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  1. In Memory of LAJ_FETT: Please share your remembrances and condolences HERE

Celebration V: My Experience

Discussion in 'Star Wars Celebrations' started by darthantony, Aug 15, 2010.

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  1. darthantony

    darthantony Jedi Youngling

    Registered:
    Aug 15, 2010
    I have been a Star Wars fan my entire life(born two months after A New Hope) but this was the first time I have been able to make it to a Celebration event. I live about three hours from Orlando so it was very convenient even though I was only able to make it to one day which was Saturday. My sister and I attended and we were very excited to finally be able to share our love for Star Wars with so many great fans from around the world. Seeing the passion and devotion from the fans is one of my main reasons for attending as well as the chance to do a meet and greet with the cast and crew of the various films.

    We arrived at about 11:30 AM Saturday and headed straight to the autograph hall. We browsed the merchandise section and then took a peek to see which stars would be available for autographs later on. We then checked out the One Man Trilogy which surpassed my expectations in entertainment value; great show! After browsing around the convention center and checking out several of the exhibits we grabbed some lunch and headed back to the autograph hall. I met Peter Mayhew and he was nice enough to take a candid shot with me. My sister did the same with Jake Lloyd since she is "all things Anakin" fanatic. Jake is a cool guy, it was a pleasure meeting him.

    After that we purchased a few items and caught the 5:30 bus back to the parking lot. We would have loved to do another day but could not fit it in due to scheduling conflicts. The experience was worth every penny and I hope Orlando gets the nod for C6 which I would imagine will take place in three years when we are celebrating the 30th anniversary of Return of the Jedi. It is great to be a Star Wars fan and Celebration 5 made me realize that even more.



     
  2. DragonLove76

    DragonLove76 Jedi Youngling star 1

    Registered:
    Oct 2, 2004
    The Good
    Hanged out with a few cool guys a lot of them like to do what I do. :)

    Celebration store crowd management, was smooth this time around

    Blu-ray is coming out next year with deleted scenes and GL joked "I can make more Star Wars movies"

    Got in to the major events without much hassel! Line management rocked this year!

    Will think of more positive/good things to mention, but negative ones are louder right? :p



    The Bad
    Did not make as many friends as I hoped to, which is most important factor.

    A couple of the products sold I felt was WAY too overpriced (The Darkside Lanes bowling shirt for example - $60? :/)

    Products at the last day did not get any discounts, so I could buy more T-shirts

    No lockers

    The staff's knowledge of where places were very poor. I asked a few of staff there where places are at during the first day, but a bunch of them really had NO clue at all!

    A little lonely/solo

    No mention of live action TV series

    The so-so
    Harrison Ford couldn't make it, Hayden and Natalie couldn't... Carrie, Mark, Anthony, R2, Peter Mayhew, Jeremy,etc could not be together on the stage during the Main event, that kind of full cast reunion would be more awesome!
     
  3. DarthBreezy

    DarthBreezy Chosen One star 6

    Registered:
    Jun 4, 2002
    The Good -

    Staying at the same hotel as most of the folks - where else could you share a smoke with Nick Gillard?

    [image=http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v17/DarthBreezy/c5/c5002.jpg]

    Seeing a TONNE of old friends, and new ones. :*



    The Bad -

    Damn cheap camera.

    Sore shoulder and knee made it hard to get around.

    Not having enough money to bring home EVERYTHING I wanted! :p

    The Mixed - It's over for another 3 years... [:D]


     
  4. echo-3

    echo-3 Former RSA star 4 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Mar 11, 2002
    I had a wonderful time ,here are my thoughts.

    Pro's:
    Spending 4 days with old and new friends
    The wonderful staff of all the restaurants and hotels of Orlando
    Seeing the Main Event
    being right there when the Blu Ray event came down.
    The OCC center.
    The Bus's back and forth to hotel and Conn.
    The wonderful Lego displays
    The guy drawing the chock Clone Wars on the floor.
    Clone Wars Season III panel
    The collecting ESB toy panel.
    The cool Wampa outside the Hoth Bar.
    The vender area with miles of toys to look out.
    Hasbro area
    The area with the Jabba's cantina creatures.


    Conns:
    LFL or Acme,who ever made the stupid choice to have one cash register and making me wait in line for 4 hrs Thursday to pay for my prints.
    The ofter rude OCC staff!
    The Orlando Heat and humidity.


     
  5. DragonLove76

    DragonLove76 Jedi Youngling star 1

    Registered:
    Oct 2, 2004
    Yeah, I am defnitely very sore and tired, but I am not gonna list it as one of the bad factors. :p

    #$%^ing damn s*#)*@ cheap cellphone!!! :mad: :p
     
  6. DragonLove76

    DragonLove76 Jedi Youngling star 1

    Registered:
    Oct 2, 2004
    Sadly, I can't say the same about spending time with old friends , because I came alone and no one I meet in the old conventions called out my name.


