04: Teaching and Personal Growth (w/ Zeb Wood)

I’m gonna go ahead and get started, if that’s cool with you. Zan. I’m ready. Thank you so much for coming on.

I was telling myself when I was writing my questions and thinking about what to talk about, I’m like, where do I even start? It’s wild, but I’m sure we’ll figure it out. Maybe you could tell me how you want to start. I have no idea.

This is my first podcast, and I’ve been told to remind your lovely audience that all opinions are mine and not the opinion of Indiana University or its administration. So now we can talk about whatever you want. I’m glad we got that out of the way.

Wonderful. And completely necessary. I get it, but.

And so Indiana university, that’s where you teach? Yes. Yes. I think I’ve been here since 2013, full time as a faculty member.

And that’s where you and I met? Even before that, while I was in grad school. I think it was in 2008. It’s an incredible environment of inspiration and education and camaraderie.

I’m really thankful to be a part of it. I was, too. It’s so special thinking about the times at that school.

You know, there’s lots and lots of schools out there, and, you know, Purdue and IU both have their real campuses. And not to say that IupuI isn’t a real campus, but there is something very special about that campus. I don’t know what it was.

Also the timing, like having you as a professor and the people that we were surrounded by, there’s a particular energy that was really fantastic and that propelled my entire career. So it’s like, unbelievable how grateful I am for that. And it’s funny, you know, just to fill people in.

You were my professor when we had first met, and then we became colleagues, and we taught at the Art Institute for a short period of time together. And now we’re just like, best of friends. It’s wild how things go.

I was just thinking about IupUI and, like, its location. For people that don’t know, it’s in Indianapolis. And unlike Josh, I come.

I come from a rural area, once a rural area, Westfield, Indiana. Now it’s more of a suburb. And going into the city for college was like.

It was a pretty big deal. Challenging a lot of assumptions, how I was raised and the type of people I was around for my entire life. Going into the city let me see a lot of diverse perspectives pretty quickly, and I think that’s kind of some of the magic that you talked about.

There’s something special about IupuI, and I would have to agree. It started with leading the rural area of Indiana and going into the big city. Or it seems like a big city.

It’s not so big. Yeah. It’s a reasonable size.

It’s not too big, not too small. It’s kind of just right. That’s what I feel about St. Pete as well.

I’ve really fallen in love with that city, and I can’t wait to have you down here. I don’t know if you’ve ever been to St. Pete, but it is magical. No, I haven’t.

I’d love to. Okay. Yeah, it’s.

It’s really cool. Well, we’ll have you down. We’ll do an in person podcast next.

I can’t believe this is your first podcast ever. I think so. Yeah.

I mean, yeah, it is. What, 100% people tell me I’m scary. I don’t know.

That’s hard to believe because you’re so well connected and you’re. You’re so deep into the community. But what I realize is, you know, not a lot of people, even though podcasts, there’s millions at this point, not a lot of people are doing it.

You know, it’s still kind of an emerging tech. Yeah. Yeah, I agree.

I mean, my long drive. My drive each way from Westfield to Indianapolis is 40 to 50 minutes. So I try to listen to a lot of audiobooks and podcasts, but right now, I’m on audiobooks and finance.

Yeah. Well, now you will have a new podcast that you can subscribe to, and that’ll be about one way for you. For our episodes, we’re trying to keep them at an hour, but they always go over.

So maybe your commute there and then halfway home. But I’ll try not to listen to my episode too much. It’s gonna be so good.

You’re gonna not be able to. But it’s always weird hearing your voice back. People are like, your voice is fine.

I’m like, I sound so weird. I hate my voice. I want that on the record.

But somebody called it sultry the other day, so I’ll take it. You do have a reputation. Or dulcet.

It was dulcet, which I had to look up. What does dulcet mean? Just deep and soothing. Oh, I agree.

I agree. There’s something to it. It’s very unique.

I mean, everybody’s voice is unique, but I. Yeah, we’re always hardest on ourselves, you know, in art and creation. Indeed, who we are. Yeah.

But, yeah, I know you know, from everything that I’ve heard and what I experienced is that you’re teaching, you know, you were direct, you’re more down to earth and more real as far as coddling, maybe is the word. And maybe we can get into that because I want to talk about first how you even how did you become a teacher? Why did you become a teacher? Oh, cool, cool question. First with the why, then maybe the why to being a truth teller, maybe.

One of my earliest memories with my dad, we were at the kitchen table and he was looking through a newspaper and found like the top five or top five least stressful jobs. And professor was like the second. So, which is kind of funny because I would say it’s pretty stressful nowadays.

