Hal-Con 2011 was an amazing year. Record-breaking attendance of nearly 4700 participants was astounding. Thank you to absolutely everybody for rocking our world.
The organizers have gone into Quiet Planning mode (a little like hibernation). However, stay tuned as lots will be announced shortly!
DATES & LOCATION: Hal-Con 2012 will be from October 26-28 in beautiful downtown Halifax at the World Trade & Convention Centre.
GUESTS: A partial guest list was announced at the convention closing and there are some clues on our social media sites. A more complete list will be posted in February. If you’re interested in participating as a guest for Hal-Con 2012, please reach out to us! We’d love to hear from you. Email the guest coordinator.
WEBSITE: Being re-vamped with new shinies to make it more functional and friendly. (Suggestions? Email webmaster@hal-con.com with your ideas.)
COMMUNITY EVENTS: Laser tag, trivia nights and loads of more fun activities are being planned and will be announced soon!
EXHIBITOR REGISTRATION: We are planning to have the number of tables and prices ready to go by end of January.
TICKETS: We are planning to have tickets available online by April and in stores by May/June. Good news – our amazing Warp Speed ticket option is decreasing in price!
KEEP IN TOUCH: Please sign up for our email list over on the bottom of the right hand column, join us on Twitter @HalCon_SciFiCon, @Nelson_HalCon, Google+ page or the Facebook page or group.
In the meantime…
Hal-Con is 100% run on volunteer power and is a registered not-for-profit organization.
Hey all, for everyone who’s been itching for information about how to sign up to be a volunteer this year, the wait is over!
Our volunteer application is now live on our website under the ‘Get Involved’ -> ‘Volunteering’. It is a bit different than the one we had last year, but have no fears! This change is only for the better and to make things much more simple.
We will also be announcing the date of the first volunteer recruitment meeting to be held sometime in May soon, hopefully we will see you there!
For anyone who just wants a quick link:
http://hal-con.com/Get-Involved/volunteering-rules-and-guidelines/
Hal-Con, Atlantic Canada’s largest Sci-Fi, Fantasy and Comic Convention gets 50% bigger and a lot less hungry.
After fans and organizers alike complained about crowded hallways and lack of sustenance on-site something had to be done.
“It’s nice to have a consensus”, says Hal-Con Facilities Director, Amanda Schreiber. “The consensus about Hal-Con 2011 was that we didn’t have enough space and the people who didn’t want to venture out for food had nowhere to pick up a bite. Lucky for everyone it has been an easy problem to fix.”
The fix comes in the form of adding a third floor for Hal-Con 2012.
Thanks to our friends at the World Trade and Convention Centre the third floor will open up a whole other world of space for fans.
“It’s mostly going to be gaming space.” Says Hal-Con’s Gaming guru Shawn Kehoe. “2011 was amazing for us gamers, but, there were crowd issues and noise issues being that close to the main convention area. We’ve fixed that for 2012. The third floor is away from the hustle and bustle of the main area. The extra space provided by the third floor will let us respond to our fans’ requests for more games without sacrificing any of the great events that made the 2011 games room such a great success.”
According to Schreiber moving the huge gaming area upstairs means more room for exhibitors, venders and presentations and just more room to get your geek on.
It’s hard to get that geek on with no fuel in the tank. Also new to the con this year is food, glorious food! The extra space we’ve acquired this year means we have the room to host a food vendor which means guests do not have to brave the cool October winds of Nova Scotia, sacrificing precious con-time in the search for sustenance. We’re still working on the menu with the folks from the WTCC, but, it looks like sandwiches and soft drinks, including that most precious universal commodity, pure H2O, will be available at a reasonable cost.
When Hal-Con asked me to be one of the 2012 guests of honor, I jumped at the chance. Not only did I know some of the con runners, and admire some of their previous guests of honor, but Hal-Con is located in Halifax, which is in Nova Scotia, which in turn is the site of one of my favorite historical mysteries: the Oak Island Money Pit. (LINK: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oak_Island )
Here’s the short version of the story. In 1795, some boys goofing around on Oak Island, a small (140 acres) island just off the Nova Scotian coast, discovered an apparently artificial hole where none should be. Over the ensuing centuries, many people have tried to get (literally) to the bottom of the hole, only to be thwarted by what seems to be a series of booby traps designed to protect something incredibly valuable that waits at the bottom. It’s still there, still undiscovered and unexplained.
I’ve read about this since the mid-80s, starting with Darcy O’Connor’s paperback, and it’s lost none of its fascination, even after a pretty reasonable debunking by Joe Nickell at the Skeptical Inquirer (LINK: http://www.csicop.org/si/show/secrets_of_oak_island/ ). I’d always intended to write something that explained it, even though Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child beat me with Riptide, which at least includes a clever explanation for the pit’s design in an otherwise goofy adventure story.
When I began my latest Eddie LaCrosse novel, Wake of the Bloody Angel, I had a few broad inspirations: pirates, the song “Brandy” by Looking Glass, and Oak Island. Originally my version of the Money Pit was to be a central part of the story, but as I wrote it became less and less important, until finally it’s barely an image only a fellow Oak Island-ophile like me might recognize. That’s how the process works sometimes: the thing that inspires a story gradually gets winnowed out of it.
But Hal-Con will be the closest I’m ever likely to get to Oak Island, even if it is now privately owned and I can only see it from the shore. So I’m hoping at some point I can slip away from the con and glimpse the home of one of my favorite mysteries and inspirations. If you see me at Hal-Con with a ridiculously big grin, it means I’ve just gotten back.
BIO:
Alex Bledsoe grew up an hour north of Memphis (home of Elvis) and twenty minutes from Nutbush (birthplace of Tina Turner). He now lives in a Wisconsin town famous for trolls.
Hal-Con is holding an online auction to wrap up 2011 donations, and we’ve added a few goodies from early 2012 as well! Come and check out the new group page, browse the photos, and place bids on any items that catch your fancy. Bids are open until February 10, 2012. Details are available on the Facebook group . Spread the word! Share your favourite photos, and post your suggestions for items you’d like to see on the auction block at the 2012 convention on the wall. Happy Bidding!!
Click on the link below to see a PDF with the winners and honourable mentions!
The numbers from the door prize draw:
166857, 138550, 346327, 346063, 345604, 346059, 166784, 328450, 166884, 345922, 306563, 166807, 167009, 346290, 138422, 306542, 308168, 307984, 138348, 345930, 345942, 345987, 345674, 346507, 433431, 346204, 346518
If your number is listed above, please contact us at info@hal-con.com
Exciting news everyone!
Aperture Studios has posted the photographs taken yesterday to their website. Please go to the gallery link and select the guest you posed with to see your photo.
Our local celebrity, Fat Apollo, is generating quite a stir on the internet. This amazing fan art was drawn for the Maritime Heavy Armour group, friends of the con. You’ll want to check your convention programme for everything Fat Apollo upon arrival and make sure to meet this fantastic celeb.
