It's yesterday, and it's one of those “trials” that I greatly wanted to happen.
First and foremost, I tried (well, not exactly tried, but rather forced) to do an event in 4 days. 60+ people came, some of them are results of a one hour direct, sudden, and targeted publication campaign, done four hours before the event. Ha!
Second, I tried to change my presentation style. From static, slide-guided to dynamic, “me“-guided presentation. During the powerpoint design, I watched Steve Jobs' keynote at WWDC 2005. One of the most inspiring speeches that Jobs have made, and definitely not the only one. I tried to create a similarly styled presentation. (btw, I created three versions of the slide, the standard MS style, the refined one, and the presented one.) Minimal text, lots of beutiful things, and of course, a message. I have been able to accomplish the first two, but failed to deliver a good message. I think this is because I'm transitioning. And during the presentation, I'm not exactly Jobs-equaling yet, because of some file failures (video links not working), computer failures (not every application need to be demo-ed installed), and some nervousness that happens when you are trying something new in front of real audiences. Ha!
And no, I won't upload the slides because it's too simple to be read. And no slide notes because of the prep constraint. You'd better off reading the Imagine Cup Specification included in the Starter Kit CD/DVD (I'll talk about this later tonight).
At the end of the day, it's the experience that matters most. A quick recap on the feedback forms, my session was rated with high variability (ranging from 1 to 9), some complained the publication was too short, and one of them actually wanted a demo on XBOX 360!
You guys can see the gallery which includes one of the images generated when demoing the use of PhotoMontage feature in Microsoft Expression Graphic Designer.
After the event, we were entertained to a dinner (+ reps from local newspaper + photo session by one of the rep) and breakfast (on the train station) by our beloved Academic Developer Evangelist. (Z: post something amazing in your blog, it's dull!)
In lieu to the presentation style I tried, I read Howard's post to a link about presentation style titled Gates, Jobs, and the Zen aesthetic from Presentation Zen (just added to my OPML list). Reflected to what I have done yesterday, I admit that the style Microsoft have been using in their Powerpoint application and Speeches are too technical. I was trying to imitate what Steve had done, but haven't grasped the entire concept of simplicity. I wanted it to be simple, yet I have added things that does not exactly worth mentioning...
That link also supports my assumption that “Bill is Geek and Steve is Artist”...
What do you guys think about presentation styles? What is your style?