Throwing Your Company Event the Natural Way

By holding corporate events, organisations usually aim at entertaining or rewarding their staff, launching new products, establishing partnerships, and more. These days everyone is going green. From corporations to individual households, people have realized the importance of protecting our environment, the planet and all animals. Going green has become so important that those industries, corporations and individuals who do not partake in it are frowned upon, some even to the point of being boycotted. For many reasons, including this one, many companies are going green in their offices, in the products they produce and at the events they host. Green company picnics are becoming more common and are not as difficult to pull off as one may expect. It’s all in the details. From the location to your menu to even your décor, going green at your next company picnic can be a snap.

With any corporate event, the best place to begin the process of planning is by choosing your location. Choosing an eco-friendly event venue has never been easier. Whether you are looking for an indoor or outdoor corporate event facility, the range of options that planners have to choose from is much larger than it was even 5 years ago. From hotels to restaurants to private parks, facilities have chosen to go green in ways that are cost-effective and beneficial to Mother Nature. Many facilities have become energy efficient by using natural light and solar power, in turn cutting down on monthly energy bills. Recycling always seems like the most natural and first option that groups take to go green. Recycling plastic, aluminum, paper and cardboard, for many venues has decreased their monthly waste fees while also helping the environment. Finding a venue that recycles waste and also the products they use is key.

While narrowing your search down for a company picnic caterer, look for a catering company that does not serve beverages in aluminum cans, plastic or glass bottles, thus reducing the amount of waste and recyclable products. For the waste that is produced, it is best to find a caterer that recycles or composts it. Also, seek out a caterer who uses organic products from local farms and free-range fare. This forces chefs to purchase seasonally, which ends up being very cost-effective. Using sustainable foods guarantees that the present needs are met without having to compromise the needs of the future. A new green trend at corporate events is the use of edible centerpieces, adding a whole new flare to green designs. By replenishing the edible arrangements throughout the event, corporate event planners and caterers are able to use local cheeses, fruits and vegetables as centerpieces. The easiest way for a caterer to go green is to be styro-foam free, using recycled plastic paper plates, flatware and napkins. The green options are endless for caterers, so seek out a caterer that puts them into practice.

Rentals and décor can easily be green as well. It is natural that rental companies are green. They reuse the tables, chairs, linens, stemware, etc. that they rent, thus eliminating waste. Make it a point to not use new content at your company picnic: bring in trees, fabrics, rentals, etc. that you have used at previous corporate events. You can even use recycled products and compost for crafts or arrangements. Even simple décor, such as balloons come biodegradable. Using resources, such as rental companies, is an easy way to begin going green at your company picnic.

Changing the way you market your corporate event can also help the environment. The greenest way to market your company picnic is completely paper-free. The best paper-free option for marketing is the internet: e-invitations, websites, emails, etc. The internet is limitless and has a huge range of options. If it is necessary that you use printed materials, use recycled paper and soy based ink for your company picnic flyers, promotional materials, posters, etc. These days recycled papers can be made from recycled plastic, recycled bottles and recycled cardboard. Marketing paper-free is always the best and most cost-effective option when it comes to going green.

Going green for households seems like a daunting task, so it is natural to think that putting on a green corporate event would be extremely trying. The reality is, however, that it is easier than you think and may even be the more cost-effective route to take in the long run. It is important to remember that the key to going green is to reuse and recycle. Make this the base of your company picnic, keep this rule in mind while planning your corporate event, and the green details will come naturally.

Jamie Rose Erickson is a graduate of the University of San Diego where she earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Interdisciplinary Humanities with an emphasis in Art History. She enjoys creating extraordinary green company picnics and planning unique corporate events for Team Play Events, Inc. in Southern California. Find the unique food to cater for your guests.

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Identify The Best Venues – Get The Best Deals – And Make Your Event A Great Success

Celebrating for a corporate family days has a long term effects in your employees relationship. With the advent of technology and given today’s fast paced life, organising a conference is no longer limited to hiring an auditorium with an overhead projector. In fact, organising any corporate event, especially a conference, involves a lot of planning and strategy. From identifying the number of attendees to selecting a perfect venue to assessing the facilities required, all form a part of organising a perfect conference. If this sounds daunting, do not be dismayed, as there are many specialised agencies that excel in the field of organising conferences. Conference organisers have made this mammoth task very simple by their expertise and efficiency. Whether you are organising a conference in Staffordshire or Essex or Surrey, there are conference organisers that will help you identify the best venues, get the best deals, and make your event a great success.

Professional and successful conference organisers will take care of all aspects of your conference, thereby giving you time to enjoy the entire conference and benefit from it, rather than worry about the logistics. Once the type of conference being organised is decided and also the number of invitees, conference organisers come into the picture and help you plan and implement the entire event. Planning a conference begins by identifying the perfect venue that will suit the needs of the event. Most conference organisers are well resourced and can provide a list of available venues along with the facilities and services and their rates. Choosing a venue becomes very simple with all the information available at hand. However, it is always best to personally visit the venue to ensure that all the aspects advertised by the venue owner are indeed true and would be made available. While selecting and identifying a perfect venue for the conference, conference organisers take into consideration the location of the venue and its accessibility. These two factors are very important, as they decide whether participants to a conference can attend without any apparent difficulty.

The next step in organising a conference, before finalising a venue, is listing the facilities and services provided by the various venues. While looking at the facilities and the services provided at the venues, one should always keep in mind the kind of conference being organised, as this would determine the requirements. A professional and successful conference organiser would predetermine the needs and requirements of the conference and identify a venue that would provide all the facilities required for the conference. These could include audiovisual equipment needed for presentations, a big auditorium, a good podium or stage, and perfect lighting to enhance the event, among other needs. Personal inspection of the venue would help in identifying the other facilities provided by the venue owners. A creative conference organiser will identify certain extra facilities provided by the venue and use it effectively in the conference.

