As seen at STAR WARS CELEBRATION II • MOS EISLEY DIORAMA BUILDERS
Indianapolis, IN, USA from May 03 to 05 2002.
post production Celebration II FRANK’S WORKSHOP JOURNAL
Welcome to the OFFICIAL Star Wars Celebration II Mos Eisley Diorama Builders workshop site featuring my EXCLUSIVE CREW COVERAGE not seen anywhere else on the web.
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Mos Eisley Spaceport… where it all began… I just had to keep a personal journal of my adventure. At the time, this was just a test and I had no idea if it was going to sink or swim, nor that I would be returning to EVERY USA convention ever since. This is my adventure, what it takes to design and produce a fan booth at the Star Wars Celebration convention. The following is my original 2002 transcript. It was fun for me to re-read it (NOTES in RED are new comments I just did in 2022) I hope you enjoy it as well. …
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Celebration II Diorama Builders workshop is really happening ! I am so exited about this but wish I had 1 more week to prepare. (NOTE: nothing has changed 20 years later LOL) It’s insane how time flies by. I wanted to put this section online last week but was too busy, as if that’s any surprise LOL. Last week I went to my friend Mark’s Worshop and we built the Diorama Exhibit Podiums. You can CLICK HERE to see how they turned out.
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This weekend was cookoo. I spent Saturday printing out the T-Shirt Iron-Ons for the Crew. It’s really cool to be able to make your own Iron On Stickers but very time consuming 🙁 but they will make great souvenirs and a great way to thank the crew for all their help during the Diorama Builders Workshop.
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Sunday I printed out my Special Gifts I will hand out to people who find me and say “Eechawanna” I know it’s a bit corny but it’s all in the spirit of the convention – 🙂 I also started making the T-Shirts. They turned out a lot better then I expected. If only it didn’t take 15 minutes each. I have made 6 and have 12 more to do tomorrow after work. I also fixed up Vader’s Secret today, its was messed up, almost 2 years sitting on the shelf. All the decals were peeling off and I also just finished my Bacta Tank Diorama. I am really happy with it. Now that May is almost here, might be that my next Diorama will be an Episode 2 scene 🙂 I can’t wait to see this movie. it just looks sooo good. (NOTE: What was I thinking lol)
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OK, it’s 2:30 am, I must go to bed. Last day of work tomorrow then I am off to INDY 🙂 I will be arriving Wednesday Night. Setting up at the convention Center Thursday. I will try and see how we can keep you posted on our progress. If I cannot access my site for updates during the show, you will be able to see what we did on Rebelscum. I will have LOTS to tell you upon my return home on Tuesday May 7th Until then, take care.
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I woke up early. Around 9:30. Hey, that’s early for me ok – LOL. My best friend from University and Co-Pilot on this adventure, Lucie picked up the rental MiniVan and dropped it off while she went to do last minute errands. I am printing out all the Biography cards that will go in front of every diorama display for the Exhibit. During this time, I brought the podiums to the balcony and started sanding them. Our plan is to leave Montreal by 2:00 pm today.
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Guess what ? it’s 4:00 pm and I just finished sanding those damn podiums. Good news is that they all fit in the MiniVan. Bad news is I haven’t yet started packing the dioramas, or made my suitcase or even showered. Lucie is back and helping me pack. Great, none of the boxes I have are big enough to protect the dioramas. I must cut some and make adjustments. More time wasted 🙁 We placed all the figures in glad sandwich bags to protect them and finished putting the dioramas in boxes at 4:45 pm. I must now take a quick shower. I am so nervous for being this late. we wanted to avoid rush hour hell traffic.
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5:30 pm … the MiniVan is now all packed and looks like it is about to explode – LOL. I have never seen so much stuff shoved into the back of a car 🙂 and FINALLY we’re off. Yeah!!! but after about 10 blocks I realize I forgot my glasses at home. #&$*@&$%#&!!!! I need them to drive at night so back to the apartment we go. As if things aren’t bad enough, my glasses are not where I usually place them. Typical. ;P After searching every room, I found them hidden under some Star Wars Lego I was building 3 nights before LOL. OK, now we’re off FOR REAL … except as we feared … stuck in rush hour and I am going bonkers. Have you seen the movie FALLING DOWN ? 😛
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It took about 2 hours to get out from the downtown traffic and onto the highway. Thank God we are now rolling at a good 120 km/h. All the traffic is on the opposite direction. Except for LOTS of trucs, did I tell you there are LOTS of trucs – LOL – not many cars on the highway. We listened to CD’s (NOTE: Do you guys even know what those are anymore ? 🙂 and drove all the way to Toronto – about 6 1/2 hours. Lucie’s friend is letting us stay at her home for the night to take a rest before the LONG LONG journey to Indianapolis.
