Fireside Chat: A High-energy Visual Effects Tech Panel Event
Since the creation of the VFX Tech Meetup group July last year, we’ve had a series of successful events where hundreds of VFX enthusiasts, technologists and entrepreneurs have come together to share best practices, discuss the latest in media technology, and mentor aspiring developers and engineers.
On June 30, we successfully held our first tech panel event where industry thought leaders converged to discuss innovation and challenges within studio workflows and share insights from their vast experience working in film technology.
The expert panel consisted of like-minded individuals who share a passion for pushing innovation within the industry. We had Lawrence Schlosser from ConductorIO Atomic Fiction, Eoghan Cunneen from Lucasfilm and Usman Shakeel from Amazon Web Services — a formidable combination of industry experts with collective experience of over 35 years in creative technology.
The event was moderated by Igor Boshoer, who founded the VFX Tech Meetup with this very intent — to create a platform for VFX and film tech enthusiasts to learn from each other’s experience. The panel discussed a wide range of subjects relevant to the present state of film technology, as well as how it is going to evolve in the future. We discussed emerging technologies, best practices related to film and VFX pipelines, the impact of open source and cloud-based technologies on VFX pipelines, and how VR and AR will shape the future of film-making.
An enthusiastic and forthcoming audience of young and raring pipeline developers, engineers, startup entrepreneurs and VFX enthusiasts played a big role in the success of the event. As many audience members were new to the VFX/Film industry, the discussion questions covered the whole spectrum — from the basics [What is a visual effects pipeline? How would you define a VFX stack?] to the more complex aspects of studio workflows.
The panelists provided valuable insights into:
· Recent advances in technology workflows
· Challenges faced when working on a global pipeline
· Data sharing and management between global teams
· The need for innovation and what drives innovation in studios
· Key roadblocks in studio technology and how they can be removed
· Impact of Cloud-computing on studio workflows
· The future of story-telling with Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR)
· Real-life and day-to-day challenges of working in VFX
The event concluded with a riveting round of Audience Q&A and turned out to be a great success, thanks to my brilliant colleagues who are always so forthcoming when it comes to sharing what they have learnt through years of living and breathing creative tech.
Missed this event? No problem! There are definitely going to be more of these.
Join us at the VFX Tech Meetup group to be the first to know about future Meetups. We’ll be glad to have you!
