for our last days in europe, we found ourselves in rome looking at lots and lots of lots of ruins (and eating some REALLY good pizza). for our final day we ended up in the uncovered city of pompeii to visit even more ruins.  all of which were incredibly impressive. it was amazing to be walking on streets that were well over two thousand years old.

and HERE is some predictable but no less appropraite music to listen to as you browse.

… which is pretty much the exact same costume i drew last time, only the red is now a bit more purple and the “R” is now an “S”. yay for creativity!

also- florence pictures are now up.

some music to listen to while you browse.

for drawergeeks‘ giant monster topic today. :)

also, jen has posted our germany photos- or as we like to call it,  CASTLE DAY!

here again is some music to listen to if you decide to browse through.  this song will now forever remind me of watching the french and german countryside speed by as we traveled by train from paris to munich.

republic tigers – “buildings and mountains”

i think jen’s going to upload these in chunks so i’ll just post them as she lets me know. some of those videos are pretty funny too. and for those wondering who those other two people are in every other picture, we went with our pals shawn and alisha who were great travel companions. after spending over two weeks together, i think we only tried to kill each other like twice.

HERE’s some music to listen to as you browse.

here i am on my first day, ready to make the big bucks with my awesome display (thanks matt!)…

…which i decided to make even better on day two. :)

aw heck. let’s just skip to costumes.

these bat-villain costumes looked great.

especially mr freeze’s, who was apparently lagging a bit behind (check out ed’s report to get a better detailed look at this one).

and eventually bats and catwoman caught up to our table- with indy cosplaying third wheel.

what would a comic convention be without ash and zombies?

the only thing this mario didn’t have going for him was his pacing. “jump more!” i said. “jump!”

speaking of mario- jen took some time out to play some super smash bros. brawl during it’s debut weekend (we ended up buying it on our way home). two guys playing peach and kirby (who happens to also be my smash bros. of choice) were pretty much smashing everybody. here’s some footage jen took of them in action.

this death looked pretty foreboding…

…but i love this pic of him even more. it must be in the morning before everyone has crowded onto the con floor and he is just wandering in conventional death fashion after a day of hard work. poor lonely death.

jen had to get this pic of a soldier in galactica uniform.

as well as hold a cylon head someone handed her.

they weren’t 300 of these guys, but there were quite a few. here’s a couple of them protecting some random convention goer.

sally and jack just looked awesome. jen had to chase them down after seeing jack’s head peeking out form a crowd of people down at the end of our aisle. there were so many great costumes this year. i think people get better and better making them every year.

yay for miyazaki costumes!

i guess we’ve reached the anime section of this report. here’s a chobit waiting patiently for her groom.

three in one for jen! pikachu, stitch AND a hello kitty hanging around a neck. it’s like her stuffed animal collection came to visit us at the con.

even gargoyles shop at wal-mart.

saved the best for last! how cute is this aang! jen and i were standing around wondering why we hadn’t seen any avatar costumes and then later she comes running up to show me this picture. so awesome. and look at how jen instinctually poses in typical fire nation greeting. i love my wife.

i also love this picture! this is jen’s assistant photographer, henry, who comes to the show every year. i can honestly say he was the easiest person to spot on the entire floor.

saturday night we hung out at garibaldi with half my local tampa drawing group and most of the orlando crew. shortly into the evening we were bombarded by a mariachi band who serenaded us while we ate.

this video jen took captures the moment better than any picture.

haha! except maybe this one. this picture is classic. :) that’s dan boyd and joel carroll lovenly pictured above.

i had to do it.

we hung out with joshua smeaton almost the whole weekend, who’s table was right next to ours. here he is looking even more creepy than that photo of dan and joel above.

i was actually able to do a few quick sketches while i was there. this is one i did for dan’s sketchbook which he was kind enough to scan for me.

and here’s a couple i’m mailing so i was able to scan at home. a supergirl request…

