Review: The Podcast & Portable Media Expo

Just over a week ago, thousands of podcasters, video podcasters, netcasters, vidcasters, vloggers, bloggers and many others descended upon the Ontario Convention Center in Ontario California to attend the 2nd annual Podcast & Portable Media Expo.

And I was there to witness the event. In a word, it was fantastic and I’m very happy to share this collection of images and links to the people and places mentioned below each image. If you have additional caption info or comments, please send them to me at images@andrewdarlow.com, or feel free to leave comments below (all photographs below © Andrew Darlow).

At the entrance of the Ontario Convention Center, where the Expo was held.

Saturday 9/30 Keynote by Andrew Baron, founder and producer of Rocketboom

Robert Scoble doing the Saturday “Unkeynote” on the show floor in Podango’s booth.

Robert Scoble and Lee Gibbons, Podango’s CEO in Podango’s booth. You can find the audio from Podango’s entire Unconference from the show floor here.

Jake Ludington’s 9/30 session: Turning Passion into Profits – Converting Free Subscribers into Paying Customers. Jake has a lot of great info and tutorials on his site, and I recommend his Hollywood Reviews podcast as well.

Jake Ludington interviewing Greg Smith from FeederReader, which, according to the company’s website is “a full-featured RSS Aggregator with podcast listening and watching (“podcasting” or “podcatching”) and enclosure support, running on Windows Mobile.” Jake’s interview can be heard here.

At Samson Audio’s booth, where the company gave away a Samson CO3U Multi-Pattern USB Studio Condenser Microphone every 15 minutes.

The LA Podcasters Live Show on Friday night at the Ontario Marriott. Dan Klass, Lance Anderson, Cush (Pictured Above), Tim Coyne (From The Hollywood Podcast), and the Goodnight Burbank Crew treated a packed room of people to stories, videos and just a jolly good time. The event was sponsored by LA Podcasters and iProng. Frank Conniff (TV’s Frank from Mystery Science Theater 3000) and Moira Quirk (Mo from Nickelodeon’s GUTS & GLOBAL GUTS) also recorded an episode of the Live Radio Adventures Of Dr. Floyd Show.

Storyteller Lance Anderson Friday night at the LA Podcasters Live Show. He told a funny little story involving a celebrity.

Dan Klass played a short video on Friday night that he made at the LA Podcasters Live Show.
In the video, Dan describes his life as an actor and a stay at home dad. It’s very funny, well put together and I believe it was also played for the entire audience before the first Keynote address on 9/30. You can find the video here.

Dan Klass speaking briefly about his video and his view of life in LA (and life in general). If you are not familiar with The Bitterest Pill (one of Dan’s podcasts), I highly recommend checking it out. I also recently finished Dan Klass’ and Michael Geohagen’s co-authored book, Podcast Solutions, and I recommend it highly for those who want to just listen to or make podcasts. I found the Audacity open source audio editor tips especially helpful.

Libsyn.com’s Marty Mulligan just before the clock struck 12. He was then presented a cake for his birthday.

Representatives from podcast spot, a hosting service with unmetered bandwidth. Surprising to me was that one of their service levels (under 25mb/month) is currently free.

I met the Podcast Voice Guys (Joe Klein and Bill Fortune) just outside the Exhibit Hall. They specialize in voiceovers and audio production. Their site has some great sample audio, and they allow you to listen in via Skype while they record your audio.

This photo is of Trucker Tom, from Tom’s Trucker Blog and Podcast. I’ve heard many of Tom’s comments on Adam Curry’s Daily Source Code and it was great to meet and speak with him for a while. I also photographed Tom for a few minutes outside the Convention Center and I can’t wait to print some of the images.

Sam Levin from Inside Mac Radio and Sam Levin Consulting. Sam does a great job reviewing products and software from many different companies on his “Cool Mac Picks” segment of Inside Mac Radio.

On the show floor in front of blip.tv and Podkive.com.

Gary Leland from Podcast Pickle spotted a “Pickle Party” announcement at the Doubletree hotel’s front desk on the way to the Libsyn party. Turns out some fans of the Pickle just decided to have a Pickle Party and Gary wasn’t even aware of it.

Eric Olson from Feedburner in front of a shirt being signed by Feedburner fans.

Rick Klau and Eric Olson from Feedburner in the Feedburner booth. Rick is VP of Business Development at Feedburner and did a session at the Expo entitled: How To Create and Optimize Your RSS Feed for Maximum Effectiveness.

Jason Van Orden during his session: Promoting Your Podcast: Cost-Effective Strategies for Building Your Audience. I purchased Jason’s book at the show and believe that it can help many podcasters build their audience and make more money from their shows and websites. Jason’s site also has a lot of great comments about the Expo, with an overview of some of the tips he picked up from a number of the speakers.

