Fuel Up

Every industry and profession in the world has conferences. If you are in a licensed profession then chances are that you have to attend conferences, classes, and seminars to maintain your certification. For the rest of us, a conference is a vital part of staying ahead of the curve.

A conference of any kind is only has good as you make it. A well-run conference will have an agenda that is timely, informative, and on topic with current trends and advancements. If you attend these sessions then you should walk away with new ideas that can not only help your company but will help you with your career advancement. If you feel like you are in a rut, then go to a conference and re-charge your creative batteries.

Networking

Networking is always a big part of any conference. It’s not just about hanging with friends and business partners. It’s about meeting new people. It’s about sharing ideas. When you have an opportunity to talk face-to-face you will find that many of your colleagues have the same issues. You have a relaxed setting to share these issues and ideas.

You could also use a conference to pitch new business and maintain current clients. If you plan accordingly you can “kill two birds with one stone”. You can save travel expenses by getting several face-to-face meetings at one conference.

EAMC 2009 at Colorado Springs

The Event and Arena Marketing Conference is coming up June 10th thru June 13th in Colorado Springs. carbonhouse is a sponsor of the conference. We sponsor this for two reasons: 1) we want to expose and market our product to this industry. 2) We want to learn as much as possible about the industry. We need to stay as up-to-speed as you do. We need to hear from our current clients and potential clients. We take this info back to the office where we can create new products that the event and entertainment industry needs to market in the 21st Century.

We hope you will join us at this year’s conference. We plan to be part of a panel session discussing online sales & marketing. We also will host a breakout presentation on what we can do for you. If you see us at the bar, tell us you read this blog and we will buy you a drink. Cheers!

EAMC 2009 Registration

Author: James Sack

Let’s make fists!

Jeffrey Brown, Writer and artist

As a creative design firm, we find inspiration from other creatives. The weekend of June 20-22, the Heroes convention took place in Uptown Charlotte. The Convention was started in 1982 by the gang at Heroes Aren’t Hard To Find —one of the premier comics specialty shops in the country.

Most of carbonhouse attended the show at some point–as well as many other creatives from around town (Shoutouts to Studiobanks and Marty Kelso).

There were many great guests this year, but what always stands out for me is the Top Shelf Productions‘ booth. They publish outstanding, contemporary graphic novels by some dedicated artists.Two favs generally make the trek to Charlotte—Jeffrey Brown and Alex Robinson. These two excel in the little episodes, slices of life stories and I highly recommended you check out their work.

One of the great things about the Heroes Con is the chance to talk with your favorite artists/writers; they can even provide original sketches for you for a minimal charge. Jeffrey had a great idea this year to create convention trading cards. Three of us had our portraits done by Jeff with a running theme. A little back story: last year Mr. Brown created a self portrait for me with him saying “Let’s make fists.” Jeffrey took that theme and ran with it. Below are Jeff’s sketches of us, which assemble a nice strip. Thank you, Jeffrey Brown!

View more photos from the convention here.

Contemporary Graphic Novels that satisfy:

Blankets by Craig Thompson
Box Office Poison by Alex Robinson
Mother, Come Home by Paul Hornschemeier
Epileptic by David B.
Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood by Marjane Satrapi
Sleepwalk: and Other Stories by Adrian Tomine

Artevation is a show of works depicting historic places and properties in Charlotte. The show is a tribute to the late Warren Burgess, an influential city planner, urban designer and talented artist who worked many years for the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Planning Commission and the Town of Davidson. Artevation will showcase many of Burgess’ architectural drawings, as well as the work of the following local artists whose work depicts Charlotte’s architecture and history through photography, fabric art, paintings, woodcuts, illustrations, and more:

• Wendy Arundel
• Nellie Ashford
• Bryon Baldwin
• Diane Davis
• Starr Davis
• David French
• John Howard
• Deborah Langsam
• James Sack

“When I was asked to participate in Artevation I jumped at the chance—especially with the tribute to Warren Burgess,” Sack said. “I had the pleasure of working with Warren for a number of years while I was vice president of the Historic North Charlotte Neighborhood Association. His sketches on the NoDa area are fantastic and were an inspiration for my NoDa series of wood block prints. Warren was a true visionary for Charlotte, and his mark on Charlotte’s fabric is a constant reminder of his work. I look forward to this show.”

Carlos personally studied with the world’s noted master on creativity, Dr. Edward de Bono, author of the Six Thinking Hats and other bestsellers. He coaches companies and star athletes worldwide on how to achieve breakthrough creativity and performance.

Over the course of several hours, Carlos revealed the problems most of us encounter in terms of “group think” and other barriers to creativity. We are taught, for example, to defend our ideas—often in a very competitive and even arrogant manner.

Breaking the Barriers to Creativity

This all stems from centuries-old practices, notably passed down from the Greeks and their debating style of philosophy and discourse. To this day, we live in a terribly litigious society that rewards staunch positions.

Unfortunately, the end result is that many people either jump to conclusions, believe they are “not creative,” choose to sit on the sidelines, or see everything in a very linear, black-and-white way.

The key to getting rids of these roadblocks in our thinking is exploration vs. argument. Ironically, Carlos used the analogy of the “blind men and the elephant.” from which we derived the title of our blog.

“Most people still stand in one place beside the elephant, insisting that their viewpoint is the truth,” Carlos explained. “The real moral of the story is: Walk around!”

In others words, you have to find ways to move beyond the comfortable grooves or your experience, embrace stress and systematically bring new ideas to the table.

The Six Thinking Hats method is ideal for understanding the process of provoking different paths of thought, particularly in a group setting. Thinking, Carlos said, is in fact a skill that can be taught, and that everyone can do.