It has been years since I’ve attended a science fiction convention, but twenty years ago I was a frequent visitor. Back in those days, a convention was considered big if it took up four or five rooms at a hotel and featured a half dozen fairly well-known stars from the few science fiction tv shows or movies that people knew.
Nowadays, the mega-conventions of Comic-Con and DragonCon span entire hotels (multple ones in the case of DragonCon) and play host to dozens of different fandoms with hundreds of actors/writers/creators. Typically, thousands attend these “cons” and it can be quite difficult to get in to that one special panel that you want to see. A panel is a dedicated meeting of a select fandom where stars or creators of that fandom show up and take questions from the fans.
For many, these panels are the highlights of the conventions. Actors and creators provide great insight and background to the shows themselves, and frequently provide a great deal of entertainment in the process. It used to be that the only way to know what was being said was to actually attend the con and be lucky enough to gain admission into these panels.
That’s not completely the case any more! Fans with small handheld video cameras have been taping these panels for the past several years and putting them online on sites like YouTube. The videos can range from just a few really funny minutes to the entire panel (usually at least 45 minutes).
Watching these videos can be a great substitute for actually being at the event, with typically great sound and audio thanks to some tech-savvy fans. I’d suggest if there’s a fandom that you love, go to YouTube and search for it along with “con.” You’re sure to find a large amount of video that you’ve never seen before, and many hours of delightful entertaining video to appease the fan boy (or girl) in you.