• The Rockies from 30,000 feet up.

I met Fabio Sasso from Abduzeedo! Ain't nothing cooler then this guy right here.

Scott Hanson, ISO50 onstage dissecting one of his posters in Photoshop.

• Tycho performing at one of the FITC after parties.

• Part of Erik Natzke's work for Nokia

• 'Cymatic Ferrofluid, with Gray Scott Reaction Diffusion' by Robert Hodgin

• Kyle Cooper telling stories and showing us select title sequences from his library of over 150.

• Shot of Brendan Dawes' DoodleBuzz application

• Yugo Nakamura wowing the crowd with his portfolio work and upcoming releases.

• San Francisco fog, as captured from the window of a bus.

I returned from my big trip to FITC San Francisco 2010 this weekend, and after a short break from the blog and all things scheduled I’m ready to get back to work. San Francisco was wonderful, and it was great to meet some new creative folks and re-unite with some pals. After a short stint of lost luggage upon my arrival, the whole trip went real smooth. Please excuse the low quality of some of the presentation shots above, as I only had my handy iPhone available to snap pictures of people onstage. I’ll have to see if I can track down some more professional looking photos. However, here is a little wrap-up of the 3-day event as I wandered from talk, to party, to talk.

One of the highlights was certainly meeting my pal Fabio Sasso, creator of the mighty Abduzeedo. I’ve been in touch with Fabio for about 2 and a half years as we teamed up on a few giveaways and other fun blog collaborations, so it was awesome to finally hang out with the dude and shake his hand. He’s just as cool as you would think and we had a great time having a few drinks and talkin’ blogs.

I also got to see Scott Hansen, ISO50 speak for the second time. He made some adjustments to his presentation this time around, which included a breakdown and explanation of his art show poster in Photoshop. He opened up the source file and showed us how we went about creating the composition, effects and color treatments. Scott is great at explaining himself and the reasons he makes design choices along the way, so it was wonderful to see his layered work in action. To top it off, he performed as Tycho at one of the FITC after partys where I got to hang out backstage with Scott and Dusty Brown (whom I only knew through Scott’s posters). It was a great time.

Following their talks I had the pleasure of meeting a few of my other art & design heroes such as Erik Natzke and Robert Hodgin. Erik’s presentation was beautiful, where he took us through his progression as a code-driven artist chronologically, showing us how one idea led to another and how his he ended up being hired by big clients for the work he sees as “play”. Very inspiring and nice guy. Robert, or Flight404, has been one of my favorite visual artists for the past 10 years so it was awesome to finally shake his hand. His talk was excellent and he covered topics from video feedback, magnetic sculptures to building a universe. His work is always intricate, scientific and inspiring.

I also had the pleasure of meeting Brendan Dawes following his presentation as well. Brendan is always entertaining to watch and manages to get some really good advice into his delivery as well. He talked briefly about the products his company produces, and described it as “We wanted to be more in control of our own destinies, rather then at the whim of a budget.” A good point there. He showed us a few of the projects he and his company worked on over the past while, and previewed his new iPhone app, the Accidental News Explorer.

In conclusion, FITC always delivers on quality speakers and great networking opportunities to meet those you look up to and make new friends. This is the third even I have attended and have had a wonderful time at them all. If you are an artist, designer or developer and have the means to get to an FITC event, you won’t regret the trip. A big thanks to Shawn Pucknell and the FITC gang for making this latest event a fantastic time!

I am off to FITC San Francisco today to see some great speakers and meet some wonderful creative folks along the way. As I mentioned in a previous post, I will have some Signalnoise t-shirts and goodies available during the event, be sure to follow my Twitter to see when I will be getting these into peoples’ hands.

Things might be a little slow on the blog this week, depending on how much time I have during the many fun events to keep things updating. If time is short, I will be sure to update everyone upon my return home.

So, if you will be attending FITC San Francisco, I look forward to seeing you there!

In a short 6 days I will be packing up all my gear and heading to FITC San Francisco to check out presentations by my favorite artists/designers as well as meeting a bunch of like-minded creative folks who read the blog. I can’t wait.

That being said, I will also be packing up some Signalnoise t-shirts that I will be selling to interested people attending the event. This isn’t anything official being put on by FITC, just me and a suitcase. The print shop has assured me that the new Signalnoise t-shirts will be all done before I depart, so those of you at the event will have first crack at the supply before it hits my online store. I’ll also have a complete restock of my sold out Signalnoise Classic t-shirt. Here are the available designs:

Since my t-shirt supply will be limited by the size of my suitcase, I need to ask a favor of all those interested in grabbing a shirt from me at the event. Please send me over an email or leave a comment here stating which shirt you would like to purchase and what size. That way I can pack the necessary shirts to ensure I have what I need to get these into peoples’ hands. I will be charging $25 per shirt, $45 for two which is a bit of a savings from ordering online, and you will still get a swag bag containing Signalnoise stickers and buttons. Cool?

I’ll be on Twitter the whole time I’m at FITC San Francisco so I will be sure to let you know where I am and when I am selling my wares. Looking forward to seeing you there!

Since I launched the Signalnoise t-shirt line 3 weeks ago I have been getting no shortage of tweets, emails and comments in support of the designs and the new venture as a whole. The reaction from the creative community has been overwhelming, and very unexpected. I was caught quite offguard by the amount of t-shirt orders I received on the launch day and spent the past 2 weeks sitting at my coffee table folding and packing t-shirts to ship out.

Another surprise was what design customers were interested in. I spent a great deal of time creating original works for print on my t-shirts, but the biggest seller turned out to be the Signalnoise logo shirt. I’m humbled by the idea that so many want to wear my little rainbow sun on their chest, and for that I would like to send out a sincere thank-you to everyone who ordered shirts and took the time to send me encouraging notes and comments. This has been a wonderful experience thus far.

That being said, I’ve been working on some new designs over the past little while and have sent 3 to print yesterday as well as a re-print of my Signalnoise logo shirt. It sold out quickly, so a restock will happen very soon. I’m also looking into adapting the website a bit more to my apparel needs, as well as updating with some more detailed information regarding the shirts including a sizing chart for those who asked for it. You will see a few little changes to the site over the next little while.

Thanks again, everyone! I’m working hard to bring more designs to this growing project. Stay tuned!

I made the decision very recently, but I’m super happy to be attending FITC San Francisco in a couple of weeks, August 17 – 19. This will be my first trip to San Francisco, plus the first time seeing any part of the North American west coast. I won’t be presenting this time around, just attending.

I’m really looking forward to seeing some of my favorite online artists and developers speak, a few personal highlights are Erik Natzke, Scott Hansen, Yugo Nakamura, Robert Hodgin, Brendan Dawes, Jared Ficklin and a bunch of others. I’m even going to see a live Tycho set, can’t wait. On top of that, I’m looking forward to meeting and hanging out with fellow artists, designers and students whom I only know through the blog and Twitter, such as Fabio from Abduzeedo! Yeah!

I’m not sure what I can put together on such short notice, but I plan on bringing a few Signalnoise goodies along for the ride which might include stickers, buttons, posters or t-shirts for those I meet. I’ll see what I can do, and will keep you posted.

If you are attending the San Francisco event, drop me a comment on this post. Hope to see you there, kids.