West Portal Reflections #7, September 7, 1997
West Portal Director of the MSU Communication Technology Laboratory
West Portal Reflections document my experiences as I try to open a portal to Northern California for Michigan State University. They are targetted to my teams in the Comm Tech Lab and Virtual University, to my close colleagues and bosses throughout Michigan State University, and to close friends and family. These pages serve as ethnographic documentation of my participant-observation research on TeleRelating ("using technology to sustain and enhance close personal relationships"). The contents mix professional and personal life because I am reaching out 2500 miles to people I care about and work with. I hope my reflections help you to keep me in your hearts and make San Francisco a place that is yours. Thanks for journeying with me as I think, learn and experiment.
I visited recent MSU digital media grad Jeff Johnson at his brand new job with Tippett Studios in Berkeley, makers of special effects and animation for Hollywood movies. Upcoming releases with special effects by Tippett include Star Trooper, Virus and My Favorite Martian. Jeff has been working there for one and one half weeks, in the position called "data wranger," taking care of 2 terrabytes of storage space. The grin on his face in the photo below stayed on his face throughout my visit. I love to see a student so thrilled with a new job, fulfilling the dreams he came to MSU to launch.
Phil Tippett, one of the original founders of Industrial Light and Magic, runs Tippett Studios. Small scale and life sized physical models of weird creatures and machines lurk in corners everywhere -- some famous and some top secret for not yet released Hollywood movies. Most of the work is computer modeling and animation. Sometimes a physical model comes first.
In a warehouse district in Berkeley the unlabled facilities, protected by gates and security systems, house about one hundred people. In spacious, high ceiling, multi-tiered work spaces, artists and techies invent computer models and animating them using SGI machines and Macs. Indoor photographs were forbidden because the designs of upcoming movies are secret. But I assure you the scary future creatures are really gross and disgusting -- terrific to work next to.
The receptionist types with an old Mac IIci which used to be a top of the line Mac in production lines for graphics of Jurassaic Park. Now that same PC is a low end tool. Folks who think I am crazy to teach multimedia developers to throw things at each other for stress relief might be interest to hear that the ceilings, lamps, and monitors were littered with soft ball-like objects with sticky edges on each side. The upper deck people were having a war with the lower deck people.
Jeff just emailed me these comments:
Just wanted to send along this report on what I'm up to, and what it's like working here at Tippett Studio in Berkeley, CA. I've been here about 2 weeks, and I simply love it. In my job as Data Wrangler, I monitor space on the terabyte (!) and manage the tape vault. I also work in systems administration (Unix and Mac) and help out with video systems in editorial. It is a fascinating job, and takes me around to all areas of production at the studio. The coolest aspect of the whole deal, of course, is just being able to work in film, and to be associated with a legend like Phil Tippett. (He was a founding designer and puppeteer for ILM - go home and watch the credits on Star Wars). I've had the chance to speak with him and hear his philosophy about an integrated approach to FX, animation, and filmmaking - it's really unique. Everyone here is friendly, and it really is a great, open working environment - they have beer parties every Friday night, and everyone hangs out and chats. Carrie stopped by the other day, and I was able to give her a mini-tour of the digital studio and the creature shop (where they do some puppeteering and motion capture) - she was wowed! (I'm sure she'll have some things to say in her own report).
So, let me just conclude by saying how how thankful I am to be doing something I truly and thoroughly enjoy. It's awesome! I'm really glad to be able to give a glimpse into this line of work, and would be more than happy to answer questions, and offer whatever help I can to anyone interested in this field. Please feel free to email me - jeffj@tippett.com. Thanks, and good luck to everyone!
Work in multimedia in the big city seems strangely insecure. Sasha is the person who caused Jeff Johnson's internship at Broderbund to happen, working with his boss, Joe. By the time Jeff got to Broderbund to start the internship, Sasha was no longer with the company. He had been a contractor, hired for a specific project . Broderbund kept him on long after that project because they liked his work. However, in late August for fiscal year reasons, they let go of all contractors.
I just received email from Joe, Sasha's former boss and Jeff's boss for the internship, indicating that HE no longer works for Broderbund either:
Joe Don' Work for Bro No Mo.