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It’s half past midnight, and I am in my room for the night. This house is HUGE but there are 11 people living here. I am experiencing THE REAL WORLD. LOL. A mattress on the floor with bare walls is not home but it sure is better then sleeping in the car. Not to mention there is no room left. Not even for an ant to crawl in 🙂
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It’s 4:30 am. We rested just enough to break the trip into 2 sections. We decided to try and avoid rush hour customs by going through Niagara Falls. The MiniVan was in an indoor parking so I was happy that nothing was stolen during our sleep. After a brief potty break – oops, did I really have to mention that ? TMI Frank TMI 😛 We got into the car and took off.
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It’s now 6:30 am and we just went through customs. I had a picture of my dioramas, picture of the podiums put together and a list of every item in the MiniVan. The customs man asked us how much we we’re selling this stuff :O We said it’s only for exhibit. He said “oh… ok go on then” move along 🙂 and let us right through. We we’re scared that they would make us take out every box and inspect every item. It pays to be prepared. Maybe it’s because it was early they didn’t make a fuss. Now it’s my turn to drive, so switched places and drove for about 4 hours until we got hungry. Ate some Spicy Chicken at Wendy’s at 11:30 am and then Lucie took over again all the way to Indianapolis.
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5:30 pm … we have arrived in the city, it is pouring rain. We had NO clue where the Holtel was. (NOTE: This was BEFORE GOOGLE MAPS and GPS phones) I wanted to stop for directions and Lucie was yelling at me to stay calm. I was now experiencing what it must be like to be on THE AMAZING RACE – LOL. It’s one thing for your friend to come and watch DVD’s (2 hours in the dark, no talking) but another ballgame staying together 24 hrs a day, and the trip was just starting, what did I get myself into – Ha ha ha. We finally found the hotel. WITHOUT directions ;P Before leaving Montreal, I was invited to a supper event at 6:00 pm and thought we we’re late. I had completely forgotten that there is 1 hour time zone change here. It was 4:30 pm NOT 5:30 pm. So we crashed on the bed for an hour and then I called David Syczylo, one of the Indy Knights (the official Indianapolis Star Wars Fan Club) and an excellent diorama maker to boot. He gave me directions to the meeting and said it was pushed back another hour. Cool, more rest 🙂
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7:00 pm … Lucie and I got there and we we’re not sure where to park. We asked this young guy outside the restaurant if we we’re allowed to park there and he shrugged his shoulders and said “I think so”. Took a while to find the meeting room and then was asking around if David had arrived. “There he is” someone pointed and it was the same guy we asked about parking outside LOL. How funny was that ? We had just met but did not know it at the time. Seemed we had just missed Philip Wise from Rebelscum. He had to leave to pick up some actors at the airport for the convention. Everyone seemed very excited about Celebration and had even created a giant 6 foot thank you card for fans to sign and be presented to George Lucas. At the end of the meeting Lucie and I were starving. We had to go eat. There was no real food here. Just as we were leaving, we were introduced to 2 of the coolest people I had the chance to meet during my stay in Indianapolis. Dan Ramsey and jamie Follis (NOTE: You guys know him as SILLOF online and the one fan who has been helping me at EVERY workshop since). These guys went WAY beyond the limits of helping out a stranger. They offered to borrow a truck and go get the plywood sheets for the diorama and get plaster and materials from the hardware store. This was so generous I was in awe of their kindness but my tummy was growling so it was time to GO NOW and eat 🙂
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Just before dinner I called Mary Franklin, from Lucasfilm, and told her we had just arrived. I was also nervous about leaving all the stuff in the van overnight in the hotel parking lot. “Bring it now” she told me. We were only 4 minutes away from the convention center. When I got there I met Mary for the first time. She was waiting for us at the loading dock and for someone who had been setting up the convention all day, she looked great. Not even tired !!! She helped us get the dioramas and podiums out of the van and showed us where we could place them for the night. Our room wasn’t ready yet so we placed everything in front of the autograph area. Now I was less stressed about tomorrow’s set up and could eat in peace.
