Yesterday the ZBrush booth was completely out of control. The ammount of polys that were flying around the mesh they were murdering was so grossly insane that I literally gagged. They looked to be adding a baboons rear end (when in heat) to a poor human models face, and they were doing it extremely fast. It reminded me of the scene in Total Recal when their oxygen masks explode and their faces get all re-mixed. Barf. So Zbrush is totally crazy. I can’t wait to start playing with it when I get back to Phoenix. In other Siggraph related news I was assaulted by a June Bug. My lawyers are already on it.

Ben Young at the Penton booth:

First off, San Diego rocks! I stopped by the reel-exchange booth to pick up my article in Digital Content Producer. Siggraph this year has been pretty cool. I went to a party last night on an aircraft carrier!! I texted a few people that and of course they didn’t believe me. Siggraph is all about networking and I’m trying to promote myself like crazy. My biggest regret thus far is I didn’t get on any of the event guest lists before I came. There will always be next year. Right now I’m really looking to meet new artists to collaborate with and cool projects to work on. Check out my reel at www.daylightproductions.com and at reel-exchange and lets make the next martial arts conspiracy theory movie!!

Cheers,
Ben Young
Director, Animator
www.daylightproductions.com

One of the amazing and great things about the Siggraph show is the breadth of people you meet–from computer gurus, to animation wizards, to students and enthusiasts. Obviously, it’s important for Digital Content Producer and Millimeter to be a part of such a show, not only to to get the info on the latest technology for you, our readers–but, it also gives us a chance to meet and interact with our readers. These are always great, and revealing moments.

I’m at Siggraph not only to represent the magazines, but to also promote our new online community, Reel-exchange.com. I just had a great chat with one of our members, Vincent MacTiernan, who (not trying to be too self-serving, here, but…) was ecstatic about the site and the number of sales leads he’s gotten via the “Request A Reel” feature. He notes, “Not just small folks in the middle of nowhere. I’m talking about the big guys in LA and NY.”

During our talk, he turned me onto a great way for members to track their page views, traffic, and overall web presence. We are currently in the works development-wise to add reel counters and other functions to Reel-Exhcange in the future. For now, though, MacTiernan finds alexa.com to be highly valuable.

Anyway, if you’re a Reel-Exchange.com member and you’re at Siggraph, be sure to stop by and say hi to us at Booth 420.

Thus far my first day of Siggraph has been pretty gnarly. Our game (www.shankethegame.com) we built for the Art Institute seems to be going over extremely well! It’s amazing to see something we worked so hard on over the last few months being played by so many people. I haven’t had the chance to meet any of my artistic heroes as of yet, but I plan to!