Headless Lounge Feedback
Hello everyone...hopefully all of you have made it home from AC-2010 con-crud free! 
As the manager of the Headless Lounges for the convention this year, I'm very interested in hearing what you thought of what we had to offer. If you are a fursuiter who used either (or both) of our lounge areas this year, please tell us what we did right, and what we could have done better. (Don't hold back on your opinions...I know I deserve what's coming. 
)
We would also like to know how we can make the lounges even better for 2011. If you have any suggestions, please feel free to leave them here.
Hope to see all of you next year!
Unfortuantely, there isn't a room that we can reserve in the DLCC that has a restroom attached to it. It normally isn't something that the convention center would have a request for,...so the building wasn't built with something like that. Also we'd be farther away from the elevators and main ballroom, and that might be more of an issue than the bathrooms would be.
We can see about a sewing station in the Washington room headless lounge. Will add tht to our possibile improvements for next year.
My only criticism was that the cups were rather small, had to take like three drinks at once just to relieve basic thirst. Other than that, i feel you did a great job, the doors stayed closed keeping the a/c inside for us fursuiters. good job.
WOOF WOOF, cuddle time now plz?
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I was very impressed to see an entire WALL covered with large Lasko fans (whose boxes made for fun bowling in the fursuit games). It greatly helped the rotation of people stationed in front of those fans. 
The small fursuit repair station was also a great idea, though I did not need to use it, luckily.
Lots of fans was nice but the white ones kept getting used as head driers (turned to point straight up) so it was still tough to find a fan at some points. No real complaints and can't think of much that could be done to improve things (larger room, more fans, more AC, other things that are tough to do and cost more, ect.)
Perhaps we could take up a collection or some thing from suiters who wished to help out to get more/newer stuff for the lounges?
For the head tree, perhaps you could put small holes in the sides of the pipes that hold heads. That way the air could blow out all sides, instead of just the ends. Maybe even cap the ends, with a few small holes in the caps so that would force air out the sides as well.
And a bigger, or second, head tree for next year wouldn't hurt
Other than that, it was always nice and cool in there, and even with people using the side fans as head driers (myself included) I never had an issue getting fan space when needed.
The problem with putting too many holes on the sides is that you lose air pressure a lot faster that way. When all of the branches are in use...the air pressure is a lot lower, and diminshing it even more might not make the device very effective.
Still, we will definitely look into what can be done.
As far as getting a second tree, that one was donated to us. I unfortuately would probably create something that would barely be able to dry off a mosquito if I were to try and put one together....but if someone else wants to build and donate a second tree to us (or even a third for the Westin lounge), we're very amenable to those kinds of donations.
I think that if you cap the open ends (with a hole or 2 in the caps as well) you would have adequate pressure. If I remember correctly, the tree that FCN has does it this way.
May have to do a little experimenting to get it right. The nice thing is that pvc is pretty cheap. I may work on a tree this summer and let you know how it goes/have it available for use next year
This was my first time suiting so I don't have experience with past headless lounges but I was impressed with this one. The water was always cold and always full. Also I'm not sure if they were staff or just volunteers but there always seemed to be someone to open the door for me into the lounge which I was very thankful for.
Many thanks to the staff and volunteers who kept the lounge running smoothly.
Thank you for coming to Anthrocon! I'm quite glad to hear that the headless lounges worked well for you. We had some really dedicated staffers and volunteers that were helping with opening the doors...it was a monotonous job...but we really appreciated them helping out.
very lovely job keeping water constantly stocked, and good plan with the small cups to keep us from over-hydrating when in panic mode. That said, the headless lounge in the main hotel was rather weak, and when the convention center's shut down on Sunday, I was rather devastated, attempting to cool off in the sweltering Westin Lounge. Otherwise, awesome job managing 713 of us.
We will definitely see what we can do to improve the Westin lounge. We're a little space constrained there as there are not quite as much space there as we have in the DLCC...but we can investigate to see what we can do. (I know the room is small for a large number of suiters and that's what contributed to the room being warm)...we just need to see if there is a viable option for us to work with.)
