“What if?” at 20×2 v. 7.0

March 16th, 2007

As I mentioned before, this year at South by Southwest, I was asked to do a presentation at 20×2, and my goal was to answer the question “What if?” in 2 minutes along with 19 other fellow speakers that had 2 minutes each of their own to take a swing at that same question.

I was on a panel at SXSWi this year (more on that later if you haven’t found it all over the internet by now), but nothing occupied my time more than prepping for 20×2. I must have reworked the concept of the presentation over and over in my head for days and weeks but couldn’t settle on anything. (The concept before this one for the record was: “What if Google wasn’t indexing everything I was writing?” Lame, I know, but a common problem for bloggers.)

Not having anything to work with, I proceeded to grossly take advantage of the torrential downpour the day before 20×2 to get to work on my presentation. After tinkering around with subject matter that I didn’t particularly feel very passionate about, I then scrapped everything I was working on and started fresh with 24 hours to go before showing my piece publicly.

For the record, the YouTube file above is not the original file that was shown at 20×2. In fact, I had to enlarge the fonts on several screens for that version to be readable. The actual presentation I showed is here, in its original form.

This is the result of the first time I’ve ever produced a video in my life that I actually had to edit and all. I think, for me, I just wanted to use a medium I was unfamiliar with. Additionally, I thought that 20×2 would definitely be the venue to express myself in this different way.

Technically, I think the editing wasn’t as tight as I wanted it to be at all. Conceptually, I’m pretty fascinated and almost romantic about machines such as automobiles, trains and planes, and general themes of what’s left and leaving — I liked the bookending I did with the sequencing of New York footage and the images of the doors opening and closing to California and those parts of my life, particularly.

When it was presented publicly, I didn’t know myself what to make of it, though I thought it to be far too Hallmark cardy and a little embarrassing in that sense. After, I felt exposed and realized that it wasn’t so much the part of myself that most people see regularly, but rather a different, more raw and vulnerable personal part of myself, which was particularly surprising to me. It was strange that my feelings manifested themselves very strongly in this medium as opposed to others I’ve worked with prior.

I think what I was trying to put across was my respect and admiration for my friends, both old and new. (And although I would’ve liked to include a second for everyone, I was working primarily with clips that were months old. I am sorry about that — just know I’ll be beating myself up about it.) The whole underlying theme which I wanted to bring across stronger was the fact that that period in my life was marked with endless what-ifs for both the positive and negative. That juxtaposition didn’t come off as strong and I would’ve liked, but the message came out hopeful in the end, and all of it is true to life: the advice that was given to me, the sentiment when I left and still feel when I leave New York, the peace I’ve come to know, and the experiences I share with others.

OK. I’m totally about to barf on myself, so I have to stop before I cry.

Lastly, the music was carefully chosen to include a song called “Leaving Ohio” by Brandtson that I listened to quite a bit before I moved to California. During one of the morelost points of my life, I actually saw Brandston play in their hometown of Cleveland, bought this album at their merch table, left Ohio, and took a train to Philadelphia.

But that’s another story for another day.

Thanks so much to Kevin Newsum, Jeff Rider, and Mike Stephens with 20×2 for being so patient with me and all my last minute-ness. It was a great experience and I had so much fun, and it allowed me to really push my own limitations. I thank you all so much for making it happen!

—-

Download “Leaving Ohio” (mp3) or view lyrics
from “Trying To Figure Each Other Out”
by Brandtson
Deep Elm
Buy at iTunes Music Store

Entry Filed under: 20x2, Arts, SxSW, SxSW2007, SxSWi, SxSWi2007, Video