Thread
1 week and ~600 people later, I’m still trying to process that #eyeofestival is over. At the time I applied to volunteer in March, I was excited for the chance to meet my visualization heroes but little did I know the impact the festival would have on me.
As an usher, I got to meet the 600 attendees including those whose work has inspired my studies/projects in visualization and interests in different uses of programming @sxywu @AlbertoCairo @giorgialupi @stefpos @nealagarwal @halden_lin @W_R_Chase @currankelleher
As I look back on the week, every attendee I interacted with in greeting, talks, conversations and listening to left an impact on me. Eyeo’s motto “Converge to inspire” really did happen - where else could I meet people and have conversations about Tangible Bits, fabrication,
design, visualization, math, generative art, birds, nature, AI, hacking and more in one week. Before Eyeo, I was struggling to navigate what to work on next, where to draw inspiration from, answering the questions “so what exactly do you work on ?”
and “what do you plan to do after you graduate ?” and setting unfeasible target goals/deadlines to build fully functional projects to share.
In the past I’ve had difficulty embracing the uncertain but through the week’s talks and conversations, the speakers and attendees who are all talented and hard-working in their own right shared their doubts, questions, fears and how they overcome them.
@blprnt mentioned that one of the initial name ideas for Eyeo was Step Step Jump which was rejected but for me represents my Eyeo experience.
The speakers, attendees and atmosphere of Eyeo helped me take my first step in finding a community, overcoming my fear of the uncertain, finding inspiration, and how to look at each day/project as Shirley put it, “a work in progress”
as I work towards finding my next step and taking a jump into the certain.
To the speakers whose talks I attended - @mattckenyon @AlbertoCairo @nervous_system @giorgialupi @design_io @hexadecim8 Alex Nathanson @stefpos @ersinhanersin @dbtwr @birdturntable @the_jennitaur @sxywu thank you for sharing your inspiring stories, works and insights
To the speakers whose talks I wish I could have attended - @suhlomay @pinar_demirdag @agyeidesign @deedottiedot @_jenlowe_ @patriciogv @TheFeelies @genekogan @L05_ @PopovichN @prettydarke @jessnordell @golan and the substitute speakers
I can't wait to see your talks when they are published
To @blprnt @eyeofestival dave, caitlin @wesleygrubbs and the curatorial fellows - thank you for the opportunity to volunteer and meet an amazing community of people
And lastly thank you to all the new friends, fellow volunteers and people I met (This is only a subset of all the people I met whose twitter handles I could find. But do know I do remember meeting at some point so please reach out on discord or twitter
@connjie @ladataviz @RamikSadana @ollywogs @jedmund @lolyuchen @tarngerine @mflux @tdeBruyn @iloveprimes @mendez_phil @zhoyoyo @nselikoff @can @emily_miley @jackhulbertpdx @elibryan @annalizhaz @CarniDC @porquedotsam @PrinceOfBlair @taylorbaldwin
I wouldn't have been able to have so much fun and learn without all of you