KP
Many thanks for your work on the lounges; it is much appreciated! ^^
I love feedback myself, so here are some items I've been thinking about:
Stuff really I liked:
- The presence of fans in the fursuit friendly dance room.
- The existence of a fursuit repair station in the DLLCC lounge (though I did not use it).
- Loads of fans in the DLLCC lounge.
- Woo yay for long drinking straws!
Suggestions for following years:
- Mirrors in the lounges would be very useful to ensure all details on the suit have been put on properly.
- The Westin headless lounge and the fursuit friendly dance room were quite far apart for tired suiters.
- It seems a few caps for unused headtree branches went missing. How about attaching the caps to the tree with string?
- The convention is growing steadily. The headtree should probably grow as well.
- Drinking straws are awesome. However:
- Straws might have arrived a little late (I didn't see any during the long Thursday dance).
- More straws are needed; they were used up before the lounge closed.
- It would be neater if straws were offered standing in a bucket or similar, rather than left in a pile on the table.
- Straws beside the water dispensers at the fursuit friendly dance and in the zoo would let fursuiters drink on the go without taking their heads off.
- If there weren't any drinking straws in the Westin lounge, there should be.
Since I notice possible crossover between this list and other areas of responsibility, let me know if my feedback will be better heard elsewhere, and I'll post there as well!
First off, thank you for your comments! This was my first year on staff and any feedback will help me do better for you and the other fursuiters next year.
I will claim responsibility for the long straws. They were available at both the DLCC and Westin lounges from the very beginning. I did not put them out because nobody had said there was a need for them until Bryagh's handler requested one. Once I knew there was a need, straws were put out in both lounges. Listening to the requests of others is something that I hope I did well, and I hope I was polite and courteous to every one who walked through the doors.
- Colin
The lounge this year was actually pretty awesome this year. I was also happy about having one in the Westin. The repair station! Oh my gosh this! I had a few commissions that needed that and I am so glad it was there! Please bring this back! Overall, the lounge was pretty darn awesome this year. Although, I think we may need to build another head tree...
Pros:
* The water was always cold and abundant!
* Plenty of fans in the DLCC headless lounge
* The sewing machine was a good idea. (I didn't use any sewing supplies though in retrospect I should have when my snap came undone.)
Cons:
* A clock or two would have been very useful
* Mirrors would have been helpful as well
* The Westin headless lounge seemed to have a shortage of fans, at least on Sunday night which was the only time I used it.
I agree with another reply that the head tree could use a few holes drilled to help dry the sides of the fursuit head. I was having trouble getting my head to stay on a pipe in such a way that the pipe was not merely drying one spot on the inside of the head. I found the fans to be more useful than the tree as head dryers, anyway.
And while it would be a lot of work to pull off, if a display could be rigged during the masquerade (and maybe fursuit games) so that we could see what's going on from the green room, I would be eternally thankful, and I'm sure a lot of furs would appreciate it too. :>
Hope this feedback helps!
Oh and thanks to whoever donated all those pop tarts! (Was that Kellogg?)
So far I'll have to say that based on just three years of going to AC, this being my third year the Headless lounges were the best they have been so far. It was really nice to see that the water was nearly always full and always cold. Mad props to the people who were consistently changing the water out. It was also nice to see that this year it was mostly suiters who were sucking in the water versus the past were a lot of non suiters were helping themselves to the water inside the lounge.
Now as someone who was volunteering to help manage the place I have a few things worth bringing up that may help with it's progression in being even better than it was this year.
The first thing to note is that I didn't see mirrors in either lounge. I had thought this year we were supposed to have them but I don't know what happened.
