Thanks to all the totally rocking people that came to my reading. Sunday 11.30 is such a tricky time and you were a great audience. My love letter to an unread book was so much fun to perform and I’m glad I’d memorized big chunks so I could throw myself into it. I was nervous about reading the first chunk of my Roller Derby fairytale, but it was so great to see people’s responses. Yay indeed.
Big yay for meeting new fantabulous people and reconnecting with people of win. Oh so many smart people to debate with and listen to.
It was strange, but rewarding, to have so many different aspects of my life combining (writer, life model, comics-geek who has talent scouted). It was such a pleasure to spend time on panels and demonstrations with talented artists, art directors, writers and community activists. I had not anticipated that when I consented to model for the convention that I would be in the middle of the exhibition hall surrounded by flashing cameras! If you took a photo I’d love to see it.
A public service announcement. It’s highly unusual for a life model to be photographed and in normal circumstances you should never photograph a model unless you get consent in advance. Given the nature of the convention space I’m cool with all the photos that got taken at the con (though I would love to see them), but this is an exception. Personally I think you should only photograph the model if shooting reference is part of the specific brief of the session 1) dynamics of power can get weird and 2) you should be paying a model a whole lot more if you want to capture them on film 3) being drawn and interpreted through the hand of an artist is a very different experience to being captured in a photograph. It is much more exposing for the model.