5 replies to this topic

[ThisIsGabe]

Wheeeee! Time for my first ever trip report, and it was a pretty fun trip too!

IAAPA 2015

 

Tuesday: Early flight out of my hometown at 6, had to be up at 4am which I would /never/ recommend.

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Flew to Newark, then down to Orlando. The first flight was ok, but the second one had a few kids who cried just enough to be annoying. Oh well. Orlando's airport is very pretty.

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After a Mears shuttle (which was very nice and cheap) to the hotel, I walked to the convention. I regretted doing that about halfway there, because the Orlando heat caught up with me in my dress clothes. 

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The expo building was absolutely MASSIVE. I honestly think you could have fit a good chunk of my college campus in there.

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The first day of the expo I just went around and took in the sights. There's just so much STUFF in there.

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Some company brought a whole flippin roller coaster!

There was also this cool high ropes course with a continuous belay system, so they just clip you in at the bottom and there's a rail track for the harness.

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This was the inflatables "section". There were more outside, but the weather was iffy so I decided to pass on it. Lots of bounce houses and cool stuff!

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These guys had lots of cool lights and they had them out so I could be a nerd over it. All of the lights were being powered and controlled with just a few wires, I believe they were serial modules. (LED panels are hella cool to me)

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Skyline booth! Met up with IOE and chatted with the skyline people a little. They had this neat ride that I rode (I'm almost too big for it though).

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This was a neato harness ride!

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Big pump!

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Shooting gallery and a haunted house! The haunted house was really cool and I only jumped a lot.

 

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A shot of the games alley, which had every kind of arcade game imaginable and they. were. all. FREE.

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KUKA had a booth, little more on it tomorrow.

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Orlando Eye, and my hotel!

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Hotel wifi was so laggy

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Nearest pizza place...heck yeah!

 

END DAY 1

(I'm gonna post these in sections because uploading all the photos is annoying)

[ThisIsGabe]

Wednesday: Day 2

As I was planning on talking to manufacturers, I decided it was time for the suit 

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This was a weird Oculus Rift motion simulator (not me riding)

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KUKA finally got their robot arm working, so I rode it! They made everyone sign a waiver first, and I asked for maximum intensity. It was really cool, but my tie kept flying around and hitting me in the face xD

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Some more arcade games...I may try and make the first one for fundraising

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One of my fraternity brothers interned here and he wanted me to say hi for him, plus their booth was neat!

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DINO!

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S&S had a whole roller coaster car! Most of the big manufacturers brought cars: Premier, S&S, B&M, GCI, PTC, Gravity Group 

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FREE DIPPIN DOTS!!!1!! There were food booths and you could eat as much as you could get away with I must have had 15 cups of dippin dots during the show

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I met the guy who made the animatronics at the Cedar Point fortune tellers, he was really nice

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This was a neat hot dog stand by skyline, they had pineapple bacon hot dogs that they'd put in these special buns, which made less mess. Very tasty!

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Last game of the night on the worlds largest Pac-Man game - a giant LED matrix!

 

After the show I hung out with IOE some more, they're the best and I owe them a lot because they have been a wonderful resource to ask industry questions.

 

END DAY 2

 

During the day I talked to Premier, GCI, S&S and Chance Rides, as well as briefly with Intamin and B&M.

Two companies took my resume, four gave me contact info to talk with.

We'll see if anything comes up in the next few weeks

 

 

 

[Rollerfreak987]

Sounds like an amazing event. I will definitely need to go up there next year!

[Spaghetti]

Wow, that is insane! I wish there was another expo in Seattle...

[Kevkillerke]

Wow, it's even better than I expected!

Good trip report, let's hope you get a positive response

[Chubs33]

Glad you had a good time. It was a phenomenal week, it just went by too fast.