Gina talks about her first New York Anime Festival

Gina Giannetti talks about her first time at the New York Anime Festival. What we did and her first time being part of the press.

So, this year was my first time at New York Anime Festival. I didn’t even intend to go to a convention this year, but it was close to home and I was able to fit it into my budget, so I decided to go, and I’m glad that I did.

First of all, it was run a lot smoother than I expected; everything that I wanted to go to was in close proximity of itself, so I was able to enjoy the con without tiring myself out too much. The staff was knowledgeable and really friendly, probably more so than any other con I’ve gone to.

This was also the first time that I had gone to a convention as a member of the press, which was exciting. I had access to the press room, where I was able to take breathers, eat lunch, leave behind heavy objects, and charge camera batteries. I interviewed Kyle Hebert in the press room as well.

Ah, interviewing Kyle Hebert. That was probably the most memorable part of the con. I greatly admire Kyle’s work, so being able to sit down with him and ask him questions was a joy. Even through some technical difficulties and a bit of an information mix-up (just so you know, Kyle has a DAUGHTER, not a son) he was gracious and patient. He even chilled and chatted with Yan and I as he ate his lunch. Kyle was definitely a cool guy. I also got to check out his panel, where he pulled people out of the audience, gave them some lines to voice act, and then helped them improve their performance. That was really interesting to see.

I really loved the other panels that I went to as well. My favorite was the FUNimation industry panel; the people running it were funny and their acquisitions and previews were really exciting to see. I also got to check out Anime Press Your Luck which was run by our friends over at Disorganization XIII and was pretty enjoyable from what I saw of it. I also went with Jon and Ray to a panel about the differences between American and Japanese video games, which was really interesting.

I also went with the rest of the crew to see Cencoroll, which premiered at NYAF. It was visually stunning, although the plot was rather underdeveloped. It was only 30 minutes long, and I think it really needed more than that to give the story some punch so the viewers could get attached to the characters and understand what was going on better. Overall, I enjoyed it.

I also got to meet a lot of voice actors that I had been wanting to meet for quite some time, namely Rachael Lillis and Veronica Taylor. I’m a big fan of their performances in the video game Valkyrie Profile. Funnily enough, those parts were apparently quick and simple ones, since neither of them had ever seen what the characters they played looked like. It was interesting to see their reactions to seeing those characters for the first time, especially when Rachael gushed over how pretty her character Princess Jelanda was.

I also got to participate in OOTP’s ritual of going out for a big dinner on Saturday night, like we do at every convention. We went to Bubba Gump’s Shrimp in Times Square, which was a lot of fun. We told the waiter it was Jon’s birthday when it really wasn’t, but Jon is a trooper and went along with it anyway. It resulted in quite a bit of laughs.

So all in all, I loved going to NYAF this year. It was the first time I’ve worked a convention with Out-Of-Time, and I really liked the experience. Good friends, good panels, and good times were had.