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When in Indianapolis go to RAM’s – LOL – We had the BEST Filet Mignon in a LONG time. Though at $30 ($50 Canadian) it better have been. Ha ha ha. After dinner, now almost midnight, we headed to the hotel and collapsed in our beds. I won’t go into details about waking up at 3:00 AM with severe cramps. Let’s just say, DON’T eat Filet mignon at 11:30 PM – LOL.
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Woke up at 8:00 am. Called Pat at Bates Supplies. Tell her what docking bay to send the art supplies. Tell her to be there before noon. Went to breakfast downstairs – free included in hotel price – then headed for convention Center. At first I was freaking at how far the Hotel was but it could not have been better. Go out the parking, turn right and you are on the highway on ramp. Drive 5 minutes and your at the convention center. just brilliant.
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9:30 am… Just arrived and went into rooms 116-117 but started thinking is this the right room? There were only 10 tables instead of the 28 ordered and NO barrier ropes. Great start to the day 🙂 After 15 minutes of being told to go see “Mr.X” who said go see “Mrs Z” who said go see “Mr.P” – get the picture? – I found out that the plans for the room had been changed. I have NO idea who drew them but it was NOT the design I had planned and was approved 2 months ago. 30 minutes later I was told there was a mix up between 2 other rooms and our stuff would come in soon so Lucie and I started to assemble the podiums just as David, Dan and their friends started showing up. They offered to help start painting the podiums which was great. During this time I was also looking for David. I found him in the “book” room setting up all the foreign books for the convention “grab what you can carry” room. What a great concept. Excellent idea Lucasfilm. This alone was worth coming to the convention. I was able to pick up some cool reference books including one I had NEVER seen before – The ILUSTRADED EMPIRE STRIKES BACK SCRIPT. Gorgeous hard cover with the entire script and freeze frames of every scenes. I was in heaven ;P
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2:00 pm… The podiums are painted. The main table for the diorama is complete as well but where was my Art Supplies ? I called Bates and was told they were going to deliver tomorrow instead. NO NO NO. I started to FREAK OUT in panic. You MUST come NOW. Why did I call at 8:00 am to confirm delivery? After some begging they finally agreed to send the delivery guy now. Thank god. If the material would have arrived tomorrow it would have been a HUGE disaster. Plus there were items on the list I needed NOW to complete the set up. Again, David and his friends were too generous and offered to go wait by the docking Bay for the truck. The rest of us stayed in the room and started moving our tables around but soon found out we needed our missing tables NOW so we could continue the set up. :(
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One cool thing we did was change the “wet” area to another corner due to there being a bathroom right across the hall. how convenient was that ? (NOTE: because of this and how practical it was, Mary has gotten us our own SINKS inside our booth for all conventions since) I was very happy 🙂 I finally got to meet Philip Wise when he brought me the Workshop Banner. I laughed the night before when I was told by the young helpers that he was an “OLDER GENTLEMAN” Let me say he looks a LOT younger in person 🙂 Everyone seems to think because you have an internet site you must be 20 years old 🙂 LOL. Now I had my banner, it was time for another headache… to find the people who were to hang it.
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2:30 pm… I was able to finally exchange my passes Lucasfilm provided with the Badges needed to walk around without an escort. This was an adventure in itself, there was so much going on. I was able to follow someone to a booth where they quickly exchanged the tickets for a C-3P0 Exhibitor Pass. How cool was that. I was giddy like a 12 year old 🙂 At least now I didn’t have to find David or some other staff to escort me into various areas now. I must say it was fun and felt important to be able to flash a card and go in anywhere we wanted to go in the convention halls, to watch as Hasbro was setting up their figures, or all the toy vendors, Legos, Rubies… and this is when I fell in love… the moment i saw the NEW lifesize Episode 2 Yoda in person I KNEW I HAD to get him. $500 if pre-ordered at Celebration. After the show, the actual price kicks in… $1700. Which to me is RIDICULOUS. But $500, what a great deal. This was the ONLY purchase I had time for at the show. I had to get back to set up my own booth and had little time to see anything else.
