Greg GoralskiMeet FITC featured speaker
Greg Goralski

Greg is an interactive media professor at Humber College and is fascinated with the creative process. He has won gold at the National Post Design Exchange Awards for is previous work on architectural visualization tool, IN_situ. He is an alumni of the Interactive Project Lab and holds an MBA from Ryerson University.
 
Greg is also the brains behind AppSeed, an app that turns sketches into functioning prototypes fast, which is currently up on KickStarter and has also been featured on Co.Design!
 

1) You're a professor at Humber College, what is it that you teach there? 

I teach the foundational coding classes and the mobile dev classes in the Web Design and Interactive Media program. I also run that program, so a big part of the my job is putting together the team that teaches the other classes. I am very proud of the team we have going, they are accomplished, engaged and teaching for the love of it. My rockstar team: @lnakanishi, @andrewdertinger, @fionaogilvie, @trnsmttr, @drewisthe, @daveghent and @jlapegna.

2) When not in the classroom, what are you working on?

For the last while, I have been working on bringing in more entrepreneurship into higher education. Both to encourage new companies and to have students see their own careers from an entrepreneurial perspective. I think that in a world where the industry and jobs change as quickly as ours, entrepreneurial thinking is the best tool for creating a sustainable career.

3) You'll be presenting "Computer Vision with OpenCV" at SCREENS, what will you be talking about exactly?

We will be looking at Computer Vision for mobile devices. It looks at some of the different uses and how to get started with it. I think it is going to be fun, working with this tech feels like working with magic.

4) For those that want to kickstart their own project, any words of wisdom you have to share?

AppSeedSo far I am still in the thick of it, so I am sure my advice will be better once I finish and reflect. But a couple things:
 
a) Get your team together and ready for the first few days; this is not something you do on your own, you need the support of the people around you.
 
b) Love the product, love the process; you are going to be doing a lot of reaching out to people and blatantly trying to promote your product (AppSeed: support it and get a free high 5 at FITC Screens) and if you don't love the product, it will be tough.
 

That being said, it is a lot more fun then I expected. It has given me a chance to reconnect with people that I have been meaning to for a long time.

5) Anyone in the industry that inspires you or that you'd like to work with?

When I was just getting into the industry and everything was all shiny and new, I was introduced to the work of David Rokeby (davidrokeby.com) at the CFC Media lab. His artwork blew me away then, and I see echoes of it in this project.  It would be great to collaborate with him.

Thanks so much for the interview, Greg!

Don't miss Greg's presentation Computer Vision with OpenCV at SCREENS October 2-4!