Dogpatch Press

Fluff Pieces Every Week

Category: On the scene

June 3, 2015

Great news on the West Coast: PAWcon promises to bring back a legendary experience.

by Patch O'Furr

800px-PacificAnthroWeekend2015

Pacific Anthro Weekend (PAW CON)

October 30th – November 1st, 2015

San Jose, California

 

It’s “Survival of the Furriest” this Halloween, with an end-of-the-world party to die for!  Pacanthro.org has details.  Follow their Twitter for updates.

Last year was their inaugural event.  It snuck in under the radar of many. About 200 furries showed up for low-key fun.  Fine-tuning of publicity and planning has brought great pawgress.  PAWcon is following in the pawprints of the other well-established Furry con in San Jose, Further Confusion.  (How many places are lucky enough to get two great cons?)  Now they’re stepping up to stage it at Fur Con’s original venue, the Doubletree.  Many people have missed the unique magic of that venue after outgrowing it.  Those who remember (or missed it) can have it again!

They have kings, queens, and suites open for booking:

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May 28, 2015

There’s furries in Peru too, sad mascot documentary, Furrycon article – Newsdump (5/28/15)

by Patch O'Furr

Headlines, links and little stories to make your tail wag.  Tips are always welcome. 

Documentary: The Anti Mascot.

Lou Seal is the one Giants fans love.

Lou Seal is the one Giants fans love.

The story of the San Francisco Giants’ Crazy Crab, the most outrageous mascot of them all. The 1984 San Francisco Giants were dreadful. But the team’s ill-conceived “Crazy Crab” mascot endured worse.

Shared by Excelsior30 on FurAffinity … a cautionary tale of how anthropomorphic costuming could make you a magnet for abuse. Professional performer Wayne Doba documents his experiences with water balloons full of pee, and back injuries from a “macho” attack by players from a rival team.  (Get happier with Hulu’s mascot documentary series, Behind the Mask, that had an Emmy nomination for Outstanding New Approaches in Sports Programming.)

MNFurs becomes a registered 501(c)3 nonprofit.

News announcement. On FurAffinity, Aerak shares what it means to him: now the organization can officially host charitable activities like hospital fursuiting to brighten people’s days. MNFurs have a lot to be proud of:

In a matter of six years, with only the word-of-mouth advertising, MNFurs has gone from a small group of close friends and associates with a weekly meeting number of less then a dozen people to 40 to 60 people in the same room every other Saturday night. At the same time, we went from 20 to over 200 people on our mailing list.

Their growing presence in the world of fluffy stuff is bringing Furry Migration, “Minnesota’s first furry convention having its second year on August 28-30, 2015.”

Furrycon in Rochester gets a great media spokeskitty, Zeigler Jaguar. Read the rest of this entry »

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May 25, 2015

Scale’s paintings push the limits of furry art, with surprising mainstream crossover.

by Patch O'Furr

(NSFW – nude paintings below!)

In “Furry Good Ideas“, Scale commented on my suggestion about starting a Furry art gallery: 

scaleNot sure if the times are ripe for a dedicated furry art gallery, but for what it’s worth I’m having some success entering furry paintings in local art shows… I’m also making a bet that a market niche for paintings actually exists within the the fandom and that a decent number of fans would like to own furry art which can be displayed alongside other kinds of art. The results are very encouraging so far.

The article was meant to encourage feedback like this, revealing a cool new story. Nice to meet you, Scale!

Scale does classical style anthropomorphic figure painting.  Public display of his work puts him in a favorite focus of this blog: crossover.  He isn’t just showing regular fantasy art to the public, either.  It’s both painterly, and super hot!  It’s the best of both worlds.  Look at the dragoness below… the attitude, the pose, the voluptuous sculpted butt… excuse me while I fan my face for a minute.

