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The Semipermanent Creative Conference is dedicated to showcasing the amazing talents and work of designers, photographers, artists, illustrators and typographers.

This year including a brilliant lineup. Highlights included: advertising superduo Moffitt Moffitt, fine artist Kelly Thompson, fishing photographer Corey Arnold, Supervixen, We Buy Your Kids, Dean Poole from the Alt Group, fashion photographer Kayt Jones, typographer Gemma O'Brien, and Fuel VFX.

And proving he's still "mental as anything", Reg Mombassa dazzled us with his art and bone-dry wit.

One of the common themes from all the artists was to get in over your head and challenge yourself to stay afloat.

Apparel designer Michael Leon summed it up best with the enigmatic: "Nobody moves and nobody gets hurt"

Another great dose of inspiration from a group of artists at the top of their game. See you there next year.

After just saying I don't get to Melbourne enough, I had an opportunity to go again to see one of the greatest living animators in the world: Glen Keane.

Not only was he so inspiring as an artist, but he was incredibly generous with his time. After a two hour talk he still had time and energy to hang around for another hour or so signing autographs and meeting animators, students and fans.

One of the key insights from his talk for me was that, in his words: "dead people can teach you".

Once you have the basics of your education, look to masters like Rodin, Degas, Toulouse-Lautrec, Schiele, Modigliani to continue your education.

Another highlight was seeing the rough keys for the "Part of Your World" sequence from The Little Mermaid. At first, Keane apologized because there was no sound, but without prompting, the entire audience started singing along.

The experience of hearing 500 or so grown adults singing in falsetto to a series of drawings projected on the screen still gives me chills just thinking about it.

Check out my blog post on Glen Keane in Melbourne for more insights.

I don't travel to Melbourne as often as I probably should, but I did head down recently to see the Tim Burton exhibition at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image (ACMI).

Tim Burton is a legend.

Here is a guy who has had an amazing and uniquely creative career, and is showing no signs of slowing down.

An incredible inspiration to keep drawing to do good work.

Previously I had written that there were 5 reasons to enter animation competitions.

Turns out I was wrong.

At least one more reason to enter is the opportunity to see your work with a live audience.

I was lucky enough to be a finalist in the Sixty40 Proto Ninja competition at the Sydney International Animation Festival, which meant that I got to see my animation along with a packed house of 300 or so animation fans.

I have to say: there is no feeling like it.

Imagine it.

You've already seen the film a million times, so instead of watching the animation: you are entirely concentrating on the noises and reaction from the crowd.

Every laugh, snigger, breath, sigh and the final moment of applause is just amazing.

If you're working on a short animated film, please do what ever you can to get it screened.

We want to see it. And it's well worth it.

Today was my first day at Dr D Studios.

Everyone I've met so far seems not only extremely talented and well qualified, but ridiculously friendly as well.

These guys rock.

Looking forward to making a significant contribution to this amazing film.