ICON 38 Photos

Finally getting around to putting some photos up from last month, starting with ICON 38.

We threw a room party on Friday night, and a lot of fans came by to say hello.  This is Jeanette on the left and Ange on the right, both all dressed up and looking very chic.

From our room party again, on the left is Lauren, who came down with us from New Richmond to attend her very first SF convention!  Dean is standing behind to the right and I don't remember the name of the gentleman with the bowler and goggles, but we were all having a good time.

Some more party guests dressed up in fine steampunk style.

This is Adele, who was the Spider Lady.  Love the hat!

One of the most fascinating panels was a showing of some of the very first motion pictures ever shown in Iowa, starting back in 1896!  They were discovered by the gentleman standing next to the film projector in a basement of a house in a small Iowa town almost thirty years ago and he's been working to catalog and restore them ever since.  He had a wonderful show that he narrated vividly, including all kinds of facts he'd discovered about the films, including the fact that the highest paid actor in film back in 1901 was... a dog.  It wasn't all glitz and glamor back then.

He'd also found much other material, including records of where movies were shown and when, and how much money they made selling tickets.  Needless to say, this is really priceless information.  He'd also brought along a precursor to motion pictures called a Magic Lantern, and you can see one of the wooden slides in the photo.  They had multiply moving parts that would be turned to show a "moving" picture, and they dated back from the late 1860s.

Here's a shot of the Magic Lantern itself on the table at the left.  Initially they used a kerosene flame to light it, but this one had a light bulb that was cooled by the circa 1910 Sterling Electric Fan (made in Chicago) on the right.  Note the handy guard that allowed for spontaneous fingernail trimming on the fan...

One of the things Erin and a couple of the other artists in attendance did was to take some of their acrylic paints and use Lauren as a canvas for a work of art that she wore around the convention on Saturday.

Mike Miller laughing out loud while Dave Ingraham smiles on the right.  Good times.

Some of the floundering father and mother ships of Iowa science fiction fandom.  They still know who they are, even if they're getting grayer these days...

 Ange in another spiffy costume on Saturday night.

And this costume was good enough to eat, being on a chocolate cake.

On Sunday morning there was a panel on the process of creating steampunk objects, which was well attended and enlightening.  Erin was there too and got some ideas I'm sure.

Finally on Sunday afternoon, there was the panel on ICONs past, starting on the left with Mark Moore, Greg Frost, Bill Johnson (aka Billjon), Mike Miller, Steve Tait and Denny Lynch.  Thanks for helping to start it all!