Refresh Pittsburgh

Join us this Thursday, September 17th at 7:00 pm for a joint meet-up of Refresh Pittsburgh and the Pittsburgh Adobe Flash User’s Group.

This month’s meet-up will be at Alphalab – located at 2325 East Carson St. in the Southside. (About a block away from the Doublewide Grill.) Check out some detailed directions.

This month, we’ll be hosting a panel discussion entitled “Flash, What is it Good For? – Where Does Flash fit on the Web?”.

Recently there has been a lot of buzz about the role of Flash online. With some well known Flash shops — like Big Spaceship — opting for a site that’s more blog than Flash and HTML 5 on the horizon there seem to be more and more speculation as to what will be the next Flash killer.  Have the times changed?  Has the Flash microsite been killed by blogs and social media?  What role does Flash play on the web now – especially when dealing with web standards.  Where might it fit in the future?  These are the kinds of questions we’ll be discussing on the panel.

So far, our panelists include:

• Josh Sager, Pittsburgh Technical Institute, joshsagermedia.com
• Jeremy Shank, Artist/Illustrator and Multimedia Designer at Atlas Design Group. jeremyshank.com
• Wayne Lincoln, Interactive Art Director, New Perspective, Adjunct Professor, CMU
• Nathan Peretic, Developer, Full Stop Interactive
• Geoff Barnes, Information Architect at Elliance, Inc.

We may have an additional panelist or two added before the meeting. We’re doing our best to put together a panel with many different opinions in order to have a good discussion.

Val Head, Senior Designer/Developer, New Perspective, Manager, PITTMFUG will be moderating the panel.

Like our last panel discussion, it will help to have some questions in advance. If you would like to submit any questions in advance of the meeting, send them to us at info@refreshpittsburgh.org. It would be a huge help to have a nice pool of questions to pull from in advance.

Feel free to forward this invite to a friend.

As always, please RSVP by sending an email to info@refreshpittsburgh.org or just let us know you are coming on the Facebook event page so we can plan accordingly!

With only a week left for the conference early bird tickets, I figured now was the good time to send out an announcement about Flashpitt 2009.

Flashpitt will be held on Friday, October 16th 2009. This year, we’ll also be having a day of workshops on Thursday, October 15th too!

Flashpitt is a conference for interactive designers and developers. Flashpitt 2008 was Pittsburgh’s first major Flash-centric conference and we’re back for a second year, officially making it an annual event! Flashpitt is a great chance to take a break from the daily grind to network, learn, and recharge. It’s a large scale interactive conference – all without venturing too far from home. The event features four half-day workshops, followed by a day packed full of sessions. Each night also features a networking after party

This year’s speakers include:

• Ian Coyle, Superheroes
• Julian Dolce, of Fuel Industries
• Boris Pique, Lead Developer at Odopod
• Dan Mall, of Big Spaceship
• Seb Lee-Delisle, of Plug-in Media

And more! See the Flashpitt Speakers Page for more information.

Don’t let the name scare you!

Flashpitt is not just for flash developers. Creative professionals, developers, students, educators, artists and business owners working with and in the interactive industry should join us. Designers, developers and students looking to find inspiration, pick up new techniques, or network and meet industry leaders should attend. You get the idea. If you’re involved in the interactive and creative industry, Flashpitt is the event for you.

Take a look our sessions schedule. This years topics include “Hacking the Newsroom” by Jer Thorpe, “Flash and Web Standards: Getting Along on the Playground” by Dan Mall and “Plays Well with Others”, tips for design/developer workflow by Stacey Mulcahy.

Workshops

For those who are interested in getting more in-depth to some topics, we’re also having a day of workshops on October 15th. Topics include:

• Beginning ActionScript 3.0
• Flash Video and Flash Media Server
• iPhone Development for Flash Developers
• Intermediate ActionScript 3.0

View our sessions schedule for more details.

Registration

Early bird tickets are available only until September 13th! Register soon to ensure the early bird price.

Visit our registration page for pricing information on the conference as well as the individual workshops.

Thanks!

Thanks for your support of Refresh Pittsburgh. We hope to continue to help to put on great events like this in the future. We have a great community here – and we couldn’t do things like this if it wasn’t for you.