I’m happy to share this as a nice surprise to the chairman of Eurofurence.  He commented on my article about Biohazard’s crossover art stunt:Screen Shot 2015-05-11 at 5.43.25 PM

We’re seeing a little subcultural eruption, from as far across the line of “low art” as you can get.  Scale’s art is pushing limits.  His cool, thoughtful style speaks of Old Master sensibility, but the hot-blooded subjects are a weird combination that makes sparks.  Isn’t that what art is for?  The way people respond to it brings interesting thoughts about art meaning:

The bunny painting was accepted in the show without any problem. I keep finding evidence that most non-furries don’t read a picture like that one as a sexy pinup… I suspect most people just see it as a parody of human nudes.

OK, it’s sexy to furry fans (5,000 on his popular FurAffinity account), but he thinks it doesn’t communicate like that to the “normal” public.  Is that a failure?  Would they show it if it doesn’t speak to them?  It has to work as simply good painting.  It’s an example for furry artists: don’t make good furry art – make good art. Read the rest of this entry »

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May 21, 2015

Amazing BLFC report, Hug Permits, furries in national art shows. Newsdump (5/21/15)

by Patch O'Furr

Headlines, links and little stories to make your tail wag.  Tips are always welcome. 

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Mainstream sightings and fandom news

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VICE parties hard at Fur-eh!

The article gets super friendly, and stays refreshingly non-judgemental.  It can be hard to broadly cover an event with immersion in a tight circle of friends, so it’s only a small slice of the experience.  Not all furries are way into parties.  Some feel like it ruins think-heavy sci-fi focus.  However, sci-fi cons with no parties are a world I don’t want to live in. You can make a furry con anything you want it to be.  When they do party, nobody does it better!

Impressions from Biggest Little Fur Con.

I confess to partying too hard to cover this with it’s own article. (Thanks Vox for a great vid!)

  • It’s really amusing to see someone get covered head to toe in shaving cream.  (It takes about 4 cans.)
  • Favorite shirt I saw: “I’M FAT – LET’S PARTY”
  • Thank-you’s for blogging? You might as well thank me for eating! Someone joked that it must take drugs to pound these out.  Nope.  Fursuiting is my drug.
  • Attendance of 2400+ makes BLFC the 6th largest con. (AKA “Biggest Medium Fur Con.”)  That’s impressive to build in 3 years. The subculture is rising!
  • With the future Dystopia theme, a lot of fan interaction means they succeeded. Many said it was the best use of a theme they had ever seen.  High praise.
  • More interaction I loved were the unofficial “Hug Permit” officers.  They were funny, engaging… and helpful with secret wing-man encouragement. (See “code 90944?”)  Come on… with 2400 adults together for a once a year celebration, how could that NOT happen? No judging. Further proof that “Hugs are the handshake of furries.”

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May 19, 2015

A con was threatened, but don’t attack symptoms and make a problem worse.

by Patch O'Furr

There were lots of reasons to celebrate in Reno, on May 14-17, 2015.  2400 furballs tumbled across the desert to Biggest Little Fur Con, making it the 6th largest con after three short years. I spoke to the Chair, who said that they were very lucky to have the extravagant layout of the Grand Sierra. Happy vibes filled it up. There was a group photo of 700 fursuiters.  I jumped in to hug as many as possible, and it was like a spin in a dryer on fluff cycle.

Swept away from the outpouring of Furry friendship, there was one little black speck of pain. While others acted out their inner feelings in colorful costumes, one lonely guy let his inner demons out.  He went to make an outburst with threats of violence.  It was a cry for help. But the community could only help itself, and he was detained and escorted away.  Everyone else’s happiness could only be a mirage in his personal desert.

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May 13, 2015

Yay for street fursuiting! San Francisco’s 2015 How Weird Street Faire furmeet.

by Patch O'Furr

To me, street fursuiting is the best, most spontaneous form of “The Most Furry Activity”.  Street fairs are the best place to do it.  So, the start of street fair season is a special occasion.

In San Francisco, for at least the past several years, How Weird Street Faire has been first on the list.  After this, the season reaches a high point with the million-attended Pride celebration. It stays strong through October with events like the Superhero Street Fair.  It’s especially strong here because the crowds are very friendly to freaky spectacles and costuming – and the area may have the world’s highest population of furries.  Fun like this makes a good reason to say that the San Francisco Bay Area is Furry Mecca.

