Um.... this isn't anybody here. Is it?

[derg]

Either the heat's got to you or you sucked in too much halon.

A little of both. You know if you catch the vapors, that stuff has flavor!

 

[Beech driver]

jmaynard, apparently I got a look at your airplane over the weekend. I was down at the fly in on Sunday morning. Some of the people I ran into told me of this Tron guy and his airplane. I knew nothing of the sort until I came across this thread. Checked out the plane for a bit, looks like a nice ride. Never spoke to you as you were busy fielding questions from other people and my schedule told me it was time to head home. Now I do wish I would have been able to chat for a bit.

 

[jmaynard]

Well I am interested now to here how this whole thing got started. I'm sure it's explained somewhere but I'm too lazy to look it up. How did "Tron Man" come to be?

I've been a fan of the movie since it first came out in 1982. At the time, I was a very junior mainframe systems programmer. TRON fascinated me as the first attempt to show what goes on inside a computer. Some of the stuff they got right, some they got wrong, some we thought they got laughably wrong at the time (programs fighting each other? Come on!) turned out to be not so wrong after all (viruses and anti-virus programs...).

I went to my first SF con in 2003. I'd never seen a masquerade before, and I thought it might be fun. The con, Penguicon, is a crossover SF and computing convention, and TRON struck me as the perfect subject for a costume, being an SF movie about computers. I spent the next year planning and searching. Most TRON costumes I'd seen got one of what I saw as two critical details wrong: they either were white, not matching the green of the characters in the movie, or else wimped out and didn't use spandex.

I got the armor pieces in November 2003 off of an eBay auction. I picked a paint color one day at a hardware store (it's Krylon's Fusion paint, in the color they call Honeydew - and PPG matched that color for N55ZC), painted up the Frisbee from the armor collection, and sent it off to the folks I buy Renaissance faire tights from, Renaissance Dancewear, to have the unitard made in a matching color. The rest of the work took place the week before the con.

Slashdot had run an article on fan-made TRON costumes a couple of weeks before the con. One of the guys who run the site was a guest of honor there, and I asked him how to go about posting a followup story. They told me what they liked to see. The next morning, after the masquerade, I went to one of the panels he was on in the costume, told him that this was what I was asking about, and he said I should definitely submit it. I did.

I went off to take a friend to the airport. When I returned, the story had broken on Slashdot, and started drawing tons of comments. It hit Fark almost immediately, and drew lots more comments. Nearly all of them were negative.

The page also became one of those that people forwarded to all of their friends, and spread across the net at, well, Internet speed. That led to lots of other stuff, culminating in 15 appearances on Jimmy Kimmel Live! throughout the rest of 2004. It's slacked off since then, but I will never again be truly anonymous.

 

[jmaynard]

jmaynard, apparently I got a look at your airplane over the weekend. I was down at the fly in on Sunday morning. Some of the people I ran into told me of this Tron guy and his airplane. I knew nothing of the sort until I came across this thread. Checked out the plane for a bit, looks like a nice ride. Never spoke to you as you were busy fielding questions from other people and my schedule told me it was time to head home. Now I do wish I would have been able to chat for a bit.

It's indeed a nice ride. I'm really happy with the way it turned out, both cosmetically and functionally.

Which end of Minnesota are you in? The plane will be based at FRM, and I'm always happy to talk about it and being the Tron Guy...

 

[Beech driver]

I fly out of Flying Cloud. One of my students has family down there and thought it would be neat to fly down and see them during the fly in. If I know in advance when I will be heading that way, I'll let ya know.

 

[Cptnchia]

The page also became one of those that people forwarded to all of their friends, and spread across the net at, well, Internet speed. That led to lots of other stuff, culminating in 15 appearances on Jimmy Kimmel Live! throughout the rest of 2004. It's slacked off since then, but I will never again be truly anonymous.

Let's not forget the character on South Park. You were holding your own until the Panda got you! Too bad that the Department of Internet Money doesn't really exist.:cwm27:

 

[CirrusMonkey]

If he wears the suit, I will buy him two.

Oh, don't get me wrong, I have no problem with the suit except.......Well..............Hey Jim, do you need a sidekick?

 

[WacoFan]

I've been a fan of the movie since it first came out in 1982. At the time, I was a very junior mainframe systems programmer. TRON fascinated me as the first attempt to show what goes on inside a computer. Some of the stuff they got right, some they got wrong, some we thought they got laughably wrong at the time (programs fighting each other? Come on!) turned out to be not so wrong after all (viruses and anti-virus programs...).

I went to my first SF con in 2003. I'd never seen a masquerade before, and I thought it might be fun. The con, Penguicon, is a crossover SF and computing convention, and TRON struck me as the perfect subject for a costume, being an SF movie about computers. I spent the next year planning and searching. Most TRON costumes I'd seen got one of what I saw as two critical details wrong: they either were white, not matching the green of the characters in the movie, or else wimped out and didn't use spandex.

I got the armor pieces in November 2003 off of an eBay auction. I picked a paint color one day at a hardware store (it's Krylon's Fusion paint, in the color they call Honeydew - and PPG matched that color for N55ZC), painted up the Frisbee from the armor collection, and sent it off to the folks I buy Renaissance faire tights from, Renaissance Dancewear, to have the unitard made in a matching color. The rest of the work took place the week before the con.

Slashdot had run an article on fan-made TRON costumes a couple of weeks before the con. One of the guys who run the site was a guest of honor there, and I asked him how to go about posting a followup story. They told me what they liked to see. The next morning, after the masquerade, I went to one of the panels he was on in the costume, told him that this was what I was asking about, and he said I should definitely submit it. I did.

I went off to take a friend to the airport. When I returned, the story had broken on Slashdot, and started drawing tons of comments. It hit Fark almost immediately, and drew lots more comments. Nearly all of them were negative.

The page also became one of those that people forwarded to all of their friends, and spread across the net at, well, Internet speed. That led to lots of other stuff, culminating in 15 appearances on Jimmy Kimmel Live! throughout the rest of 2004. It's slacked off since then, but I will never again be truly anonymous.

OK...you had said in an earlier post that the Peter Pan guy is a "Chick Magnet"...which leads to the inevitable question: Does being Tron Guy make one a chick magnet? I imagine there are lots of science fiction girls that would dig you.

 

[Mavmb]

That costume and him in it is very disturbing.

 

[jmaynard]

OK...you had said in an earlier post that the Peter Pan guy is a "Chick Magnet"...which leads to the inevitable question: Does being Tron Guy make one a chick magnet? I imagine there are lots of science fiction girls that would dig you.

I get a lot of folks saying nice things, but haven't really had much in the way of women throwing themselves at me. Randy Constan (the Peter Pan guy) is in a bit better shape than I am.

 

[WacoFan]

I get a lot of folks saying nice things, but haven't really had much in the way of women throwing themselves at me. Randy Constan (the Peter Pan guy) is in a bit better shape than I am.

With the new plane, and the target market of Sci-fi chicks I am sure it will happen for you soon.

 

[derg]

BTW Jay, congrats on making page 98 of the July 2008 issue of "Wire" magazine!

Here I was browsing this months issue talking about this thread over the Atlantic and I dropped the magazine on the floor and said, "OMG! There he is!"

True story.

 

[KLB]

I read that article a while back...maybe a day befoe this thread was created. The interesting things that I see on JC.