But the mirrors are minor compared to something I noticed that was happening frequently during the convention. I noticed many suiters and their handlers grouping up around the water-cooler. While I understand it is in the nature of critters to group up where there is water, that creates a problem when they are blocking easy access to the door ways. More than a few times I saw people coming in and having to push their way through a wall of people in order to get in, get their stuff off, and do what they needed to do. Now the first thing we can do is just have our volunteers push a little more next year to get people to not block the door ways. The other option would be to move the location of the water itself. That way as people group up they don't end up blocking the door way. I don't know how viable that option is.
Now this year I noticed less photography going on in the head-less lounge which is a huuuge plus! Yay! However there were a few times here and there where people were whipping out their camera. Some people were rather polite about being asked to put it away and some others were rather grouchy. I'll like to reiterate that according to con rules there is no photography allowed in the headless lounges. So it doesn't matter if the person is only filming you. There is no filming allowed to be going on in that location.
That said perhaps it might help to put up something as a reminder, such as a sign that actually says that "There is no photography in this area". More than a few people who should have read the rules but didn't actually didn't know it was a no photography zone.
The last point worth dropping is that people really really should remember that the lounges are a place for cooling down and minor repairs. They are a tool that is invaluable for us critters in costume. Some of you, and I won't name names here, were consistently using the lounge a social hang out staying far too long inside. Now some of you may go "Well I don't see why we can't hang out here".
To put things in perspective let me say it like this. As a person who was walking around inside throwing away trash, helping people who needed help, and try to help rotation along I noticed that the room goes through 4 different temperatures depending upon occupancy. When the lounge is empty to about a 4th full the room stays rather cold. When the lounge becomes half full, the room is cool but not cold. When you hit the 3/4th mark the temp goes up and it's only slightly cooler than the space outside. When it hits full occupancy is not cool in there. It is not cold. It is hot, and it remains hot until enough bodies leave and the room is given time to cool back down.
Bodies generation heat. Heat that heats the room up. So this is why it's not a good idea for people use it as a place to hang out. Numbers start to build and the temp goes up. So it helps if everyone remembers and passes it along too that the lounge is not a social hang out. It's a tool. So please remember as many of you did to use it responsibly.
If I think of anything else I post it later. These are the main points I thought worth pointing out.
I'm glad you liked the Headless Lounges so much this year...though to be honest, it's volunteers such as yourself that have helped to make them as great as they are. I can't say thank you nearly enough.
Like I said above, any and all input that can be provided that will help us make the Headless Lounge experience even better next year will be taken into consideration. If you have any more suggestions, please feel free to leave them here.
- Colin
I've been thinking on this and I think I'll go ahead and throw it out there now that my rested brain remembers it. If the water in the lounge cannot be moved away from the doors it might help to put down a blue line to establish a "Don't block" area.
I saw them use the tape for the fursuit games...which was a really neat idea(and also verified a question of mine of if we are even allowed to use that stuff on the carpets). If we can establish a good area to put that line down across horizontally it's as simple and telling people "Stay behind this line" when they are hanging about.
Then the only time people are standing inside the space is A: they are coming in or going out or B: getting water.
Also I now finally remembered the other idea that popped into my head while standing at the doors during the games. Why not go ahead and designate one side of the doors, lets say the two closest to where the photo-shoot area is, as exit doors. Then we designate the other two doors as entrance doors.
That way you only need one volunteer to be stationed at the entrance doors and in charge of those two doors. Then the other volunteer can be inside helping out and they can be in charge of ensuring that when people exit the exit doors that the doors close all the way. Also this means you have less of this common occurrence where people are trying to get in at the same time as people are trying to get out and the confusion there. It's just an idea I bounced around while watching the critters in the games entering one way and leaving another way.
Of course this may involve putting some signs up that specifically say "Enter" and "Exit". It might even take a few times of doing this at the con for people to get it down in memory that there are now entrance doors and exit doors for the main headless lounge.
These are just ideas but since I thought of them I may as well put them out there for what they are worth.
It was really nice to see that the water was nearly always full and always cold. Mad props to the people who were consistently changing the water out.