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5:00 pm… Hello !?! Where are my tables? My Ropes? or the Union dudes to hang up my banner ? Cause you know you are forbidden to do any work yourself. Outside it is now chaos as everyone and their mother is trying to get ready for tomorrow. At least I was in an enclosed room and once inside, felt safe, less panic, like in the eye of a hurricane, quiet, no stress or noise from the outside. Only the knots in my stomach… where is my stuff? 😛 AT least the Bates Art Supplies arrived during my Yoda purchase. Thank God some good news. We could at least start mounting the photos and banners while waiting for the tables etc…
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With all this chaos and running around, I totally forgot about getting in contact with Eric and Joe. They are bringing in their personal dioramas for the Exhibit display. I call my hotel and get a message from Eric Plummer. Great news is that his hotel is across the street. 15 minutes later he came by and brought the Most Impressive Tantive IV Diorama I ever saw. To see it in person is 500X better then the pictures in my site’s visitors gallery. I was most impressed and now know I must make my own Tantive Hallway diorama real soon 🙂 (NOTE: 20 years later, I have yet to make this MUST DO diorama – Next year will be THE year – I feel it 🙂 About 30 minutes after Eric left, I got in contact with Joe Amaro. He is staying at the same hotel as we are. How weird is that ? He brought his Jedi Council all the way from Texas. I was very excited seeing his council in person because it was Joe’s customs that inspired me to make my own. I even modeled the look of mine after his. Joe arrived around 7:00 pm. At the same time, Wizards brought me my missing tables and Rope. We can now finish setting up.
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Around 9:30 PM, the Union guys came by to install my giant banner out in the hallway. It is most impressive hanging from the ceiling. Little did I know that they were hanging it facing the wrong direction – LOL. The fans waiting in line are walking towards the BACK of the banner which is BLANK – LOL. So NO ONE KNEW where we were, unless they poked their heads in the doorway. Geez LOL. After placing all the biography cards on their stands and all the figures in their respected dioramas, it was time to go home. The room was ready. I had been so busy I had not eaten all day. It was now 1:15 AM. We stopped off the 7-11 and got bottled water and an egg sandwich. No Filet Mignon for me tonight ;P Must wake up early. Tomorrow is day 1 of Celebration II.
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Woke up at 8:00 am, ate breakfast with Joe at the hotel. Public opening was at 10:00 am so we left hotel at 9:00 am. Arrived at Convention center and could not believe how many people were in line. It went all the way around the stadium sized building. We are talking about 3-5 regular city blocks long. We found a parking across the street and went straight in. The perks of having Exhibitor Passes 🙂 When I got to the room I was shocked and angry… the doors to our room were WIDE OPEN !!! I was told they would be locked until my arrival since we had thousands of dollars worth of art supplies, not to mention our one of a kind dioramas. Anyone could have entered and stolen the custom figures or dioramas or material supplies. This would be the start of many problems in keeping the room locked during closing hours. Fortunately Indy Knights guys had arrived 1 hour before and kept an eye on the room. There were many people walking around the halls. I was not too happy at this point. After talking to security I was promised that doors would stay locked until I arrive in the morning. Good, one problem solved.
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I dropped off my T-Shirts at the Rebelscum/Force.net table. This is the only time I will be able to leave the Diorama Workshop room. 11:00 am rolls by and then Noon, and then 1:00 pm… No one is coming to make a building. This is gonna be a DISASTER !!! Tons fans walking past taking pictures of the diorama exhibit but then leaving 🙁 I am thinking the worst… we will have 3 houses in the final diorama. Jason Garner arrives at 1:30 pm with his 2 dioramas that filled the missing podiums of the display. His awesome Bespin Boiler Room and his Dagobah scene. The cool thing about his dioramas, they are encased in 12″ deluxe boxes, a really cool idea. Are you reading this Hasbro? 😛 It was great to finally meet Jason in person. For almost 2 years now, I have been chatting and reading e-mails from friends made online, but to place a face with the name is priceless.
