My favorite face to face meetings were the visit to the Exploratorium and to the Musée de Méchanique.

During our trip to the Exploratorium I was able to revisit my favorite exhibits and also discover more about the museum. There is always something new to be seen there which I find really exciting. As you can see in the picture below, I especially like the movement aspects of the Exploratorium. That gave me some ideas for the stop motion film we did because it helped me focus on what movement really is. That was a really fun day, but what made it even better was watching the short films afterward, which gave me an entirely new perspective of what a filmmaker is capable of and just how many things they can control in a movie.

Visiting the Musée de Méchanique was also an incredible experience. I feel that as a San Francisco native, going to the Musée de Méchanique is a must so I’m glad I was able to see it. I was able to recognize different ideas from many years ago that have led to things we consider normal now. For example, many of the old machines we saw were probably an inspiration for a lot of the apps and computer games we play now. The older, more ‘risqué’ type stop motions were quite interesting to compare with what is available everywhere now; even a movie trailer can expose that much nowadays. It was really cool to see that we have not changed entirely since the past, we still have strong root connections to ideas from a long time ago.

Featured above is an old machine that would predict your future career, there is a variety of possibilities from “Stooge” to “Nudist” to “Chiropractor”.