GallifreyOne 2017

It's been a helluva year so far (for many reasons), and I've been keeping myself super busy between work, archery tournaments, and going to Conventions. Consequently, I'm behind on nearly everything, including posting about the various things I've been up to the past month. I'm posting these reports out of order, because I won't get to them otherwise.

In addition, the graphics card on my computer died in the past 3 weeks and Amazon has yet to send the replacement part we ordered, which means I can't actually get to any photos except for those on my mobile phone. If I continue waiting to get the actual photos, these reports won't get posted.

So, back in mid February for Prez Day Weekend (Feb 17-19), my Viking and I drove to Los Angeles to attend the Doctor Who convention, GallifreyOne, that we've been attending for quite a number of years. Unlike most years, I had been travelling non-stop for several weekends, and I went into this convention extremely tired and a big haggard.

How haggard, you might ask? Well, because I didn't have much time to sew any new costumes, I opted to cosplay from my closet. I chose to do one major cosplay outfit for the weekend, and had it all packed and hanging next to the luggage ready to be taken out to the car when it got packed. Can you guess what happened next?

The costume didn't get put into the car.

I didn't realize it until we started unloading our luggage into the hotel! DOH! Ah well.

I did, however, pack a number of Dr. Who themed t-shirts in my regular luggage, so all went well. The whole convention was a nice chance to relax and see a few people, including our beloved co-host ESPAÑA who was there with her hubby! We managed to record a podcast, which I will post soon! (I promise).

I attended quite a few panels, including the Iron Costumer panel that is based on Iron Chef. Two groups of costumers (Team Rassilon and Team Omega) go head to head to sew and create a costume that would fit in the classic Doctor Who series in under 60 minutes!

Both myself and the Viking were on a couple of panels. I sat on a panel of 5 for Doctor Who crafting, as well as a cosplay photography panel. It was quite fun.

Of course, there was plenty of cosplay at the Convention. There was plenty of new Dr. Who characters, including this wonderful 4-year old who cosplayed one of the Weeping Angel Cherubs. And a wonderful Cleopatra

And there were plenty of old Dr. Who characters. Some of them were quite as hokey as you'd imagine!

I wish I had more photos to share, but as mentioned above, they are on my main camera body but my computer is unavailable for me to download. I shall share them as I am able.

GallifreyOne 2016 - ConReport

Earlier this month, I attended GallifreyOne, the Doctor Who convention, in Los Angeles. It's always held at the LAX Marriott hotel, and the hotel, itself, really gets into the swing of things.

  

There are some pretty amazing costumes at Gallifrey, like this Davros.

There were folks in "older" Doctor Who.

And new Doctor Who, and as evidenced by the photo, the same people cosplayed different eras of Whovian characters.

As always, there are some pretty creative fiber artists who make their costumes accordingly.

And some very creative takes on iconic pieces, like this Dalek Fez.

And some pretty awesome mashups -- like this 10th Doctor Jedi

There was even a T-Rex carrying around a small little TARDIS that she would occasionally spit out. :-)

I was on a couple of panels, including Doctor Who Crafts -- a panel for crafters that love Doctor Who. Topics ran from how to manage your crafting to how to make money from your crafts. I'm considering writing up an article about that for the blog.

I also was on a panel for Cosplay Diversity, which was also pretty interesting. My co-panelists were from different walks of life and we covered a range of topics at a fairly high level.

This was my first year doing panels at GallifreyOne, although I've done them for years at other conventions. I had a good time and met some pretty amazing people on them.

The guests were amazing. Sir John Hurt was one of them, and the crowds to listen to him being interviewed were huge. My DH Viking got Sir John Hurt's autograph on an ALIEN chestburster, because, well...that's just how he rolls.

 

I, of course, cosplayed throughout the convention, but only managed to get a few photos of me in them. One of them was my "comfy" costume, Rosie the TARDIS (which I'll post about later, including the making.)

Overall, it was a most excellent convention, and one that we're looking forward to attending again next year.

GallifreyOne: Convention Report!

This past weekend was the Doctor Who convention, GallifreyOne, located at the LAX Marriott hotel in Los Angeles. This convention is spectacularly fun, and a great place for cosplayers, costumers, and crafters to really show off their work.