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3:00 pm… Opening ceremony is now over and a lot of people have found their SACUL Figures. (NOTE: This was a George Lucas spelled backwards Stormtrooper in disguise carded figure not to be sold in stores) Slowly, people are coming in asking how they can make something for the diorama. I gave each person a sheet of foamcore, a template for the dimension of the base and a template for the door height so figures will fit inside. The rest of the building, height, shape, design, details is all up to the creators imagination. I had some photo references of Mos Eisley but we were not trying to make identical copies of existing buildings. 2 hours later, around 5:00 pm, there is no more table space for people to sit and work. We actually have a line up piling up outside waiting to come in. The early birds have finished assembling their houses with the hot glue guns and have moved on to the plaster “wet” area. It is so cool to see how peoples imaginations bring plain foamcore to life. Some buildings are way beyond my expectations. It is very exciting and there is a buzz in the air. Convention closes for the public at 6:00 pm but I decided to let people finish their plastering so it would dry during the night. 7:30 pm we decide to start pushing people out, I need to eat you know – LOL. Maureen from team Rebelscum is actually the first person to finish a house including painting ! Talk about a fast learner :P
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It’s 9pm, my feet are killing me. I am very tired and ate nothing all day. It’s amazing how you don’t think of food when you are kept so busy. We have about 12 houses plastered and another 4-5 ready for plastering tomorrow. People were amazing. All I want to do is go to hotel but I must wait for security to come lock the doors. Suddenly strangers start popping open the “Emergency Fire Exits” on the side wall. What is this ? We find out that our room connects with the room that has the Star Wars digital projections. They are showing Empire tonight and there is no way to lock it. Anyone can come in – Not good. After waiting more then an hour, security shows up and tells us they will post someone at the outside door to prevent people from entering the diorama workshop and stealing our stuff. That takes maybe 15 – 20 minutes. Finally someone sets up a chair and locks the front doors. I feel relaxed, we can leave and go eat supper at 10:30 pm !!! 🙁 Get to the hotel after dinner, it is now 11:30 pm. Time for bed. Tomorrow fan club gets in at 9:00 am, 1 hour before the general public, have to be inside the room before 8am to prepare.
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Today there is a real marathon on the same street as the convention. Good city planning there 🙂 Knowing this we decide to try and bypass it by leaving extra early = 7:00 AM. Get to Convention center at 7:10 and all streets are blocked. Lucy lets me get out of the MiniVan and will try to find parking while I set up for the morning. I walk up to the room and find it unlocked again. Arghhhh WTF !?!. No one is inside, Where is last night’s security guard ???. I close the doors and clean up a little. I decide to put my limited for sale T-shirts on the wall since no one can see them at the Rebelscum table.
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9:00 am… open doors. Frenzy outside as line up for Carrie Fisher Autographs passes right outside the hall blocking the netrance to our room. This is when I found out the banner was facing the wrong direction 🙁 Too late now to fix it. At least there is the small foamcore mounted signs by the wall outside the door. People start flooding in taking video and pictures of all the dioramas exhibit. Many who visit Niubniub’s (NOTE: The name of my first site NiubNiubsUniverse.com) come to tell me how cool it is to see them in person. It’s great to see fan reaction in person. I got a lot of feedback on what scenes to create next 🙂 Lucie finds it extremely bizarre that 1) people recognize me from my site and 2) want a photo and autograph LOL.
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The people who built houses yesterday come in early and are ready to paint. Around 10:30 am, the room is filled to capacity with people wanting to help make Mos Eisley. Again no more space at the tables, people must stand and wait for others to move to the plaster and paint areas. By noon, there are so many people we run out of plaster bandages 🙁 YIKES, not good. We had over 75 rolls. No time to freak out, I must improvise and do a Papier Macher test. It works, not perfect but better then stopping production. Since the surface will be covered with Plaster of Paris anyhow, it doesn’t matter how ugly the base coat looks – LOL. You see, since Plaster of paris does not stick well to Foamcore and slides off, you must apply a first coat of Plaster Bandages or Papier Macher so that the Plaster will stick to it and not fall off. It is really touching to see so many fans getting into diorama building. The fear I had yesterday morning that we would be HUGE FLOP has now disappeared.
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5:00 pm… we have no space to paint so we moved some tables around to create a “drying” area. We managed to place about 20 houses and make up a lot of room in the “wet” area. The funny thing is this… people who were just entering the room thought that the houses drying was the finished Mos Eisley diorama. They were all shocked when I said the final scene would be 6x that size. People again stayed till 7:00 pm and then I had to kick them out because I had gotten tickets for the Star Wars Concert. We left the room all dirty and full of scraps on the floor to clean in the morning.
