Thousands of fans showed up at the Baltimore Convention Center showed up this weekend to prove that a show that’s just about comics can still pack 'em in. (Official attendance numbers were not available at press time.)

While mega-shows like the San Diego Comic-Con and the FanExpo Canada—held the same August 27-29 weekend—have morphed into multi-media showcases for everything from entertainment news to horror to anime, the Baltimore Comic-Con, run by Marc Nathan of Cards, Comics, and Collectibles in Reistertown, Md., purposely stays focused on just comics. Along with similarly comics-centric cons in HeroesCon in Charlotte, NC, and the Emerald City Con in Seattle, Baltimore has become a key part of a convention regional circuit that many professionals look to as a more relaxing—but still profitable—venue to sell art and commissions.

While San Diego is far and away the most profitable show of the year for most, fans come to Baltimore looking for original art, sketches and old comics.

AdHouse Books publisher Chris Pitzer set up for the first time after skipping a year and was delighted by the turnout for spotlighted cartoonists Jim Rugg and especially Paul Pope, who had a notable line every time he sat down to sign. A new issue of THB, Pope's science fiction opus, was available and sold briskly. Pitzer said the show was "damn near perfect this year."

"We had a great show," said Abrams ComicsArts executive editor Charles Kochman, pointing to a Abrams table almost bare of books on Sunday. "We brought in [Hall of Fame artist] Jerry Robinson (Jerry Robinson: Ambassador of Comics by N.C. Christopher Couch) at the last moment and could have sold 100 copies of his book in a few hours."

Robinson was also in the spotlight at the showcase event of the weekend, the Harvey Awards, named after cartoonist and editor Harvey Kurtzman, the Harvey Awards honor the best work in comics in the prevous year and they were presented on Saturday night. PvP cartoonist Scott Kurtz MC'd with edgy humor—" I don't don't know what’s more in danger," he joked at one point, "Ted Rall's life while he's in Afghanistan or his career as a editorial cartoonist back home." David Mazzucchelli’s Asterios Polyp (Pantheon)and Dave Steven’s The Rocketeer (IDW) were the big winners with three awards each; Image's The Walking Dead and Chew each took home two awards.

The evening was most notable for a controversial keynote speech by Boom! Studios editor-in-chief Mark Waid, in which he exhorted creators to look to the future with optimism despite the in-roads made by digital piracy and embrace the world of sharing, since comics are still a medium of ideas. "Comics have more ideas in three months than Hollywood has in three years, " said Waid. A complete list of Harvey Award winners is available here.

While the overall vibe was positive, the economy's overall sluggishness is beginning to show some effects at some comics shows. While individual artists generally did very well, some dealers selling comics and collectibles reported softer than usual sales.