DAY 32 had me dragging. While I really wanted to make it there for the Color Fundamental for Digital Content Creation, Visualization, and Exploration, without the bikes it wasn’t going to happen. I got there about an hour after I wanted to but I was early enough so I could check out the Production Gallery. There was costumes from Avengers: End Game and Toy Story 4, models from Spider-Man Into the Spider-Verse and character poses/panels from How to Train Your Dragon The Hidden World.

I then checked out a talk on Wacom Tablets and their practical use in education, which was an unexpected stop. I was invited by William Joel from Western CT State University to check it out and I am glad I did. After that I met up with Ferris Webby from Blue Sky Studios for lunch. I’m not that cool to make friends with someone on my own. Ferris is the husband of NVCC’s very own 2D Animation instructor Stephanie Benvenuto. We had some great conversations and did some brainstorming. We’ll see what plans we have can come to fruition. Long term goals, I’ll share more when they move from ideas to possibilities.

After lunch I made it back from The VFX of Netflix Series where I learned about the visual effects in A Series of Unfortunate Events, The Umbrella Academy, and Stranger Things. I am not going to lie; it was a little gross for my taste, but amazing all the same. The final event of the day was For the Thone- The Making of ‘Game of Thrones’: Season 8. For someone who doesn’t watch the series, there were still a lot of incredible things to learn. Each of these events reminds me of students (past and current) and will have great anecdotes to share with them. This also will help me direct them on their paths, aligning their interest areas with the multiple options that are contained in the digital arts.

With that fun over, I headed back to the hotel and to the fun of getting ready to move on tomorrow later in the day. Laundry was washed and dried, everything prepped for the morning checkout, and all the other odds and ends taken care of. Sad to see the conference coming to an end; it is so long and so quick all at the same time. That’s it for now!