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2004:
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2005:
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November 15, 2004
Well, PCGG-II is over. Many thanks to Dinesh and
Joy for hosting the event and giving me a place to stay while there. It
was a great weekend and I'm looking forward to the next gathering.
My experience began with meeting Tom at the bottom of the
escalator at the San Diego airport. He was kind enough to stop by the airport on
his way to the Padiyar's and pick me up. We spent the trip talking about
holography, glass making and art in general. Once at the Padiyar's I was quickly
pounced on by Danny who thrust an unexpected half-wave plate into my hands and
the real gathering began as there was a constant sharing throughout the weekend.
Almost everyone was present when I arrived, with the exception of Colin who
arrived not much later. It was great to greet old friends and meet additional
new ones in Bruce, Larry and Eric. Discussions on Friday night ran the gamut of
holography, science, politics, religion and general gossip with of course a
heavy emphasis on holography while Dinesh was preparing a fine dinner of chicken
byrani and kabobs. The discussions on the first night ended about 2:30 or 3:00am
if I remember correctly and only ended because the plan was to get back together
at the lab at 9:00am.
After breakfast we all met at the lab where another new friend, Bob, showed up
and the gathering was complete.
We began the day with semi-formal talks starting with the LCD panel work done by
Larry, hexcel table construction by myself and Andres (who unfortunately could
not be present at this gathering), the single-beam methods used by Colin in his
classes and the hexcan development that John has been engaged in.
The talks were informative and enjoyable with everyone contributing what they
could in the way of questions, comments on the subject and suggestions which
kept the day going strong.
Lunch at the pub continued the more casual discussions threaded through with the
ever-present topic of holography.
After lunch we continued with one more talk/discussion from Tom on obtaining
surplus equipment and then started working on the group holograms. While one
core group was working on debugging (or is that debunking) the liti material,
another was working on the group hologram. Throughout, people were filtering
through the lab, helping at times with both efforts or deep in general
discussions. That continued for several hours through several (eight?) liti
plates and four DCG copies of the group arrangement until we conceded that it
was time for dinner and headed back to the Padiyar's house for pizza and more
discussions on holography and anything else we felt like talking about. Movies,
current events, gossip about people in the industry. If you weren't there, we
probably talked about you <grin>.
Sunday started with an English style breakfast of sausage, eggs, bacon and beans
cooked by Dinesh and quick drive back to the lab.
Once back at the lab we started out with a talk from Joy on modelling/molding
techniques followed by a round-table discussion on where the PCG should go from
here. Several people expressed a desire to hold the next gathering and everyone
had good suggestions on how we we can grow the gatherings in the future. Look
for more information in the coming months. Following this we had the last talk
with Danny giving an in-lab presentation of his work on applying photographic
lighting techniques to holographic setups.
We then proceeded to an ad-hoc people-flow about the lab, talking about how the
Padiyar's do their work, continuing debunking of the liti material (even going
so far as to attempt a few exposures on the newport table to show that the
problems with the material have nothing to do with stability) as well as sealing
of the group holograms.
The evening ended for me by saying goodbyes to everyone still remaining (Colin
had had to leave a little earlier and unfortunately Bruce wasn't able to make it
on Sunday) and talking to Joy as she drove me to the airport.
Much of this was written while sitting in a airport Starbucks listening to good
Ray Charles music, drinking a decaf mocha (heretical but I wanted to try to
sleep on the plane) and watching people go by as I think to recall the blur that
is the weekend.
It was a pleasure to get back together with what I now consider "old friends"
and meet some new ones during a weekend devoted to holography and the eclectic
subjects that interest the kind of people that really like to get their hands
dirty making everything from art to kitsch to whatever it is we feel like
making.
This was the second PCG Gathering and from my standpoint it was clearly a
success. We're two for two so far and I can't see it getting anything but better
in the future. We have no lack of ideas and are an inclusive group who want to
bring both newbies and oldbies in and continue to encourage information and
technique sharing.
Two of the ideas put forth this round that I think we should make a concerted
attempt to make happen next time are the ideas of a swap of equipment/holograms
and a gallery. I think the swap of holograms would go over well and if anyone
can carry surplus to swap people would enjoy that. For the kind of people that
many of us are, it's quite a lot of fun to play in someone else's toybox. For
example, on Sunday Tom brought in a huge short-focus collimating mirror and it
was a hit with people playing with it and I believe he ending up with finding
buyers for all the ones he had. Most holographers like to show their work but
some need some prodding to bring their creations out and "show them off".
Strongly encouraging people to bring one or more items to hang on a wall would
be a good way to interest the general public in a gallery gallery environment or
otherwise public area and could also be used as a friendly critique wall. We
should also try to have a session of "bring out your dead" (not literally) where
people, in a very friendly and constructive atmosphere can provide feedback on
each piece.
Thoughts on the group hologram. The hologram itself is a collection of “cats”
representing each attendee and is a perfect hologram for the group. It's as many
of "us" as we could fit into a single-beam hologram, gathered any which a way
and all participating in whatever way we could by providing an object for the
collage and/or helping out with the creation.
This is what these weekends have been about, participation and sharing, and I
hope we can carry on that spirit and reality forward. Participate any way you
can, no matter how much or how little. We had a good collection of people, some
who were brand new to holography all the way to the pro level and every
discussion was informative to each person on some level (or so it seemed to me).
It's possible that the next gathering will be held either in Visalia or Georgia
although I'm fairly keen to have it in Texas again if it turns out at nobody
else is available to pick up the baton. If not the next time, I'm quite happy to
wait until my turn comes around again.
It will be very interesting to see how the future meetings grow. Will we be able
to move the "lab" sessions into a college or some other sizable (relative to
home labs) area where we can have more than two tables of one kind or another
going at the same time? Will more "oldbies" be willing to attend and share
information as we have been doing? Will we be able to attract non-holographers
who are interested in how their medium can inform holography or holography can
inform their medium? Time will tell.
The only thing I regret not doing this time was a group photo (and staying
Sunday night). Colin had already left before I thought of it and while Joy
thought of it earlier in the day, she forgot about it in the steady activity of
the day. Still, we have photos and video galore and the memories to carry us
through to the next gathering.
To see some of the pictures and video I took at the gathering, take a look at
the PCGG-II link on the left navigation pane.
Present
2003:
Feb | Mar |
Apr | Jun |
Jul | Aug |
Sep | Oct |
Nov | Dec
2004:
Jan | Feb |
Mar | Apr |
May | Jun |
Jul | Aug |
Sep | Oct |
Nov | Dec
2005:
Blog
2006: Blog
2007: Blog
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