ROFLcon has been great so far. I have rarely had so many rapid-fire, mind-bending conversations.
It was great to catch up with Scott Beale, and I had a conversation that leads me to want to research using diamond etching as a solution to PERMANENT data storage.
But, one of my favorite conversations was with Jason Eppink about his iSpy project last week.
Jason’s project was amazing to see, but the part that you may not have gotten just sitting in the audience is exactly how many other artists were part of this project. I helped out with set-up a bit, and got to see behind the scenes a bit. What I found so amazing was how Jason galvanized the whole project, making it seem like one cohesive whole.
I was telling this to Jason, and we got to talking about how one does this. The fundamental question is how do you let them contribute, while still maintaining control, so the the whole thing hangs together.
I think about this a lot, and some tips I trotted out are:
– know how to pick your creatives
This is probably a bit controversial, but as producer, you are the lead creative: you are picking who get’s to make creative decisions. So, choose wisely. And then let people do what you choose them to do. Get out of their way, give them all the resources they need to succeed, and stand behind their decisions.
– never tell anyone what to do, but ask questions liberally
So, you got people who good at what
– write good specs
— To be continued!!! —