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8:30 pm… we got the the ballroom and as Exhibitors were able to cut in line and get to our seats first. Sorry to all those who had to wait 3 hours. 😛 It was really cool. Sitting in front of us was Steve Sansweet from Lucasfilm and Rancho Obi-Wan. He wrote just about every cool toy book there is. If you don’t have the action figure archive in your collection – Get a copy NOW. 2 rows in back of us were Warwick Davis (Wicket) Dave Prowse (Darth Vader) who I was surprised to see was shorter then I was, Peter Mayhew (Chewbacca) and several of the imperial officers actors. There were rumors of John Williams attending but sadly was not true 🙁 The first set was the best. Episode IV is still the best of all the soundtracks. I can close my eyes and SEE the entire movie with dialogue and sound effects pass in my brain. It is because we know this music so much that it was easy to tell when someone hit a wrong note (several times) and I must admit I was disappointed with the quasi “tin” like sound. When you listen to the CD, there are maybe 60 or more violins and in this orchestra there were maybe 12. They were playing the notes from Star Wars but it wasn’t Star Wars if you get my meaning. And when Duel of the fates was sung by a choir of like 15 people, it was missing some OOOMPH, lung POWER. I did like the selections of the encores though. Ending with the Victory Celebration theme from New Hope was really cool. Aside from some corny passages like Artoo dancing I was happy to have attended the concert and more happy the tickets were only $10 🙂 Get to hotel, take shower and go to bed. Last day tomorrow.
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We decided to check out this morning and try to go all the way home instead of spending another $150 for hotel and arriving in Montreal at 2:00 am. Again met Joe for breakfast and left the hotel at 8:00 am with all our luggage in tow. Total cost: $420 Not too bad. Will come to $630 Canadian. Damn Canadian exchange.
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Doors open at 9:00 AM and 3 people are waiting outside to paint their houses 🙂 Today at noon is the drawing and we want to be ready with the figures so that there will be at least 3 hours of display for photo ops before convention shuts down. We decided that at 10:30 what isn’t painted, will get painted by helpers. It’s the only way to finish in time.
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There is another insane lineup outside our room for Carrie Fisher autographs. It’s totally nuts as many people waiting in line since 3:00 am!!! did not know you had to wait in another line to buy your coupon first. I’m glad I did not want an autograph 😛 By 10:00 am we have many more people than the previous days ready to help. We start by moving the BIG table so that the diorama will be closer to the front doors. After that I assign a “painting” crew to paint anything white. The rest of us spray adhesive to the plywood surface so that we can sprinkle our saw dust on top and not have it fly all over the room.
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11:00 am… One hour before the drawing. We start placing all the dry buildings. The only major problem…our Cantina, which is a giveaway, is about 40% done. Jamie and his Emergency Crew decide to mix the paint and the plaster together to save time. Worst case scenario… Cantina will be wet in the display but will at least look cool. Meanwhile, the rest of us continue to figure out where to place the buildings. Moving one here, no this looks better there, wait what about here? Time is getting short and the room is getting VERY crowded. People are signing up for the drawing and are gathered around watching every detail as we finish putting Mos Eisley together. Only 10 minutes left before noon, you can feel the stress in the room – LOL. Ok it wasn’t that stressful. Like magic, everything is coming to fit perfectly together. Jamie and his gang finish the Cantina and plop it in it’s spot still gross and wet 🙂 About 5-6 of us brought our Hasbro figures and customs and start placing them in the diorama. Mos Eisley is coming to life before our very eyes. It was really impressive how figures give life to an empty space. I look at the finished scene and cannot believe what people have created FROM SCRATCH in only 1.5 days. It is really incredible to see. And more so all the talent people don’t realize they poses. Again on Friday I thought this would never work but you guys and girls proved me wrong. BRAVO.
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At precisely noon, Mary from Lucasfilm was gracious enough to come and pick the names of the winners who would take home the Cantina and Docking Bay sections. It was great that the winners came to the show by CAR – LOL. I don’t know how a stewardess would have reacted to seeing a Cantina as carry on luggage – LOL. After the drawing there were SO many flashes going off it was very cool. I felt happy for all those who worked on Mos Eisley to know how much people loved the result enough to want to take so many pictures. Having Steve Sansweet and Ben Burtt pass by with his daughter was awesome. I am so happy I had this opportunity to come organize this workshop.
