dc + otakon recap!
I had a great time in D.C. and vending at Otakon!!
Momo and Poppy missed me a lot. They are being more velcro-y than usual. Thankfully I had my siblings near by to check in on them - I have a pet camera so I was able to chat with my brother while watching him lol.
D.C. TRIP!!
I got an AirBnb with one of my best friends (Arinthe Designs) since I found out that she also got into the Otakon lottery (otherwise I would have had to make arrangements with other artists). Her parents joined us as well (her mother was her table helper), so I was their adopted daughter for the trip ha ha ha.
I have known Arinthe since our high school days - funnily enough, Arinthe, our other bff BBLux, and I all went to cons together in the early 2000s and all of us table at conventions now. Our styles are wildly different so we don’t really operate under a collective. But how cool is it to have met such wonderful like-minded ppl in the 2000s in TX and still be close friends today? ETERNALLY GRATEFUL!! Our other close friends don’t table but also participate in niche/nerd hobbies, like being furries (analienrobot & dracolord), ffxiv (me, analienrobot, dracolord, bus, mirkurie), dnd (ALL OF US).
We got cute townhome airbnb somewhere in the Metro area. As we are all from TX (used to driving) it was nice to take advantage of an organized public transit system. I did so much walking I was so tired by the end of the days.
I wanted to do some tourist things and treat this convention as a vacation (+ bday day!!) since it lined up… So for the first half of the trip I did some tourist things and then the second half was tabling at Otakon.
I also vlogged my trip for my family - still editing that video but hopefully it is ready to watch this weekend when my parents are in town.
8/4-8/7 - Mon - Thurs
Monday - Mostly travel day. Finalized setting up my pet cameras, etc. I like to get to the airport early so I don’t feel rushed - I ended up grabbing lunch as well. IIRC the Austin Airport only has food businesses that are ‘local’ to Austin - I ended up getting an avocado toast with greens and glass of rose. Nothing too heavy since I was flying - but learned from last year NYC I need to be properly fueled haha.
I also drew on the plane.
Tuesday - My birthday!!! I wore a dress and felt cute~
I had some coffee at breakfast but REALLY wanted to treat myself to a birthday iced coffee - and went to Doubles Coffee in DC. They have a very cute space and seems very cozy and nice to work in. I grab coffee in a lot of Austin local spots so price was actually very similar, lol. Arinthe and her family walked by and saw me sitting at the counter hahaha!!
I spent the first portion of the day making it to the Smithsonian National Postal Museum - I loved it because of stationery!! I sent myself a postcard and some mail (I brought my TN but barely used it HAHA, though I happened to also carry my postcard stamps on hand so I was able to buy more postcards to send to my family).
Arinthe’s family went to some of the Smithsonian museums that required reservations - they also scheduled a tour at the US Capitol and factored me in, so I ended up joining them. Thanks to bday luck the security line was completely empty and we got put on an earlier tour (freeing up our time!)
I popped into the US Botanic Garden for a walk after and then sat around for a bit before making my way back home.
We had cheesecake for my bday!!
Wednesday - My other free “whole day” I set aside for tours. We saw the Lincoln Monument together and then separated as I walked down the reflection pond to the Washington monument. I didn’t go up close as it was lunch time and I went to Rice Bar DC for a quick bibimbap for lunch (my one asian/rice meal of the trip LOL). It was really satisfying and yummy.
After that I finally headed over to the National Gallery of Art to browse. I love going to art museums by myself because I can experience it however I want. I get drawn to landscapes and especially colors!! I always love looking at romantic/ethereal skies.
I only had time to walk through half of the first floor - then I went to the gift shop to buy some souvenirs before heading home.
Thursday - Arinthe and I decided to head over around 2pm to set up our tables for Otakon, which left some time in the morning to look at museums again.
I stopped by another coffee shop called Good Company Doughnuts & Cafe - they had a summer special for a Vietnamese iced coffee which was soooo yummy. I decided to go look at the other half of the National Gallery of Art (first floor). That’s all I had time for and I will have to go again to see the other floors.
There were some artists who reserved time slots to do some master studies. So cool! I could see a lot of museum visitors curious and ask them questions haha.
After that I headed back to the Airbnb to grab my suitcases for my table and headed over to the convention to set up. I’m glad they offer Thursday set-up as morning set up feels so chaotic! It turns out that we were given 8ft tables instead of 6ft so I had to make some adjustments. When we finished we stopped by the grocery store to pick up some snacks and additional food for meals.
Also I did my laundry - I packed lightly and planned to repeat outfits.
8/8-8/11 Fri-Mon
Friday - Con day 1 (AA Hours: 12pm - 9pm)
We got a little early to print some last minute signage at FedEx and then got coffee at Compass Coffee. I realize I am making myself sound like a big coffee drinker… which I am… but also everything about this trip is a treat so I also treat myself to coffee!!
Here is my table! So self-indulgent. I continue to carry a lot of old watercolor/sketch works haha. I feel like I have a clear vision/specific taste in what I carry - ie only 5x7 prints (never bigger) and specific fandoms. My best sellers were the 5x7 prints and my sports charms, but my yaoi/fujoshi merch is pretty well received as well.
