A Transformers-themed pub is in the running to be crowned Britain’s Best Home Bar, in a competition being run by Liberty Games. The winning bar, chosen… [more]
This last weekend saw yet another Transformers convention take over the Metropole Hilton, in Birmingham. These weekends have become a staple of my summer… [more]
Every year, since 2011, the nerds from TheTF.Net forum (now a Facebook group, because running a forum proved too much like hard work) have met for a weekend… [more]
This weekend saw our annual forum meet being held in the Welsh capital of Cardiff. Each year we meet in a different town or city in the UK, alternating… [more]
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We’re just counting up the money that everyone donated for this year’s Auto Assembly 2011 fundraiser and will update here shortly with details. A big thanks to everyone who donated to us, from TheTransformers.Net and from Auto Assembly.
Remember, Auto Assembly is the biggest Transformers convention in Europe, and this year it’s being held on the 12th – 14th August in Birmingham’s Holiday Inn, Birmingham City Centre.
We hope to see you there!
Auto Assembly is the biggest Transformers convention in Europe, and this year it’s being held on the 12th – 14th August in Birmingham’s Holiday Inn, Birmingham City Centre.
This year’s guests of honour are David Kaye and Gregg Berger, and tickets can be booked now from www.autoassembly.org.uk.
Usually at Auto Assembly TheTransformers.Net takes a watching brief; mostly watching the bar it has to be said. At past conventions we’ve participated solely in helping the venue to increase its bar takings, decorated display tables with our empties and became increasingly slovenly as the day went on. Our only previous worthwhile contribution was in producing a CD-ROM for Auto Assembly 2005. However, this year, for Auto Assembly 2011, we intend to actually do something.
This year TheTransformers.Net is hoping to raise funds (listen up, this is where you come in) to bring one of the best loved comic artists, and little seen at Transformers conventions, Geoff Senior to Auto Assembly.
Geoff Senior was one of the original comic artists on the Marvel UK Transformers comic, and was one of the people responsible for creating the legendary bounty hunter Death’s Head – who made a comeback recently thanks to artist talents of Simon Williams. In addition to Transformers and Death’s Head, Geoff Senior also put pencils to paper to produce artwork for Doctor Who, Judge Dredd, Dragon’s Claws and Zoids.
Getting Geoff to Auto Assembly 2011 on behalf of TheTransformers.Net and TheTF.Net is going to cost £200 – and we’re officially launching our fundraiser right here. We need our members, our website visitors, you guys, to donate any small amount you can (even a couple of pounds would be a huge help) so that we can get Geoff Senior to Auto Assembly 2011.
If you want your comics or graphic novels signed, if you want to chat to Geoff about Transformers or Death’s Head, or if you want Geoff to draw a personalised sketch just for you; help us to bring Geoff Senior to Auto Assembly 2011.
The best part is: we don’t even need to raise the full £200 ourselves as Auto Assembly will match anything we raise, so we just need to raise £100.
All you have to do donate is to send any amount you can spare to paypal@thetf.net – or you can use the donate button below.
Help TheTransformers.Net and TheTF.Net to get Geoff to AA!
Some of Geoff’s famous Transformers covers:
A few years ago at the Transformers convention in Birmingham we all know and love by the name of Auto Assembly, TheTransformers.Net produced a CD-ROM to give away free in the goody bags. This CD-ROM contained contents such as a fan art gallery from Transformers fans from around the world, and a mini website – including web links.
Now, for this year’s convention we’ve been asked if we can produce something similar to offer as a freebie in the goody bags – but alas the CD-ROM idea isn’t going to work. You see, when we produced the one a few years ago I personally worked for a design agency in Cardiff, and had access to professional printers for the CD labels, free access to CD and DVD replication equipment to mass produce the CDs and a hefty discount on the actual CDs themselves.
This is no longer the case 🙁
However; this time we do have another idea that we can’t go into too much in depth now, but it involves the Internet, Twitter, Facebook, a forum and a competition prize. This weekend, in our forum meetup, we’ll be ironing out the details of our plan for this year’s Auto Assembly and, while it will no doubt include our ever present display of empty beer glasses, it should be something pretty exciting.
We’ll make details available of our maniacal scheme as soon as we can, and as soon as we’ve approved them with the powers that be, but we’re looking forward to a great Auto Assembly this year – and a great forum meet this weekend.
