Katsucon end of con photo shoot

My friend John Nelson let me tag along on his photo shoot with a group of nice kids he’d met at other conventions, and so I snapped a few shots at the same time.  Here are a few of the best, I’ll be posting some videos to YouTube later, along with other pictures from Katsucon.

Note: to download a full-sized version, click on the thumbnail and when the picture comes up, right-click to save.

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What do you do when you have an unexpected singing partner?

Josh Williams was performing the Bluegrass song “Mordecai” when a little bird decided to land on his guitar! It’s not clear if the bird actually sang along, it might be he just wanted to get closer so he could hear better, or maybe he had a backstage pass and got ahead of himself! At any rate, Williams kept his cool and continued the song to the end, except he couldn’t play his guitar! Check the excitement around 1:45 in the video!

Quickest personality test

Here, for your enjoyment, a very quick test to determine your personality:

The Cello Song

More good music from the cellist guy in the Piano Guys duo, playing a beautiful Beethoven tune originally written for the cello. Here he plays eight different parts and blends them together in perfect eight-part harmony.

Enjoy!

Okay, these guys are just way too good…

I stumbled across these guys when I saw this really neat video on Youtube.  “The Piano Guys” are a couple of musicians that re-do popular music with piano and cello and other instruments.  They use them to re-interpret the music as well, as in the “Cello Wars” video, which also has fun with the cello artist playing both the “good” Jedi and the “evil” Sith on dueling cellos.  Look for the appearance of “Darth Vader”…

One of the other videos I saw had the two guys entertaining a group of older folks at a retirement community, playing the “Linus and Lucy” theme from the “Peanuts” TV specials.  The guys have a lot of fun getting into the music, and the residents get into it, too.  It’s sweet to see the smiles on their faces, and watch them get up and dance!  It’s even better when you see the congo line, including some of the staff!

They’re looking to raise money to release their first album, and for other projects, so if you’ve a mind to, check out their site. Or, look them up on Facebook.

AnimeUSA 2011 Last day pics

Pictures from the third and last day of AnimeUSA 2011. Kind of a shame, there has been an anime convention in Crystal City since at least 1997, and this will be the last one for the foreseeable future. I went to my first one, Katsucon 4 I think it was, in 1998, and had only missed a couple there after that. Ah, well, the price of growth, they just got too big to be handled in the Hyatt. I don’t think they’ll have as much problem next year, since it looked like this year’s attendance was down. Not as much disposable income lately…

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AnimeUSA Day 2, More pictures

Oh, look, it’s more pictures! These are from Day 2 of AnimeUSA 2011, taken Saturday the 19th. More pictures than Friday, but then again there were more things and people to take pictures of! Even pictures of people taking pictures!

If you see yourself in one of them, please leave a comment!

NOTE: click an icon for a picture, and click a picture for a larger version!

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Pictures from AnimeUSA 2011 Day 1

So, here are some pictures from Day 1 of the AnimeUSA convention 2011, held in Crystal City. Enjoy, and if you see yourself in one of them, please leave a comment!

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