Feedback - Saturday problems and other things

[JennMel]

So this is my 7th year attending lfcc summer and I wanted to drop in some pros/suggestions for next year :)

Pros

-Layout. This is the second year you've done it this way and I still can't get over how much better it is now main stage/autos/photos are away from the trading hall. Also the additon of the pillar hall for second stage this year was great.

-Main stage closed off. Thanks for taking on board the complaints last year of people watching paid talks from the back of the room! Also the surprise talk prizes were a fun addition and well managed.

-Number of amazing guests and talks you guys out did yourselves

-Bagcheck/ticket scan before queuing is a brilliant system for fast entry at opening and was well managed from what I could tell 

-Talk MC (I did alan tudyk, benedict cumberbatch and chris judge) being very on the ball and excellent at jumping in with his own questions to relieve tension should an audience member inevitably ask an awkward/inappropriate question. And the cosplay masquerade MC was on incredible form, great guy.

Suggestions for next year

-Big signs to mark where to queue if diamond or ga ticket for talks. The main stage sign in two places just meant people joined the first they saw and I saw people being sent around to ga after queueing at diamond. Similarly, need to have a blueshirt queue managing ga constantly. The benedict c talk started out with two ga queues because people got there so early  and when I asked the young blueshirt nearby which i should join he just laughed nervously and said at the moment they're both standard. (a brilliant dark haired blueshirt lady came along later with amazing q management skills to sort it out though)

-Make a simple last minute map of where your signing tables are. You've got so many guests now it's a maze and a bit nuts to try and find vq especially as some were spilled out to the balcony. Took us ages to find john rhys davies on the saturday as no blueshirt seemed to know where he'd been put! I imagine it'll only get bigger as years go on!

-Cloakroom control by talking with venue about requirements beforehand, as already mentioned above. We found the one at yalc so were lucky.

-Finally a little odd one although I'm sure this is more to do with behind doors contracts and talks. At the end of Chris Judge's talk CJ asked why he wasn't in the RDA talk later. He also wasn't aware he only had a half hour until time was called which I'm surprised hadn't been communicated prior. I know one was free and one was paid but I do find it weird when you have people from the same show who don't do talks together.

I had a great weekend and look forward to next year!

Edited July 31, 2017 by JennMel
Spelling

[Xenomorph]

7 minutes ago, JennMel said:

So this is my 7th year attending lfcc summer and I wanted to drop in some pros/suggestions for next year :)

Pros

-Layout. This is the second year you've done it this way and I still can't get over how much better it is now main stage/autos/photos are away from the trading hall. Also the additon of the pillar hall for second stage this year was great.

-Main stage closed off. Thanks for taking on board the complaints last year of people watching paid talks from the back of the room! Also the surprise talk prizes were a fun addition and well managed.

-Number of amazing guests and talks you guys out did yourselves

-Bagcheck/ticket scan before queuing is a brilliant system for fast entry at opening and was well managed from what I could tell 

-Talk MC (I did alan tudyk, benedict cumberbatch and chris judge) being very on the ball and excellent at jumping in with his own questions to relieve tension should an audience member inevitably ask an awkward/inappropriate question. And the cosplay masquerade MC was on incredible form, great guy.

Suggestions for next year

-Big signs to mark where to queue if diamond or ga ticket for talks. The main stage sign in two places just meant people joined the first they saw and I saw people being sent around to ga after queueing at diamond. Similarly, need to have a blueshirt queue managing ga constantly. The benedict c talk started out with two ga queues because people got there so early  and when I asked the young blueshirt nearby which i should join he just laughed nervously and said at the moment they're both standard. (a brilliant dark haired blueshirt lady came along later with amazing q management skills to sort it out though)

-Make a simple last minute map of where your signing tables are. You've got so many guests now it's a maze and a bit nuts to try and find vq especially as some were spilled out to the balcony. Took us ages to find john rhys davies on the saturday as no blueshirt seemed to know where he'd been put! I imagine it'll only get bigger as years go on!

-Cloakroom control by talking with venue about requirements beforehand, as already mentioned above. We found the one at yalc so were lucky.

-Finally a little odd one although I'm sure this is more to do with behind doors contracts and talks. At the end of Chris Judge's talk CJ asked why he wasn't in the RDA talk later. He also wasn't aware he only had a half hour until time was called which I'm surprised hadn't been communicated prior. I know one was free and one was paid but I do find it weird when you have people from the same show who don't do talks together.

I had a great weekend and look forward to next year!

I totally agree with your points.