It’s the Transformers convention in Birmingham this weekend and my car is now blinged up and ready to go. I just received my eBay order of 4 Decepticon car badges, which cost me just £1.20 (plus some postage) from China.
The badges look awesome and fit nicely next the Z3 badge on the back of my car. I’m now driving a Decepticon!
I was speaking to Simes from Auto Assembly this week and he kindly offered to give us at TheTransformers.Net a slot in the busy AA schedule for a forum meet. So if anyone from our forum wants to meet up and put a beard to the username, you can do so at Auto Assembly on the Saturday, between 6-7pm.
Simes also wanted me to mention that pre-registration for the convention has just closed (which if you’ve been on another planet for the last few months is this weekend, Saturday AND Sunday, in Birmingham). There are still passes available on the door though, so you can get there early and still get in.
Hopefully we’ll all see you there!
With just over 2 weeks to go and Auto Assembly 09 is already making a buzz with news that it has passed it’s own record of 423 attendees to become the highest attended Transformers convention in Europe and could break the 500 number with the usual late surge of ticket sales.
Yes, we’ve done it again and set a new attendance record for a European Transformers convention and Auto Assembly 2009 hasn’t even taken place yet!! At the time of writing this, we now have 425 pre-registrants which has beaten the previous record that we set in 2008 of 423 attendees. With 17 days to go before the convention and people still booking daily, and on-the-door attendees as well, this number will continue to rise further. We want to thank all of you for helping us to break this record and hopefully we will reach the magic 500!
Hasbro take note, this is another justification that Transformers are popular outside North America and we want you to start treating us right.
The UK and Europe’s largest Transformers convention, Auto Assembly, is getting another special guest for the 2009 convention with comic artist Jon Davis-Hunt, who has worked for Titan Comics in the UK and IDW Comics in North America. He will only be appearing on Sunday, but with be signing you favourite bits of merchandise.
Hi everyone,
As the date for Auto Assembly 2009 draws nearer, we are still adding to our extensive list of activities throughout the weekend and we are now pleased to announce that we are now being joined by our FIFTEENTH guest for the convention…
Joining us for the SUNDAY ONLY is comic artist Jon Davis-Hunt. Jon has recently joined the team working on Titan Magazine’s Transformers comic as their new regular artist for their UK-originated strip, although he has produced cover artwork for them previously. He has also worked for IDW on the adaptation of Revenge Of The Fallen and was one of the artists for 2000 AD. Prior to switching to the comic industry, Jon previously worked in the video games industry.
Jon will be taking to the stage along with some of our other comic guests on Sunday (our comic panels will be split throughout the weekend) and he will be joining the rest of our comic guests in our guest area to sign autographs and meet fans.
Jon is joining what is the biggest ever line-up of guests seen at a European Transformers event which currently includes our two guests of honour Gregg Berger (G1 Grimlock), Ian James Corlett (Cheetor), and our comic guests – Andrew Wildman (Saturday only), Simon Williams, Staz Johnson, Nick Roche, Liam Shalloo, Lew Stringer (Saturday only), Jason Cardy, Kat Nicholson, Lee Bradley, Lee Sullivan, Mike Collins, and Kris Carter. As we have three guests who will only be able to attend for a single day, the ONLY way you will get to meet all of our guests this year is to attend for the FULL weekend!
We have a very limited number of single tickets available for the Sunday, but plenty of weekend tickets available. More single day passes for Saturday may be released soon but with the convention being less than four weeks away, you need to hurry to pre-register for what will be the biggest ever Transformers convention that Europe has ever seen!
For full details on Auto Assembly 2009 and to book your tickets, visit the website at www.autoassembly.org.uk
Simon Plumbe
Auto Assembly 2009Auto Assembly 2009 is a non-profit making convention for fans of Transformers and is being held on 15th – 16th August 2009 at the Holiday Inn Birmingham City Centre, Birmingham, England.
web: www.autoassembly.org.uk
forum: http://autoassembly.proboards.com
email: autoassembly@aol.com
tel: +44 (0)7860 948296
We’ve getting ever closer to Auto Assembly 2009, and for those of you who cannot make it, here is a way to get all the goodies without even being there, the magical non-attendee pack!
Auto Assembly 2009 Non-Attendee Pack Available!
