Back in 1996, my office was in the basement of the library at Case Western Reserve University.  The guy in the office next to me was a guy named Doug Kelly who was a systems librarian with a background and strong interest in computer graphics.  I was working as a multimedia developer and we had a lot in common.

He told me that he was going to a 'the' computer graphics conference - SIGGraph in New Orleans and asked me if I wanted to tag along.   I couldn't afford to go with him, but he insisted that since he rented a condo and was already driving that all I needed was the time and $50 for the exhibit floor.

I asked my boss for the $50, the week off work, and part of the gas and condo money.  He said that driving took too long and offered not only to fly me, but agreed to give Doug the week off and fly both of us down, since Doug was paying for the condo rental.

SIGGraph was amazing, the people, the technology, the Newtek party on the Riverboat, the Apple party in the Mardi Graw float place.  And I learned a lot too. When I got back I briefed my boss on all of the technology, techniques, and show discounts (that I later learned he passed along to others at the university).

1997 rolls around and Doug tells me that SIGGraph is out in Los Angeles and will be even bigger and better than New Orleans.  I asked my boss again if I could go, and he agreed to fly both Doug and myself because we were going to stay with Doug's father.

This time I remembered to bring a camera - my digital camera - a real early model.  I wanted to get pictures to show everyone back home about this conference.

The pictures were a big hit at home, I gave my SIGGraph slide show again and again.  I was really surprised at how many people who were at the show asked me to send them the pictures.

In 1998 Doug left the university to write computer books full-time (Character Animation in Depth, Digital Compositing in Depth).  I asked my boss about going solo to SIGGraph in Orlando and he agreed to put me in hotel and let me attend the full conference including the courses. 

Before I left I setup the PowerMac in my office to be a webserver and decided to post my SIGGraph pictures every night from the hotel.  So I told Doug, and my boss, and some friends to look at the site so they could see what I was seeing.

Then Doug posted the URL to the CG-Char list and the server went down as fast and as often as I could have someone locally reboot it.  I had to (and still have to) shuffle around the location of the site from one national server to the next to keep it free and alive. 

What is weirder is that I was having people at the show come up to me and ask me about things they saw on my site the night before.

I post pictures for my amusement, people I meet, people who are interesting, parties I go to, anything that catches my fancy including those things that have nothing to do with the conference.  To me of course they are part of the conference 'trip' and in my mind are the same event.

In 1999, SIGGraph in Los Angeles again, Doug was editing Keyframe Magazine and asked me to hold off posting any picture that related to Newtek and Lightwave in case he wanted to publish them.  He also took me with him on his interviews at Foundation Imaging as his photographer.  I was on my 6th digital camera by then and the pictures were crisper and at a high enough resolution to print.   Of course this also means more time in the hotel room - resizing, cropping, editing, and posting my website.  I have to spend about an hour a night to create the page - though I get faster every year.

At the university my role in multimedia had been increasing.  With all my education at SIGGraph I moved into the field of Virtual Reality as a Virtual Reality Specialist.  One of our biggest projects is the VR Castle that we have presented at educational conferences around the world - France, Holland, Japan, Scotland, Finland.  The trip to Japan was in the summer of 2000 on the same dates as SIGGraph New Orleans.  We not only were invited to speak on the Virtual Reality Castle but also to give a hands-on workshop in Multimedia Development in Macromedia Director.  So while I regret  that I missed going to SIGGraph I can assure everyone I was being true to the spirit of CG.

SIGGraph 2001 was going to be in Los Angeles again and the girl I was dating was very interested in coming along - she promised to carry my camera bag.   This time in addition to my digital camera, I brought my 35mm film and also my 3D film camera.  The 3D camera really captures more of the essence of SIGGraph than my digitals do.  It is funny though to walk around with a camera from the 50s at this very high-tech conference. I don't post those though - if you wanna see them - you have to know me.  Keyframe Magazine also wanted more shots in 2001 and let me write an entire conference report.

The moment I got back from Los Angeles I made asked my boss to clear the dates for SIGGraph 2002 in San Antonio.  Our university has just joined the New Media Centers Organization and my office has just been named the New Media Studio.  They say this year's conference will be smaller than previous year's and the funny thing is that it is more relevant to me than ever. We shall see.  Well enjoy the pictures and write me if you have any questions or comments.