- Layout. I went two years ago when they used the Olympia for the first time. This year was miles and miles better. Just about perfect. My only change would be moving Photo A/B and Photo C/D a little further apart. Photo C/D could've been pushed another twenty feet north-east along that wall. It was very crowded between the two of them on the Saturday as they were a tad too close together.

- More signage. Yup, like the Photoshoot whiteboards or LCDs mentioned by many others. It's often unclear which guest is currently queuing or how far along they are. I would also like the mini-map so I know where each guest is signing.

 

[sadfan99]

37 minutes ago, magicalworna said:

Just wanted to pop in and say thank you to some of the great crew that I met over the weekend. In particular the crew member that was working Matt Lucas's photoshoot on sunday...he said he hadn't had anything to eat or drink because he wanted to make sure that, that queue was running well! Luckily I had one of those massive cans of america drink and I happily asked he wanted to have it, mainly because he was doing such a great job. I can't even begin to think how some people were spoken to or treated this weekend. There was an exceptionally obnoxious woman yelling in peoples face when trying to get a VQ for Mark Williams...there was a massive surge of people and I completely understand that she was near the front but the people pushed out of the way people that were behind here which meant we then had to come side ways on...which obviously isn't my fault as i was trying to be behind her and she then screamed in my face that I was pushing in...which was just awful and then in the VQ for Alyson there was a lady with a push chair and this big guy walked right in front of her and myself to get his ticket...needless to say i wasn't having that so i reached in front of him to get a ticket which i then handed to the woman with the kid and then turned back to get mine and he virtually snatched it out of my hand...to think that the crew probably had to deal with these awful people all weekend makes me sad. So big pat on the back to all of them...i hope they are all managing to have a calm, restful day today xxx

Think you might find the exceptionally obnoxious woman was attempting to protect the young lady giving out VQ tickets who was in danger of being swallowed by the surge, and had already had her friend swallowed and injured by the said surging crowd. I am sure she would apologise for your hurt feelings, but was attempting to get a bit of order out of the chaos.

[CosmicAvatar]

I am quite happy with the idea of having a Gold Pass but having to get VQTs for Diamond guests, so long as we get in ahead of general entry and have a crack at getting decent ones.  That's what the GP is all about - getting to jump a fair way down the queue, and we pay a lot for it.  As has already been discussed rather a lot, that did not happen on Saturday, despite assurances (don't know how Sunday went but understand Friday was OK).  But when this system first took started (I'm thinking of when Sigourney Weaver, Michael Gambon and Christopher Lloyd were Diamond guests), it worked fairly well (bar a delay at one queue where they didn't start giving out the VQTs straight away).  We Golds went in, got our VQTs and were pretty much out of the way as the general entry arrived to obtain theirs.

On a semi-related note: I know it's not practical to list the exact positions of every guest, but perhaps an indicator of where the Diamond guests are going to be might be useful as they're guaranteed to need VQTs (doesn't have to be the actor's name, just "Diamond guest", so if things swap around on another day as happened with Pamela Anderson moving into John Cleese's space, there's minimal confusion).  Saves a lot of faffing around wondering where they are.  I found Terence Stamp OK, but was searching for Conleth Hill for a while, while those critical minutes were ticking away.

Pre-scanning and security were very efficient.  Very happy with that.

The DP collection point probably needs more people; that Saturday queue was rather long and slow, although the crew on it were doing their best.  I wasn't fussed as I had a large window between photoshoots so wasn't in a hurry, but was wondering how many people were potentially missing out on stuff because they were stuck in that queue.

Liked the photo schedules (as posted on the forum) on walls everywhere.  Very helpful.

Things were very crowded in places on Saturday (particularly where GoT guests like Conleth Hill were signing) - people were resorting to cutting through the queues themselves as there was actually some breathing space.  Trying to navigate the "space" between the two sets of opposing queues got a bit nerve-wracking at times (I'm a claustrophobe), although it was still not so bad as that one LFCC a few years back where they ended up doing "one in, one out" as the venue reached critical mass capacity-wise.  I didn't go anywhere near the dealer areas on Sat, though (except to go to lunch) as they looked very crowded; that's one reason I couldn't find out about the goody bag as I couldn't even work out where the info desk was, let alone try to find it.  Some areas were blissfully spacious and cool, however, so it was nice to escape to those after braving the crush points.  The walled-off section in the guest hall was a good idea as that meant all you could do in there was queue - no cutting through (in theory, anyway - I certainly never noticed anyone doing it when I was getting Tricia Helfer's auto in there).  Having the guests overflow into the adjoining hall on Sat was also a good thing on the whole.