At the Expo session: For Musicians Only: Promoting Your Music with Podcasting. From left to right are Corey Denis from IODA, C.C. Chapman from Accident Hash, Managing the Grey, U-Turn Cafe and the Podsafe Music Network, and Ali Partovi from GarageBand.com.

Ben “Bendrix” Williams from Digital Media Tips N Tricks (and many other shows) reviewing his session notes (see below for the title of his presentation).

Ben Williams answering questions during his talk on video blogging and podcasting.

Kris Smith from Palegroove Studios at his session: Leveraging Your Knowledge as a Successful Podcasting Consultant. Kris has a nice overview of his experiences from the show on his blog.

Yes, those are Apple iPods, Sony PSPs, chargers and related accessories. Where are the Fig Newtons?

At the session: Monetize with Ads and Sponsorship: Use An Advertising Service or Sell Your Own? The panelists were Frank Barnako, Barnako.com; Mark McCrery, Podtrac; Murgesh Navar, PodBridge; Todd Cochrane, RawVoice; Jonathan Cobb, Kiptronic; Greg Galant, Radio Tail; and Jay Selman, Grape Radio.

Doug Kaye from IT Conversations and GigaVox Media at his session: The Secret Lives of MP3 Files.

The LA Podcasters Booth (above and below), sponsored by iProng, was packed whenever I walked by. For a full description of who was there, plus links to the audio from all the shows recorded, including this one called the “Reality Podcasting Panel,” visit the LA Podcasters site.

A number of podcast-related companies from Japan came together and had a booth at the show. To see all the companies who participated in the booth, visit this page and look for the words (Japan booth) next to the company names.

An iPod Mini in a box with nuts and bolts in the ShieldZone booth, prior to a “torture test.”

Phillip Chipping, President and Founder of ShieldZone (left) and Sterling Campbell (right) in the ShieldZone booth. Both gentlemen demonstrated very effectively how strong their clear protective film can withstand abuse from scratches. No iPods were harmed in the tests, even after two days of intense shaking. However, they left some areas of the iPods intentionally uncovered, and those areas showed the kind of damage that would occur if the film had not been applied.

Michael Geoghegan, CEO and Doug Kaye, CTO of GigaVox Media in their booth on the show floor.

Doug Kaye being interviewed in the GigaVox Media booth.

Doug Kaye showcasing the new Levelator (TM) software. It works by leveling out uneven volume levels in audio recordings. And it’s free. You can find it here (Mac or Windows). Jake Ludington has a review of the software here.

Robert Scoble being interviewed by Leesa Barnes on the show floor. Leesa’s interview with Robert Scoble, Tim Bourquin and Ron Moore can be found on her excellent blog, which is filled with tips and information about business and podcasting: It’s called podonomics.com.

There’s Mr. Scoble again (shouldn’t you be blogging, Robert?) Above, Robert Scoble makes a few comments during the session entitled Podcasting Power: Creating Killer Podcasts For Innovative Company Branding with John Furrier, Robert Scoble and Jennifer Jones of Podtech.net, Bill Kircos of Intel, and Jeff Nolan of SAP.

John Furrier, CEO & Founder of PodTech speaking with an Expo attendee after the Podcasting Power session.

Ben Williams doing a video interview on the show floor.

Tim Bourquin, Founder of The Podcast Expo being interviewed after the show by Ken Ray of Mac OS Ken. The interview can be found on Ken’s podcast (10/02 edition).

The amount of books on blogging, podcasting and audio production was staggering. This is just a small section of a huge table filled with books.

Andrew Baron and Joanne Colan from Rocketboom.

Alex Lindsay, Kenji Kato, John Foster and Scott Bourne at the 9/30 session on the show floor. The group covered production methods and technology that’s used for shows such as TWIT, MacBreak, MacBreak Weekly and The iLifeZone.

Tim Bourquin and Andrew Baron in the lobby of the convention center.

Franklin McMahon (left) from Media Artist Secrets (one of my favorite podcasts and highly recommended), Karla and Karen from the video podcast Rumor Girls (soon to be added to my growing playlist), and Chris Marquardt from Tips from the Top Floor, another great show for anyone interested in making better photos. Here’s a link to Franklin McMahon’ s main site.

The RawVoice team, with Founder and CEO Todd Cochrane (fourth from the left) in the Blubrry booth. The Blubrry site looks impressive and I look forward to seeing how it evolves.

That’s me with the one and only Rock and Roll Geek, Michael Butler.

And there I am with the man who likes to “Hang (and blog) Loose,” Robert Scoble. Note to myself: turn off the spot focusing option when you ask a friendly person to take a photo with your camera, or the background will be the only thing in focus (unless you add a third person)! I did my best in Photoshop to fix it.

