Idea Festival - Ray Bradbury Speech - End of Festival

Well, I must say it was fun volunteering at the Idea Festival and meeting all the nice people and staff of the festival. Hopefully, I will be able to do it next year. I got to attend the dinner and speech of Ray Bradbury after collecting tickets at the door for about an hour. Since this was the last event there was not a whole lot to do except packing up some of the supplies used at the booths. We packed up Festival ID badges and T-Shirts. After the talk, we handed out posters to people who attended the presentation.

It was a pleasant surprise to be able to attend the event at the end. Things were not too busy and pretty laid back after we collected the tickets. I have not read any of Ray Bradbury's books but I did see Martian Chronicles as a child. Did not really understand it though. Ray was a very energetic speaker and it was even more a surprise since he is 87 years old. He spoke about how he became a writer and what events influenced him. He encouraged everyone to become passionate about something and follow that passion. At times he seemed possessed about getting this point across, I guess he knows his time on this Earth is limited and this is his chance make one last impression on society. It was a good motivational speech. I did not get to hear all of the speech or the Q&A since I had to prepare for poster handout.

I did not take any pictures and probably should have. The Teleportic system did not seem all that 3-D to me. Ray did use his arms a lot in the presentation, I think for the benefit of that device. He did answer questions from our site and he could hear the audience but I am not sure if he could see them. The Teleportic system looks like a screen sloped at 45 degree angle from a side view. The screen starts at the top and slopes downward toward the back.

All and all a good festival and I am glad I am now aware of it now.