DesignerCon 2015, It Was Never at the LA Convention Center

DesignerCon came back to Pasadena, the only place it's ever been, for another year of vinyl toy figures and art to decorate your office, loft or even cave dwelling. It's amazing to see how big its become over the years and the amount of space it infests with special exclusive tots to find. We picked up some stylish Muertos cards from Steve Minty who was dressed as Mario. Only at the con could you get his special edition video game wallet including one based on Mario and Zelda. He was compelled to tell me not to take any pictures of them.

From the start we saw our old favorite artist, Christopher Lee at his Select Your Hero booth with a new idea. "Joy Riders, yeah, so my friend Matt and I are starting a joint toy that will be coming out hopefully some time next year," he said. He added, "It's about having fun at top speed," then he laughed and showed me the toy that resembled a cast from a cereal commercial from the 60's and some bits and pieces of Star Wars.

"I also launched Night Cake Press, my experimental sort-of side project where I can play with different illustration styles and themes," Christopher said, on another side on his booth. We joked about the name, I mean, "Night Cake" as we went deeper into the con.

His many sided booth is much like the sides of the artists who have booths at DesignerCon, so many of which only sell their work on the side. Many are animators, graphic designers and illustrators all working for bigger companies. DCon is a chance for them to stretch out and show off their own work.

Tara Billinger is one of those artists, she's trying to get her own cartoon series, Long Gone Gulch, a weird cartoon western started via gofundme. "I kind of wanted to make some toys when I'm not working on Mickey Mouse shorts," Tara said, with her booth not only about her attempts of starting a cartoon, but lined with her own art and toys.

"It's a fantasy western about two sheriffs that inhabit this world that's engulfed in a dust cloud, so it's a never ending dust cloud that moves from place to place that gathers up folk-lore and myths and they have to be in charge of it. Whenever there needed they kind of screw up," Tara said, then laughed when prodded about what her cartoon was about.

When asked about DCon she was sad she was tucked away at her booth, she wanted to go buy some stuff even though she did pick up some exclusives already.

"I wanted to do something for DesignerCon and I was really inspired by that creature, because I think it's badass. So back when I was a kid their were Fisher-Price toys that were called Little People, basically pegs with heads on them. So I designed this as a retro throwback version. So if you have a collection of little people it would scare the sh%t out of them," those are the words from one of our favorite artists whose been purposefully doing less online, Andrew Wilson.  He was showing off some toys that don't look like something from Alien films at the show. He like so many other artist just want to share their own fun ideas from their favorite mediums and childhood memories.

Going back to out first interview with Christopher, many artists were touched by Little People and the toys they grew up with. The show is sort of a way to remember one's childhood added with everything they've learned as an artist or a fan and then sharing it with everyone.

Love robots, complex action figures wearing the latest fashion and just art and toys that will make you the talk of the office as it adorns your desk; so hard to find that those around you will have to be jealous, that's DCon. An art show for those who want to toy around with toys.