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July Lightning Talks Recap
The first Pittsburgh IGDA Lightning Talk meeting went extremely well!
We had 8 talks- each unique. Check out the summary below and the pics on the PIGDA Flickr group.
Many thanks to Keith Leonard, Felix Lloyd, Regis Frey, Eben Myers,
Eric Hardman, Jason Bannister, David Shaver, and Shawn Patton for speaking. Each speaker was given a lovely IGDA tshirt in thanks!
If you didn't get to give a talk this time don't worry, we'll probably make this a regular event since it was received so well.
The next event is the PIGDA Summer Picnic- August 16, 12-4pm at the Schenley Oval. It's a pot luck video game themed picnic so bust out your Yoshi Deviled Eggs or Chocobo Chicken Salad and join us for some laid back food, volleyball, and disc golf. We'll provide the hot dogs, and some drinks.
That's it for now, and remember, when the thunder crashes, your talk is over!
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Lightning Talk Topics
Keith Leonard, representing Sword and Spirit Software
Sword and Spirit is working on a project they call "Haunted House"- a horror puzzle game. Keith went over a technique for creating volumetric fog using a fragment shader.
Jason Bannister, representing Mechanimal
Jason and Mechanimal have a dream- a shared library with accurate 3D models of EVERYTHING. He's been working with the Carnegie Museum to use the technology of games to help both researches and guests interact with detailed virtual versions of specimens ranging from dinos to ostriches.
Regis Frey, incoming Pittsburgh University Student
Regis is a self-taught programmer who learned programming by using flash. Regis relayed his own experience learning through animation and object behaviors. He has a passion for sharing this style of programming education with others and is currently trying to start up a camp to tech programming to kids.
Eben Myers, representing Etcetera Edutainment
Eben talked in general about Etcetera Edutainment's various work including their upcoming release of their Forklift game. Then Eben launched into a realtime demo of Etcetera's camera based interactive system called "CrowdPlay" designed to allow a crowd of people to play a game together. The whole room joined together to take down zombies with a jeep! Etcetera Edutainment is currently hiring.
David Shaver, representing Rabid Squirrel Games
David gave a short but sweet overview of pyPad360, an open source wrapper in Python for XBox 360 controllers. Check it out for your next personal project!
Felix Lloyd, representing Skill-Life
Felix is a teacher turned social engineer. He and his partner moved to Pittsburgh because they saw it as a great place to develop CentsCity, an online MMO designed to teach kids fiscal responsibility. Felix listed Carnegie Mellon's ETC, Innovation Works, and Idea Foundry as some of the reasons Pittsburgh was so attractive. Skill-Life is currently working with an ETC Spinoff company, Semiotic Technologies to create the CentsCity prototype but they are looking to hire an in-house flash programmer or technical producer.
Eric Hardman, representing National Network of Digital Schools
Eric introduced most of the room to NNDS- a nonprofit that builds online courses. NNDS is working on a project called Gears which uses an online 3D environment to teach players concepts in several overlapping subjects such as spanish, algebra, geography, & earth sciences. Eric mentioned they have hired many Art Institute of Pittsburgh grads and are currently looking for engineers.
Shawn Patton, representing himself
Shawn gave the closing talk which had many titles amounting to "How to (almost) make a time fountain." Shawn gave a background of what Time Fountain is- a water fountain that appears to violate the principles of time by freezing a drop of water in midair or making it rise back to its source. He then walked us through his process on his quest to build his own Time Fountain.
Posted by PittsburghIGDA on August 8, 2008 09:27 AM