2020 1st DigiCluster Meeting – West Herts College

 

 

On this occasion, I travelled without company, and the journey was slow with heavy traffic, which was further exacerbated by a Breakdown Vehicle in attendance on the Exit Slip Road from the M1 Motorway, but I still managed to arrive reasonably early at the venue, the West Hertfordshire College Campus. Those already present were in several groups engaged in animated conversation.

Even as I assembled my camera and checked settings the room was filling and among several faces I knew I was greeted warmly and it was not long before I was capturing the growing numbers of attendees, and groups were forming with genuine interest in involvement, and there were obviously some newcomers. Whilst it was less than full, I took the opportunity to capture some images involving the majority of those attending so that there was a good chance that all were captured to individual advantage in lively conversation.

Many of those attending were gesticulating with great energy, and that is always something that attracts my attention, just as much as those to whom the actions were reinforcing either their individual descriptions or the underlying humour of situations they were retelling. Not being a movie taker, but a moment capturer, I have tried to record the varying emphasis being made by some of the moments I followed.

It was quite a time spent socialising before formality was brought to the occasion as speakers Jeremy Freeman of SmartGiving and Loiuse Towler of Indigotree took the floor to give their ninety second pitches, both of which were received intently by the audience.

There followed the Fireside chat, with Syd Nadeem introducing Lucy Mann of Gunpowder Consulting to the audience, and gently providing questions to maintain the momentum, and ending by inviting questions from the audience.

During these talks, I observed the audience activities as well as the speakers to give a balance to the atmosphere and later, the attendee interactions and further conversations both amongst themselves and with the speakers. I thoroughly enjoyed how much non-verbal communication in terms of gesticulations and facial and body language plays such a part in these human interactions. And, this camera I was using for the very first time gave me the opportunity to often distance myself further from my subjects because of the range of its zoom. For those interested in the technicalities: it was the Lumix FZ1000 MkII with its extended longer focal length reach zoom.

However, despite spending several hours beforehand attempting to familiarise myself with this camera, I came unstuck a few times, and so missed shots, despite taking a total of 640 and only putting out a mere 245, so the Cutting Room Floor, read ‘Bin’ was reasonably full! I hope those attending enjoy reliving the moments I captured.

DigiCluster Gathering at University of Hertfordshire

I set off from Marston Moretaine for Harpenden In what I had hoped was plenty of time to meet up with Product Designer, Peter Carr to head for another Networking event further South in Watford. I met  more traffic than anticipated, but still with adequate time to relax before the joint run to the venue. 

We should have anticipated that perhaps the traffic I had met was indicative of further delays, as there were similar volumes on this leg too, and we initially chose the wrong Car Park, and neither of us had enough loose change for the one we entered, so added more delay! This meant at least from my angle, there was no time to lose in getting my camera out and covering the assembled delegates already gathered and already buzzing. I did however at least grab a quick drink and put it in an accessible place before spotting the most animated groups to shoot and some of the organisers, such as Syd Nadeem, putting the screens and presentation material together. There were many faces I knew, but also a good number that were fresh, and I did get a few brief words with a few whilst catching up with as many informal shots to get my eye in.

The  light level was good, but the crowd in amongst the heavy furniture meant moving around an amount of carefully negotiated strides over three-legged blue-fabricced seating to choose different groups in animated conversation. In the short time I had before the start of the formal introduction to the presentations, I wanted to ensure I had captured as many of the delegates in the small groups of conversations as possible, before I became static as far as my viewpoint was concerned. Having located a spot from where I had a good view of the group of Speakers, I asked if my seat could be kept before taking a few more shots of the group as a whole. This ensured I had a shot of the audience for the evening, and fortuitously this came as the final shot on Page 2, with the start of proceedings on the following page of images — Phew!

Enjoy. I certainly did, and thoroughly appreciated Mark McDermott’s interesting relaxed telling of his journey. I hope that the images I captured convey the spirit of the evening for those attending.

Digi-Cluster January 2019, West Herts College, Watford

The weather for the evening’s meeting of the Digital-Cluster group of Creatives was wet and windy, with a threat of snow for the return trip, but the spirit of those already gathered by my arrival was both warm and positive.

On this occasion I drove down alone, and two designers I would normally have met were not going to be there, which was a shame, as they had prior engagements. This engagement was going to be the first occasion that I would be using the new mirrorless full-frame camera body from Canon, the EOS R, and it was now that I put all that I had learned from my earlier outings to the real test.

I was nervous, and the first few shots I was very aware that my hands were shaky,  and when using the screen to select where I wanted to focus, I found it difficult to find the square cursor to move it into place for the subject I wanted to focus on, before realising I had to remember to keep my fingers away from the eyepiece, as this pulled it off-screen. I had to keep reminding myself to keep all my other fingers well away. The nerves abated once I started to be careful about coming to wards the screen from below, and avoid other fingers from getting close to the eyepiece.

