If you read my last post, you probably noticed that I went to FITC with Marie-Michelle Daigle a month ago from May 2 to May 4. I know it’s a bit late to post a recap, but it was such an interesting experience that I absolutely had to write about it. I got to see and connect with a bunch of professionals from different fields. Here’s a quick recap for you guys.

First Day

May 2, we packed our backs and prepared ourselves for a 5 hour long train ride. 8am sharp at the Ottawa train station, we boarded the train outbound to Toronto. During the ride we got to see some interesting sights of Lake Ontario.

We wanted to get to Toronto before 11 o’clock, because one of our main attractions to FITC was James White‘s presentation Back to the Future: Part II. However, we were never able to make it in time.

We arrived at Toronto Union Station at around 1:30pm. We pretty much walked straight from Union Station to the Guvernment and arrived just in time for MK12‘s showcase.

MK12 presented some really amazing and awesome motion graphics work and short films. I specially liked their demo reel and their latest short film called TELEPHONEME. It was a very inspiring and very eerie piece. MK12′s crew was a fun bunch too. They were both interesting and funny to listen on stage. Interesting fact: MK12 made most of the artwork revolving around FITC Toronto 2011. The signage had a nice retro feel to it.

Afterwards we saw Design I/O with Emily Gobeille and Theodore Watson. Yet another very impressive and inspiring presentation. This presentation revolved around interactive installations. The two main projects they presented were Funky Forest and Rise & Fall. Funky Forest was a interactive ecosystem for the Singapore Art Museum for children that involved the development of a forest/ecosystem depending on how the children would interact with the installation. For example, if you would stay still next to the wall, a tree would grow at that position. Furthermore, you had to water your trees for them to grow and stay alive. You had to interact and direct the water towards your tree for it to survive. It also had a lot of neat little features such a dynamically generated bugs & animals.
Their other project, Rise & Fall was very impressive interactive work for the Boards Magazine. It was a type of interactive adventure, written in C++ I believe, that was controlled using the magazine’s front and back cover. By tracking the angle of rotation of the magazine’s front cover with a webcam, it would either make the the scene rise or fall. Go take a look on their website, it’s really impressive work.

Second Day

May 3 started out with Grant Skinner‘s presentation called “ADHD FTW, LOL!”. It featured a lot of small projects built in small bursts of inspiration and motivation. The one project that stood out the most was  a slot car set controlled by both volume & pitch of the voice via Flash. Not only was it amazingly clever, but it was hilarious to watch. Check it out for yourself.

At 12:30pm we caught Robert L. Peters‘ presentation “Cause an Effect”. Strangely enough, I had not heard about Robert L. Peters before. After seeing his presentation and who he was, I couldn’t believe I hadn’t heard of him or his award-winning design firm Circle. They design Canada Post’s stamps for god’s sake. That’s a huge achievement in my books.
His presentation focused a lot on why we do the things that we do and the way we do it. One of the most interesting points of the presentation was “Do more with less”. This is something I try to work by and I try to teach others as well. It also goes very well with K.I.S.S. – Keep it simple stupid. Another of the both funny but very true statements during the presentation was “Stay safe, use a contract”

After grabbing lunch, at 2:45pm we went to see “Tron GFX” presented by Bradley Munkowitz, the man behind GMUNK. Himself and a team of  5 graphic geniuses worked on a hand full of motion graphics and 3D for Tron Legacy. You can take a look at the work itself on the GMUNK website. Thankfully, I had watched Tron Legacy a week before, so it was still fresh in my memory. I love these kinds of presentations, Munkowitz presented work in progress versions of some of the effects and scenes in the movie. It was really amazing seeing him dissect a simple 10 second effect into something much more complex. I had no idea that Cinema 4D could be such an amazing motion graphics beast. It was some quite amazing work.

Final Day

Finally, May 4 started out at 12:30pm with “From Design to Development For Devices” by Stacey Mulcahy. I’m not really a mobile or tablet designer or developer, but the presentation was a good insight on some good design practices for different kind of devices. The information that I found most useful was the main thinking process behind making the use of a touch screen as accessible and comprehensible as a more traditional mouse and keyboard setup. Stacey was a fun presenter. The presentation was both informative, technical and amusing.

At 2:45pm, we checked out the Source & Imagination panel featuring, Mc Bess, Robert L. Peters, Jason Thedor, James White and Owen Brierley as moderator. It was inspiring hearing these artists speaking about their inspirations and some of their methods of working with clients. If there’s one thing that I have to remember from that whole panel, it’s that James White has kick ass boots.

Sadly, that was the last event we could attend, because we had to run back to Union Station to take the train back home. One thing’s for certain, I’d love to go back next year.