My first experience at Adobe MAX. It was held May 5-8, 2013 in Los Angeles, California.  What a great conference. I not only have the benefit of attending great workshops but also be witness to Adobe’s new roll out of the new branding of Adobe products. The Creative Suite (CS) products are branded as Creative Cloud (CC). I have been using the creative cloud products for close to a year and absolutely love it. While I have not downloaded all of the products yet, I love having all of them at my fingertips.  I love the whole cloud piece - being able to upload images, videos, etc., downloading products as I need them, the Behance feature, while I haven’t used it much yet, I love the idea.

I also learned at this conference that Adobe is looking at getting into the hardware business. They will be releasing a stylus (Mighty) that is connected to the “cloud” and a slide rule (Napoleon)  that works well with tablets.

I loved the community summit that was held before the conference got rolling, I had the opportunity to meet product developers and managers along with other Adobe Education Leaders in a great social event.

Some of the sessions I attended included InDesign Tips and Tricks, Building Multi-Folio Apps with Digital Publishing Suite, Building Business Websites with Dreamweaver and Business Catalyst, Don’t Be Afraid: You can Learn Edge Animate, Hands-On New Features in InDesign CC, Creating Mobile Layout Designs in Adobe Muse and Adobe Illustrator: Advanced Techniques. So many to choose from:  https://www.adobe-max.com/scheduler/catalog.do

The Adobe Bash, was quite the bash!

Met with Dana Alexander (from Seattle area) and Rick Miller (from California) of Adobe, Inc. on March 18, 2013 with the Jason Neiffer of the Montana Digital Academy.  They came to Montana to meet with Montana State University (in Bozeman, MT) and the University of Montana (in Missoula). They also met with Missoula County Public Schools to discuss licensing with Adobe, Inc. for the Master Collection on Tuesday, March 19th. Had dinner with them at the Depot Restaurant along with Keith Graham, Associate Professor / Photojournalism & Multimedia of The University of Montana School of Journalism on the first night and again had dinner with the group the next night at the Pearl Restaurant.

What a great opportunity to teach at NCCE this year. I did a three hour workshop on Adobe InDesign using Linda Dickeson’s ClickStep book on InDesign. I forgot how much I really like teaching adults. It was a great experience and I hope to do more of these workshops.

Here is a link to all of the resources from the conference:

2013 NCCE Conference Materials

I was encouraged to apply to serve on the MCAT board last month. Missoula Community Access Television (MCAT) provides Missoula residents and organizations with the equipment, training, and channel time to produce TV programs based on their interests and concerns. These programs reflect Missoula's cultural, political, and intellectual diversity, and help foster a community dialogue about people and issues that might otherwise go unnoticed.

I did apply and had an interview on January 22, 2013. I am now serving on the MCAT board. They meet once a month on the fourth Tuesday of the month at 7:00 p.m. They televise the meetings. I am excited to serve on this board because I have worked with them for years and always felt they were “education friendly.” They are always willing to help students and teachers alike. Evidently there has been some talk of MCPS partnering with MCAT. I think that this would be a great idea. For instance, since I have had my computer lab filled with computers, I have no area for students to set up lighting or green screen work. If we partnered with MCAT, they have the equipment and knowledge to set up a great green screen room with lighting and even some audio bays. Their employees have been great to work with and I think it would be a great fit with Sentinel and MCPS. Other teachers would also have the ability to learn from employees and have their students work with them.