February
23 NYCC: Day 1 impressions

There's still a few hours to go in the first day of New York Comic-Con. The show has so far gone quite well. It is crowded, but not unmanagable.

Today's panel I moderated on Packaging, Buying and Selling Screen Properties went very well. The audience was mostly full of comicbook creators looking for advice on how to get Hollywood to pay attention. The panel — consisting of Sharad Devarajan of Virgin Comics, Scott Mitchell Rosenberg of Platinum Studios, Ken Levin of Ken F. Levin Assoc., and Brendan Deneen from The Weinstein Co./Dimension — agreed the market for comic properties was very good, dependent on the quality. If the comic book is good, it's got a shot.

The convention floor was busy during the trade-only segment. I was stationed for a while at the Sequart.com booth, where I got to see the very first copies of my book, "X-Men: The Movie Trilogy and the Comics." The doors opened to the public at 4 p.m., and the traffic noticably increased. The media presence, especially from online sites. Blogger, podcasters and video bloggers all seemed to be swarming the floor looking for interviews. Publicists and executives promised nothing but bug announcements at their various panels and presentations.

The number of exhibitors seems to be about the same as last year, though the larger hall makes it appear quite a bit bigger. One of the nice things is you can see the sky through the glass framework at the front of the hall.

Artists Alley was quite the crunch, located upstairs from the main floor with the gaming hall.

As I type this, Stan Lee is speaking in the massive Special Events Hall. He will later attend the opening of a retrospective exhibit at the Museum of Cartoon and Comic Art.

Unfortunately, I forgot the USB cable for my digital camera, leaving me with no way to get photos off it and onto the net. Thus, all I can offer is less-than-optimal, but hopefully informative, photo from my phone of the crowd in Artist Alley. Click for a closer look.