Event Report: Newport Comic-Con 2024

The South West Droid Building represented the Droid Builder’s UK Club on Saturday 10th & Sunday 11th August, over the bridge in Newport.

Mike and Paul attended Saturday, with their droids R2-TNGO & R2-D2 (respectively) along with Emma as a helper/spotter.

Matt attended by himself with his R2 droid on the Sunday.

They had a great time and it was a busy weekend.

They managed to get some video from the day along with photos, YouTube link here.

Mike got his dome signed by non other than Moff Gideon AKA Giancarlose Esperito!

Though this wasn’t intentional lol.

Check out the YouTube video (link above) for a short video from Saturday 👍🏽

Event Report: Pembroke Dock Heritage Centre - Falcon Fun Day

Early start, Mike picked me up at 7am, for the 2 1/2 hour drive over to Pembroke Dock's. A long drive, but chatting and catching up on recent events, made the time fly.

We arrived around 9:30am'ish. Introduction’s with members of the 501st Welsh Garrison & member’s of the heritage centre. Before we unloaded the droids from Mike’s van and wheeled them up the ramp. The outside area is cobblestone’s so we decided best to keep the droids inside lol on the carpeted floor.

The centre is not very big, but pack’s a lot inside, including a cafeteria. Outside where stalls and food as well as music DJ.

We were able to view the main attraction, the Millennium Falcon exhibit, before the event opened. A lot of images I’ve not seen before as well as video footage and a modified model version of the Millennium Falcon showing half completed, half as framework with wooden skin, as would of been in its full scale assembly.

Click on above image for a short YouTube video.

Photos from the day:

Other pictures of the day:

Mike said to someone they should ask for my autograph 😂……. As I was getting mistaken for Lee T, who was on the background video we had playing.

This was the que lol….. 

A future builder joined us on the day and tock these following images of the droids.

DJSS photography

(Find them on Facebook)

Thanks D, these are great.

There was lots to keep people busy, inside and out. The weather was amazing, warm and sunny. The people great and didn’t mind my long winded answers to their questions about the droids etc lol.

The event finished at 4pm and it didn’t take long to pack up. Another chat with everyone working, they kind of expected it to be busy, but were surprised by just how MANY people turned up!!

Another great event supported.

Thanks to everyone who attended as well as the boys from the Welsh garrison, it was HOT for them. And finally a big thanks to our hosts at the Heritage Centre.

Check out: Pembroke Docks Heritage Centre

*** UPDATE ***

We made the local news:

https://www.pembroke-today.co.uk/news/entertainment/first-falcon-fun-day-voted-a-success-561935

Pembroke Dock Heritage Centre - Falcon Fun Day

This coming Bank Holiday Monday 29th August (here in the UK), we’ll be attending:

Falcon Fun Day

@ Pembroke Dock Heritage Centre,

over in West Wales 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿.

Website link here

The open day was attended by another R2 builder (Matt) earlier this year.

Web link here.

If you don’t know, this is where the Millennium Falcon was built for The Empire Strikes Back.

YouTube links (not my own)

This one below, is mine 😎👍🏽

https://pdht.org/whats-going-on/

Event Report: Newport Comic-Con

Another great time had by us all and from the video and photo's, the general public as well.

Link to my YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/JamesR5D4

The sun was out and it was going to be a hot day outside at least. Inside was well temperature maintained.

 

The droids lined up.
 

This event and others around the country, was run by Monopoly Events.

Early entry doors opened at 8:30am, hence why we had to be there early lol. The queue was massive [see video]! Our location was just off the main entrance foyer on tiled floor. The main area's have carpet and for the heavier droids this wasn't good for performance 😖

 

The display table.

 

Pauls R2 & my R5

 

Oliver brought R2KT

 

Mike’s droid no1……

 

Awesome 3D printed Buzz costume

Mr Terry Cooper arrived as MARVIN, from Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

 

As per, I had been following Terry’s progress over the months of hard work, and the results speak for themselves.

MARVIN won first place in the cosplay competition!!

Checkout ‘Terry on Tuesday’ video of his day on stage with

THE John Cena.

There were three entrance time slots, and as can be seen in the video of the day, the venue was busy but not crowded. Plenty of space for people to mingle without getting in peoples way for photos etc.

We got to chat with lots of people interested in the droids, asking how they were built etc. and entertained kids big and small. Had a few run-ins with Dalek’s lol but nothing we couldn’t handle. I took a few photo's but mostly video, so check it out below link

YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/JamesR5D4

I will in future pack food lol as although there are a few cafes, come lunchtime/afternoon they had queues as long as the entrance ones and the others had sold out of food. We all had a great time though and look forward to the next one, hopefully with more droids.

Newport Comic-Con 6th August 2022

 

click above logo for event's website

Members will be attending on Saturday only with our droids.

We will be joined by THE.... Oliver Steeples from

'The Force Awakens'

(subject to availability)

#SOUTHWESTDROIDBUILDERS

#DROIDBUILDERSUK

Monday 8th August 2022: UPDATE

Event video of the day can now be found on

my YouTube channel

Event's 2022 .......... These are the Droids your looking for!

**********************

EVENTS 2022

************************

The UK R2-D2 Builders club’s event

calendar is filling up with some events

already taken place this year!

These are up and down the country from

local charity events to big name ones.

Most are likely to have more than one

Astromech in attendance.

The South West builders contingent

will be attending not just events here

in the South West, but also:

Birmingham, NEC

Milton Keynes, Marshall arena

Scarborough

Bolton arena, Horwich

Liverpool

Weston-Supa-Mare

Swindon, Steam museum

Wales, Newport

With other club members attending other events

covering the whole of the UK, Ireland, Scotland & Wales!

Sunday 6th March

Paul F & his R2-D2, attended our first ‘local’ event,

right here in Bristol @ the Bristol City football stadium,

for UKCGF (UK Comic & Gaming Festival).

He said that the que was long

and he’d run out of trading cards by 1pm!!

I'll post up an event report at a future date.....

😎😎😎2022 is looking good for events! 😎😎😎