Fireside

How do you tell a story with a million tweets? – YOH KAWANO & DAVID SHEPARD

Social media can tell compelling stories; the only problem is how to find them. This presentation will demonstrate methods for looking at both the big picture and the small picture in major world events. We will discuss how to discover and draw attention to the compelling personal portraits that individual users’ tweets provide. We will also demonstrate the use of topic modeling to discover large trends many Twitter users are discussing, which provides a subtler picture of what people are thinking about. Combined, these tools can offer many portraits of an event, from the individual tweet protesting in the street to a nation’s attitude toward that very protest.

Building Next Gen Comics – JOSHUA DYSART & DIANA WILLIAMS

With the collapse of the economy and the rise of digital distribution the old model comic book industry has found itself in an existential crisis. Past reliance on other media to subsidize it has left us with a landscape where making and marketing comics for comics’ sake has become increasingly difficult. Sound gloomy? Not if you look at this as an opportunity to rebuild the medium in favor of the creator and the idea. It’s time for comics to go back to being punk rock.

Blending & Bending; Throwing the Movie Making Playbook out the Window – EFFIE BROWN & ZEKE ZELKER

With more energy than two electrons colliding, the fiercely independent producers Effie “Hollywood: Brown and Zeke “DIY” Zelker team up to discuss, debate, listen and learn on their two very different approaches to creating cinema. In today’s creative environment producers need to adapt their approach to tell compelling stories that do much more than jump off the screen. Effie and Zeke are in the midst of producing a multi faceted, multi phase project blending and bending the rules between truth and fiction to create in today’s interactive world.

Experiential Learning – JOEL ARQUILLOS, JAMIE SALKA & ANTERO GARCIA

Join some of LA’s most innovative educators as they sit down for a discussion around what they are doing to engage their students within and outside of the classroom. Using creative writing, gaming, performers and props 826la, Story Pirates as well individual teachers are challenging the way students are learning.

More to come…