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This past Thursday I had the pleasure of meeting and hanging out with Fabrice from TvPaint. He was able to add Orlando on the last stop of his 2 week trip in the states promoting TvPaint. In a nutshell the trip was a blast, we met some really talented people that are interested in using TvPaint and I've made some new friends in the industry. Ok that's the short side. And now all the wordy. "This is what all went down in a day."

Fabrice arrived in Orlando on Wednesday night and stayed at my house with Claire, and our two corgi pups, LuLu and Flynn. I have to include them because they love meeting new people so much that when we walked in the door I was practically invisible. But Fabrice was a good sport about it all and the pups fell in love with their temporary house guest. We all shared good conversation in both English and French over OJ, Beer and Tea respectively. As well as some tasty butter cookies Fabrice brought from France.
The Next morning we jumped on the interstate and later arrived at our first destination, Premise Entertainment. For me this was the highlight of the day because I was sitting in a room with a bunch of talented artists talking shop and learning new things about TvPaint, and kicking myself in the head for not starting off with the Pro Version. I met Dave Nethery & Dominic Carola among so many other artists. Dominic was dealing with a water logged studio after some pipes burst and took out a couple of their machines and threatened to destroy a few traditional tables. Fabrice and Dave unraveled the tvPaint awesomeness while we all sat in the meeting room captivated by different features of the program. The artists at Premise had a lot of questions about the program and were genuinely excited about it’s possibilities. We probably could’ve stayed a few more hours but Fabrice had one last presentation at Full Sail University and we were still about 30 minutes away from Winter Park.
Hungry and running low on time we hoped on the interstate and headed in the wrong direction. After some u-turns and a few fingers pointed up in my direction, we made it back to Winter Park with 5 minutes to spare. McDonalds suckered us in with their speedy, gut wrenching, processed meat in a can and we raced to Full Sail. The time was now 12:57 and I was afraid that a lot of people would show up to the lecture hall I set aside and start to leave if we were not on time. As I raced down 436, two cars on either side began to suffocate me. One car rested at a packed turn lane, his tail sitting in my lane. And the other came to a stop a few cars too early and I found myself in a Speed Racer scenario though unfortunate for Fabrice, he had no idea what the hell was going on and probably thought I suddenly had a desire to kill us both. After I safely made it between both cars I remembered I was not alone in the car and embarrassingly apologized to Fabrice who responded, “It’s ok if were late. It’s better that we arrive in one piece.”
The Full Sail presentation was a little more quite but Kathy Blackmore, Barry Temple, Dan and Thor had their share of questions and delightful epiphany’s about tvPaint.
After the presentation, we met Barry and Dave Nethery at Sleeping Moon café on 436 and Aloma. The time crunched away as we talked about animation. film, games and tvPaint. Fabrice dined on Hungry Howies, packed his bags and we dropped him off at the airport. As he walked away from the car I saw a little paw slip out of the suitcase. I jumped out and snatched Flynn out of the bag and said, “Nice Try”. We all threw our heads back and laughed, like at the end of every 80’s cartoon. The camera moved up and away to a birds eye view. Fade to black. And cut. Ok so Fabrice didn’t try to steal Flynn. But everything else in the story is true.

I’ve said it once or maybe 50 times now but I’ll say it again. Including Orlando on your trip was fantastic. I look forward to your return so Dave and I can show you some other parts of Winter Park, actually sit down and have dinner and I’m pretty sure LuLu and Flynn might go willingly into the bag for a trip to France.

Thank you so much to Fabrice, Elodie and the rest of the team I haven’t met yet. You make an amazing piece of software that speaks to the needs of traditional artists working in a digital medium.

Sounds like a wonderful visit!

Hahaha, thank you Matthew for that excellent review on "Fabrice in Florida"

He told us he found you an your wife very friendly. The trip was grueling, but thanks to people like you, Paul, David Nethery etc... it was surely more pleasant =)

I can imagine that it was grueling for Fabrice; always in a rush to the next appointment, always in strange cities, sleeping in strange beds, drinking the strangest kinds of coffees (French Roast at our house, of which Fabrice had never heard of nor tasted the likes of) and everywhere he came there had to be two dogs who treated him the way they all have a habit of treating strangers.