Conference organisers play an important role in selecting the theme and feel of the conference. They provide the creative content that is absolutely necessary to make the conference a successful event. Their activities are not restricted to venue search and logistics, but include handling and managing the delegates, identifying facilitators, and preparing conference material and delegate packs. Once the subject of the conference is conveyed to the conference organiser, designing and preparing subject-related material, identifying eminent speakers on the subject, and requesting their presence for the conference is the duty of the staff, which is highly resourceful and dynamic. The conference organiser ensures that the material being distributed is of good quality, both in terms of content as well as appearance. Once you hire a good conference organiser to handle your conference, they handle everything right from inviting the delegates for the conference to registration of delegates to collecting delegate fee and finally making sure that the delegates are comfortably placed in their respective accommodations during the conference. They also make sure that the invitees are well aware of the itinerary of the conference and are given their delegate packs on arrival. Even while compiling the delegate packs, the conference organisers take utmost care to see that all the material is properly placed and nothing is left out. Most organisers even cater to the entertainment needs of the delegates by choosing a venue that has varied options that would both intrigue and benefit the attendees of the conference.

Finally, the conference organisers provide onsite help during the conference for the smooth running of the conference and to iron out any problems that may arise during the course of the event. This helps the delegates to attend, enjoy, and benefit from the conference without any hassle. Apart from the actual services provided during the conference, organisers also help in marketing and PR of the conference. In some cases, where necessary, the conference organisers also help in obtaining sponsorships for the conference. In short, they provide expert holistic support to the conference being organised by a corporate. Click here for corporate catering plan.

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How to Make a Cartoon on the Computer the Old Fashioned Way

The most important thing when applying for roles in storyboard artist film is to demonstrate good drawing skills. Animation is ingrained in modern culture and media very deeply. Few children from anywhere in the world do not spend their formative years being entertained and often inspired by the animated motion pictures and television shows that dominate the screens of the 21st century.

What started as a curious experiment by the likes of Fleischer and Disney has now become an expansive industry that not only shapes the art of entertainment, but has also contributed to the advancement of seemingly unrelated fields of science! Few people can honestly say that at some point in their youth, they did not want to try to make a cartoon. For a long time, even if we had the artistic merit to pull it off visually, this was something that would be a pipe dream for most.

That was, before the digital age took full root in society. Computers have changed a lot about how we do things, and they have also brought the power to accomplish great and beautiful works to our hands. Now, it is very easy to learn how to make a cartoon animation on the computer. It is so easy in fact, that we’re presented with a veritable cornucopia of choices in how we want to go about it.

But, let’s look at a more conventional way to animate, especially for those of us who still feel at home with pens and paper, rather than vectors and inverse kinematics. Animation has for the longest time been the art of taking a series of sequential sketches, painting over them with transparent cells, and photo-implementing them against backgrounds.

This used to involve lots of expensive resources and equipment, fail to mention teams of specialists to operate the processes. Now, a single multi-talented individual can do this very easily. First, it’s a good idea to storyboard your animation. This is done in a style similar to a comic strip, but each panel being what is known as a “key frame”. These key frames are examples of distinct poses within the animation, between which a smooth series of animations should transition.

Upon designing your key frames, it is best to use thin, non-pulp paper to create your animations. Determine how many frames are between each key frame, and stack your key frames, from the bottom up, with the corresponding amount of blank paper between them. Now, begin tracing your key frame, making minor changes for a frame of movement. When you get to the next frame, trace the previous one, making further changes.

If you’ve done it right, by the time you hit another key frame, you should have a perfectly smooth transition from the last. This takes time, so be patient, relax, and be precise. Use heavy ink lines, bearing in mind what your next step will be.

Once you have your inked (or pencil if you prefer) animation frames completed, you should scan them, using a common naming convention like “frame01” etc. to preserve order in your files. Be sure to scan them all at the same DPI and dimension!

Now, you want to color your animations, and omit the paper backdrop, right? You can do this with Photoshop. Open an image, and use the magic wand tool to select the ink lines themselves. Adjust its tolerance until it gets all of it. Now, copy it, and paste it in a new payer. Delete the original layer.

Uh oh, the inks are jagged now, aren’t they? To solve this, select the layer, and go into channels, and create a new layer. Fill it with white, and a white version of the jagged inks will appear. Now, go to effects, and do a Gaussian blur of less than one percent. Then, adjust the levels until the inks smooth out. Copy this channel layer, go back to your normal layers, and just fill it with black.

Now your inks are beautiful, and over a transparency. You are now free to color your cell as you see fit.

Having made your backgrounds beforehand, you have choices in what you assemble your animations with. The easiest one is Flash, which can import your images in series, if you remembered to always save your scans and colored finals with a sequential name system. Once in flash, you can position the backdrop in a layer beneath the animation cells, and export the movie. It will export as Quicktime. You can use any number of free programs to convert it to any number of formats from this point.

This animation method is not for the impatient or easily tired. It takes hours of drawing, scanning, tweaking and coloring just to get a few minutes of animation. This is why this method is expensive and used less often as the years go by. Other forms such as 3D animation and vector/skeletal animation are faster and far less tedious… but for that organic look and classic, timeless feel… nothing beats the old ways!

It’s Fab Cartoon’s hobby to draw, scribble and also create digital art, mostly in cartoon form. In his blog [http://howtomakeacartooncharacter.com/], he shares this passion and introduces the topic to other hobby animators. Read more him at Scenesbydean.com

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