There was a lot of different skill levels. There was some pre-made / purchased costumes, and a lot of hand crafted ones. There were costumers of all ages.

I was glad to see many parents getting their children started early in the cosplay world.

 

7 month old twins dressed as Amy Pond & River Song.
I LOVE their hair

Or you can get them even younger with this customized Dalek stroller!

There were costumes everywhere. One of the panels for the day was "Iron Costumer", which is a take of "Iron Chef". There were two teams of costumers (Team Omega and Team Rassilon). They were given sewing machines, a motley of different fabric, and 45 minutes to build a costume around the following theme:

Romana has regenerated. The President of Gallifrey needs a new outfit 

The costumes they came up with were pretty spectacular. Each team divided up into "Props" and "Sewing". There were extremely inventive! The gentleman's staff are whiteboard markers that are attached to each other then covered with foil.

We had costumers ranging from beginner to full-fledged prosthetic masters.

 

Dream Crab anyone?

And what's nifty is that there are a lot of fiber artists at GallifreyOne as there are many knitted costume pieces in the very show itself! This young lady had her own take on the 7th Doctor, played by Sylvester McCoy.

 

Her underbust corset is duplicate stitched. 

She initially did Intarsia for her gloves, 

and opted to duplicate stitch for her underbust

There were many variations of the 4th Doctor's scarf running around. I wore my gloves on a couple of days and received a lot of compliments.

In addition to one-person costumes, there were a lot of group costumes as well.

And for those not doing group costumes, there were plenty of meet-ups for cosplayers doing a specific costume. For example, there was a Missy Meetup as well as a Companion Meetup. It was a good way to meet other cosplayers who love the same characters you do.

The number of cosplayers is pretty large at Gallifrey. The masquerade alone had 40 entries! I'm already starting to plan my own set of costumes for GallifreyOne next year. I hope to see you there.

Gallifrey One Convention Report (Part II Fiber Arts at Gally)

The one nice thing about Gallifrey One is the sheer number of very crafty people who make their own costumes as well as their own crafty goodness. It's pretty impressive how imaginative people can get. It's so impressive that I left the convention with a bunch of ideas to make -- sew, knit, and make. Even my dear Viking was MUST MAKE ALL THINGS!

Everywhere you walked, you saw people who made something -- either a costume or knitted item. And there are a LOT of knitted & crocheted items at Gallifrey One. There's a Ravelry forum, Who Knits, that's just dedicated to Doctor Who fiber arts.

The biggest knitted item for Gallifrey One is, obviously, the infamous Doctor Who scarf. I made one for myself (albeit using a knitting machine) several years ago. I saw plenty at Gallifrey with some interesting twists.

There were some interesting ways to wear them. I mean, what do you do with a 13 foot scarf?!?

Wear it ala Toga style!

You can turn it into a dress:

If that's wool, she's gotta be really warm!

Of course, you can always turn a scarf into a raglan sweater. (I'm going to need to steal this idea!) Her aunt had made this for her years ago. It's a crocheted sweater out of sport weight with small bits of lace.

The scarf wasn't the only knitted or crocheted bit of goodness at Gallifrey. I saw one crocheted Tardis and a mashup of 4th & 11th Doctor goodness.

There was also an amazing vendor (Hand-Knit Habitat) who sold HAND-KNIT scarves, hats, and knitting kits for those who don't knit, and she sold out of nearly ALL of her stock during the convention. It was awesome to see a successful knitter. I bought one of her knitted bow-ties in support.

She specializes in Science Fiction knitting, which I highly approve!

GallifreyOne: Convention Report (Part I - Costuming)

I'm finally getting to catch my breath again from the whirlwind between GallifreyOne and Stitches West 2014. I've tried to write up my Con-Reports with photos, but I was a bit delayed until I got the photos completed. It's no fun to write up a Con-Report without photos!

