It's Getting Better All The Time

Our fourth year at Maker Faire (Bay Area) has come and gone and I have to say that it was the best one yet. There were even more makers on hand exhibiting their talents, as well as an impressive number of how-to activities available to attendees. It was a whirlwind few days full of friends, whimsy, discovery, absurdity, laughter, learning, and lot of fun.

ArcAttack's Tesla Coils and "The Imperial March"

E's 3-DIY exhibit has grown along with the show. He started out showing off some of his homebrew displays and rigs on his own and then expanded to sharing a small area in a large hall with a couple of friends on either side. This year, he was asked by the Maker Faire producers to curate an entire room of 3-D goodness, which came to be known as the 3-D Village. The dimly lit room contained Do-It-Yourself 3-D Cameras and Displays, 3D Phantogram Imagery, 3D Virtual Reality for the iPhone, Hologlyphics, [I am a Bird], as well as other live 3-D projection, demos, and imagery by at least three other artists. We were swamped the entire weekend. Fortunately, we finally managed to get some friends to come up, help out, and join in the fun.

Even with the extra hands on deck, we seemed to get away even less, perhaps because of the high traffic. I did steal away though to watch the ArcAttack group perform a few times (see video above) and managed to take a stroll with some droids. I also finally got over to the EepyBird Coke Zero and Mentos show, which was tons of fun! One of the guys visited our table and was super nice.

At the end of Sunday, a few of us got to shoot OK Go's supremely absurd (which I mean in a very good way) partially submerged performance in 3-D. Hopefully, some of that footage will be publically available soon. The video above shows "rehearsal" and some of the show.

If you didn't make it to this Maker Faire, hope to see you at one in the not-so-distant future!

Eight Nights A Week

No, this isn't an early Hannukah post...

A lot of our friends always say things like, "You guys do SO much." I often downplay it and insist that sometimes we do sit at home and drool in front of the tv, but come to think of it, that is more the exception. This past week leaves me defenseless as we did something every single night.*

Monday: Neil Finn @ Largo, who was joined by his son on the drums and Largo's favorite son, Jon Brion, on all sorts of instruments. I could go on and on, but suffice it to say that the show was amazing.

Tuesday: As part of the Downtown Film Festival-Los Angeles, E and several members of the L.A. 3D Club , put on a special screening of independent 3-D short films at the Downtown Independent, a really cool, fairly new film and event center. We had a great turnout and a reception on the roof. (I had to go back to work from 11:30pm to 1:30am).

View from roof of Downtown Independent

Wednesday: VisionFest is the annual Filmmakers Alliance (FA) event which gives an award to a prominent figure in the world of independent film (this year's recipient was producer Ted Hope), a presentation of short films, followed by a party with food, booze, and mingling. During the festivities, E ran a video theater to show other shorts by various FA members.

Thursday: Of course we attended the 3-D Club's annual officer installation and awards banquet. Not only are we members, but E is the VP and usually the projectionist. One of our members was quite boisterous this year, making it a unique occasion, but that's neither here nor there. The important thing of it all is that I not only got my participation ribbon for entering each , but I also got a 3rd place medal for the newbie group!

Friday: It was Avatar Day and by the time we remembered to request tickets, the only place left in the L.A. area to go was Long Beach. That was fine since some friends who are also into 3-D live there and joined us. We made the trip worth our while and had some Peruvian food with them after the sneak preview. We stopped at Scoops once back in L.A. & I got the last of the Brown Bread for the day! P.S. Avatar looks pretty effin' cool.

Saturday: After a long, exhausting day at work, we went to closing night of the DFFLA. We got a very rare glimpse at a dated, but fascinating, documentary called The Jackson 5 in Africa. The footage from 1974 had only screened once before in New York and it's unknown when or if it will ever be seen again. Unfortunately, the after-party was a bust, but we ended up going to Wurstküche, an exotic sausage restaurant in the Arts District. We'd heard wonderful things about the place and they were all true!

Sunday: After sleeping in a little, we decided to drive down to Laguna Beach to catch the soon-closing Sawdust Art Festival. We strolled around the art galleries along the ocean first and then took in the arts and crafts. There was also a lot of candy, but I don't want to talk about that.

Laguna Beach, my favorite place in the O.C.

Monday: Now we're up to last night. We met up with an old friend from college, who will soon be moving back to L.A., and a couple of his friends. It was a good time and even though some business-type stuff was discussed, the hours flew by as we indulged in good food and conversation.

*You may have heard me complain about being broke and that hasn't changed. We're very fortunate in that a lot of these fun things we do often cost very little to nothing, for a variety of reasons. We did pay full price for the sausage, though, and it was worth it.