I was very aware that I was working far less smoothly, with less confidence than normal, and ‘chimping’, far more to check focus and framing. However, what I soon realised was that the image within the eyepiece was so much brighter than the scene I was shooting, which had not been apparent from all the outdoor testing I had been doing in the preceding week.

Occasionally I did show a couple the people the images I had taken to give them an idea of the improvement in quality over what I had been able to achieve with my earlier DSLRs using the same lens.

The evening began by Syd Nadim apologising that one scheduled speaker had not been able to make it for personal reasons, but had recorded a message which Syd duly played on screen, he also explained that there were some 90-Second pitches, and a ‘fireside chat’ covering a range of topics, and questions from the audience.

At the end of all this formal section there were a range of pizzas and drinks kindly provided, and later for those interested a trip to the bodega. The gallery of pictures I took of the informal networking and the talks, hopefully captures the spirit of the evening, and certainly proved to me that the EOS R definitely provides high quality images.

DigiCluster at Watford Town Hall

Peter Carr and I went from Harpenden to Watford for the evening networking gathering at a new venue, Watford Town Hall, and fortunately the car Park we have used on previous occasions was familiar territory, but the journey’s navigation was provided by Peter as he sat beside me with a GPS app on his new iPhone. Peter seems determined to test my knowledge of the car’s width by choosing a route involving the narrowest of restrictive traffic-calming roads, and I invariably gently nudge the kerb as I pass through –  perhaps he considers this to be the price to pay for doing the navigating for me!

Despite early crowded roads as we left Harpenden, we made fairly reasonable time and were certainly not the latest of arrivals. As we left the car park we met a fellow delegate, who had already done a complete circuit of the building searching for the correct entry, and the door we selected for entry proved to be correct so we all entered and signed in! Obviously yet another navigation test; and we passed.

We were treated to cups of tea or coffee before entry to the hall where we were welcomed by Manny Lewis. From there Syd Nadeem took over to introduce our speakers with a brief synopsis from their LinkedIn Profiles, which later was to gives all a laugh when introducing Howard Hughes with a brief History of his namesake, but the profile was from way before Linked In was even dreamed of! It did mean Chris Farthing was let off lightly, but later in conversation he did own up to a girlfriend named Penny!

The discourses from the Speakers was concerning the recent free WiFi link to Watford Town Centre, and Introduction to G-Cloud, the Internet of Things and the means whereby data could be streamed vast distances very much faster from embedded sensors that had long lives due to much lower consumption or even from being solar-powered. There was also a short Q&A session and some short videos to get the messages across, We were also introduced to much improved methods of procurement with much shorter lead times and fewer restrictions and were invited to consider taking a look at the new means of tendering that was now available.

At the end of this session, we were once again treated to a selection of Pizzas and a range of drinks as we then spoke to the speakers and amongst our fellow colleagues. I hope that the pictures I took give a taste of the evening, though the blog does not proved smells and flavours. I did make an observation, I learned that Josh Bolland’s listening stance is a precursor to launching both his body arms and hands when he is ready to launch int animated speech, so for your added delectation, I give you this ‘tell’:

When you see this stance you know he is listening, and is tightly coiled ready to launch into an answer…

Digi-Cluster 2016 Finale – Warner Bros. Studios

To close the Network Evenings for 2016, JB Cole, Clock and Digi-Cluster with sponsorship from Watford & West Herts Chamber of Commerce, Hertfordshire LEP and West Herts College, the final Meeting for Digi-Cluster was arranged to be at the Warner Brothers Studios at Leavesden.

Peter Carr and I went down in my car and arrived we presumed well early, but found we were not the first by quite a number, and as we went through all the necessary Security procedures, we took the opportunity to look around the maps of the venue, and thumbed or way through the History book, but it only covered the US era, but later the more recent history was covered by Dan Dark in his opening welcome to us in the Presentation theatre.

We did not have long to wait, and in smallish groups we were carefully shepherded between Security staff at various gates till we arrived at the complex that housed our allocated Presentation theatre.

After meeting up with others to chat over pre-event drinks, we moved into the theatre and Josh Bolland handed over to Dan Dark who in a very relaxed and assured welcome, gave us a short resumé of how and why Warner Brothers came to be here. He also showed a couple of videos to illustrate his talk, and answered questions from the audience.

He related some of the location's history and the benefits that accrue from the sheer size of the plot and scale of the existing but derelict buildings, that were so perfectly suited for the needs of a Film Studio.

This was followed by three 90 second pitches by Helena Baker, Tom Shurville and Tim Parfitt, with Syd Nadeem questioning the participants to provide background and expand upon their projects.  Emma Stewart then followed to announce a new programme to support SMEs who work, or wish to work within the TV/Film sector and explained how 'Creative England' would be hoping to provide funding to help bring this about.

We then all adjourned for the customary and generous food and drinks to close the evening; chatting amongst both ourselves and the speakers. Once again grateful thanks go to our hosts at Warner Brothers, and to all those who behind the scenes put everything together to ensure the evening's success, and we were learned the next meeting is scheduled for March 2017.