I made back my table cost in the first couple of hours and made back my AA expenses in the first day. I had a couple of people stop by because they knew me from the Tenipuri Discord <3.
I also took some traditional sketch commissions at the con. They were all simple (pics at the end)… I remember I used to make full color watercolor commissions back in the day. This year I didn’t give myself extra homework and everything was finished during the con.
Arinthe’s mom helped halfway through by bringing me a beloved iced coffee to help me get through the rest of the day.
Saturday - Con day 2 (AA Hours: 11am-9pm)
Long day! The extra hour felt like 5 hours. We stopped by Compass Coffee again as it is across from the convention center. I always expect it to be busier than it is?? But I think the con attendees actually go to the Star$ in the convention center… We (Arinthe, Arinthe’s mom, and I) had a little bit of time so we sat to drink some of our coffee and had a fun chat about given names. It has been really fun to get to know Arinthe’s parents lol.
Here's my main purchase:
My Saturday sales beat my Friday sales. Yay! I’m still so happy because I have such niche items. I think those played into my favor as I was told that I was the few artists selling X merch - less competition. I love seeing the wide variety of people I get too - I sometimes draw a normie crowd because I have a lot of prints that are more generic. I got a Feixiao (Honkai Star Rail) cosplayer who bought 3 copies of my bird bath prints (link is to my portfolio carrd). Bird bath print haunts me because it has terrible moire because of the halftoning that I scaled up but I no longer have the original to re-tone (well.. maybe it’s in my files somewhere)… and it is one of the most popular prints I have. *cries*
Arinthe and I were so tired when we got back to the Airbnb. We worked out a plan with Arinthe’s mom where she would head back around 5/6pm to go back to the Airbnb to make dinner, so we were so lucky to come back home to a balanced dinner <3. Arinthe’s dad didn’t join the con stuff, but instead he saw some other museums as he likes historical things.
Sunday - Con day 3 (AA Hours: 10am-3pm)
LOL. Why does Sunday have to start at 10am?!
We got Compass Coffee again (a quick grab this time) and headed to the con. I took the time to browse the artist hall and saw some artists I wanted to check out later - but overall managed to stop myself from buying things. I did spot something that I wanted to get for my sister, so I found another artist for something that I could get my brother (gifts for checking in on Momo and Poppy).
I was also able to briefly say hello to Fish (sadly we didn’t grab dinner or anything since there wasn’t much time to do that). I’ll have to attend a convention with them another time. I also met Milorin (someone who participated in a Raw Paw shirt design challenge) and Phossi (who follows Raw Paw and bought my Yaoi Hands shirt). Sooo sweet. I didn’t network that much at this convention since I think I really just enjoyed the quality time I had with Arinthe and her family lol.
We packed up relatively quickly and then headed back to the Airbnb. My sales were less than Saturday but I think proportionally on trend?? In any case this was my best performing con - it definitely beat my ANYC numbers.
Since it was the last night, we ate out for dinner at this neighborhood beer garden that we kept passing on our way to the metro. They had nice outdoor seating and good vibes (also very LGBTQ+ friendly as they had progress pride flags hanging. I got a Hibiscus Mule cocktail, with bratwurst, and pretzel.
Monday - Travel back!
I had a late afternoon flight which meant I needed to kill time. I considered looking up a luggage storage service to explore the city a little more, but decided to go back to Doubles after I checked out of the Airbnb, and find a table to hang out at for a couple of hours.
I ended up working mostly on getting my pictures and videos exported to my phone to continue editing my trip vlog. I’m making myself do this so that I can finish quicker and free up space on my phone, ha ha ha… Some of the trip exhaustion started to catch up to me - so I actually had two coffees before I headed out.
I took the Metro rail to Reagan Airport - rolling the suitcases was a challenge but worth it. My flight ended up being delayed about 15 min, so the added commute time helped since I was able to check in my bags right away. I sold enough that I was able to pack my smaller roller carry-on into the bigger suitcase but it maxed out my luggage weight again, lol!
TSA stopped me at security - because of how I packed my acrylic charms. LOL. They look like suspicious bricks.
The Southwest terminal at Reagan Airport is SO small. I had enough time to sit down and have dinner so I splurged on that - it was spendy but I got to have a relaxing dinner and be seated.
After that I was ready to sleep on the plane ride home.
Afterthoughts
This was my 2nd con flying out of state. For both of those conventions I was able to make enough money for my table costs + expenses, but for Otakon I decidedly made a profit that is in range for what I needed to make for regular attendance to work.
I hope I can get into Otakon again, but as it’s lottery based I will just be lucky if I do!
My top performing pieces:
+ Prints (both original and fanart) - I have probably mentioned before but I made the decision to only carry 5x7 small prints. For future prints I’d like to make riso or riso-inspired (color separated) triptych style pieces.
+ Sports Acrylic Charms - there are a few more series that I would like to add/few more teams. People get so excited and passionate about sports.
I think I can also expand the ‘manga’ style charm for other series.
+ My screenprinted shirts/totes did pretty well. I didn’t over-pack which was great!