Last week Jonathan and I gave a presentation on puppetry at BarCamp Canberra - an event where no one is just a spectator, but rather, everyone is a participant and involved in the event in some way. Participants can give a talk, by signing up at the start of the day and allocating themselves a room and time, use social media throughout the event, voluteer and become an 'un-organiser' or avidly take part in other people's presentations by asking questions and giving feedback and suggestions.
We were newbies to the whole BarCamp universe (it's a world wide event, in an 'un-conference' style), and decided to give a brief overview about puppetry, what it's like to be a puppeteer and teach everyone some basic puppetry techniques, such as lip-syncing, eye-focus and character voices! Each participant created their own puppet character with their provided socks and eyeballs. Other presentations included talks and demos on bubble blowing robots, laser cut jewellery, small business funding, arcade games and more. The corridors were filled with all sorts of delights like 3D printers and designer cupcakes... We were a bit worried that we'd stand out a little with our puppets, but we were surprisingly embraced by the BarCamp community, which was evident from all the live tweeting that was going on (see a selection of tweets below) and the involvement of everyone who attended our workshop!
Thanks to all the participants that came to our presentation and everyone who tweeted and took photos! Special thanks to Ruth Ellison and Alastair D'Silva for sharing their great photos with us!
Marianne gives a preview of "Marco Polo" - photo by Alastair D'Silva
Explaining lip-syncing techniques - photo by Alastair D'Silva
A captivated audience at BarCamp learning lip-syncing - photo by Alastair D'Silva
The puppetry session in lecture room 4 has us all with sock-and-eye sets. I sense impending group performance... #barcampcbr #greatfun
— Hannah Mattner (@mattner_d) March 17, 2012
At #BarCampCBR. Walked into a talk and was handed a sock and 2 ping pong balls. This'll be an interesting talk about #puppets.
— Samuel Spencer (@legostormtroopr) March 17, 2012
ANYTHING can be a puppet, as long as you can animate it and give it character. #barcampcbr
— Hannah Mattner (@mattner_d) March 17, 2012
Audience participation sockpuppetry #barcampcbr twitter.com/M0les/status/1…
— Miles Goodhew (@M0les) March 17, 2012
My sock puppet keeps drinking my coffee! #barcampcbr twitter.com/UTLAU/status/1…
— Andrea Carew (@UTLAU) March 17, 2012