No complaints re Sunday - that went perfectly well for me.  So much quieter, so I was able to amble round the dealer areas (and find the info desk!).  I do wonder how many people with DPs/Golds/early batches decided to skip morning sessions and turn up at the afternoon ones so they could have a lie-in, though - the photo areas A-D seemed to have relatively few people around them when I was there for morning sessions between 9:30 and 10:30!  Again, made it very nice and chilled for early birds like me, but possibly unnecessarily squishy later on.  Not that SM can do anything about that!

 

TL;DR: Saturday stressful/squishy in places.  Sunday nice.

 

 

 

Edited July 31, 2017 by CosmicAvatar

[sadfan99]

Had great weekend thanks despite a major panic attack being stuck in a crowd which was unable to control itself unfortunately. 

Photo areas were much better on Sunday - acoustics not great so hearing what was being called was a bit of a challenge. Some newbies near me were very confused about where they should be and when and as we were all at the back of the crowd it wasn't easy to understand myself..however, got through with no risk of personal injury.

I think the crew did brilliantly in the main - I don't know about anyone else, but there seems to be some very aggressive attendees as the scrum for VQ tickets was bordering out of control...these are grown up people sprinting and barging and I witnessed 1 mob almost swallowing a poor lass giving out VQs unfortunately (injure an attendee and her friend being abused when she panicked and tried to help the VQ lady)  ,maybe I'm just old 

The only small thing for my friends and I was collecting VQs at Matt Lucas area on Sunday - there was no-one apparently handing them out until I saw her talking to another crew member - bearing in mind it is apparently a free-for-all now for VQs, was a tad frustrating as was late getting others we wanted. 

Guests were all great, and the Diamonds we got were worth it.

[reelbigmartin]

I didn't have a gold pass, but did have a Diamond. A good way to solve the disappointment with Gold Pass holders is to perhaps allow them the first VQ tickets for DP guests, even if it is for the first half hour. This still give Diamonds the guarantee, but offers more value out of the Gold Passes? 

I personally wouldn't go for the gold pass, but I understand frustration

[Dobbin11]

Luckily I got low VQ's and autographs on Friday for the ones I wanted, except RDA who is really slow. Saturday I only bothered with 2 VQ's because it was a scrum and focused purely on photo shoots.  I would recommend Friday, much more chilled and relaxed. Next year I will get some Diamond passes and maybe a gold.

[magicalworna]

2 hours ago, sadfan99 said:

Think you might find the exceptionally obnoxious woman was attempting to protect the young lady giving out VQ tickets who was in danger of being swallowed by the surge, and had already had her friend swallowed and injured by the said surging crowd. I am sure she would apologise for your hurt feelings, but was attempting to get a bit of order out of the chaos.

 While I'd appreciate if that was the case...as soon as the woman got her ticket she made a swift exit running onto the next queue and doing the same thing, doesn't really sound like someone who was trying to help anyone but themselves. 

[lomax]

This was my second year for LFCC and i must admit I thought last year was better organised. I can only applaud the crew members for doing the best that they could especially on the saturday which was just insanely busy. 

I have a few gripes which i hope will be thought about for next year.

1. my mum has trouble walking and is partially disabled, we asked the security at gold pass gate where the disabled entrance was as i had a gold pass and she just had general entry. instead of allowing her to use the disabled entrance she had to walk all the way round to the other side of the building to go through normal entry. (This happened both days!)

2. There really did seem a lack of crew members in areas. 1 crew member outside of photo areas A ,B and C was not enough and if was also incredibly difficult to hear their instructions. cant they be given a loudspeaker or something?

3. Lack of signs saying where the Photo areas were. There really needs to be more of these especially where some were spread out quite far from each other. Areas A,B and C were far too close to each other as well and when multiple 'big guests' were on at the same time it just became a mess. 

3. Dealers in the autograph cues. it is annoying enough that they get walked to the front of the cue but for them to then get 40/50/60 items signed is a bit of a joke. the limit should stay at 5 items. 

4. Even some of the 'big' guests were in way too small an area. We knew how big Conleth Hill and Natalie Dormer were and their queues were in way too small of an area. 

5. GA being let in before Gold Pass. Ok its only 5 mins, but when im spending a bit more money for the benefits a gold pass can have i want them benefits.

 

I know it sounds like iv'e had a terrible time but it was one of the best weekends of my life. It just could have run a lot smoother. 

