[TheForge] Abana conference

Mon Mar 5 13:46:56 EST 2007

Hey Steve,

If you re-read my e-mail, you will see in paragraph  5, that I did address
the high cost issue for membership in ABANA.

Demonstrators at conferences are not professional actors reading from a
script.
They tend to wander around, while looking for tools or responding to
questions from the audience.
 When I attend a conference like the Batson Blade Smithing Symposium.  I
have found it is much more effective to place my video camera on a stand and
record the whole demonstration, rather than try to take notes and watch the
demo at the same time.
  It doesn't bother me if he/she wanders out of camera range as long as I
can hear what the demonstrator is still talking about.
When reviewing the tapes at home,I'm often surprised at what I missed when 
actually watching the live demonstration
The major cost in time and effort in producing videos is extensive editing. 
I
think the editing should be kept to the absolute minimum.  An example of
what I'm talking about is Rodger's tape number 102 of Ralph Sproul's
demonstration.  For the first 20 minutes of his demo Ralph wanders around
pulling out jigs and talking about tooling that he's developed.  Ideas that
are worth their weight in gold, but could easily have been edited out.
Chuck

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Steve Smith" <sos at alum.mit.edu>
To: "Sponsored by ABANA" <theforge at mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Saturday, March 03, 2007 7:24 AM
Subject: Re: [TheForge] Abana conference

> Chuck, I don't see the equipment being the issue. You have to have people 
> who are willing to run the equipment and people to edit the tape into 
> something useful. To make a good video of a demo, I think you need two 
> cameras and tripods, two people on those cameras, an extra person capable 
> of setting up the sound and running errands. If instead you duct tape a 
> camera to a spare anvil, what you'll end up with is a video that nobody 
> watches. Just my opinion. For an example of the best conference videos 
> I've ever seen, get one from Rocky Mountain Smiths. The budget won't break 
> (much), but finding the volunteers is tough.
>
> Roger's videos are decent, I have a stack of them. For all I know, he just 
> duct tapes his camera down, contrary to what I say above. He clearly knows 
> what he's doing, however, and is only working on one demonstrator with one 
> angle of view.
>
> I agree that conferences are too expensive for most people. Good videos 
> would help spread the word.
>
> I don't mean to be picking your comments apart, Chuck, but I've got one 
> more thing to point out. You say: "They tell me that ABANA has no 
> relevance for them as far as blacksmithing is concerned." I notice this 
> doesn't say anything about too expensive, rather that the offering isn't 
> of interest.
>
> Something's out of whack, but I'm not sure what it is. I think the AR and 
> HB are great publications, with AR admittedly getting a bit weird and off 
> center at times. I'd love to see ABANA continue to put on conferences in 
> some altered form to make them more useful/accessible to the membership.
>
> Steve
>
> Chuck Robinson wrote:
>
>> Hey Ries,
>>
>> My suggestion for video recording the regional conferences should be 
>> possible without breaking the ABANA Budget.
>> I believe that several years after recording as many conferences as 
>> possible, they would be a revenue you making activity for ABANA.
>>
>> The basic problem that I see is that the present way of holding large 
>> expensive conferences isn't working anymore. The  fact that only about 
>> 10% of our ABANA membership are willing or able to attend means that 90% 
>> of our membership don't support or receive any benefit from the 
>> conferences.
>>
>> I am the ABANA affiliate liaison on the Gulf coast blacksmith's 
>> Association. The GCBA  has 125 members, of which including myself, only 
>> three are members of ABANA. One of these ABANA members does not plan to 
>> renew his membership.
>>
>> When I question my members  as to why they don't want to be ABANA 
>> members. They tell me that ABANA has no relevance for them as far as 
>> blacksmithing is concerned.
>>
>> ABANA membership is too expensive for the benefits they receive from it. 
>> Most of The articles in the Anvils Ring show projects that are well 
>> beyond their capabilities to make.
>>
>> I first joined ABANA in 1973.  The earlier newsletters  weren't nearly as 
>> polished as the current ones are, but they presented a lot of useful 
>> information and tips that the average blacksmith would be interested in.
>>
>> The conferences are generally, too far away and way too expensive for 
>> them to attend.  So they basically get zero benefit from the ABANA 
>> conferences.
>> Our library however, has most of Roger's Conference Videos, and they are 
>> very popular with our members.
>> Chuck
>>
>>
>> ----- Original Message ----- From: "ries" <ries at riesniemi.com>
>> To: "Sponsored by ABANA" <theforge at mailman.qth.net>
>> Sent: Thursday, March 01, 2007 11:00 AM
>> Subject: Re: [TheForge] Abana conference
>>
>>
>>>
>>> On Mar 1, 2007, at 8:52 AM, Chuck Robinson wrote:
>>>
>>> I would like to make any alternate proposal to having a 2008 ABANA 
>>> conference.
>>>
>>> Since the last few ABANA conferences have been extremely expensive,  and 
>>> under attended by the it's members,  I would suggest ABANA use  some of 
>>> the funds it intended to use for the next conference, to  instead 
>>> purchase high-quality video making equipment.
>>> It would be used to make DVDs of the regional conferences put on by 
>>> affiliate groups throughout the country. It might also be possible to 
>>> send several people to international blacksmith and conferences to 
>>> record them .
>>> I have been extremely impressed with the  wonderful job that Roger 
>>> Degner of the Upper Midwest Blacksmith's Association has done in 
>>> recording the conferences that he has attended and produced DVDs of, 
>>> that have valuable instructional material in them.  They are  available 
>>> to individuals for a very nominal cost.
>>> Granted the videos aren't the same as being there, but they are  orders 
>>> of magnitude better than missing the Demos, when you can't  attend in 
>>> person.
>>> I would strongly suggest that ABANA contact Rodger for advice on how  he 
>>> does it.
>>> Chuck
>>>
>>>
>>> Chuck- the whole problem is they dont have the seed money- the  general 
>>> idea of how it usually works is that the conference makes a  slight 
>>> profit- say 50 grand or so- then that gets used for deposits,  startup 
>>> costs, and so on for the next one.
>>> The conference itself is supposed to be self supporting- the fees 
>>> coming in pay for the expenses going out.
>>> But this time, Seattle didnt make any money- in fact, it probably  lost 
>>> money.
>>> So there is no pot of money to buy video equipment.
>>> Roger does indeed work closely with Abana, and he does great things. 
>>> Long term, it would be great if Abana helped Roger more, and Roger  made 
>>> more Abana videos available- in addition to the ones from abana 
>>> conferences he already has.
>>>
>>>
>>> Ries Niemi
>>> Industrial Artist
>>> http://www.riesniemi.com/
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
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>>
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