Wednesday at Worldcon started out slow, as the panels I was interested in did not begin till noon. Until then I wandered around the main area, pictured above. I was glad I registered the evening before but the lineups did move along quickly.
Best Writing Advice I Was Ever Given; David Gerrold (GoH), Bobbie Benton Hall, P.C. Hodgell, David D Levigne. A great panel on writing and it could have been applied to starting anything. The main takeaways were to write often, write lots, and if someone tells you you should not be a writer and stop then you were never meant to be a writer. If you get angry and focus that anger into your work then you are a writer.
Being Creative: How do you get an idea?; Daniel Spector, Brad Foster, Theresa Halbert, Jeff Sturgeon, Alan F Beck. Geared to artists it was equally applied to any creative activity. It was an interesting look at the way artists developed ideas to fruition.
Hard SF Movies: Are they still making them?; Connie Willis, Fonda Lee, Alvaro Zinos-Amaro. Takeaways were how to create a hard SF world without making it too bogged down in science (handwave very limitedly and be consistent) and that Connie Willis is not only a popular writer but she's funny too. Have to try to see some of their movie favorites made in recent years, like Predestination, Primer, Ex Machina, Her and Time Crimes.
Girl Genius Radio Theater; Phil and Kaja Foglio. As always, the hastily written radio play used members of the audience and the hour and a half show was entertaining and hilarious. Head to the link for free comics and great times.
Discarded Worlds: Astronomical Ideas that were almost correct; Brother Guy Consolmagno. This presenter recently won the Carl Sagan Medal for his public speaking on science and he gave a 90 minute lecture on the above topic. He went over the various theories and "facts" throughout history that almost were correct until new data came around. His main takaway is that the science community is like a family; it listens, it makes mistakes, it criticizes, and it corrects but above all it learns from its mistakes and corrects itself with the help of the whole.
That was my first day at my first Worldcon. Great fun and learning with laughs thrown in.
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