August 25th, 2009 (09:28 pm)
current mood: :woofase:
Another year another manifest.
Like the sucker I am, I go expecting to be disappointed, but this year I was wrong, very wrong.
I ditched work early on Friday and headed over to the showgrounds, where surprisingly enough, it was held this year. Waited around outside for my pass to arrive and headed in.
I had been to the showgrounds for Supanova, and thought it was pretty impressive, but Manifest? It's a whole different show bag. (Thank you, more puns will be coming)
First thing I noticed was how professional it looked. No longer was it a group of people pretending to be professional, no, this was the real deal. Manifest had grown up, and was showing the big boys it knew how to roll.
The big players were there showing their wares for sale (Madman, Tamarket, the Box Hill anime store whose name I keep forgetting) along with a dozen or so fantraders all with amazing artwork.
While wandering around I caught up with a friend doing some work for ANN.au who had come down from Sydney for it. We walked around, found an anime theater hall in a vast shed (which was quite weird) before settling down in the smaller theater and watching a few episodes of Guu.
It wasn't hard to tell that the Friday would have been a very quite day had you been there all day.
The following day, it was an early rise as a friend needed to go early to pick up his pass. Back to the showgrounds, only this time to line up. After waiting in line for an hour it finally started moving. While he went to get his pass, I ducked out and started looking for cosplayers. All the staple cosplayers were there. Your Narutos, your loligoths and your Ouran High's. Also of note was a 420chan cosplayer.
There were a handful of K-On cosplayers which didn't go astray.
The rest of the day was your standard convention. Screenings, traders, cosplayers. On hand were several Japanese food stalls selling average Takoyaki (I guess once you have it in Osaka, everywhere else is average) and curries.
A friend from Adelaide mentioned how the cosplayers in Melbourne were of a higher quality than Adelaide. I kinda mumbled a response as I tend to gloss over cosplay. There are only so many Narutos you can see before they all start looking the same, but upon closer look, the amount of work that goes into them is very high. It's amazing what going to a convention with someone who cosplays can make you see.
Sunday I had a chat with a guy I have spoken to online for 8 or so years, without actually meeting. We talked about Manifest, where it had come from and where it had gone, and he made me realise something.
This years Manifest was easily the best one yet. Over the very poor last couple of years, Manifest had actually improved on itself, and is possibly one of the best conventions in Australia.
Hopefully it will keep up the high standard.
Photos here