Rather than writing some long drawn out report, I thought I’d give you the “a picture tells a thousands words” version, and just include lots of pictures (photos by Brad Moore and Drew Gurian). Here ya go!
View of the opening standing-room only Keynote presentation from Thursday morning. The screens aren’t actually white, but well, ya know, it’s an exposure thingy.
This guy is psyched because he knows that winning a Photoshop World Guru Award can be a career-changing experience. (Just ask NAPP’s own Corey Barker—–that’s how we found him!).
Nothing like waiting for the Expo Floor to open.
The “Adobe Halftime Report” kicks off the opening keynote (LtoR: Matt Kloskowski, Me, and Dave Cross”—“The Photoshop Guys.” We played it up as though it was a real halftime report, but of course, we replaced all the football lingo with Photoshop lingo. Sad, I know.
Crowd favorite, Adobe VP John Loiacono (AKA Johnny L) scored big as the featured keynote speaker.
We totally pranked Johnny with a Vegas-style intro, complete with a parody of Toni Basil’s “Mickey” song, titled “Oh Johnny Your So Fine….” along with a live appearance from the UNLV Running Rebel cheerleaders. Johnny was speechless (Well, for a while anyway).
Johnny L and Adobe’s Russell Preston Brown (AKA Dr. Brown), sneak-peeked some “future Photoshop technology” that had the crowd oooohhing and ahhhhing. Well, mostly oooohhhing, but I did hear the occasional Ahhh, and a gasp or two.
After the keynote, it’s time to get to class. Here’s Joe McNally in one of his lightning technique classes, enjoying a shallow depth of field.
McNally shooting a portrait of Vanelli. This is a particularly important photo, historically speaking, because this is the longest period of time Vanelli stood still the entire conference. That’s Drew Gurian, Joe’s assistant, getting all dressed up for the event, in some really nice shorts and flip flops.
Fighting for their right to Party! (Warning: Obscure Beastie Boys reference alert).
In Part 2 of my Retouching session, I did a live shoot in the classroom, and then retouched the portrait using the techniques we had learned in Part 1, and the first half of Part 2.
Here’s a shot from the Canon Live Studio Shoot pre-conference workshop. They created some amazing shots that day, and one lucky student won a Canon 50D camera and some other goodies (the winner was chosen by applause from the keynote crowd).
Photographer Laurie Excell during one of her sessions on the Show Floor. (By the way: Laurie rocks—–people love her style of teaching!).
RC Concepcion during one of his classroom sessions (Besides Vanelli, I think RC probably had the best time of anybody at Photoshop World—that guys was everywhere doing everything. I’m not sure he slept).
Getting up close and personal during my live Elinchrom lighting demo at the Bogen Imaging Booth. I showed how we use the Elinchrom BXRI’s, spot grids, strip banks, and the HiLite background in the studio. Great crowd, and lots of great questions and interaction. Had a ball!
Moose Peterson once again brings an attendee to tears during the portfolio reviews (totally kidding—this was staged just for laughs). Made ya look for a sec, though, didn’t it? ;-)
Ben Willmore during one of his sessions (See, I wasn’t kidding—-Ben really did get a Mohawk haircut). I know. I was asking the same thing.
Jeff Schewe during one of this Real World Camera Raw sessions (If I remember right, at the moment this photo was taken, he was saying something along the lines of “Hey, did you see Ben Willmore’s Mohawk?).
Things got a little out of hand at Photoshop Midnight Madness (just ask Terry Reinert, shown above, what happened next. Hint: the woman standing behind me [my assistant Kathy Siler] walked up and slapped him right across the face. Luckily, it was all a set-up to pull a prank on the crowd, who thought one of them might be next).
Your hosts for Photoshop Midnight Madness; Terry “T-Bone” White, Yours Truly (wearing a Bucs jersey, not realizing that we would be 0 and 4 just a few days later), and DJ ‘Roddy Rod’ Mac-Daddy, Mad-Dog, Harlan.
This poor guy entered our Midnight Madness “Photoshop Tips Challenge EXTREME” and had to give the audience a Photoshop tip while under extreme conditions (loud tension music playing, two red heat lamps aiming at him, he had two guys right up on him, he had to wear goggles while Terry used a black magic marker to scribble on the front of the glasses, while Matt was standing off camera firing a Nerf pistol at his face, among other things). It was a beautiful moment of love.
Photoshop World instructor Dave Cross, with NAPP’s Executive Director Larry Becker, during his induction into the Photoshop Hall of Fame
Wrap-up
There’s more to show you (including some cool stuff coming up on Thursday), but this post is so long I thought I’d better wrap it up for now. Next year we’re in Orlando in late March or early April (I can’t remember which), but it’s going to be even bigger, even better, with lots of new classes, some new instructors, and some wild new stuff to take everything up a big notch, and if you didn’t make it to Vegas this year, I hope I’ll see you in Orlando next year. It is simply an amazing, creative, learning experience and three-day Photoshop love fest you’ll never forget. I can’t wait!!!!
P.S. Catch Scott Bourne’s Wrap-up Coverage of Photoshop World, over at PhotoFocus, right here.