Auto Assembly 2009 is set to break all attendance records once again for a European Transformers convention and we are delighted to say that we are going to be joined by fans from not only all over the UK but from all over Europe and from as far afield as America, Singapore and Japan making Auto Assembly 2009 a truly global event.
However, we appreciate that there are many of you who would love to be able to attend the convention but can’t attend either because of distance of who are unable to get time off work so once again we are offering a non-attendee package which will allow you to get involved in the convention and get your hands on all of this year’s convention goodies and a whole lot more besides…
These non-attendee packages are £60 for anyone living in the UK and £70 for the rest of the world and are fully inclusive of shipping costs. While these are more expensive than passes for the convention, we think they offer exceptional value for money. Why? Well, each non-attendee pack will get you:-
* A Personalised convention pass with your own ticket number
* The FULL Auto Assembly goodie bag containing up to 12 gifts (with more under negotiation)! (the earlier your ticket number, the more gifts will be in your bag. Visit the website to see the full details of what’s on offer this year!)
* Entry into all of the Auto Assembly 2009 Pre-registrant prize draws
* The Cybertronian Times Issue 10, signed by ALL our convention guests
* All Hail Megatron Issue 13 convention exclusive variant cover comic
* Auto Assembly 2009 convention exclusive mug
* Auto Assembly 2009 Grimlock keyring
* Full set of Auto Assembly convention exclusive postcards from 2004-2008
* Proxy bidding rights for the Auto Assembly charity auction
* A personalised sketch from a random Auto Assembly 2009 comic artist guest
* The option to use your non-attendee pass at ANY TIME and become a full weekend attendee during the convention by simply turning up at the convention and showing your pass and collecting all of your items on the day for just an additionalAnd that’s not all! The first 20 people to buy the non-attendee package will also receive a copy of Apocalypse Comics’ retailer exclusive edition of All Hail Megatron #1 or All Hail Megatron #12! This is quite possibly the best non-attendee package we have EVER put together and is an ideal way for you to get involved with the convention if you can’t make it this year and potentially your ONLY chance to get this year’s convention exclusive comic!
Once you have paid your £60 (or £70 if you live outside the UK) there is nothing more to pay. The only additional charges are for additional postage charges that may be incurred should any competition prizes be won that we may need to ship, or relevant amounts for any auction items that you may win.
To purchase your non-attendee package, visit the Auto Asembly website NOW! If you are able to join us, full weekend tickets are available and are £45 for adults and £35 for children/students/senior citizens with under 5s being FREE. Family tickets (2 adults and 2 children) are just £145 saving £15. Limited numbers of single day passes are also available starting from £18. Don’t miss out on your chance to be a part of what is going to be a great weekend celebrating 25 years of the Transformers!!
For full details on Auto Assembly 2009 and to book your tickets, visit the website at www.autoassembly.org.uk
Simon Plumbe
Auto Assembly 2009Auto Assembly 2009 is a non-profit making convention for fans of Transformers and is being held on 15th – 16th August 2009 at the Holiday Inn Birmingham City Centre, Birmingham, England.
web: Auto Assembly
forum: Auto Assembly – Home
email: autoassembly@aol.com
tel: +44 (0)7860 948296
IDW Editor-in-Chief Chris Ryall has posted the final coloured version of the Auto Assembly 2009 Exclusive cover for IDW’s The Transformers: All Hail Megatron #13.
You find the cover has improved colour contrast compared to when it was last seen, the Apocalypse Comics website (who helped get the cover done), and Grimlock saying something that only Grimlock would say. The cover is limited to 1000 copies with a maximum of 2 sold to each attendee at Auto Assembly 2009 in August.
The cover has art from Nick Roche with colours from Liam Shalloo.
All Hail Megatron #13 is due out next month. Look out for #12 later this week.
Just like last year, Auto Assembly, Europe’s largest Transformers convention, has again been previewed by an article on the BBC website.
The article contains an interview with Simon Plumbe and lots of details for anyone who hasn’t heard about the convention but is interested in attending. Here’s the best quote:
“If you’ve never been to a convention before but you’re passionate about Transformers and want to meet like-minded fans, meet the stars of the series, and just want to enjoy a packed weekend of Transformers-themed activities, then maybe Auto Assembly 2009 is for you!”
This years convention is a 2 day event over the weekend of the 15th and 16th August 2009 in Birmingham.
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