Fog town went to make faire last year, but I was too busy to go
I have such fond memories of running around maker faire as a loose teenager in 2016 - 19, and even exhibiting my own work for the last couple years. I knew it had gotten a lot smaller since they re-opened after the pandemic (I also remember discussions even before the shutdown of the 2020 faire being severely scaled back, sponsorship cuts) but it still felt like a wonderland to me. Being surrounded by people who love making stuff and the projects they make. From code to art to cardboard. It made kid me so excited to keep delving into all my different hobbies. It was also one of the first places that this weird little nerd felt comfortable talking to strangers, enthusiastically even, knowing we all had something in common and an easy conversation starter - what is your project?
the maker movement as a whole and the talks given by Adam savage seen both in person at the faire and on YouTube long before my first time going are what made me who I am today
So all in all, it was very exiting to be back, and exhibiting with a project I love so much!
Fog town is a sherlock adaptation which combines small-scale virtual production with live action puppetry! All our sets are digitally sculpted in blender, brought into unreal for lighting and animations, and displayed on a monitor to use as a backdrop for the 8-inch rod puppets. It’s 95% in camera, no green screen or 3D animation except for those specific 5% SFX shots that were beyond the limits of the setup.
That’s the pitch!
I recommended the team go last year, knowing that the combination of art and technology in professional but still very approachable and user-friendly form would be right up the alley of maker faire attendees. Most of the marketing focus had been on the series as a piece of media- the characters and stories took the forefront of discussion, but everyone wanted to know how the puppets worked! I suggested they focus on the techniques used as a talking point and a demonstration, and interest in the show itself would come from the footage shown and naturally progress from interest in the tech.
And I was right! They got kinda overwhelmed even, with only 2.5 people to run the booth they were swarmed. This year we had 5, and were properly set to have enough people to take breaks and enjoy the faire and not get overwhelmed.
Day 1 - travel day
Time to meet the team!
Sean - show runner, writer, the brains behind it all, led the team last year Kayla - film background, regularly seen on-set lighting setup and puppeteer, went last year Jovah - film background, spent some time on set but we hadn’t met before, extra hand and brought the nice camera Presley - spent one day on set doing one single shots and its one of the best, just as crazy about puppets as I am Me ! That’s me !10 hours in the car not much else to say! We left Portland at 1pm and arrived at the place we were staying at 11:30
Day 2 - school day
September 26th. Friday at maker faire is a school field trip day, there’s fewer events going on and not every booth is set up yet.
We got there around 9 with an hour to setup. Luckily, we don’t have anything too large. Unluckily, only 2 of our 5 person team knew the tech setup, and in a hurry to leave the day before our cords were less than organized. so there was some holdback as we waited for instructions to get our monitors in place. But we had everything mostly set up by the gates opening at 10, and fully set up by the time people started wandering by our table 20 minutes later
(Image of the sketch here) (Any images I have of the setup, as well as some nice ones from Jovah)Talked to the booth across from us about taking fog town to schools
We were also right across the way from the chomp saw booth, which is a special table-saw like device that uses a hole punch to efficiently cut cardboard. It’s completely safe and really efficient - I got to use one on the bug project. Unfortunately I can’t afford the 250 dollar asking price at the moment ,but for how much I work with cardboard it’s definitely on my list if I ever run my own space with that kind of a budget
We were also near the chicken booth run by a kids maker space, we checked out each other’s stuff often and I even made my own fog town pins using our promo cards
This day ended early - 3pm - so we went out to get pizza afterward and played card games back at the house
Day 3 - long day
This is the first proper day of the faire and the busiest! Now that we had experience with the setup, we were able to plan a little bit when people would be leaving to enjoy the rest of the faire
Presley was down for the count for the second half though
This was the day of the maker mixer! The faire opened at ten once again, ended at 5. The mixer started at 6 and I don’t remember when we left but maybe 9?
We packed up the booth to take things out to the car first. Who did we talk to? The guy with the cool spinning staff said he recognized me from comic cons in the Portland area and said he followed me on instagram. Which was a little wild because I haven’t posted there in years. That was cool though.
The guy who was on the trains The woman who ran the booth that I got a pin from Dalek guys - where I learned that I had seen their previous trash Dalek at previous years Guy with the spider bot They had drink tokens and free nachos and mediocre music Bug car ride!!!!!!!! Let’s goooo!!!!!