If you click you can see where I was sitting… It’s that chair pulled out at the back on the left side. (If you were there I was the fat chic dressed like an apple store employee, I got asked several times if I worked for Apple. I didn’t really know they wore tan pants, just what I pulled out of the dresser.) My offical black Apple employee shirts I got off ebay are just about the most comfy shirts I own.

The conference was really good. Bert Monroy is a digital da vinci with his realism. Some of his tips were so hand to the head “why didn’t I know that!” duh simple, others were more complex just that you never though of doing it THAT way. Some of them just make my head hurt in a good way. I went to learn more about alpha channels and came back with a lot more than that. I plan on spending the day on Photoshop with my workbook from the class just to make it all sink in.

I was rather bewildered at how many folks seemed learn the most basic photoshop functions like layers at the seminar. The lady next to me was taking notes like nuts over what I think is Photoshop grade school level stuff. Some of the questions asked like “show us how to se the pen tool” were shocking. I mean, shit folks, the pen tool is nearly the same thing as in illustrator, and basiclaly the same idea as any other vector drawing application. You should know that before going in there. I was also disgusted that 80% of the audience was PC. The teacher was a mac guy so the PC guys had to adapt to his mac commands, ha!

They should have a “knowledge level” list list assigned for these conferences so everyone walks in with a similar skill set. “Know how to use pen, layers, and layer styles”

But all said WELL worth the $99 I paid (make that $111 aafter the parking fees!)

Highlight leaving was that the convention center was also being rented for it’s yearly Memorial day weekend 3 day long scifi con called Marcon. It’s one of the larger ones in the midwest.

(When they had good guests I even used to go to it, I’m still occasionally remembered for my Rainman like performace a a Babylon 5 “Jeopardy”-style trivia game show they where running in one room and where I happened to get pic, but that’s another story. They are run by scifi book guys, who look down on the TV fans, so no more good guests just boring writing seminars and author guests. There’s a caste system in scifi, don’t cha know.)

Imagine 200 design geeks in a walking horde passing through a few dozen early bird geeks checking into the Marcon Friday-prereg line. The fat pudgy one in bad fitting t-shirts and thick glasses and holding a staff while wearing a blue velvet cape. The overweight female elf in harem pants, panty hose and clothe hanger eings and covered in boddy glitter. Oh and lest we forget The “fandom famous” Luke Ski “filk” singer doing a tune in the corridor about being eaten by orcs… I was laughing the entire way at the clashing of my worlds. Little did those designers know how packed that area would be the next day. Just crawling with hundreds of them.

Anyway, that night Mr Man came home from Vegas. I went to a SCA event for Saturday afternoon that was in town and skipped the second day of it Sunday (Crown Tourney, whoo freaking hoo.) to stay home with the man and nap in air conditioned comfort. Monday too. Have I said recently how spectacularily comfy my bed is? Oh yeah it is. Way.