Day 2 at San Diego Comic Con 2009

I started the day by going for the Coraline panel. Henry Selick, Neil Gaiman and the other crew from Coraline were there. Panels are really for people who want to see the stars. The content they spoke are probably going to be on the DVD itself. I wasn't disappointed, but I wasn't impressed as well.

This is me queuing up, hoping to get onto the Disney panel at Hall H. I was there 1 hour prior to the event, 2 hours later, I'm still queuing. The panel started late, be even so, when I was just outside the Hall, the panel ended. I'm really disappointed, particularly at wasting time. Anyway, there's going to be a video about the panel online soon, probably on Youtube.

And I went for Viz Media's Anime and Manga panel as well. It wasn't really good although there were people cheering whenever a title mentioned. But seriously, book releases don't need a panel. There were no authors and artists as well.

The last panel I went to was on Kazu Kibuishi, who allegedly (from the brochure) single-handedly revitalized the comics anthology format. I've a few of his comics and I follow the Copper comics online.

His story is pretty inspiring to any aspiring artists. In 2003, he was at the comic con submitting his portfolio. For Daisy Kutter he worked 80 days straight, only sleeping and working. He showed a picture of his studio when he was starting out, which was basically him drawing on a cardboard box beside his bed (see photo below).

Before creating Flight, he was actually an animator. Working extreme hours while animating, he also drew comics to the point his company gave him the ultimatum. He chose to quit and concentrate on his comics. Today, he's doing well due to sheer determination and his passion for comics. Currently, he's working on the new comic series Amulet.

His advice to aspiring artists is the same: Practise, practise, practise. Spend at least 10000 hours on honing your skills.

You can see more work on his blog boltcity.com.

With whatever time in between, I was walking around taking photos of cosplayers. Will be posting the photos up later.

Tomorrow, I'll be back to check out more books.