Indeed. This year the DLCC had people whose job was pretty much full-time water replacement staff. It made a big difference, and we let them know at the close-out meeting. While such is not my department, I'm pretty confident that will happen again next year.
This year the DLCC had people whose job was pretty much full-time water replacement staff.
Too bad the Westin didn't, or else they couldn't keep up. There was no water in the back of one room I was in; I popped into another one and found none there either
OTOH, the water in the Dealer's Den was actually quite potable this year - now I don't feel so bad about making a fool of myself by whining about it as the last commenter at '09's CC (and maybe the last commenter ever, now that we appear to have discontinued live feedback at CC?)
While I was in the DLCC headless lounge for the masquerade I heard a few furs asking about the possibility about having a screen in there so they could watch the other acts.
This was also my first year in a fursuit I must say the headless rooms were nice first time I went in one there was no water but that was fixed in 5min with ice cold water. I do hop you can find a room in the hotel area for a 2nd headless room just with only one on Sunday it got packed and hot really fast. I did enjoy seeing that there was a door man at the headless room for the convention side to help keep the doors closed. I tried my best to thank him/her when I could. In all I think the staff and hotel staff did a wicked job many thanks to all. ^_^
Side note just me being kinda a clean freak.. but walking around and crushing peoples cups that they just toss on the floor with water still in them.. to me this is not very cool. Just my view i am a rookie at fursuiting just wanted to toss this out there.
About that, the trash issue is something to take up with your fellow critters in costume. Myself and several other people volunteering to help out the place did the best we could as per picking up discarded trash, crushed cups, forgotten/abandoned full cups, ect ect and putting them in the trash where they belong.
After the Fur-suit parade when I made it back after getting out of suit to help keep an eye on the place it really did look like a frat party hit the main lounge. Crushed cups where everywhere in places I didn't think they could manage to be. Myself and someone else who was also a volunteer did an entire sweep of the area.
While we can continue certainly to help out with the trash it would also help if the peeps coming into the lounge would do their part and try to remember to throw away trash, and to definitely throw away their cups when they are done.
For people who would want to contribute equipment it would be useful to know how many amps, (@ 120 volts), are available in the DLCC and Westin Headless Lounges.
ColinFoxTail has been a tremendous asset to us at Anthrocon and he did his job to a tee. Everything ran quite smoothly, no drama to be known of.
Thank you so much, Sonic God. It's great to know my work is appreciated.
Overall the lounges were excelent but there is alwasy room to improve. What I noticed:
I think the only 2 times we ran out of water was in the DLCC after the fursuit parade & Sunday night in the Westin during the dead dog. I'm not sure how often they check the water, but I think it is critical that the water be toped off in the ballroom and the dlcc headless immediatly before the parade, possibly with staff ready to refill right at that time frame. The Westin staff (peopel in business suits* hand filled and delivered our water in the Westin lounge sunday after the normal maintence crew went home, they are AWESOME!!! and we love them for that.
The straws were nice for those that either couldn't or didn't want to desuit to get water however, the small cups and the rediculasly large straws made for an interesting drinking experience, the straws cut in falf woudl probably still be sufficient and more managable, or bigger cups. Or better yet (and less likely) bottled water woudl fill the need as well.
Clocks for the love of god Clocks need to be available in both lounges please.
The con has grown to the point, I think it might be time to open another airwall and make the lounge one room bigger, i realize this adds signifigantly to teh cust, but I think the space would be used, if the budget allows.
Water temp, this is a touchy subject I know, it was almost too cold, but i doubt any amendments can be made, and rather cold then room temp
I know we want a big open space, but the lounge could benefit from a few more chairs, again, I know a sticky subject, with both pros and cons.
