Saturday night I attended the Cut & Paste competition at the Henry Fonda Theater in Los Angeles CA. This is a competition where 2D, 3D, and Motion design digital artists compete against each other to come up with the most original, creative, and best looking design in 15 minutes.
Cut & Paste at the Henry Fonda Theater in Los Angeles CA
My friend Kate is a designer and invited me to join her and Justin at the event. $15.00 for an open bar and to see something cool with good friends–I was there.
Team Adventure Hits Cut & Paste
Since there was going to be an open bar at the event, we took a cab from Echo Park to Hollywood.
Team Adventure Calls a Cab
Justin asked the driver, “Do you accept cards?”
The driver responds in a heavy Russian accent, “I prefer cash.”
No-one spoke a word after this until I started to laugh at the sign in front of me.
Driver Carries Only $5.00 in Chanege Sign
It’s funny because “change” is spelled incorrectly (for those of you who also can’t spell).
We got to Hollywood at 6pm and ate at Roscoe’s House of Chicken and Waffles a few blocks down the street from the theater. The service was worthless but the waffles were ridiculous–this restaurant renewed my faith in the waffle.
When we got to the theater after dinner, Team Adventure were told to start the line for will call tickets. Part of me thinks they just wanted to create a line so that passerby’s would see something exciting happening and want to buy tickets. It was supposed to have started an hour earlier.
The event was poorly run–we ended up walking into the theater with no tickets in our hand by saying, “That girl said it was okay.”
I could’ve saved the $15 but who knew? Maybe this is a sign for me to start showing up to events with no ticket and seeing what happens.
There were four computer terminals set up in the center of the stage. In front of computers were 5 large back-lit projection screens–four of them showing the competitors’ screens and the fifth showing a live feed by Justin.tv who was covering the event.
Cut & Paste - Los Angeles
The event started with a guest speaker who lost my attention immediately. After his fifth joke in 2 minutes about how graphic artists don’t work hard, I stopped caring. If you don’t have respect for your own industry, how can you expect anyone else to?
Next started round one of the 2D design where each of the four competitors had to create an original design from scratch. Some of the competitors had friends come with them so that they could take pictures right there–the theme was “frienemy.” The task was to design a Yearbook page layout.
The next competition was for 3D design. I caught a short video of what we were viewing during the competition.
Cut & Paste was fun but poorly organized. For example, the DJ never stopped blasting music the entire time the host, judges, or competitors talked. Even with a microphone, no-one could hear them speak.
Also they shut down the open bar at 9pm for two hours because “not enough people showed up.” That doesn’t make any sense to me–that means more open bar for the rest of us.
The final 3D motion graphics round was cancelled because 3 out of 4 competitors never arrived.
The consensus amongst attendees was basically, “I could’ve done that.” I think a better caliber of competitors, a different set of rules, and better organization would have made the event more fun. Instead, I left thinking that I could’ve held a better competition.
I joked that the designers should be drinking a shot every minute. Someone said, “Oh like in the Social Network?”
Yeah, kinda.. but more like in every other competition that existed before The Social Network came out where competitors drink while they design. That movie didn’t make that idea up.
We did make some new friends though and that’s always lovely.
Team Adventure @ Cut&Paste
Did you attend Cut & Paste in Los Angeles? What did you think? I’d love to hear your comments below.
