Noreascon Four Committee News

Work session report: Here's a sample we built of something that could serve as a Mended Drum wall. It's made of lightweight sheets of extruded polystyrene insulation that come in 2' x 8' pieces that can be easily cut and taped together. We can cover them with the stone wall paper that will be coming next week. It's also cheap (about $6/sheet) and lightweight.

Work session report: Here's a sample First Night sign. (First Night logo by Alice Lewis.)

Work session report: Building Saturn's rings...

Work session report: Deb experimented with attaching signs to self-stick foam core. Here's a sample of our sign template. (Note: Those lines are really solid; the apparent uneveness is just an artifact caused by the photo reduction...)

Work session report: Sharon just arrived, proudly displaying her copy of PR 7, which arrived in her mailbox today.

Work session report: Here's a more stable way of combining 3 pieces of grid wall so it will be more stable than a simple triangle. (I believe this was suggested by Mike Nelson.)

We just placed an order with Oriental Trading Company for a whole bunch of kitschy prizes for First Night (in addition to balloons and fireproof streamers for decoration, and the 1000 or so glowsticks donated by Chairman Deb). Some examples of the assortment are shown below. We've got Flocked Unicorns, Mini Metallic Bean Bag Aliens, Cloth Fairy Tale Hand Puppers, Neon Bear Clip-Ons, Plush Neon Dinosaurs, Sparkling Sequin Bow Ties, and a whole assortment of puzzles, games, toys, key chains, pens, fans, and other accessories.

Priscilla Perfecting Program

Okay, no particular reason for this picture, except that I've got a new wireless laptop and wanted to see if I could post a photo in real time. Here is Priscilla making the latest changes to the program at the NESFA clubhouse on Wednesday night.

Leslie writes:

I'm listening to the DNC on C-SPAN and Gov. Bill Richardson just said, "Presidential nomination petitions must be submitted to the Office of the Secretary by 6 pm today, Tuesday, July 27 ...and must be submitted to the Hampton Room on the 3rd floor of the Sheraton Boston Hotel."
I don't know, I just felt a little cognitive dissonance there...

Deb replies:

Huh. We're gonna have filk in Hampton.
Sing your petition...

Since the most commonly asked question at at-con information is "What time is it?", Sheila Perry designed this spiffy wall clock using Bill Neville's "Lens Family" art. The clocks will be used around the con, and you can also buy one for yourself here.

Last night at the NESFA Clubhouse, a group of Noreascon committee members had great fun unpacking and assembling our brand new wide-format color inkjet sign printer. It came in a box the size of a refrigerator, and wasn't much smaller when fully assembled. When it was powered up, it printed out a test pattern, then was observed to use different colored scanning beams to check and correct its color and alignment. It moved the paper back and forth and appeared to be thinking about things before it went woosh, woosh, slice, and dropped the completed picture into the catch basket below. The observation was made that we'd better not let it see I, Robot or it might start getting ideas.

Here's a picture of our sign master, Pam Fremon, getting acquainted with the machine. (Notice that the machine is actually bigger than she is.)

And here's a picture of our esteemed Chairman displaying one of the first images output by the machine. (The second test was a Hynes/Sheraton floor plan.)

Very cool!