The second edition of the Vienna Comic Con took place on November 19th and 20th 2016 at the Messe Wien. The event is a spin-off of the well-known Comic and Science Fiction Convention in San Diego.

Many Comic Con visitors are attending the event with complex, self-designed costumes – they are called Cosplayer – and this makes the convention very special. Also in Vienna, many of these cosplayers attended and therefore you meet countless Jedi knights and other characters from the Star Wars universe as well as Star Trek officers, hobbits, Super-, Batmen’s & women’s, Deadpool’s, Manga and gaming creatures plus characters from the popular TV-series Game of Thrones as eventually the Iron Throne can be occupied at the Vienna Comic Con ;-)

A conversation with Batman (c) OeWF (Florian Voggeneder)

Olivia Haider and the encounter with a Borg

Sarah Feilmayr in conversation with a visitor (c) OeWF (Florian Voggeneder)

Right in between between artists, merchandise shops, fan clubs and star guests one can find also our OeWF booth. Our attraction for the weekend was our princess Aouda, our Mars spacesuit simulator. For our OeWF team it was the first time at a Comic Con and some of our readers might ask themselves why the OeWF is present at an entertainment event.
The answer is quite simple: fiction inspires science and vice-versa. Just think about how the Star Trek Communicator was the archetype for the later clamshell phones. Many fans of science fiction & fantasy series and movies are also vivid tech and space afficionados. Thus, it was only logical for us to find out, if we can inspire people for space sciences and if it’s possible to attract people to become OeWF team members.  By the way the NASA is by now a regular guests at the Comic con in San Diego to talk about space sciences and space exploration.

Visitors of every age

Star Trek meets OeWF :-)

Also in sign language our spacesuit is fascinating (c) OeWF (Florian Voggeneder)

“This is not a costume :-)”

During the weekend, we were able to have countless conversations with very interested visitors from all age ranges and many walks of life. Also, the Mars panel on Saturday inspired the audience for our research activities. We were very pleased about the numerous positive feedback we’ve got after we explained to our visitors that the spacesuit simulator is not a costume and we do real science with it. Which impressed me the most was that in all conversations we’ve had, people always had a positive attitude towards spaceflight and space sciences.
The experiment science meets fiction thus succeeded:

“You cannot say Science Fiction without saying Science.”

Mars-Panel with Dr. Gernot Grömer (c) OeWF (Michael Seirer)

Close-up view of a Mars meteorite (c) OeWF (Michael Seirer)

Close-up view of a Mars meteorite (c) OeWF (Florian Voggeneder)

More information:

• Vienna Comic Con Webseite
• San Diego Comic Con Website
• Report on „NASA’s Next Giant Leap“ Panel during Comic Con San Diego 2016
• Michael Seirer Photography
• Florian Voggeneder

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