    What's up with that? :(

    However, I did stay at a hotel with some cool people. Plus, in the line I made a few friends as well. In the mixer party @ Valencia I met some great people too. :)

    I have to agree on the buses back and forth between the hotel and con.
    Not sure if they did that at C2 and C3, but that's certainly really awesome! These ones I got roommated up and drove my car.


    I still need to get Clone Wars season 1 and 2 on Blu-ray and have not seen all of the episodes yet, but yea Clone Wars season 3 looks really awesome!

    Who knew Darth Maul had a brother?



    [hr]

    [b]The Good [i]revised[/i][/b]


    [li]Hanged out with a few cool guys a lot of them like to do what I do. :)[/li]

    [li]Celebration store crowd management, was smooth this time around[/li]

    [li]Blu-ray is coming out next year with deleted scenes[/li]

    [li]And GL joked "I can make more Star Wars movies"[/li]

    [li]Got in to the major events without much hassel! Line management rocked this year![/li]

    [li]Although actually it's another $75, but the Indy-SW crossover totally blew me away!![/li]

    [li]Bus to hotel[/li]

    [li]Clone Wars season 3 looking awesome![/li]

    [li]Force Unleashed 2 looking awesome! [/li]

    [li]The Old Republic looking awesome![/li]

    [li]Free T-shirt from the Old republic!![/li]

    [li]Memories and priceless photos[/li]


     
  7. Darth-Dogfish-Head

    Darth-Dogfish-Head Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 5, 2004
    Pro's
    *The NH Mandolorians taking me in and letting me stay with them in Florida, getting to meet them a few times before we left.
    *CV staff being nice enough to waive the increased price for me to upgrade to a four-day pass when I went there Wednesday.
    *Having the opportunity to volunteer for both Official Pix and CV by being in the right place at the right time and with the help of the NH Mando's (and having the money for my 4-day ticket refunded for volunteering at least 12 hours)
    *Helping the 501st set up for Speed Dating and seeing their gift bag to George Lucas
    *Getting to get in early and work on several different jobs, including helping with the line, stuffing the gift bags, working in the store and in Laser Tag.
    *Working in the store while George Lucas, Steve Sansweet and Lucasfilm staff were doing their private shopping. That was the top moment for me.
    *Working with Cat Taber, and working the line for Ashley and Mark in the autograph hall.
    *Going to the Mark Hamill panel
    *The three writing panels, the Insider panel and the filming location panel
    *Meeting people at the Fanforce table
    *Getting all the autographs I was hoping for (one of the things I collect)
    *The Belgian displays and finding out Lucasfilm shipped them all for them (Falcon, Tie Interceptor, Snow Speeder, AT-AT etc)
    *The art exhibit
    *The Fanforce party and seeing the Clone Wars cast and Dave Filoni
    *Watching Boba Fett blow up Star Tours Saturday night.
    *Anne from Official Pix and Kristen and Todd from Reed for organizing the volunteers and making everything flow
    *The hard work of the volunteers who somehow managed to keep the line for Mark Hamill from imploding
    *The vast majority of the stars signing autographs spending time with me, telling stories and taking pictures
    *Meeting the Forcecast guys
    *Putting names to faces of people on Fanforce.

    Con's
    *Some of the staff working at the registers for Official Pix were a touch rude and condescending.
    *I had to tell everyone buying autographs Saturday morning that tickets for Mark and Carrie's autographs were sold out.

    This was an absolutely amazing experience for me, greatly surpassed my expectations.







     
  8. DragonLove76

    DragonLove76 Jedi Youngling star 1

    Registered:
    Oct 2, 2004

    Working in the store while George Lucas, Steve Sansweet and Lucasfilm staff were doing their private shopping. That was the top moment for me.

    You can't reveal that, can you?

    Re: Volunteering

    Question. I would love to volunteer (Pretty sure it makes friends much easier), but I don't want to be missing out on big events because of it. So, is volunteer pretty much prevent you from attend many of events that you wanted to goto?



    I know seeing GL and other top people personal and close is really amazing!! I may volunteer at C6, see how it goes :)
     
  9. Vayder

    Vayder Jedi Youngling

    Registered:
    Jun 29, 2010
    I had so much fun at CV !!! It was really sad having to pack up and head back home...but definitely looking forward to the next one.

    Some pros were..

    all the free swag
    meeting other Star wars fans, always had someone to talk to while we were standing in line.
    and a bunch of other stuff

    the biggest con I had was the management of some of the store lines...like at artist alley.....3 hours to buy a print !!??!
    and some of the staff/volunteers were extremely rude

    But other than that it was an AWESOME time !!!!
     
