A great day at Preston Comic Con!

My Twitter and Facebook feeds seem to be full of comments about the Leeds' Thought Bubble convention that's on this weekend, but personally I'm very happy that I chose to accept the invite to Preston Comic Con. 

Preston Comic Con took place yesterday in the city's Guild Hall. I'd heard good things about the show from previous guests, but I was concerned that attendance might suffer due to it clashing with other comics events in Leeds and Cardiff (and numerous SF events around the country). My fears were unfounded. Preston Comic Con was one of the busiest events I've been to this year.

Firstly, my thanks to Darren Wildman, Paul Dunne, and the rest of the Wonky Rocket team for their outstanding hospitality. We were collected at the railway station, wined and dined on Friday night, and looked after throughout the con on Saturday. The show had an equal balance of guests from comics and film/tv, and we were all treated the same, and it was good to mix with each other. A shining example of how a comics/media convention should be run. 

As I said, the event was very busy, and I was sketching most of the day. (Which is why I didn't have time to take many photos other than the view from my table.) I know that some people look down their noses at 'Comic Cons' that include actors, but in my experience it's a positive thing (as long as there are comics guests on the bill as well). The media guests attract a slightly different crowd to the comics-only events, and I find that people are pleasantly surprised to find "The Beano is still going?!" or "I remember Oink / Combat Colin!" so it enables comics guests to engage with members of the public we might otherwise never meet.

Someone asked me to do a Beano version of Judge Dredd, so here's how it turned out...

It was a real pleasure to attend Preston Comic Con, and good to catch up with friends such as Laura Howell, Phil Winslade and his wife Pippa, Trev and Simon, Clare Eden, and (far too briefly) John Higgins, Dave Taylor, and Martin Griffiths. Great to see artists Adrian Salmon and Tim Perkins too, who dropped by for chat, and also good to meet artists Dave Milgate and Karl Richardson.