Submit a Panel

Hosting a panel at Yama Con is a fun way to get involved with the convention, put those thousands of hours of anime watching to use, make new friends, and even get a discounted or free badge to Yama Con!

• Panelist and co-host must be at least 16 years old by the time of their panel.
• Directly involve anime, manga or other Japanese culture. For example, a well-planned proposal that features an anime will take priority over an equally well-planned proposal that features an outside fandom, such as American comics or movies. Having said that, we do have a certain amount of leniency, especially if the fandom is large (in other words, we’ve received a lot of proposals for it) or overlaps Yama Con’s main fandoms in some way, for example: tabletop games.
• Are well-planned and have supporting materials. The proposal is our first glimpse of how you communicate and what you want to do at Yama Con. Make sure it’s well-written and try to include evidence that the panel will be successful. If you can’t include something in the online form (such as a picture) or something changes after you submit, email it to panels@yamacon.org (make sure to include your name and the panel name for reference).
• Are engaging and interactive. We like lectures, too, but a proposal that introduces a creative way to communicate with the audience really catches our eyes.
• Are more than dressing in character and showing up. You can certainly submit “in-character” panels, but we’d like to see more than, “come ask your favorite character a question” in the description. If you have support for your panel going well in the past, such as videos, we’d like to see that, too.
  • If you plan to submit an Ask-a-Character panel, we require a video submission of your characters acting in-character.
• Don’t involve aggressive physicality. We know that “battle chess” and other such games are super fun, but we don’t have the room or oversight to make sure they run safely, unfortunately. However, panels that are yoga based, or dance workshops are completely okay, and we welcome them, and we might even join in! If you are unsure if your panel is physically aggressive, then please email us at panels@yamacon.org.
• Aren’t speed or blind dates. You can definitely submit a proposal, but please know that we’re pretty strict with planning these sorts of events. We have to make sure that all our guests are comfortable and safe, after all. That being said, Yama Con is a huge gathering of people with interests just like yours – any event could be the place you meet your new best friend!
• If you have any other questions about this information or the panelist proposal form, please send an email to panels@yamacon.org.
• Please include a presentation or detailed outline with all panel submissions. We will place your panel on Tentative if the description does not support the panel idea. This will delay your panel acceptance, as we will email asking for more information.

We appreciate you and all the work you do coming up with cool topics to host and putting together a presentation, and we want to make sure you’re taken care of! We offer two discount options for those approved for less than 3 hours of panels, and a free 3-day badge for those approved to present 6 or more hours!