At this point we are still waiting to hear from GenCon. We need to find out how much the booth will cost, how much space we get, and how much set up time we have. Until we figure that much out there isn't a whole lot we can do as far as the diorama itself goes. I need to know how much space we have before we can set a firm blueprint and figure out exactly what needs to be made. I also need to see how much set up time we have, so I can determine what all needs to be pre-built and what can be built on site. And if this is going to cost too much then there is no way this will ever even get off the ground so there wouldn't be any point in starting.
On our last sample project half of my dio team were no shows with their entries, I know Brent has been out of the country on business and real busy with work otherwise, but he at least got something done and plans to finish it. I think we are just seeing a drop off in interest, which I hate to say it, but it was inevitable. People were really interested back in July when we started kicking around ideas but if you look through the first UGP thread you'll see 5-10 names of people who showed interest initially but haven't posted here in these threads in months. Like any thing this big and ambitious there is usually a glut of interest in the beginning but when not a lot happens for a few months the interest will die off some. I still think we might be able to pull this off if we can find out the facts from GenCon soon.
There is still stuff going on though, Ennis is running the Rebel figure challenge. And you can always throw together some civilian customs that we can decide whether or not we need later.
The dio samples ended almost two weeks ago, I was waiting to give the next set of assignments until we get the booth specifics, which was supposed to happen in September/Early October, but since that hasn't happened I may have to come up with something else. Perhaps have everyone make trees and rocks, or maybe a smaller building that would fit into the dio regardless of how much space we have.
I'm glad you're enthusiastic about this patreek, unfortunately we are kind of in a holding pattern on the dio until we get more specifics.