But what must have compensated for the trying days must have been the enthusiasm with which we were welcomed. It was so easy to setup demo sessions because TVPaint has gained a fantastic reputation among students and instructors alike and everyone wanted to hear it explained in French or at least somewhere in between that and English and Fabrice made his lectures sound like a walking, talking, breathing TVPaint manual so that by the end of each presentation people wanted to know where to sign their names in both languages. I am not kidding when I say that many times during presentations all present would gasp in fits of rapture at the sight of small and large miracles appearing on the screen.

We had a great time with your Fabrice and I awarded him with great appreciation by dragging him through two, maybe three, battleships including a WWII submarine that comes with a sign "Do not touch anything because everything is very fragile".

We too wouldn't let him back on his plane without experiencing the great American sport of becoming lost among insane road signs pointing either to nowhere or the other way at best, which never fails to bring merriment on board any car rushing to the airport -- if there is one around anymore.

Paul Fierlinger wrote:We too wouldn't let him back on his plane without experiencing the great American sport of becoming lost among insane road signs pointing either to nowhere or the other way at best, which never fails to bring merriment on board any car rushing to the airport -- if there is one around anymore.

American road signs :)
In France they are usually not that bad... with some kirks.
My favorite when entering Borny (a Metz suburbs), at a T junction :
- a sign pointing left : "All directions"
- on the same pole, pointing right : "Other directions".

In Switzerland, they installed road signs in roundabouts' center (and not next to exits). I always found this very dangerous, because you have to turn your head to the left and so, you are not attentive to the road anymore.

ematecki wrote:... My favorite when entering Borny (a Metz suburbs), at a T junction :
- a sign pointing left : "All directions"
- on the same pole, pointing right : "Other directions".

"MonthyPythonesque" !

in the middle : get out of the shit by yourself !

Toutes les routes menent a Rome :)

Nice to read those reports!
Can't wait to see the animated series "Fabrice in Florida" coming from this trip

That is such a good idea.

Thanks to Matthew for posting the report on Fabrice's visit to Orlando, Florida . (and the great cow animation !) It was good to finally meet Fabrice face-to-face after all these years. I only wish we had more time to spend together ! It happened so quickly. I was able to make it over to the presentation at Premise Entertainment in the morning, then I had to get back to work . As Matthew mentioned above , I was able to briefly rejoin Fabrice and Matthew for coffee later in the afternoon , when we were joined by former Disney animator Barry Temple (who I have worked with on various projects going back to "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" in 1987. Barry is now teaching animation at Full Sail University in Orlando. )

Everyone I have spoken with who saw the demonstration of TVPaint was very favorably impressed so I hope this leads to some more new users of TVPaint. I'll be available to follow-up with people who were at the Premise meeting who asked if they could call on me to ask additional questions about getting set up with TVPaint . Of course , one of the main comments I keep hearing from all my former Disney colleagues at Premise or Full Sail is : "TVPaint is the closest thing to drawing with a real pencil . It feels very natural, not like trying to draw with a slick vector line."

Paul Fierlinger wrote: I am not kidding when I say that many times during presentations all present would gasp in fits of rapture at the sight of small and large miracles appearing on the screen.

Yes, I noticed the same thing during the demonstration.

Hi there,

I'm writing so lately ... please excuse me.
Business never stops, and after arriving in France, I took a short rest, then I had to visit a school and many studios.
Then I came back to the office to focus on other developments and various accounting stuffs. ( Some of you have already noticed the Android Tablet topic. )

But well, I just wanted to write a big THANK YOU for all of the people who helped me to organize the trip.
From New York to Orlando, I met Debra, Paul and Sandra, Anthony, Matthew and David + a lot of animation teachers.
That was not easy to speak english all days long, but I think my job regarding the TVPaint promotion was correct.
We had various good feedbacks through MP and Emails, and a few people have ordered their software already.

This trip was the opportunity to talk a lot with Paul (some complex debate about the 2D animation in itself + the freelance way of life, etc ... ), to have a party with many animation related people in Debra's studio (french party with cheese, wain and TVPaint ), to finally meet Anthony, Dave, Matthew and a lot of dogs in every house.

Everybody is asking me if the business was good, but please be patient, schools and studios time to decide a purchase is usually long. You need to wait for budget, administrative and technical decisions, etc ... it can take several months. I will let you know privately as soon as I have more information.
For sure, I have good chances to come back (probably for some training sessions in schools, since it was requested), so I will let you know.

I wish some of you will visit France one day, I will then help you to discover nice places.
Once again, thank you for everything.