To any fursuiters who have never done it on the street, and feel like traveling – consider making a trip coincide with one of our meets.  You’ll get an amazing subcultural experience you can never have as a regular tourist.  That’s the beauty of subculture – friends wherever you go!  You can do this wherever you are, though.  Get inspired by my interview with Sakura Fox:  Renegade fursuiting is BEST fursuiting.

The 2013 How Weird furmeet gave us wonderful photos.  For the 2014 meet, ABC News gave a shout to furries picked out from thousands of costumers.  There was continuing recognition at the 2015 How Weird Street Faire, their 16th annual event.

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March 23, 2015

A small story about being sexually assaulted in fursuit.

by Patch O'Furr

Or should I say “manhandled?”  Nah… Dogpiled. That’s more like it.

This story is no reason for alarm.  It’s just a P.S.A. to say “hey guys, look out for each other!”

With this story, I’m assuming:

  • You’re a furry, or at least you don’t hate them. (It’s in-group stuff.)
  • You don’t hate hearing about adult activity, with a disclaimer that it’s a special sub-interest that doesn’t define furries.

The fur was flying at a party that was very loud, crowded and gay. Muffled music was coming through my fursuit head. I was bouncing around and giving hugs to everyone, from “just friends” all the way to grinding if they wanted.  People know I’m into that (in the right time and place,) even if they come up behind me and I can’t tell who it is.  Basically, “if you see my fursuit, that’s my consent.”

A guy shoved up in the darkness, and I thought he was a regular.  He started pawing my junk, and his friend crowded in and yanked my belt off.  She got rough because I had suspenders on it holding up my tail.  That’s when I got surprised and flustered, because furries aren’t aggressive. Even when there’s “instant consent” with ones I can’t see, they’re respectful, but this was rough handling by outsiders.

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March 11, 2015

Animation remakes: Watership Down, NIMH, DuckTales, Dumbo, more. Newsdump (3/11/15)

by Patch O'Furr

Headlines, links and little stories to make your tail wag.  Tips are always welcome. 

The Tufts Daily goes to a furry convention.

Anthro New England gets a good college news piece.  My Newsdump gathers links as news happens, but it’s interesting there’s no other media articles this time!

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Comics/animation: “who likes remakes?”

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I hope you like remakes, because it seems there’s no stopping the onslaught…

New images for Disney’s Zootopia.

i09 shares an update from what may be the new furriest movie ever, scheduled for 2016.  “Taken from the Disney Facebook page, these new Zootopia images reveal these animals have designed their buildings and bridges look like their own furry appendages.”

Hulu’s docuseries “Behind the Mask” stars pro mascots.

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February 25, 2015

Austrian TV and Lakeside Furries, Harper’s con story, Awesome Possum – Newsdump (2/25/15)

by Patch O'Furr

Headlines, links and little stories to make your tail wag.  Story tips are always welcome. 

Ursa Major Awards nominations close on February 28.  Nominate Dogpatch Press – get fuzzy hugs!  I love furries so much, blogging about them is it’s own reward.  But I love shinies too, so can the highly attractive readers of this site nominate it for an award?  Submit a Best Magazine nomination.  These hugs are worth it.  (OK, they’re worth nothing because I hug everyone for free. They’re just priceless.)

                                             _____________________________

                  In the Media

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High traffic for $11,575 fursuit story.

Far flung places like German news sites are continuing to give notable high traffic for last week’s story of the record high fursuit price.

Austrian TV covers furries with a good 15 minute news piece.

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February 19, 2015

Early Furry Fan Photos – by Fred Patten.

by Patch O'Furr

Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

Greymuzzle Stickmaker (Rodford Edmiston Smith), an attendee and photographer of many World S-F Conventions and other s-f conventions of the 1980s through the 2000s, has been posting his photos on Flickr since late September.

Most are of interest to s-f fans, but some contain pictures of furry fans at bygone s-f conventions. (I’m in there, but never mind where – I don’t photograph well.)

A fox fursuiter (but the word “fursuit” didn’t exist yet) at the 1991 Worldcon in Chicago.  (link)

w91m003

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