2023 IPMS/USA National Convention

The 2020 IPMS National convention was supposed to be San Marcos, Texas, just down the road from my home in Austin. But the COVID pandemic postponed the convention until 2023. By that time I had moved from Austin to Colorado, so I made the long drive to revisit some familiar locations and faces. Krista did not relish returning to the Texas heat and humidity, so I made the trip alone. I didn't go on any of the tours, but I did take the opportunity to pop up to Austin to see some old friends and see Oppenheimer at the IMAX theater. (Go see it: terrific movie!)

I spent the rest of the time hanging out with the space-modelers. The two space related seminars were terrific: Mike Mackowski and Mike Idacavage hosted the Real Space Seminar and showed how they built their entries for the Real Space Hypothetical category. David Carlton hosted a seminar showing how he built his 1/48 scale cutaway Saturn V that was so large it had to be displayed on a table apart from the rest of the Real Space entries. My only complaint about the show was that the aisles in the vendor rooms and contest room were quite narrow, leading to lots of bumping into people and jostling for position to see the models.

I didn't take as many photos as usual this year, but I got all of the Real Space entries along with other models that caught my eye. If you get a chance, you should attend a National convention: the 2024 convention will be in Madison, Wisconsin, and the 2025 convention will return to Norfolk, Virginia. Start making those planes now!