a part of this amazing community and contribute ALL THE VIDS I have inside me to it and keep improving my vidding skills. Once again, Vividcon is the BEST EVER!
Yes! This! x a billion! <3