  10. DragonLove76

    DragonLove76 Jedi Youngling star 1

    Registered:
    Oct 2, 2004
    I hope I don't have to struggle with transportation and lodging (Aka come or stay with some friends) at the next one, but I am glad to have this experience (again) there is always NEW ones to enjoy and learn. I am sad it's over, but at the same time I am glad to return home just because I spend so much money on transporation and hotel alone. The merchandises are also very overpriced at the store, which prevented me to get a few of stuff I thought looked good and wanted to get. The main store did not have a line issue.

    BTW, can you tell me which vendor you had to wait 3 hours to buy a print? Also, can you post a picture of this print looks like? :)
     
  11. hothie

    hothie Jedi Youngling star 2

    Registered:
    Jun 12, 2004
    It wasn't one particular vendor, it was Artist Alley in general. What you do is go up to an artist, tell them you would like to buy a print, they fill out a receipt thing for you to take up to the register. You pay there, then go back and get your print. The trouble was EVERYONE buying prints had to go to the same register, and they only had 1 working printer, and they printed receipts for every single print, not just multiple prints on 1 receipt for you. That's what I heard anyway. Made for some very unhappy people.
    But they at least fixed it somewhat, from my understanding, so that the lines were considerably better the rest of the time. I could be wrong, though.
     
  12. chucknotsteve

    chucknotsteve Jedi Youngling

    Registered:
    Jul 19, 2010
    Pros
    - The Main Event!
    - Seeing the look on the kids faces when they stand next to an R2 unit...
    - Forcecast live!
    - Meeting Ashley Eckstein about 10 times during the entire con... we just kept running into each other!
    - Being 3 feet away from Seth Green during the Season III panel on Saturday... wow!
    - The Season 3 panel. I was so excited, the trailer looks so awesome. I got chills... the editing was PERFECT and all the scenes were awesome! I love Dave Filoni. Its proof that it counts to have a true fan as supervising director.
    - Dressing up as Geonosis Padme on Saturday... I think 12 people asked to take my picture! So surreal, I loved it.
    - Robot Chicken Panel... Seth Green.
    - The organization! Besides some sass from the OPX girl working at Mark's line on Saturday morning... we dealt with that. We only waited for Mark for about 30 minutes, and it FLEW by!
    - The people! I've met some of the best people ever this trip. I love talking 'Wars with everyone... and that includes Clone Wars!
    - How even though Carrie's Sunday panel was cancelled, she introduced the Main Event recast. Wonderful, she is awesome!
    - The merch! Ahh. Not to mention the freebies.
    - The sheer SIZE of the hall! It was MASSIVE.

    Cons
    - Heat and humidity! But what can you do about that.
    - OCCC's lack of knowing where things were... the maps were confusing!


    I loved CV.. my first Celebration and probably the best weekend ever. Thanks to everyone who made it possible... I am eternally grateful!
     
  13. chucknotsteve

    chucknotsteve Jedi Youngling

    Registered:
    Jul 19, 2010
    I didn't even mention the Last Tour to Endor event... probably the best ever. Got to ride with Chewie on the LAST ride. Saw GL in the second showing of Indy. The fireworks made me cry, they were beautiful. The hyperspace hoopla--I love being with fans! Winning a Han Solo action figure from Oopla for knowing who directed ESB... whoever said GL fails (sorry). Accidently running into Anthony Daniels. Oops! Wait, no. It was awesome. Riding Tower of Terror with Star Wars fans. Seeing Filoni on Rock n Rollercoaster. EVERYTHING WAS AWESOME.
     
  14. Darth-Dogfish-Head

    Darth-Dogfish-Head Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 5, 2004
    Dragonlove, do you mean can I tell you what was in the bag? No, I can't, because I did not look in it, only happened to see the name tag and took a picture.

    As for volunteering, I met a ton of people, most were friendly, some not so much, but you run into that wherever you go.

    I volunteered two shifts for Official Pix, one was from 2:30-7pm on Thursday and the other 9:00-2:30 on Saturday (yep, I scheduled myself during the Main Event, I knew there was no chance I would stay up all night in line). For working two shifts I received a crew badge, t-shift, one free autograph for each hour I worked and a special CV volunteer pin.

    In addition I volunteered for CV itself (Reed). For volunteering 12 hours I had my four-day pass refunded (or will have it refunded in a few weeks). I also received a t-shirt each day I worked (they all had a different design on the front) and would have received a crew badge if I didn't already have one from Official Pix.

    To specifically answer your question, yes, you probably will miss out on some things you'd like to do if you volunteer, and when you're working you need to focus on the guests enjoyment of the Celebration before your own. There are also rules that must be followed. I practically had to bite off my right hand to keep myself from taking a picture of George Lucas when I saw him in the store, but the rules were very clear to not bother the the stars, let alone George himself. I found that in volunteering for both of these organizations the experience greatly enhanced my Celebration experience and the fact that I missed out on a few panels didn't bother me at all.