[maxcat]

Another great London event, albeit I have once again been unsuccessful in gaining Christopher lloyd's autograph. Next time ill diamond pass to make sure I get it.                           

However on Saturday I had a bad experience which is as follows-I had a clash towards the end of the day in which benedict and tom skerritt were at almost at the same time, and skerritts photoshoot was shorter, and I went to a male crew member and tried to explain he just pretty much dumped me in the benedict queue saying they'll get thru the shoot very quickly, albeit I tried to explain my situation and he just dumped me in the queue. And then 5 minutes into the shoot my part of the queue they cut up the queue and stopped us from moving without explanation, this was when I tried to catch a member of the crew but none of them were about/interested. Stopping us from moving slowing us up made me completely miss my tom skerritt shoot, and then I had a wait at least 40 minutes at the sales desk to get it carried over for the next day. I don't what was going on but to me that was a poor customer service as it is every crew members job to give advice and help customers. Aside from this particular crew member every other staff member were very helpful. 

Aside from this and I managed to get a photo with tom this was an enjoyable con.

Edited July 31, 2017 by maxcat

[phoebemonkey]

16 minutes ago, lomax said:

1. my mum has trouble walking and is partially disabled, we asked the security at gold pass gate where the disabled entrance was as i had a gold pass and she just had general entry. instead of allowing her to use the disabled entrance she had to walk all the way round to the other side of the building to go through normal entry. (This happened both days!)

The disabled/extra help entrance was at the same door as the general entrance - not next to the Gold Pass entrance like it had been last year. (This had been stated on the forum, but the extra help emails had outdated info and still said to go to the Gold Pass entrance). 

I used the extra help entrance - we were able to go past the main queue, collect our extra help/carer wristbands, have our tickets scanned and collect diamond passes. Then we went in past the general entrance with no issues - it was pretty smooth, although if we hadn't gotten a taxi to the venue I would have had to be pushed in my wheelchair round the building since it was really quite far away from the main road/train station! I understand this is because there's simply not enough room for the large number of disabled/extra help people at the Gold Pass entrance anymore (due to safety etc). 

In terms of suggestions for next year, it would be good if there were more signs (like A LOT more). There was a lot of time spent trying to find things/figuring out what queues were for etc. For example the main entrance for the second stage wasn't accessible (big step) so we had to go in the secondary entrance, through a cafe/sitting area. This wasn't signed so there were a lot of confused people as well as chancers trying to skip the main queue into the talk! (Thankfully crew appeared to tell them to go queue, lol) 

Having better signs for the diamond/gold seating in the main stage would be great too - there was a lot of grumbling because people coming in late to talks would ignore the 'diamond pass only' signs and just sit in those rows. Which meant they were in front of the general ticket people who had queued for ages! I felt sorry for the poor crew girl since she was trying to police the entire area herself at one point. 

Also would it be possible to have signs for the photo shoots? As others have commented, it's often hard to hear what batches etc are being called - plus some people just crowd round anyway! If there was a sign to hold up for each batch (like on a stick?) perhaps that would stop the crew being asked what numbers had been called constantly. Just a suggestion :) 

I was really pleased that there were lots more lifts in use than there were in 2015 - it was easy to get between floors in my wheelchair :) All the crew we met were friendly and very helpful. 

 

 

[phoebemonkey]

Oh also, like others have said, I was a bit puzzled about why Chris Judge and RDA didn't do any sort of Stargate talk together... the Michael Shanks/Ben Browder one at Collectormania was brilliant and since RDA/Chris talk about each other in their talks it didn't make a lot of sense. In fact Chris even brought it up himself and said he didn't know why it was like that... 

I'm guessing it was scheduling issues or something, but it's a bit odd to have two of the main cast not doing anything together. 

[Chris C]

Best thing about this weekend's comic con: fantastic guest line up.

Things that could be improved: better air ventilation around the biggest name stars: it became very stuffy rather quickly due to the sheer mass of people. There was still plenty of unused space in the gallery so more mid level stars could fan out a bit. That would allow more room for everyone and even allow a better conversation with all the stars with less noise.

[Lushchicken]

15 hours ago, loveamyadams said:

my friend and i looked at each other in shock as we waited in line at general entry to see people in the disabled queue going in early ( which is the correct way of treating people),some in wheelchairs ,then abandoned by their carers etc as they were allowed in and legged it up the stairs. Taking advantage comes to mind. naughty people!!! 

