Wednesday, September 30, 2009

What's Cookin' on the back burner

An animation community Events Calendar:
Listing Free days at museums around town, ASIFA and ACM SIGGRAPH meetings, as well as special events.

A Night Program (?!)
Once a week, in the evening, after classes are done for the day... we'll get together all ninja-like in one of the classrooms and have a "Best of " showing. Everyone who comes should contribute with a link, file or DVD of the best animation or animation related video they've seen that day, week, month, year, etc. This additional weekly event should exist to provide the group with added discussion, ideas, questions, comments and inspiration.

Field Trips:
We plan on scheduling group trips to the events and museums. Speaking of which, we're all very excited about the new Disney Museum in the Presido, which opens this Thursday. We hear it is worth several day trips and will blow your socks off!

We also foresee putting together bigger group road trips for things like SIGGRAPH.

At the moment we're all buzzing about Animation Expo which is happening soon: Nov. 20-22 2009. Club members definitely want to go and volunteer to work at the event (free admission for volunteers!). If you're interested, go over to the Volunteer Page and sign up TODAY. They are still short on volunteers at the moment, but you'll have to sign up quickly to secure your free admission to the event.

The question now is how we all want to get down there -carpool? Bus? And where we'll stay while we're there for about 3 days. If we can get club funding for a bus or lodging, we will post that info here ASAP, for now though it's up to us, so...

Comment if you'll be going!

Some good questions covered from the Town Hall Meeting Discussion today

Points discussed were:

Lab space & Peak lab hours:
The directors will look into opening up classroom space and possibly adding more lab space as usage and student enrollment dictates.

Peak Hours, according to the 3rd floor lab front desk, are 1pm to 4pm.

The PC lab is open from 7:30AM to 1:30AM daily and if you don't want to wait for a computer it is recommended you come in before 12:00 noon.


Approaching and working with your Faculty Directly:

1. To express interest in bringing in additional guest speakers to review demo reels before the student's last year of classes.

Outside of the guest lecturers and panels AAU brings to speak in Morgan Auditorium, like Dreamworks, etc. It is recommended that you, as students, approach your instructors and ask them collectively, to bring in a colleague in the field to review your reels in class and give you some added feedback.

As always, you should keep in mind who you are catering your reel to: what studio? and what kind of reel are you presenting? Keep it specific and you will get better feedback.

AND
2. To get more info on a course you would like to take.

Have you read the course description in the AAU catalog? Read the syllabus online? Called your advisor and they can't tell you any more about the class? Still not sure if the class is right for you...?

Email the Director of the Department that the class is in, to ask for more info. about the class: what software is used or taught. What are the projects you'll do and what skills are those projects going to teach you. Ask specific questions about the class.

If you'd like to ask more than just a question or two, CALL to schedule a meeting. That way as soon as an opening is available, you can book it.

It is strongly recommended that you CALL rather than emailing; because it may take half a day for you to get back about the time that was available and which may no longer be available by the time you reply to the email. So, CALL to book appointments.


Do we have a render farm? Yes we do!
To keep things from getting disorganized and haphazzard with the renderfarm usage it is overseen by our awesome lab matron: Galina Rozina. Once you are ready to render out your project, go to the back of the 180 building's 3rd floor lab and speak to her directly about setting up your renders.

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Fall Kick-off BBQ Rescheduled for THIS Saturday -> New Location

The BBQ planned for last Saturday was postponed due to thunderstorms.

Now that the weather seems to have cleared up again, we will have the BBQ THIS weekend, at Dolores Park this Saturday from 1-5.
Collaboratively Organized by clubs in: VFX, ADV, ANM, ILL, & MPT.

This event is fully catered by CASE and it is BYOB.
(No really, bring your own beer!)

Join us to start the semester off right with a frisbee, a friend, some tunes and brews. See you there!



We are unable to secure any area ahead of time, so several of us are going to show up early and steak out a space, between 9:30 and 10am. Any of you who can come early and help with this, please do, it will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!


Check out the AAU VFX facebook page for the most current status updates on this event (if you are unsure about the weather on Saturday or any future cancellations) as well as regular postings for collaborative projects.

Thursday, September 10, 2009

BBQ This Weekend in GG Park!

Important info about FREE FOOD!

There is a huge BARBECUE this Saturday, September 12th--1-5pm at Golden Gate Park!

Collaboratively Organized by the clubs in: VFX, ADV, ANM, ILL, & MPT.

This event is fully catered by CASE and it is BYOB. (No really, bring your own beer!)

Start the semester off right with us at Golden Gate Park. Bring a frisbee, a friend, some tunes and brews. See you there!

- VFX Gateway

It's going down in Dougboy Meadows, @ JFK Dr. & 16th Ave--spread the word.