On the show floor with Andrew Baron and Joanne Colan from Rocketboom.

Hope to see you there next year!

All photographs above © Andrew Darlow, all rights reserved. To request images for use in blogs, podcasts and other media, send e-mail to Andrew Darlow at images@andrewdarlow.com.

The Imaging Buffet Podcast 003

THE IMAGING BUFFET PODCAST 003

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or Download Podcast as an mp3 Here
After a summer break, we’re back with a new podcast! I wanted to make sure this was posted to coincide with the 2nd Annual Podcast & Portable Media Expo since my guest on the show, Scott Bourne, will be speaking at the Expo today, Friday, 9/29 and Saturday 9/30. He will be joined on Saturday by Alex Lindsay, John Foster and Kenji Kato from 2:45pm – 3:15pm on the show floor (back area). All are free to attend. I mention this particular talk because they will discuss some of of the production methods and technology that’s used for shows such as TWIT, MacBreak, MacBreak Weekly, The VFX Show, Inside The Black Box and The iLifeZone. You can find a link to all the sessions at the Podcast & Portable Media Expo website

Scott Bourne is a photographer, author, podcaster, and someone who is doing many great things in the world of podcasting. He’s also the host of the iLifeZone, which covers tips and advice all about the iLife suite of products from Apple Computer. I highly recommend subscribing if you use any of the iLife apps.
Show links: www.myphototricks.com

www.podcastingtricks.com
www.aperturetricks.com
www.bloggingtricks.com
www.ilifezone.com
photofocus.libsyn.com
www.thedigitalstory.com
www.lynda.com

For those who plan to be at the Podcast Expo, if you’d like to say hi in person just send me an e-mail at imaging (at) andrewdarlow.com.

All the best,
Andrew

News from Photokina: HP’s new Z-series printers

The photokina World of Imaging is being held at the Cologne Exhibition Center in Cologne, Germany from September 26 to October 1, 2006. From the exhibition organizers’ facts and figures sheet, “photokina is the only event in the world which offers a comprehensive presentation of all the imaging media, imaging technologies and imaging markets — for consumers and professionals alike.”

They’re not kidding! Almost every imaging-related industry is represented, from companies headquartered in cities across the globe. I’ll be highlighting a few of the photo and digital print-related products over the next few days. To start things off, HP introduced four new “Z-series” wide-format inkjet printers. I had an opportunity to see the printers in person and print my work on these printers a few months ago. The HP Designjet Z3100 is an 12-ink pigment-based inkjet printer, with 24 and 44-inch wide versions and HP Designjet Z2100 is an 8-ink pigment-based inkjet printer, also with 24 and 44-inch wide versions.

The HP Designjet Z3100 runs on 11 HP Vivera pigment color inks (four of them black or gray), plus a twelfth Gloss Enhancer “ink” that provides better gloss uniformity and helps reduce bronzing on gloss and semi-gloss papers. In the prints I saw before the printer’s final release, image quality was sharp and detailed, with vibrant color, a nice grain structure and little gloss differential or bronzing, especially when the Gloss Optimizer was used. The printer also comes with four black/grey inks, that help to make monochrome prints look more smooth and neutral.

The HP Designjet Z3100 (left-24″ model, right-44″ model)

The HP Designjet Z2100 uses 8 HP Vivera pigment color inks (the same combination of inks that are used in the HP Photosmart Pro B9180, a 13-inch printer that I’ve been testing with impressive results on both matte and gloss papers. No gloss optimizer is used with the Z2100, but color and black and white output on gloss and semi-gloss papers has very little bronzing or gloss differential. The Z2100 has one less gray ink compared with the Designjet Z3100 (three vs. four black and gray inks). A monochrome output option on both Z-series printers allow for just black and grey inks to be used, which allows users to produce prints with very even tones and longer expected longevity. For information on expected longevity on a variety of papers for the Pro B9180 (same inks as the Designjet Z2100), visit www.wilhelm-research.com.

One of the features that sets the Z-series printers apart is their embedded spectrophotometers, which use Eye-One technology from GretagMacbeth to allow for the creation of custom profiles right on the printer. I was very impressed by this technology and HP has created a step-by-step process to make it the process easy to complete. Both printers ship standard with a stand, and built-in connectivity options are Ethernet and USB 2.0.MSRP for the printers is as follows:HP Designjet Z2100: $3,395 (24″) and $5,595 (44″). HP Designjet Z3100: $4,095 (24″) and $6,295 (44″). For a good overview, with a link to the full press release on the new Z-series printers on HP’s website, visit this link.

On HP’s site, you can also order free sample prints from many different printers, including the Z-series.

Check pricing and read more about the HP Photosmart Pro B9180 at Amazon.com