The biggest thing I think that is needed, is something that has already been in discussion by staff from what I hear and no cost effective / good way of doing it has been found, however, the need is there....There needs to be a part time small auxillery loung either in or just off of the dealers room. Many people, including myself, walked to teh dealers room, and by the time we realized we needed a break, it was too late, pushed outselves to the edge needing water & a place to de head while walking the Den, and then going oh crap I need a break, but we're sooo far from the lounge. I had to take head off get water in the den, then slowly make my way back. I think a smallish corner of the den with pipe and drape only and a single water station would go a long way in helping bridge the den to the other lounge. Den is big enough, I wouldn't evenb bother with a fan per se, but I knwo pipe & drape costs money & i know we're out of water stations, but any way to get the logistics nailed down would save a lot of people
We can definitely look at some of the suggestions. The one that we will have some dificulty with is opening up another airwall for the headless lounge. The problem we have is that we now have to have the supersponsor lunch in the DLCC. There is no space in the Westin large enough for that event. In order to be able to accomodate that event, we need to use 303-305. The secondary issue there is that the room must remain with tables set in the original configuration for the entire duration of the convention. So we can't do any room resets in the DLCC.
We intentionally tried to keep excessive numbers of chairs out of the headless lounges because then people tend to use them as a social gathering point. We really are trying to get folks to just use the lounges as a cooling off area, not a place to talk or play games. (This is why the rooms kept getting excessively warm..too many bodies in there that didn't need to stay in after a while.)
We'll be looking at more options and alternatives for next year...so please keep providing input.
Well, could we maybe get a couple benches and a few less chairs? Chairs are easy to move around (often in the way) but some of us with extra appendages on our suits have a tough time with chairs. A bench would be less likely to be moved and has no back to it so its more suit friendly.
Also, can any one rig up a diverter (like a wedge made of cardboard) to sit in front of one or more of the fans? I often (once the lounge got busy) found it hard to find a fan to stand in front of because either a group of suiters were mobbed around it or some one had plopped a chair directly in front of it and was sitting there. Having some thing which would split the flow of air from a single fan is almost like doubling the number of fans and causes less crowding.
Just a thought.
Oh! Oh oh! By the way, while it's still on my mind, where the world do the giant straws get purchased from? Might wanna use them for other events in suit.
I walked into the headless lounge in the Westin once and I went out quickly due to the oppressive funk, what the room needs is fresh air
What I suggest is putting fabric screens around the door for privacy and leave the door open to bring in fresh air
I used the headless lounge quite frequently during the con. I have to say that having volunteers at the doors definitely helped out quite a bit. Beyond keeping the doors closed when needed, it was very nice to have someone there holding the door open when you approached. It made me feel all special and fuzzy inside ^^
That aside, I think the headless lounge was definitely run well.
I was VERY Happy with the headless room this year. I was able to leave sharky saturday morning (from after rehearsal) to Saturday afternoon for Parade untill Saturday night. This was a BIG help as lugging the suit up to the westin and to the elevators is a trek in the suit. I was impressed with the security at room also, as I was asked several times (each time I went in with no suit) if I needed help ? I really felt like suit was in good hands, and would not be messed with
Sharky
This my second year fursuiting and the headless rooms were great!
I do have a couple questions tho..would it be possible to get a cooler of towels and keep it stocked in the convention? I am thinking no just because of cost and what not but at MFF last year they provided this and it was just heaven. Or maybe just small towels and we could wet them ourselves.
Another is the dead dog dance and the smaller headless room in the Westin, is it possible to bring up a couple more fans or even the head rack for this event? seems everyone was drying there heads with the fans and there was no air movement in there at all.
THanks so much guys for making it such an awesome con.
Couldn't some mount a towel hanger (for paper towels) above a trash can and put those blue shop towels on a roll on it? They cost less then $2 a roll and work just like normal towels and are disposable so no cleaning costs. The ones Scott makes has 55 sheets per roll so if people are hogging 2 sheets at a time that's still 27 suiters per roll. One sheet should be enough for a face and that's all they should be using them for. Just a thought...
I believe the head rack was actually a piece some kind soul designed, constructed, and donated to anthrocon. I daresay we'd love to have another one, though, if someone wanted to track down the designer, sweet-talk them out of the specs, and make another one for us (especially if it packed down into a nice easily packable bag or something).
