At the Adapt Conference Auditions, your work animation work is reviewed by Emile Ghorayeb (aka Emilio Ghorayeb) and Aaron Gilman. If they believe you demonstrated knowledge of the principles of animation, you received an Adapt Artist Card. Here is the one I received.. Companies that were present were, DreamWorks Animation, ILM-LucasArts, Electronic Arts (EA), Ubisoft, Hybride, Beenox, PhenomBlue, Artificial Mind and Movements (A2M)

Official website: http://www.adaptmontreal.com/a2006/

"...people should focus more on what [they] are doing with these tools rather than focusing their attentions on the actual tools." -Jean-Eric Hénault (http://www.vfxworld.com/?sa=adv&code=319b255d&atype=articles&id=3005)

This line alone, in my opinion, best describes the first annual Adapt Conference. Held september 23-24 in Montreal at the Hyatt Regency Hotel, the adapt conference turned out to be a very high quality event with some of the most respected names in the industry; Meats Meier, Scott Robertson, and Aaron Gilman just to name a few.

Seeing such giants in the industry reminds me of my beginnings as a 3D artist (I emphasize artist because I started as a 3D programmer in Open GL.) The first book I read was Michele Matossian 3D Studio Max 3 (Visual QuickStart Guide.) It is a great book, I still use it as reference today (like where to find the autobak files,) but there is no such thing as a “quick start” into 3D...at least not yet. We are getting closer. Some of the techniques these masters used were quite simple in nature but, then again, even simplicity is an art. Who knew the cinematography of Star Wars would be heavily influenced by a Maya playblast.

It was a great conference; it highlighted what individuals can do with technology instead of seeing new flashy features of the new version of a 3d package. Just because your car is capable of going twice the highway speed limit, it doesn't mean you are a NASCAR driver.

For details on the conference, please visit the official website.

Posted in cilsya's blog