Anime Weekend Atlanta
posted Sunday Sep 19, 2010 by Scott Ertz
This weekend Allante and I spent at one of the largest anime conventions in the country, Anime Weekend Atlanta. This convention is completely different from the cons we have covered here on The UpStream in the past and totally in a positive way.
We were joined all weekend by our good friends from the 3000 Brigade who spent the weekend in costumes (as always). They started the weekend as Playboy Bunny Peach, Zelda and Sheik with Mario and sexy Link and Red Link on Friday. Saturday we had the Raving Rabbids wandering the convention floor and taking pictures adding the Fire Emblem group at the end of the day. Today we brought back the Raving Rabbids (one cosplaying as Mario), and added Links and a gothic girl. Awesome as always.
For more about AWA, hit the break.
The dealers' room was huge and filled with impressive dealers. At most smaller cons you see a lot of mediocre shops with OK stuff but AWA goes the distance and has large vendors with great products at even better prices. We were pretty surprised several times when a realist tail was only $20 and Pocky was only $1. We also got to see our new friends at Glitch Gaming Gear and some of their new Portal designs.
In the artist alley were a lot of impressive, nationally-known artists with a lot of great work. Some booths were so stocked with artwork and items that you could barely see the artists. The room was set-up into small squares of 6 artists in clumps instead of large rows, which made traversing the room a little more difficult but made for a lot more space for people to walk and stand to see the works. The artists seemed to have gotten the same memo as the dealers and their prices were also a lot less expensive than we usually see at cons.
All-in-all, the convention was a lot of fun and definitely worth the trip. We are looking forward to a bigger and better AWA next year!