With towels for a 4000+ person gathering, i worry a little about sanitation; we need to make sure we're not helping to spread germs around any more than we have to. I don't know if we could pull off a cooler of ice and a pair of tongs or a plastic cup so folks who bring a washcloth can tuck an ice cube into it, most especially if some volunteer wanted to take charge of getting cooler and ice; the matter would probably depend a lot, again, on union rules. Hrmmm...
Well shoot.o.o If someone brings a cooler, I'll bring the towels. o.o
It may not be as simple as that. It would really depend on the union rules.
We can inquire about the union needs of that, though, if our attendees are willing to take the initiative on a cooled container of towels, and appropriate laundering of them during/after the con.
--Chi
Oh right... Someone would have to wash the towels.... *sigh...*
Indeed, someone would have to wash them. And we would need dozens of them, which runs into an enormous expense. Or was it suggested that they would be communal? That is absolutely out of the question on sanitary grounds.
The towels are nice, but not necessary.
Take advantage of the PVC air rig. Whoever invented and designed that was a genius.
Let's see now, this year was my first time fursuiting so I certainly went into the headless lounges a lot.
Overall I was very pleased with them, the one in the DLCC was very nice. Major kudos to the DLCC team responsable for changing the water out, and major kudos to the Colinfoxtail and any others who were opening the doors for suiters and making sure the doors were closed. Thanks a bunch for taking your time to do that.
As for the headless lounge in the Westin, I only used that when the Dead Dog was going on. In my opinion it could have used more fans. Though I can imagine that's the trickiest of HL's due to the space provided.
When it comes to suggestions, as others have said before...a mirror and clock would do nicely.
Oh yes, this may be a bit off-topic but I will ask just in case. Over in the ballroom, were there any water coolers in the ballroom during the dances? I don't recall seeing them, though I did see water coolers in the ballroom when it was used as the giant HL before the parade.
-Silverwulf *aka* Tobias
Hi All!
Ok, as to some of the comments about needs for the "Dead Dog Party"..It really should be called the Dead Dog Dance! (in fact I am going to start calling it that..so DDD or 3D will be the new name for it!)
The space for 3D is given to us thru the kind auspices of Kage and KP. It is NOT an official Anthrocon function!
Therefore it is not really open to requests for services from the con.
Now that being said, AC staff tries VERY HARD! to give us what we need to throw this final little bit of fun for everyone!
Thru the years I personally along with Tony Ringtail and others have run the water stations trying to keep them filled without incurring any costs to Anthrocon, and the managers at the Westin have been great in letting us do that!
Now, I will see if I can talk about PERHAPS being able to get a few of the items mentioned, this is NOT a guarantee I will just inquire!
Once again I want to personally thank Kage and KP and all the Anthrocon staff for their awesome devotion to making "our" convention the forefront of what ANY convention should aspire to be!
Joe Ward/DJ_Rory
1200 CU ft air movement per minute is good enough for a tree?
How many branches do you think that could have?
Comair Rotarian makes some amazing cooling fans for industrial use and meant to be used for vacuums and tubing etc. and I could set up a rig if I have the money.
one thing i would like to mention is the bathroom areas near the headless lounges. many fursuiters dont like going across the hallway with a suit halfway down their legs just to use the bathrooms. i understand that the bathrooms were nearby & all, but for some suiters who have full suits & have difficulty walking in them would have even greater difficulty walking to the bathrooms. some may even have to put the suit back on, walk to the bathrooms & take it off to not ruin the magic. er, my suggestion is if it is possible next year, to have a headless lounge in a room with a bathroom.
oh, & the 3rd floor headless lounge in the hotel area didnt have a sewing machine when i went to it. i needed a quick repair & couldnt find one in that lounge.
other than that, it was very air conditioned & very comfortable! ^^ the water was just perfect & that head cooling rack thing was epic! 8D
HAIIMMURK&THISISMYSIGNATUREITROCKSDOESNTHUH?