Have you ever considered that those 'naughty people' were carers getting VQ tickets for the disabled guest? Because that's what my husband and I ended up doing on Sunday. On Saturday we had to realise that anyone who couldn't use the stairs would have to walk/roll to the other end of the venue, take the lift and walk/roll back. Fat chance of getting a reasonable VQ number like that. 

[CelticRob]

I thought having 4 photo areas quite close was a good idea, but maybe space C&D 15 feet further along that back wall, and then queue D along the wall itself. This would help with the congested area between them all a bit better.

The SOA bike shoot looked awful. Just buy one of those off-white backdrops that rolls down and onto the floor. Would have looked infinitely better having uniform colour rather than crappy grey floor and cheap and tacky backing dividers as your backdrop.

Photo Area D - Red Shirt. When queuing for Rosie Jane she was telling the blue shirt to 'push' people forward. WTF is that about, telling crew to manhandle and shove attendees? . The experience is supposed to be enjoyable

[Beechy08]

2 hours ago, CelticRob said:

Photo Area D - Red Shirt. When queuing for Rosie Jane she was telling the blue shirt to 'push' people forward. WTF is that about, telling crew to manhandle and shove attendees? . The experience is supposed to be enjoyable

That's crew speak. 'Pushing' and 'pulling' are terms we use for moving queues. It literally means asking people to move up.

[Raylenth]

Yeah, they won't actually physically push people along though I appreciate how it sounds.

[Swissangel4616]

At all... it was well organized... and also thanks having more space with those halls. Two years ago it was terrible with all the merchandising table on the same area with Celebs
And thanks having all photo-Shots  on the same floor / level where the guests are...
Sure... saturday it was busy... but by far more relaxt than two years ago.

The only I don't like really is my Pamela Anderson Picture with that bright light...

Otherwise.. it was fun... Phil at the photo Area A was cool... very well organized! Thanks

Also that area for Benedict Cumberbatch was good. They were only 1 fan-girl was.... she ignored completely the rules NOT TAKING ANY PICTURES of Ben...even his bodyguard warned her a couple times. Benedict himself was nice.. even he was busy with signing :-D

Thanks also for the different entrys for Gold Pass and regulare entries... even it was a little bit opened... so there was less stress with stand in line. Please SHOWMASTER -
keep it that way.
 

[phoebemonkey]

10 hours ago, Lushchicken said:

Have you ever considered that those 'naughty people' were carers getting VQ tickets for the disabled guest? Because that's what my husband and I ended up doing on Sunday. On Saturday we had to realise that anyone who couldn't use the stairs would have to walk/roll to the other end of the venue, take the lift and walk/roll back. Fat chance of getting a reasonable VQ number like that. 

Edit by QS: Please check your E-Mail from Samantha. It explains the Details about how disabled guests can join the autograph line in Detail.

Edited August 1, 2017 by Queen_Sindel

[Lushchicken]

49 minutes ago, phoebemonkey said:

Edit by QS: Please check your E-Mail from Samantha. It explains the Details about how disabled guests can join the autograph line in Detail.

Hey QS, I'd be interested in that information as well, for next time!

[Queen_Sindel]

1 minute ago, Lushchicken said:

Hey QS, I'd be interested in that information as well, for next time!

E-Mail extrahelp@showmastersevents.com. They will give you all Details and advise accordingly for every Event.

[Lushchicken]

15 minutes ago, Queen_Sindel said:

E-Mail extrahelp@showmastersevents.com. They will give you all Details and advise accordingly for every Event.

I wish they would. I'm happy to write to them, but this will be my third email and they never get back to me. 

[Queen_Sindel]

32 minutes ago, Lushchicken said:

I wish they would. I'm happy to write to them, but this will be my third email and they never get back to me. 

Am I allowed to Forward the address you registered on the Forum with to them? We had some Problems with some e-mails never getting in. Your home Country was not on the list so far, but I guess there is always a first. *sighs*

[Lushchicken]

24 minutes ago, Queen_Sindel said:

Am I allowed to Forward the address you registered on the Forum with to them? We had some Problems with some e-mails never getting in. Your home Country was not on the list so far, but I guess there is always a first. *sighs*

Sure that would help a lot, thank you!

[MVronsky78]

I wasn't too unhappy with the gold pass goody bag this year - quite chuffed with my pen and book of post-it notes!  Certainly better than my previous two at LFCC since I went Gold for the first time in summer 2015.

However, I can't help thinking it would be a good idea and nice gesture if Showmasters could include their £5 programme with the goody bag in future - rather than a couple of trolls for example.