"I was one of the lucky 4% who was restructured out of a job on Wednesday. I'm a little surprised, but not bitter. Call it the "moses syndrome"---I could lead the Print Shop group to the promised land of real graphic design, but I couldn't cross the old river. *sigh* It's an old story.
The good news is that I have some time to think about what I'm gonna do next. So I'm going to get settled in my new digs*, watch a week's worth of summer blockbusters, and hang a new shingle:
XOJ d e s i g n . Art Direction & Information Architecture
In other words, I'm looking for contract work. If you hear anything, I'd like to know about it. More importantly, I'd like to hear from _you_. Drop me a line! I've got time for lunch..."
As one who has worked for Michigan State University for 23 years, this SF lack of job security is a terrifying fact of life. New jobs replace the lost one, but not without effort and anxiety.
I have made substantial progress networking with Northern California companies and academic labs and individuals. The chart below shows people I either have already met or am going to be meeting with soon. Dark orange circles are academics. Lighter orange circles are industry contacts. Green outlines indicate previous ties to MSU. I laid out the people somewhat geographically, with overlap between Palo Alto and other south of San Francsico groups. The individuals' workplaces range from Santa Cruz, to San Jose, Palo Alto and other Bay area south of San Francisco, San Francisco and Berkeley. Until I get these names, places and people plugged in to a navigable, zoomable VRML model, this is probably the last time I can fit everybody onto a single chart like this, as contacts will continue to mushroom as I attend events and meet more people.
These contacts are useful for my research into telerelating. They also facilitate setting up student internships as qualified (i.e., outstanding) DMAT students let me know they are interested in having an internship arranged.
In addition to my evolving human network, I will be preparing to contact the large Bay area companies to discuss funded research collaboration possibilities. I hope to make initial contacts this week, arranging meetings for after I return from my Lansing visit.
Brian and I are also redesigning the CTL and DMAT web sites. We feel that a more clear separation of research, CTL products/services and DMAT teaching will be useful as we incorporate the west portal factor.
Lots of conferences in this field happen in Northern California. During the week I am in Lansing, I will miss: a 4 day VRML intensive training seminar by Mark Pesche ( inventor of VRML) at SFSU Extension in San Francisco; a Women and Computing 3 day conference in San Jose; and a BayArea SIG presentation on True 3D Display Technologies at Apple.
Here are some of the upcoming conferences, interest groups and events I have identified so far:
Interest Groups- San Francisco Bay Area Chapter, ACM
- Silicon Valley ACM/SIGGRAPH Home Page
- Berkeley '97 Info Management Calendar of Events
Conferences- SF ResFest Digital Film Festival 9/25-9/27
- SF Virtual Worlds: Beyond the Screen Series Fall
- Wearcon Oct 13-14 Boston
- SF Telecommuting & Home Office Oct 16-17 SF
- ** SF Earth to Avatars, Oct 22-24, SF
- Palo Alto ICAD Nov 2-5 Sonification Palo Alto
- ** ACM MM97 Nov 9-13 Seattle
- SF IUI'98: Intelligent User Interfaces Jan 6-9 SF
- San Diego VR and Medicine, January
- Monterrey VRML '98 Feb 16-19 Monterrey
- LA CHI 98: Call for Participation Apr 18-23 LA
- Hypertext '98 June 2-4 Pittsburgh
- (** I will be speaking at these conferences. Darcy and I have submitted a proposal to the VR and Medicine conference. Brian and Lynn and I are considering submitting to CHI 98 (due Friday) and Brian is working on a piece with me for Hypertext '98 (due Dec 1))
Sheldon and I did make time for the zoo to see playful baby lion cubs fighting like kittens over large rubber balls and baby leopard cubs wobbling uncertainly as they climbed trees. Then we moved on to the Pacific three blocks away where local water temperatures are 8 degrees hotter than usual due to El Nino. We actually went swimming (this may not sound unusual to you, but very few people other than surfers in wet suits swim around San Francisco in the cold vast Pacific). And then biked home and got to work. We ate great Cambodian food tonight in Berkeley where we watched a fascinating documentary about the revolutionary, Che. And then came home and got back to work. (Am I starting to sound more like the Carrie you remember...?) The Casio digital camera makes bright green distortions in bright sunlight, but since the color has to be distorted, I prefer to modify it into yellow skies and red reflections.
Take care. See you soon!