…and captain cow, ready to fly off to his next convention!

there i am on day one! with cow and buffalo excited to be on display. :)

and i guess that was it for day one because the rest of the photos have me wearing a different shirt. that’s matt to the right of me giddy about showing off all the display stuff he made for me (thanks matt!).

when matt would leave to go wander the floor cow would step up in his place. i would try to have conversations with him but it was like talking to a piece of cardboard.

oh cow!

i don’t usually sell sketches for people at shows because i’m sloooooooow. but this guy was persistent. he wanted a dancer so here’s girl uh… dancing. on fire. hotttt.

this one guy came by with this huge book of sketches he’s collected from artists drawing yoda. it was the coolest book to browse through with original drawings from amazing artists like jeff smith and david mack. this took less convincing for me to quickly sketch my tea drinking version of the old jedi master.

speaking of tea- this young captain america recognized my tea drinking wolverine from drawergeeks. his dad informed me he was saying “more tea, mr fuzzles?” for a week after seeing it. cool!

speaking of captain america- here’s his not quite as well-known counter part, captain ohio (great costume)!

matt is a lover of chickens so he couldn’t resist taking a picture of this guy balancing a rubber chicken. incredible!

matt then thought it would be fun to have some of the costumed characters reading adventures in sandwich making. here’s batman…

and hellboy… (i love that guy behind hellboy. he’s so ready to do.. something…)

and this guy…

batgirl and superman… (great hair supes!)

vader…

a jawa…

and this stormtrooper. this one’s gotta be my favorite. he just looks so generally involved.

that’s it! back to drawing!

(photos by jen)

the convention center!

view from the convention center. that bridge is pretty scary to drive on.

this guy cleared out the whole top floor! i didn’t think he was that scary…

…until i got captured!!! oh no!

the comic con!

there i am in my brown shirt, staring up at things in awe. that was pretty much what i was doing the entire time i was there.

this is for you, ryan!

this is for you, matt!

giant pikachu! this is for you, jeff! (but also for me and jen)

the legos!

a batman made entirely out of legos. it was so cool!

lego batmobile..

lego spongebob..

huge bionicle.. thing.

the statues!

yes!

this was my favorite of the statues we saw. it was just so ridiculously well done.

of course, jen took her time around the harry potter section.

yarr!

arrgh!

the lost statues were CRAZY! it’s like a mini john locke!

the panels!

the scott mccloud panel was insane. this guy just teleported into the room right in front of us! scott was just exercising his geniousness with a, “yeah, so besides reinventing comics i’m also inventing new ways of travel” as he explained the ways to make his travel time quicker during his fifty state tour.

..to which his wife replied, “he’s crazy!”

up close with lisa henson, brian froud and genndy tartakovsky duriing the dark crystal panel:

not so close up at the lost panel (but still pretty close considering amount of people in this room!):

that’s hurley and jin there with damon lindelof in the center:

the flight crew getting ready. too many to name.

but i’ll mention jeff smith because he’s my hero (there in the pony tail).

the costumes!

doug tennapel was cross-dressing as the invisible woman.
it was creepy.

we later found him out of costume though. that’s jen getting a catscratch drawing from him.

don’t know who this is but she looks cool.

so many star wars people…

a lacsidasical galactus

captain america saluting adkins.

that scarecrow is hillarious!

meanwhile…

elvis stormtrooper and buddy christ, together again. only at comic con.

this is pretty funny. joe got his picture taken with this guy too- the same day before we even met up with each other.

the costume people were so funny. whenever jen would ask if she could take a picture of them, they would go into total serious mode.

jen and i loved these last two:

my friend dan isn’t in costume. he really is a member of team zissou.

his bright orange hat came in handy when we were walking around with him. here’s a where’s waldo type picture. can you find dan?

and there you have it. didn’t take as many picture as we probably should’ve. we were to busy having fun talking to people and buying stuff. next time we’ll have to bring video!