After a bumpy start, Watchout (software for making digital slide shows) enjoyed a flurry of success when David Branson took the reins from Jim Kellner, becoming Dataton’s US importer. Branson was a former producer of big car-launch shows for Detroit’s big three: Ford, Chevy and Chrysler; he was also a technical wizard; that’s why I felt honored when he asked me to produce a demo for one of his clients, NEC, to launch their latest projector at a major trade show. Actually, Branson had a prior commitment to produce a show for Digital Projection; simultaneously working for NEC would have been a conflict of interest for him. | The show was called ”Pot-Pour-Eye”—a play on the word “potpourri” which loosely translated means “variety.” | There was no budget for the NEC demo show; I got compensated with Show Sage computers and discounts on Dataton Watchout licenses. The presentation was thrown together in a little less than a week using a piece of stock music and pictures from my image archive, together with sequences of visuals from other Watchout shows, particularly a demo I made at the invitation of Charlie Watts, to play in a friend’s art gallery, on Pine Street, across the street from Watts-Silverstein’s offices, next to the Moore Theater on Second Avenue; that demo was a complete waste of time—nobody of import showed up to see it; but the scenes made for it came in handy for the NEC/Dataton demo. The show played as a continuous loop; it ends where it begins, and vice versa. This show is 100% Mesney; I take full credit for every part of it. More information at mesney.com.
