FlashForward San Francisco 2005
Noteworthy
The best sessions I went to at FlashForward were given by Stefan Sagmeister and Ze Frank. Both had more of a presentation and a message than the "let me look through my harddrive, oh, here's something cool I did..." showboating of some of the technology sessions.
Ze Frank became famous for his how to dance properly party invite to a few friends. The invite was sent out to 17 friends on Thursday and by Monday over a million people had viewed his web invite. His site is totally kooky and so is he - both have an uncanny ability to connect with people through dry humor and the absurd. His message was refreshing. All of us are taught to niche and focus on a particular area of expertise from college to business, while he stresses that leaning a totally unrelated skill (such as tossing a card for distance) will help open up creative minds to think more broadly.
I had seen Stefan's work before in Communication Arts and wondered who had made fonts out of meat and other odd materials. He teaches at the School of Visual Arts and has a 3-person firm in NYC. His message was about being true to yourself (he uses journaling) and, in his case, be used in your client work.
Ok, and, Chris Harding's animations. Check out ShoeBox.
JibJab cofounder Evan Spiridellis was there - I love their work (This Land) but was disappointed in what he presented (how to do collage animations - sorta basic and missed the point of what makes them great). I would have been interested to hear about how their political humor evolved and their business.
Main Conference Message
Flash is perfectly positioned for the future. Whether that future is on the web, your PDA, cell phone, Pocket PC or other device. And, it's especially well suited (now with the new version just about to release - I'm on pins 'n' needles) for interactive video. Video. Isn't that where everything's headed anyway? Found a good streaming company, just in case.
Streaming Video
A quick word on streaming. The word streaming has been bandied about to such an extent I have clients sending me 1MB video files and suggesting we stream it. Ok, parameters please. If you have 30 minute to an hour of video, yup, you need streaming and you're going to pay for it too - $1,000/mo in server costs alone. However, if you have a minute of thumbnail video, we can just embed it in a flash document and you're good to go.
3D Modeling
Buy Poser. Or, hire a 3D artist. After a painful step-by-step tutorial on why not to by Electric Rain unless you are a 3D artist, Poser (good for human forms) looked too good to be true.
Where are All the Woman Presenters?
Do I have to get up there and give a presentation just so we have a little more representation?? I found a number of presenters could have used Connie Miller's help in preparing their talk. Some presenters didn't have a point (Chris Georgenes) and just wandered through their FLA files looking for something to talk about. Others made it clear they didn't have it together "I was up until 2am last night looking for something on my harddrive to show you today." (Yikes! Are these volunteer positions??)
So, naturally I thought women presenters could kick some butt here. As luck would have it I talked with my business and web idol Lynda Weinman (her firm co-sponsored/produced the conference) and asked her how people are selected to speak at the conference. It seems as though it's sort of organic: they know you, someone has recommended you, or they've heard you speak.
There you have it. Lynda said she'd love to see more women presenters (just hasn't seen any good ones yet). Time to go on the conference circuit and get out there! (Apparently there were more women at this conference than previous ones - some FlashForward lifers* told me.) Time to take the next step, move from audience to stage. Charge!!!
* Flash Forward lifers - person who's gone to 4-5 previous conferences.
The best sessions I went to at FlashForward were given by Stefan Sagmeister and Ze Frank. Both had more of a presentation and a message than the "let me look through my harddrive, oh, here's something cool I did..." showboating of some of the technology sessions.
Ze Frank became famous for his how to dance properly party invite to a few friends. The invite was sent out to 17 friends on Thursday and by Monday over a million people had viewed his web invite. His site is totally kooky and so is he - both have an uncanny ability to connect with people through dry humor and the absurd. His message was refreshing. All of us are taught to niche and focus on a particular area of expertise from college to business, while he stresses that leaning a totally unrelated skill (such as tossing a card for distance) will help open up creative minds to think more broadly.
I had seen Stefan's work before in Communication Arts and wondered who had made fonts out of meat and other odd materials. He teaches at the School of Visual Arts and has a 3-person firm in NYC. His message was about being true to yourself (he uses journaling) and, in his case, be used in your client work.
Ok, and, Chris Harding's animations. Check out ShoeBox.
JibJab cofounder Evan Spiridellis was there - I love their work (This Land) but was disappointed in what he presented (how to do collage animations - sorta basic and missed the point of what makes them great). I would have been interested to hear about how their political humor evolved and their business.
Main Conference Message
Flash is perfectly positioned for the future. Whether that future is on the web, your PDA, cell phone, Pocket PC or other device. And, it's especially well suited (now with the new version just about to release - I'm on pins 'n' needles) for interactive video. Video. Isn't that where everything's headed anyway? Found a good streaming company, just in case.
Streaming Video
A quick word on streaming. The word streaming has been bandied about to such an extent I have clients sending me 1MB video files and suggesting we stream it. Ok, parameters please. If you have 30 minute to an hour of video, yup, you need streaming and you're going to pay for it too - $1,000/mo in server costs alone. However, if you have a minute of thumbnail video, we can just embed it in a flash document and you're good to go.
3D Modeling
Buy Poser. Or, hire a 3D artist. After a painful step-by-step tutorial on why not to by Electric Rain unless you are a 3D artist, Poser (good for human forms) looked too good to be true.
Where are All the Woman Presenters?
Do I have to get up there and give a presentation just so we have a little more representation?? I found a number of presenters could have used Connie Miller's help in preparing their talk. Some presenters didn't have a point (Chris Georgenes) and just wandered through their FLA files looking for something to talk about. Others made it clear they didn't have it together "I was up until 2am last night looking for something on my harddrive to show you today." (Yikes! Are these volunteer positions??)
So, naturally I thought women presenters could kick some butt here. As luck would have it I talked with my business and web idol Lynda Weinman (her firm co-sponsored/produced the conference) and asked her how people are selected to speak at the conference. It seems as though it's sort of organic: they know you, someone has recommended you, or they've heard you speak.
There you have it. Lynda said she'd love to see more women presenters (just hasn't seen any good ones yet). Time to go on the conference circuit and get out there! (Apparently there were more women at this conference than previous ones - some FlashForward lifers* told me.) Time to take the next step, move from audience to stage. Charge!!!
* Flash Forward lifers - person who's gone to 4-5 previous conferences.
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