Greetings all,
It’s been a week since I’ve come back from my trip to VO Atlanta. Drove all the way there and back. Next time, a plane might be the way to go. We’ll see how airline prices are by this time next year.
What an amazing time. Going in, I knew that I was going to meet a lot of people, learn a lot…man, I did all that, but so much more than that.
Meeting People: This is the backbone of VO Atlanta. The people you will meet there will be so awesome, so willing to help, so darn cool, that you wish the day had an extra 12 hours just to sit and chat with everyone. The VO community is one of the most friendly and helpful that you will meet, and VO Atlanta draws a line under that. Heck, at one point, we had an airline pilot hang out with a bunch of us because he was so enthralled with what we do! (I did say to him, ‘you do know you’re an airline pilot, and this should be the other way around, right?)
Case in point about the community: I arrived and went down to the bar. I see Dave Fennoy. I figure, what the heck, I’ll say hi. I do, he comes over, and we BS for a little bit. The fanboy in me was trying real hard not to come out, but the point is, he was just Dave, and had plenty of time for me.
Learn a lot: I may have missed one morning class due to wanting to sleep in (cut me a break, it’s a 15 hr drive, and I was exhausted!), but for the most part, I saw everything I registered for. Learning from movie trailer maestro Jack Daniel and the head of the CNN promo department were major highlights. New goal: be a promo guy for CNN.
Another great part was meeting Matt Buckner from Sennheiser. I was checking out the mics they had on display (a TLM102 with my name on it, unfortunately, it must have fallen off) and the U87 (also with my name on it), and struck up a conversation. One failed sweepstakes attempt later, Matt tells me he’s sending some Sennheiser 400Pro headphones my way. I’ve been using them for a few days now, and MAN…Matt rocks. Thanks, Matt.
It all comes back to the people. Getting to meet Jessica Holtan and Ryan Derosiers in the flesh was a blast, as expected, getting to meet Joe Cipriano and J. Michael Collins and actually talk with them was incredible, and then finding new friends after the seminars were done…good times were had.
The cherry on top of it all was learning that Anna and J. Michael Collins were going to be taking over from the esteemed Gerald Griffith, and NOT ending. The crowd went wild, and Gerald, I hope, felt a great weight lifted from his shoulders. I hope his brother Jerome attends the parties thrown going forward.
We’ll call this part of a series. There’s still plenty more to talk about.