Only one presenter gets a golden star from me–Michael Coleman’s (an After Effects Product Manager) efficient, yet droll session on After Effects expressions left me quietly humming. Expressions eliminate the tedium of keyframing and drive some seriously wicked effects.
I had high hopes for a session called “Next-Generation Flex Skinning,” but Ely had covered most of the salient points in his Gumbo talk so this one sort of fell flat for me. If you haven’t seen Ely or you’re looking for skinning examples built on top of Gumbo then it’s probably worthwhile. However, it was encouraging to listen to someone UI nerdy enough to argue over beer about whether a radial knob (a range scrubber) fits under the same component framework definition as a slider (a range scrubber). Ultimately the Gumbo team’s answer was no, but those nerds are my kind of people.
The Sneak Peaks were also a big winner. Due to some smart tactical decisions (yay beer) this was a fun event. Nice work Ted.