I was about to say, but you do kind of make your own hours and you only answer to yourself and your students in many ways. But I was maybe eleven or twelve and I didn’t really give the article much away until I heard my, I was playing college baseball and I had some stress fractures in my spine, so I had to kind of like rethink my entire trajectory of my young career or my goals. Perhaps instead of playing baseball, I had to stop that.

And I ended up going to IUPUI as a, I don’t know, a bandage semester to figure out who I wanted to be and found computer graphics technology, which is a Purdue program, the program I taught un in 2004. And long story short, by the end of that, I didn’t feel like my portfolio for animation was up to snuff. A faculty member had just left the program and I have no idea what came over me, but I pitched to the director and doctor Banitine, Mark Banitine, whos like a second dad mentor to me.

I said, hey, ill stick around if you guys will pay for grad school. I need some more time for my portfolio. I can teach these classes that this other professor had left behind.

And they jumped on it like it was the best offer they’d ever heard. So maybe they knew something I didn’t. But the next semester I had you in class.

I’m so grateful. I mean, how cool. How cool is that? I mean you, I went to a SiggraPh call out, which is special interest group on graphics.

It’s the world’s largest computer graphics organization and they have chapters throughout the world for different schools and cities. And you were doing a call out meeting just to get interest and you were leading that. And that literally changed my life.

It was a pivotal moment. I apologize thoroughly for the better. I should clarify.

Yeah, siggraph. And in general, I think conferences for any young person and what we call in the business co curricular communities, things to do in college outside of class, fighting your people is probably the most important part of college. And SIGGRAPH was that for me, as a graduate student, teaching you and many of our colleagues, now colleagues and friends, hopefully continues to be that IUPUI and other campuses.

It really taught me what a community could be on a small campus and how easily that community transcends kind of like state, national and international barriers. Because shortly after that, we went to conferences and met people from all over the world that we call friends now. Yeah, it’s truly magical.

It sounds cliche, but it is absolutely something special. And I know that people from SIGGRAph or know about it will, you know, be listening to this and will completely agree. I mean, it’s a life changing experience.

And you had mentioned that, you know, outside of classes and honestly, with classes being part of the running, I think SIGGrAph changed my life more than the classes that I was taking. It was, it was more important. I was involved in the community, I was learning a lot more outside of class.

I was pushed to a new limit because we were kind of at a hyper level. Rather than just doing our studies, we were at this next level. We were going to the conferences, volunteering at the conferences, meeting people from all over the world.

It’s, there’s so much to that, like anybody who’s listening, who’s going to go to college or in school doing those kind of things, what do you call them? Co curricular. Co curricular, yeah. Outside of class.

Yeah, that’s absolutely where it’s at. Yeah. You think about what young people need nowadays.

And even when you and I were in school, the classes are very much technically oriented and maybe a little bit of design theory, but very much like how to take your ideas and execute them with software. But a co curricular experience or a student group like SIGGRAPH is the socialization, the making meaning of what it means to be a part of a community and identify purpose and see other students and young people, peers finding their own purpose. That’s what college, that’s how college was sold to me
by my parents, is like, you, you go to college to figure out who you want to be.

But when I arrived, sorry, iu, Purdue, when I arrived at school, it was just like, here’s how you click on buttons and learn to design software. So I was really happy to find SIgGrAPH as a student and shortly after that, become the president, if you will, or like the advisor, grad student advisor. It definitely changed my life, too, and I think probably still remains kind of like.

My core mission as an educator is to make sure student groups like SiGGrAPH and communities on campus exist. Especially for a commuter campus like IUPUI, where students think they should just show up for class and then leave. They need to be staying, socializing, finding their meaning, and maybe not working as much, which is harder and harder, I think, especially after Covid.

Yeah. That. That community aspect is enormous, and it’s.

It’s admirable that, you know, because it go same with teachers, it could go the same way where there are some instructors who go down and they do their job, and then they peace rather than being involved and really doing the important work, which is building that community and supporting that community. And that community therefore supports itself outside of class because it’s not easy. You know, there’s deadlines or hard topics or programs that you don’t understand or what do I do next? And at
least then you have this community that you can lean on.

You guys see each other every, you know, other day or every week, and you get together, you build up this rapport, which you can have each other. Each other’s back. Yeah, yeah, I I’m actually.

Hopefully some of our students hear this. Student groups, since COVID since we’ve returned back to campus, have struggled. And I think it’s harder than.

For faculty members like myself, maybe more than ever, to say, hey, you guys need to value this potential. It’s not yet there, because you’re a part of the potential of what a student community can be. And kind of as a bandage.

I’ve just been taking all my independent study and capstone students which meet outside of classes with me, typically one on one, and I smash them all into the same room once a week just to kind of get that culture of critique, that culture give and take and, like, a safe space to say, you know, your ideas are not working, which is what Siggraph used to be and what you just described. I think that isolation of COVID has really became a normalized experience for a lot of young people. That’s
probably the thing that scares me most about colleges right now.