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Mos Eisley would have been nothing without all who helped out…Thank you to David Syczylo, Dan Ramsey, Jamie Follis, Joe Amaro, Eric Plummer, Jason Garner, Bob Collins, Chris Kelso, Bill Cox, Kevin Watts, Mary E.K. Cate, Bradley Wiseman, Eugene O’Reilly, Phil O’Reilly, Dave Hannenbohn, Kim Hannenbohn, Alec Castle, Austin Castle, Rob Castle, Michael Thomas, Daniel Linn, Kevin Lehning, Greg Suess, Chris Taylor, Dave Truscello, Chris Sharp, Bryan Borgman, Craig Schaefer, Thad Boyer, Harry J. Pell, Scott Carrier, Ken Falkson, Bill Cory, L.E. Spry, Dylan Spry, Kevin Mikel, David Mikel, Laura Sheppard, Marten Dollinger, jonah Comstock, Nathan Comstock, Steven Black, Emt Molon, Steve Boughton, Chris Pelletier, Nate Gerald, Adams family, Aaron Weisner, Reid Martin, L. Skylas, Bill thomas, Brad Komack, Jack Komack, Aaron Feder, Wendy Ostrander, Andrew Straw, Renee Lerner, Austin Lerner, Evan O’Dell, Paul Krautter, Christian Krautter and Paola Voci and of course, I could NEVER have done this without Lucie Trudelle !!! My Montreal accomplice 🙂
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3:30 pm… people started taking their houses with them. What a perfect souvenir to an awesome weekend. People’s response was great. They could not believe that there was no line up (most of the time) and that it was free. It was sad to see the diorama crumbling down but in 30 minutes the convention was over. I can’t believe how fast it all passed. We started cleaning up and picking up all the stuff I had to bring home. I donated the podiums to the Indy Knights so they could display their work at home. Plus I was all too happy not to have to carry those babies back in the Mini Van with us 🙂 At 5:00 PM they were taking down the banners and I was most happy to find out I could keep mine. What a great item for EBAY. HA HA – just kidding – I would never sell my banner ! (NOTE: Still have it preciously hanging in my workshop) Dan Curto found me the official mounted Diorama Workshop signs and was more then happy to surprise me with them. I am dead tired and tear down sucks even more then setting up 🙂 Putting all the figures back in their bags and taking down all the dioramas is one thing but finding a cart and going back to the docking bay is a mad house. Every Dealer and Exhibitor wants to leave at the SAME time, it’s like rats running away from a sinking ship – LOL. Thankfully, Lucie had hidden our cart from Thursday and kept it in our room all this time. Smart girl 🙂 we just put our boxes on top and walked to the MiniVan.
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Saying goodbye to all the new friends we made was the hardest. (NOTE: Still to this day – at EVERY convention it sucks, but it is not really GOODBYE as it is SEE YOU SOON) It felt like summer camp. Like you know you will stay in touch through e-mails and web chats but the chances of ever seeing anyone again in person is slim 🙁 Perhaps at Celebration III? 🙂 A Bespin or Naboo Diorama perhaps? or a giant Arena battle? 🙂 (NOTE: I ended up picking the DEATH STAR as the theme, you can see photos in the sites Conventions menu)
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7:00 pm … Take off towards Montreal. We drove for 2 hours till 9:00 pm and stopped off at Taco Bell. Was great to sleep on the back seat while Lucie was driving. 3-4 hour rotations while the other sleeps is a good plan for 18 hour drive home.
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At around 2:00 am we got to Canadian Customs. I was asleep and the brakes woke me up. We were asked how long we were gone for and if we bought any booze and cigarettes. “nope” we said half awake and the were told “have a safe trip” and went right through. No searches no opening boxes, nothing. great news when it’s dead of night. We drove to a Tim Horton’s for donuts and coffee and then I took over the wheel for 4 hours till dawn arriving in Montreal at 11:45 am. I put my things on their shelves and then went to the bank to deposit my US currency. I HATE bank tellers. ALWAYS take forever. Long Live ATM’S 🙂 Then went to Legends to get my new Action Figures. Brought them a Sacul and some books. Was great to see their smiles. Until I left and they were arguing on who gets to keep the Sacul Figure 🙂 Came back home at 2:00 pm and went straight to bed till 9 pm. What a BLAST it was. I was sad to be home.
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It is now 1:29 am and I am very tired again. I hope you enjoyed my stories and hope you will enjoy looking at the pictures. For those of you who couldn’t be with us, I think it will be the next best thing as having spent the weekend with me. For those of you who were there, I know it will bring back lots of smiles. Keep up with your creations and send me your diorama pictures. Again a BIG thanks to Philip Wise (Rebelscum.Com) and Mary Franklin (LucasFilm) for making this Workshop happen and Action Figure Xpress, BJ Action Figures, Entertainment Earth, Sci-Fi Expo and Toy Palace… the fans and I thank YOU for your generosity in paying for ALL building materials. There could NOT have been a Diorama Workshop without your help. See you maybe at Celebration III 🙂
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