    Oh have to add a few more Pro's!
    Meeting Steve Sansweet at Last Tour
    The One Man Trilogy
    Watching the American Sign Language Interpreters work, I got to learn a few new Star Wars signs I didn't already know!
     
  15. KissinDigital

    KissinDigital Jedi Youngling star 1

    Registered:
    Jul 25, 2010
    Pros:
    - MarkMarkMarkMarkMark ... Seriously, that dude has to be the coolest and sweetest celebrities in existence.
    - Both Robot Chicken panels. Seth is hilarious!
    - Most of my lines. Made new friends, made the time pass superfast, one person even shared some swag she'd picked up that I hadn't had a chance to get.
    - Tour to Endor. We decided literally with about half an hour to buy tickets to go and seeing the Indy show alone was worth it.
    - SPAAAAAACCCEEEEEE. Seriously, someone complained about us paying for wasted space but I would GLADLY pay for that much space again. People were a LOT less pissy simply because they had space to move around (aside from those super small areas in the 100/200 area.) Also meant we didn't have to deal with much con stench. I'm usually yelling something about deodorant consistently at MegaCon and I actually barely got a whiff of BO at all.
    - The Mixer. Totally lame till the limbo got things rolling but man. Turned into a rockin party after that. It was a little sad to have the -entire- dance floor covered in dancing people totally enjoying themselves while surrounded by just as many people who did nothing but watch us dance. No one cares if you've got moves or not people, just shake ya booty and live it up!
    - The cast of Clone Wars. I met only a few but they were all amazing and really were having fun with us nerds.
    - Dave Filoni. That moment during the panel on Thursday, when he answered the question about whether we would be seeing more Jedi force powers.. There is rising suspicion that George may be grooming him to take over if/when he retires and after that moment, I have absolutely NO issue with it.
    - Cindy. We were standing behind her in the line for James Arnold Taylor, the cap of the line Sunday evening. She had a poster with the main cast of Clone Wars that had all but two autographs, Ahsoka and Obi. She managed to get someone agree to take the picture in for Ashley to sign but they didn't really speak English so she got to go in and translate for them. She exited that booth and came running for James' autograph just as we were finishing up. To be there to see the completion of something so epic was a perfect cap to a wonderous weekend.

    Cons:
    Not much really, and I'd rather not remember it cos this was the best con I've ever attended. :3
     
  16. chucknotsteve

    chucknotsteve Jedi Youngling

    Registered:
    Jul 19, 2010
    KissinDigital, I totally loved your CV "Review"! It made me so happy... everything was so great, I love hearing someone love it just as much as I did! Especially saying something about the Mixer... everything was so fun!
    And totally agree about Dave Filoni... wow, he is awesome. I'm a big fan.
     
  17. KissinDigital

    KissinDigital Jedi Youngling star 1

    Registered:
    Jul 25, 2010
    *high-five* As AngryLeia will attest, I am ALL about dance parties. xDDDD For reference, I was the chick holding one end of the limbo bar. :B

    Also, I did think of one thing I didn't particularly care for. Jay seems like a pretty cool dude, but I wish he would have shut up and let Mark speak. Also interrupting him mid-story was very unprofessional. And I don't believe he's ever really sat down and watched any Robot Chicken so I think a better host could have been chosen.

    Honestly, Mark Daniels (was that his name? the dude doing the pre-show warm up) would prolly have been a super fun host for at least the Robot chicken panels.

    I heard about Jay's patch jacket though, sounded pretty awesome.

    I think I'm still pretty high from the weekend. As they're saying at work, my head is totally in another galaxy.
     
  18. JediMara77

    JediMara77 Force Ghost star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 5, 2004
    I've been to MegaCon a few times, and several times during CV I found myself thinking that it didn't seem like the same location as MegaCon at all, mainly because of all the free space. MegaCon is usually just in one of those halls, and it's so crowded and claustraphobic. The last time I went, I remember the line to get in was ridiculous. So I was very pleased at all the extra space, and the food court in the exhibit hall was a great idea.

    I wholeheartedly agree! I've been to three MegaCons, two Dragon*Cons, and two Celebrations, and this was the most fun and best-run con by far.
     
  19. PreludeRM

    PreludeRM FanForce CR, & Fanforce Council Calgary, Alberta star 4

    Registered:
    Oct 28, 2002
    I loved the mixer. When me and the others from Calgary rolled in there was lame lightsaber fighting going on. We went straight to the DJ gave him a half a dozen requests. The Humpty Dance got the party started. I thought it was actually going to die when he played Ricky Martin, But that's when the limbo broke out to keep it going. After that it never stopped. It was a great night. Met a ton of people from all over and it was one of the best nights at CV. I'm just wondering if anybody has any pictures of that epic night as I only got one from my camera.
     
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