An overview of a typical Redemption

We kick off properly on Friday afternoon, finish late on Sunday night, and at our peak times on Saturday, we tend to have about six or seven scheduled items running in parallel: guest talks, discussions, debates, workshops, games, and so on.

Friday

Registration opens early on Friday afternoon, and shortly after that, the first programme item starts at 2pm.

At 7pm, there's an introductory session for those of you for whom this is your first convention. We'll tell you everything you need to know, explain what you can expect (the convention conventions, as it were), and ensure you have a fun weekend.

We follow this up at 7.30pm with an introduction for Stewards. Every convention relies on volunteers to help run it, and this is more true for Redemption than most conventions. If you've volunteered to be a Steward, this is where your duties are allocated by our head Stewards.

The Opening Ceremony happens at 8pm. By this point, the convention will have been going for a good six hours, and we'll have kept you busy until now, but this is where we welcome you all. Before now, all the programme items will have been in the smaller programme rooms. The Opening Ceremony is in the Main Hall, and we introduce you to your guests (who you might already have met at earlier items), your Committee (that's us), and to a few other interesting characters of whom you'll be seeing more over the rest of the weekend.

The Opening Ceremony is followed at 9pm by the now-traditional Pub Quiz, where you can gather into teams and demonstrate your knowledge of SF (or lack of it). At the same time, if you're not into the quiz, the programming continues in other rooms.

After the Pub Quiz, from 10pm through to the wee hours, we have a ceilidh (or barn dance, if you're from southern regions). The band will have a caller, so don't worry if you're unfamiliar with the steps. Besides, half the fun is flailing around randomly to music without a care in the world....

If ceilidhs aren't your thing, other programming will be going on elsewhere: panels, debates, etc.

Saturday

Saturday is where Redemption is at full-throttle, all day from 10am to 2am. You can expect at least five of our programme rooms to be active throughout most of the day, and sometimes more. Some of our guests will be talking on the main stage, in parallel with the other activities.

The Chaos Costuming workshop will be running for the early four hours of the day, from 10am to 2pm. This is where you can whip up a costume to amaze us all later on (at '01, one of the costumes produced in the Chaos Costuming workshop won a prize in the Fancy Dress).

There'll be another First Timers' session at 10am, and another introduction for Stewards at 10:30am, for those who couldn't get to the convention in time for the Friday night one.

The Chaos Modelling workshop will be during the afternoon. This is where you get to make a copy of anything else that takes your fancy, out of a cola bottle and two toilet rolls.

During the afternoon, we plan to be running our version of B5's Zocalo, with a sort of market-square feel. If anyone feels like reading tarots, telling fortunes, juggling, doing a few magic tricks, etc., please get in touch!

For those of you interested in taking part in our Fancy Dress or Cabaret, there is a "rehearsal" during the latter half of Saturday afternoon. This isn't actually a rehearsal, as such. Instead, it's where the running order is arranged, where you tell the tech crew what requirements you have, in terms of lighting, music, microphones, etc., and so on. If you're interested, you could make our Tech crew's life easier, by telling them in advance.

The Fancy Dress and Cabaret themselves happen from 8pm onwards. Most conventions have a Fancy Dress, where the con members demonstrate their costuming abilities - some of whom have worked on their costumes for months. Redemption also throws into the mix the Chaos costumers, some of whom have worked on theirs for minutes. It's followed by the Cabaret, something you don't see any many conventions these days. The fans - that's you - are the ones who provide the entertainment here. Songs, dances, sketches - the choice is yours.

After the Cabaret, at 10pm we have the Saturday night disco, which will be themed.

The debates, discussions and filking pick up again here, for those who aren't the disco kind.

Sunday

Sunday looks much like Saturday, with a vast array of programme items. Some items of interest that happen on Sunday are:

More main hall talks from our guests.

The Charity Auction is where we flog off the collectable items we've scavenged from kind hearts everywhere, for as much money as we can get, on behalf of our two charities.

Early on Sunday afternoon, some disreputable characters whom you may have recognised from various SF shows will put forward their case for galactic domination. Yes, the potential Rulers of the Universe will be stating their platforms in the hustings, and you get to grill them on the issues that matter to you. Afterwards, you get to vote.

At the end of the afternoon, we have our Closing Ceremony. This is where we wish you all a farewell, and we thank everyone who's helped to run another Redemption, not to mention our guests. Plus, you get to find out whether the Green or Purple Drazi factions won the Drazi war, and who is the new Ruler of the Universe...

But that's not the end of the convention. Just as programming started before the Opening Ceremony, it continues after the Closing Ceremony, for those who are still around. There are more panels and discussions. There's also the filking, and the Dead Dog party, where we can all collapse, and start wondering how we'll cope with returning to the Real World.

So there you have it. That's roughly what a Redemption looks like. There's plenty for you to get involved with. Redemption is run mostly by the fans who attend. Really. And we don't just mean that you turn up and enjoy yourself. As many as one in five of the people who come to Redemption are listed on the Programme as running some item or other. That's a low estimate, and that's not counting the Stewards, Tech crew, Ops, or the people who perform in the Fancy Dress and Cabaret.

Redemption: Be Involved.