A Photo View of a Local Science Fiction Convention

Article by Frances Moritz
Photos by Marinda Darnell

While we all love gaming conventions, there's something that can be said for the variety available at other types of conventions. Chicagoland has no shortage of conventions of various types throughout the year. The first convention of the calendar year is usually Capricon, a Science Fiction convention with a different theme each year.

Capricon always hosts a variety of dealers in their Dealer's Room. The mix for this year included:

• Bast's Garden
  The ladies of Bast's Garden specialize in making shoulder dragons, wings of various sizes for costuming, and altered plush.
  

• Bluebeard Studio
  A pair of pirates add flavour to the convention
  

• Camelot Enterprises
  Life is better with feathers.
  

• Draken Masks
  Handmade paper fantasy and Mardi Gras masks
  

• The Five Wits
  Arts, crafts and costumes produced by a pair of gamers.
  

• Girl Glass
  Hand blown art glass
  

• Honeck Sculpture
  Fine bronze sculptures
  

• La Paloma Hats
  With the right hat nothing else matters
  

• Off World Designs
  Offering a great variety of geek clothing
  

• Orion Works
  Scarves and jewelry to your heart's delight
  

• Ravenwing
  Ravenwing's colourful table includes a mix of hand-made jewelry and hair feathers.
  

• Swords and More
  A collection of swords on display.
  

• Susan Van Camp
  Artist and creator of the Dragon Storm role-playing game.
  

• William L. Howard
  School for the metal arts
  

Gamers, of course, have their own corner of the convention. Or corners, in this case - Capricon provided three different rooms of varying sizes for gaming this year. And that's not counting the gamers that were seen playing in the lobby or other rooms around the convention.

One room hosted assorted Steve Jackson, Looney Labs and other assorted games.

Guest of Honor James P. Hogan can be seen playing Chez Geek.

Another room held scheduled Dragon Storm games and various miniatures games.

The third room was used for open gaming, where this group of gamers can be seen playing Killer Bunnies.

And not to be missed, particularly in the evenings, are the costumes and the parties. The parties are hosted by convention attendees and by other conventions on a designated party floor.

More costumes appear in the evenings as the parties step up.

Capricon 2006 opened their pre-registration table before this year's convention was over. The 2006 Convention Chair, Greg "Guido" Williams, can be seen working the pre-registration table the last day of the 2005 convention while wearing the University of Fandom t-shirt for next year's convention.