Students don’t know how. How college could be different than what they experienced in high school. You know, some of the students that we have right now had their last two or three years of high school from home, so they don’t know any better.

It’s pretty scary. Yeah, absolutely. You had mentioned, though, that it takes the students becoming involved to also build that community.

So it takes that effort. It’s like this self fulfilling prophecy. You get involved, and you make.

You set out to make a community. You get. You put yourself out there, and you attract more people who are doing that.

And the more people that say, hey, there’s this thing. There’s siggraph, you know, popping off, and they’re meeting. Then it attracts more people.

So it’s like, if. But you have to go and do that, so it’s getting people to take a chance. Exactly.

Exactly. That’s what I felt when. When, at that first call out meeting, you were like, by the way, we need officers to help run the organization.

And me, like, in my first semester of college, I was like, well, I don’t know anything. And you were. And you had mentioned, like, it doesn’t matter, you know, if you just want to help out, that’s.

That’s what matters. And I was like, well, I guess I’ll just, like, volunteer and see if they want to accept me. And then, like, I swear, a semester later, I missed my first meeting, and I was like, oh, my gosh, I have to miss a meeting.

Officer meeting. They’re gonna be so mad. I came back to the next meeting, and they, y’all had.

Had appointed me president. I was like, oh, sucker. That happens throughout life.

Make sure you show up to your meetings, or you’re gonna be at the top responsibility position. That happens everywhere. Yeah.

In my limited experience, I haven’t went too far away from IU, even since school. It is. I was just thinking about that.

You know, you went there for, you know, your undergrad, and you stuck there. There’s absolutely something very special in your experience and in your mind that you value at that space, you know, you haven’t left. Yeah, I would say it’s.

It’s made. It’s part special, but also part luck and timing and networking I very much intended on. And I did train to go to the west coast and work for visual effects companies or computer graphics companies, and I graduated in 2008.

So, like, the timing couldn’t have been worse as far as the amount of opportunities for an Indiana kid to get out of Indiana. And through happenstance and a SIGGRAPH conference, I met a gentleman named Eric Kurt, who was the director at our institute, and we hit it off, and he invited me to apply to a new position at our Institute of Indianapolis at the time. And that really saved me from leaving Indiana.

It saved me from maybe taking a position that would have burnt me out. And it kept me moving on all cylinders as far as what I was passionate for and growing a community of students, even though it wasn’t at IU at the time. And all that was because of Siggraph and meeting him at a conference.

I think it was in New Orleans. In New Orleans, yeah, in 20 09. 20 09.

20 09 so I did have some. Yeah, I graduated in 2009, so I was off by a year. But yeah, I would say I’ve never entirely intended to stay at IU.

But when you’re in Indiana and you want to be close to home and be close to your support system, the college campus is the best place for somebody that wants to work in graphics and 3d, you might say. Yeah, absolutely. I didn’t.

You might have told me that before, but I didn’t know Eric Kurt was the one who invited you to teach at the art institute. Because he invited me to teach at the art institute and changed my trajectory. I mean, I ended up teaching for six years and changed my life.

I’m probably the guy that gave him your name. So, I mean, we have a lot of pain because of what Eric Eric has done and identified. But, yeah, I was just texting with him yesterday.

We’re gonna try to get together soon. Oh, neat. I miss Eric.

Yeah. Well, I’ll definitely send him this episode. Cool.

I mean, it’s, there’s, that’s so funny. Wow. I figured, you know, we’re like 20 minutes in or whatever it is, and I don’t, you know, I haven’t even asked you what you teach, you know, what you specialize in.

Can you talk a little bit about that? Well, I would think maybe five years ago, I would say I teach 3d classes, parts of the production pipeline that deal with making films and video games on things that aren’t real. So creatures and characters being kind of where I spend all my time, and I have many classes, but each of those classes are different, part of what we call the 3d pipeline. Five years ago, though, I started teaching a class that we call in 420 multimedia project development, and it’s
probably become my favorite, and maybe, I hope the school’s favorite.

I hope we replicate it in many other programs across campus in which we have client collaborators from around the city and around the country. So what that means is I spend a lot of time networking over the summer and winter months, finding nonprofits, startups, faculty that need research prototypes, and I educate those folks, those entities, on our students skill sets and digital media across not only 3d, but filmmaking, social media, marketing and strategy, web development, game development,
virtual reality, augmented reality, that’s kind of my area is VR and ar, and we do do free work for the most part, but the students get this safer space to learn the lead generation and client securing, contracting and milestone process that any studio would utilize within the for profit sector of digital media. So that I usually line up the teams in that class based upon what the client collaborators needs are, and then the students take over.

