Phil Lowles

Convention planning

Organising and running a convention is an enormous amount of hard work. This includes many skills that are transferable to the workplace including: project planning, budgeting and human resources.

Some of the tasks I undertake to run TitanCon:

Budgeting
Website design and updates
Online ticket sales
Database entry and maintenance
Email confirmations
Email - so, so much email!
Booking guests
Making guest travel arrangements
Hotel bookings
Planning the convention schedule
All print design work including name badges, flyers, information sheets, programmmes, schedules, signs, labels, attendance lists, etc.
Organise t-shirt design liaising with artist and print company
Dealer table sales and assigning table layout
Determine and assign volunteer roles
Chair meetings
Advertising
Present opening and closing ceremonies on stage including guest introductions
Organise a coach tour for 100 people including catering arrangements
Make sure everything runs smoothly on the day...

More details

www.titancon.com

Website for TitanCon, a science-fiction and fantasy literature and media fan convention that takes place in Belfast, Northern Ireland. I have organised and run this convention for the past five years including all work on the website. Features Paypal e-commerce integration, custom built backend database tracking with automated email generation functionality.

TitanCon database

A custom built XML database that utilises a functionality in the Firefox web browser to use XSLT to query the XML database. This results in a very fast operating results window that I have customised to display information on attendees, produce sales reports, and output personalised email confirmations.

TitanCon name badges TitanCon 2014 name badge

I put a lot of effort into creating beautifully printed name badges for every TitanCon. These are designed at 300dpi print quality and printed onto 10x15 Kodak photo paper.

TitanCon programmes TitanCon 2013 programme cover

Including a 24 page programme for TitanCon 2012 and a 28 page programme for TitanCon 2013. Both are A5 sized full colour layouts throughout. The TitanCon 2013 programme book featured paid adverts, three of them designed and typeset myself following guidelines set out by the client.

TitanCon flyers

Flyers for TitanCon, a science-fiction and fantasy literature and media fan convention held in Belfast, Northern Ireland. These full colour flyers were designed to be double sided and included 3mm bleed as specified by the print company.

TitanCon Schedules TitanCon 2015 schedule

The schedule sheet is an essential hand out for every attendee at TitanCon. This is how everyone finds out what's on, where it's on and which guests are on each panel. I pride myself on creating clear and clean looking schedule sheets that are easy to read and easy on the eye.