We've only been back a few days since the IAAPA EXPO but already we are starting to dream up ideas for projects for people we contacted at the show. Dreaming up cool projects is a whole lot of fun. Anything we can imagine is possible at this early stage. Soon enough, the reality of budgets, timelines and a hundred other things will come into play. For now though it is simply a matter of dreaming, and scribbling down the ideas as fast as they come - and that is pretty quick. It's like flying to a tropical paradise!
Full to the brim
Each time the shop fills to the literal bursting point some pieces are declared finished. Then we swing open the giant shop doors and pull the finished pieces outside to make room for more new magic inside. Today ten of the bowling alley arches were moved into the empty foot long shipping container. The finished pieces will stay in the shipping container until we have enough to fill a semi truck and then they will be sent down the road to Ontario and their new home. Meanwhile we began work on a whole bunch of other pieces. In a short while the shop will be even fuller than before!
Second try - a little closer
There were a few ideas we liked about yesterday's first pass on next year's IAAPA EXPO booth. But there was also lots of reasons to give it another go. We decided the flying scooter had merit as did the general shape of the booth and canopy. But the rest was going to say bye-bye for this project.
We are strongly leaning towards a ten by twenty foot booth next time we are at the show. That would allow us to incorporate a few more ideas without dramatically increasing our costs. The challenge was to keep the shipping pallet within the dimensions of ten feet long by seven feet wide by eight feet tall. We would use a variety of materials to keep it down to approximately the same weight as this year. And of course we called ourselves to make assembly and takedown at the show as quick as this year too (within an hour).
After much discussion we decided to go full blast industrial-mechanical theme - just for fun. We still have much to work out and there are many refinements to make but it may just be a little closer to what we end up with. It's going to be fun for sure!
