Speaking for the rest of the Bobbleheads, we were amazed by how consistently everyone “got it” this year. All of you seemed to be right on the same page with the same vision, which just gave all of us even more energy. This unified voice seemed to even carry over to every tweet, article and interview that we saw. We’re truly lucky to be living in an environment filled with such positive, creative and community-minded people like all of you. And it’s operating at a level I haven’t seen anywhere else.

There is a symphony of chatter going on about what to do next year. We ask that you write these ideas down as soon as you can – before we forget. As organizers, it might be best if you can write suggestions as comments to this post. However we can read posts on the public site (“feedback” page), or on the facebook group.

If you have any interesting stories or favorite vignettes of the event, please share those as well. Otherwise tag your photos with SPARKcon in flickr or tell us where else you put them.

We will be scheduling a meeting in the next few weeks to try to visit with all of you again and capture all of your thoughts. Be on the lookout and come prepared to celebrate!

Thank you again and Spark on!

Aly

Please note: we hope to have all of you at the kickoff meeting at 6 on Thursday to pick up badges, have a drink, and support the keynote speaker and Pecha Kucha event.

For tonight we just want to go through final logistics:

1. overall plan of the event, with rain plans
2. confirmation of every act in your SPARK as per the published schedule, and turning in all talent release forms
3. your final volunteer needs
4. any outstanding facilities needs
5. your official photographer and videographer names, and turning in all photo/video release forms
6. scheduling a recap meeting *with a SPARKcon yearbook event*

Spark on!

Aly

Given the growing nature of SPARKcon,  photography of the event will be organized differently this year.  Cheryl Gottschall and Bryan Regan will be our Overall Photographers. Their purpose will be to capture a few great shots of the whole event. As a result,  they will not be documenting each and every work,  artist or event in SPARKcon. We are asking each SPARK to reach out to their local community and recruit their own SPARK photographers. These photographers need to fill out the Photographer’s Release Form and submit their raw photos to each SPARK team. Each SPARK team is in turn, responsible for getting these photos to the Bobbleheads so we can create a central bank of them.

In our agreement,  SPARKcon is trading special access to these events in exchange for rights to their images for SPARKcon purposes only. Of course the photographers retain ownership of their work and can do what they like with the images as well. SPARKcon will also request that each SPARK post at leat a few images to the SPARKcon flickr group.

We do ask all SPARKcon photos are tagged with sparkcon and ____SPARK whenever uploaded to sites like flickr. This will make for some fun web-fed interactive visualizations during the event.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

We had a great ideaSPARK session all weekend and created a concept and prototype website for Raleigh360 to “create a culture of localism.” We hope to pitch this website to city leaders on how to encourage local businesses to hire local talent for their projects. It ends up being just in time to make it for Raleigh’s own public input process for their website!

Beth has already made a slideshow movie of fashionSPARK. We eagerly await Cheryl and others to submit their thousands of images as well as Eric and Alex to get their dozens of hours of footage in. We’ll have them posted on the main site under the “news” section.

Don’t forget to submit your SPARKcon documentation for the photo contest or video contest!

Please submit any feedback or links to chatter about SPARKcon as comments on our website so we can continue to build this great effort. Thank you everyone!

Aly, Gab, Ty and Greg

SPARKcon’s hosting one last meeting tomorrow night at Designbox at 6pm.

Any last minute concerns or questions you may have, this is the opportunity to voice them!

See you then.

It is very important that everyone attends so we can work out final details before next Friday.

See you all there!

323 W Martin St
Raleigh NC, 27601

First Friday kicks off tonight all around beautiful downtown Raleigh, and as far as I know all the galleries are doing their regular thing tonight in spite of the weather. I’ll be at Flanders Gallery @ Seaboard (6pm) DJing for the opening of a very cool show ( http://www.flandersartgallery.com/). After that you have tough choices. I’ll be spinning an 80s dance set upstairs at Riviera (Loft 135), DJ Castro is at The Globe (510 S. Glenwood), and Chuck Love is at Mosaic. I do believe that Mosaic has the angle on that one.

However, tomorrow night, September 6, is Neu Romance’s second annual “Disco Inferno” – A Fundraiser for SparkCon. This year the disco ball at Alibi is the perfect setting for Castro, Mark T., Drew Diggle, and myself (Madcow) to drop the best of 70s and 80s funk, soul, and disco hits AND obscurities. For those of you in the know expect lots from SalSoul and West End records! Admission is only five bucks (it will be the best dance party in town that night), and all proceeds go towards paying off Stacy Kidd (stacykidd) for the Sept. 20 Solas show. By the way Solas is free before 10pm and has a dress code. Check out their website for more info on that (http://solasraleigh.com/). Also Saturday’s “Disco Inferno” is conveniently located in a former bomb shelter that can withstand a category five hurricane (or a nuclear assualt), and with the help of a generator and a fully stocked bar that party will happen no matter what. Be prepared to sweat!

Friday 9/5 – DJ Madcow @ Flanders Gallery
18 Seaboard location / 6pm

-DJ Castro @ Alibi Bar
14 West Martin St. / 10pm

-Chuck Love @ Mosaic (Critic’s Pick!) / 10pm
517 W. Jones St. (http://www.mosaicwinelounge.com/)
Admission $5

-DJ Madcow @ Riviera’s Loft 135 / 10:30pm
135 S. Wilmington St

Saturday 9/6 – DJs Madcow, Castro, Mark T., and Drew Diggle
Second Annual Disco Inferno – A Fundraiser for SparkCon
14 West Martin St. / 9pm Admission $5
(This show is hurricane proof)

Visit the fashionSPARK page to view the designers!

Please send this info asap! The sooner it comes, the sooner we can secure all these items.