I'm going to write-up a multi-blog post on Gallifrey because there was Just. So. Much. If you're not familiar with GallifreyOne in Los Angeles, it is the Doctor Who Convention over President's Day weekend. We have attended for a number of years, and always have absolute blast. There are panel discussions on Doctor Who, interviews with guests of honor, panels on crafting, costuming, and then everything in between. If you ever wanted to geek-gasm about Doctor Who, then this is the place to do it! This year, they had two guests I particularly wanted to see -- Billie Piper (Rose) and Arthur Darvill (Rory).

We didn't think we were going to be able to go this year until the 13th hour (okay, about a month before the convention), but a bit of luck and some help of some friends with the hotel room, we managed it. (Anyways, we shall be attending Gally again next year with a bit more pre-planning.)

The convention sold out its tickets (~3000 people), and some of the evening events were jammed pack, like the Ice Cream Social on Thursday night.

Gallifrey started on a Thursday this year, and LobbyCon (the unofficial part of the convention) was jammed pack on Thursday evening when we arrived.

The convention is pretty costume heavy (nearly as costume-heavy as CostumeCon). A large percentage of the guests were in some form of Dr. Who regalia and a ton of cosplayers as various characters from the show. Everyone was showing their love of the good Doctor.

There were some very good Doctors this year.

And there were a lot of Daleks too....

Some of them were robotic in nature and others were human driven. And others were almost human.

Our friend does some amazing prosthetic work!

And it wasn't just the adults, there were a lot of very young fans cosplaying ranging from really cute to kinda creepy.

This costume was kinda creepy, especially as he kept asking everyone if they were his mommy.

The extremely geeky assistant from "Day of the Doctor" 50th Anniversary was extremely popular this year. In the show, she was definitely a fan girl, which I think many can relate.

It's always good to see the different interpretations of various costumes ranging from a very comfy K-9 to Twin Tardises!

There were also a lot of mashups, costuming-wise. (A mash-up is when you take two different shows/movies genres and mash them together, like a FireFly x Dr. Who.......)

Everyone needs a bandolier of sonic screwdrivers!

This year, we were shangheid(j/k) honored to help out with the Masquerade by judging for presentation (how well did they present their costumes). Our friends were judging workmanship (how well did they construct their costumes). Here's one of the contestants....

Can you bellieve this is her FIRST costume?!?

It was fun to be a judge again, and we got awesome seats (front row!) We've volunteered for judging next year. :-) Hopefully, we'll see you there next year as well.

24 Hours of Gallifrey

This past President's Day Weekend (for those of you in the U.S), which is Feb. 15-18, I attended a Dr. Who convention down in Los Angeles, called Gallifrey One.

Now, Gallifrey One is probably one of THE largest Dr. Who conventions on the West Coast. They manage to get an amazing array of actors, writers, costume designers, producers, etc, who have worked on Dr. Who. It's a Dr. Who Geek Paradise.

And, it's the one SF/F convention where I have seen the largest gathering of fiber artists attending. At many other conventions, there are your typical  costumers and prop makers, and Gallifrey is no exception. The costumers are pretty diverse. Every year there are numerous doctors, ranging from #1 - #11, as well as their respective companions. In addition, there are the other characters from the show and the adjunct t.v. shows, including Captain Jack Harkness, Silurians, and, obviously, the Master.

This year, there were a ton tardis dresses, a ton of 10s & 11s, Amy Ponds, and River Song. I spotted this littlest doctor with his Tardis. (You can see more Gallifrey One costumes here.)

 

But, in addition to the number of customers, there is an extremely large number of extremely creative fiber artists who attend Gallifrey. The most knitted item is (obviously), the infamous Dr. Who scarf, but there were a variety of Tardis & Dalek hats.

In every panel that I attended, there was always at least two knitter in various panels, knitting away on DPNs or circulars. In the Dealer's Room, there was one enterprising knitter selling her hats & knitted scarves for the attendees.

But, a lot of knitters took their fiber creations to completely different levels, incorporating many of the iconic elements in completely different ways. This costumer did an amazing femme Dr. Who costume, incorporating the scarf into her bustle!

 Dr. Who Bustle

 

If you're a fiber artist and a Dr. Who fan, you might want to consider coming to Gallifrey. You'll feel right at home with all of the knitting & crocheted items wandering the halls!