I just say, this is a memo of understanding. This is a production agreement. This is how you kind of identify your main milestones to check in with the client collaborator to make sure you’re on the right track.

And at the end of the semester, we showcase publicly at the school’s capstone event all of these projects that we’ve done for the local and national communities, and then more potential leads come and say, oh, that’s a really cool project. We have something we want to work on Zepp, with your class. And that’s led to full time jobs scholarships.

We probably have maybe 25% of our client collaborators renumerating the students at the end of the class for the classes tuition. And then I think we’ve had a couple startups and a lot of research being published. It’s a really cool class and I’m really, really blessed to be a part of it.

So outside of teaching three D, I tried to really utilize my network to get students, Indiana students, cool jobs before they graduate. Outside of teaching 3d. Yeah, we do this community collaboration where our students are as close as can be to contractors in digital media.

So they’re learning the client acquisition process and how to mature and manage expectations of the client. They get themselves into trouble, just like any of us would. When the expectations and communications and timelines are missed and they have to recover.

They do get 16 weeks, which is probably the least unrealistic part of the simulation. But yeah, I’m there to kind of put out the fires. I try not to do it too quickly, though.

That is such a brilliant program. I mean, I honestly think that most classes should have that. That’s the one thing that I think education is missing.

And I wanted to ask you, you know, what your favorite part of teaching is, what your least favorite part of teaching is. But like, for me, aside from the annoying administration of like, you know, that money is a foundation of these efforts and that can sometimes get in the way of the genuine education. The biggest thing for me in teaching is like this missed opportunity of bringing the real world into the classroom and actually exposing the students to what it’s like when they walk out those
doors.

You know, that’s the beauty of internships and things like that. Maybe you could speak about, you know, some of your favorite parts of teaching and your least favorite parts of teaching. Yeah, I would say that the trend in universities is to try to bring more of the real world into the classroom.

The unfortunate reality is most faculty are comfortable with what they know and what they’ve been doing. It’s a scary venture to say, hey, for profit company, come partner with my class, or take a risk on these young people, because it is a risk and the timelines are longer. So some universities, including IU, including Luddy School of Informatics, where I work, are trying really hard to do that.

But sometimes faculty and students get in the way because they have a predetermined idea of what college should be or maybe what it already has been, and they just want to stay in that safe space. Shmoop, to your question, probably my favorite thing about being a part of the college ecosystem as a faculty member is there’s a low barrier to execute an idea past just the idea. And what I mean is, if you’ve got a cool idea, but you don’t know, let’s say, let’s talk about you don’t know a lot about
material science.

Well, I could walk across a couple buildings, find an expert in materials science, buy him or her lunch, and learn everything I don’t know about material science. Or at least like get me to a good foundational understanding of the things I don’t know pretty quickly. Not maybe I have a little bit easier of a time doing that because I’m a faculty member, but I did that when I was a college student.

And I think you read about a lot of people that treated college as an easy way to access expertise. I don’t know if it’s being done as much by young people anymore, but that’s probably my favorite part about being on a college campus in the city. I can go talk to any expert in any of the 40 plus buildings on campus, but I could also email a CIO CTO CEO within the city, walk a couple blocks and tell them about my students in the same day.

And the access to knowledge experts and people that do their thing really well is so low, especially when you’re a faculty member on a college campus. It just opens a lot of doors. And conversely, I think I’ve already said it a different way.

Probably the thing I don’t like about being a part of this ecosystem is a lot of people have forgotten the potential of the space they’re active in, you know, whether a faculty member or a student, they’ve come to check in and check out. And it’s, you know, it’s not a personal dig at them at all. You know, everybody has many things going on in their lives, both on and off campus, but I just wish more people knew that all they had to do is say hello.

What a piece of advice right there. Thanks. I’ve always loved academia because I felt that, too.

Where. It’s the place where there. There are, of course, rules, but no is not as much of a word that’s thrown about.

It’s like, well, research it. We are encouraging new ideas. Especially when I hit my masters in those teachings, it was encouraged, like, no, you must do something new for your thesis.

It can’t be done. And so you had to really think hard about what’s something new. And for me, it was doing a different kind of podcast format, and here I am now doing another podcast, which I’m super stoked about, but I love that energy of that.

It is an entity that pushes people to think about new solutions. You think of the sciences and things like that. The university is where so many ideas are born.

Yeah. And relationships between, dare I say, like minded, passionate people. It’s so easy to kind of catch the bug and, like.

And feed it to somebody else and stay too late and, you know, and lose time with family. Like, those are, like, the biggest regrets that I have. Like, I’m super successful in my relationships on campus, but I’m always, like, feeling guilty.

I think that’s probably what dads do, you know, it’s just, like, just feel guilty no matter where you’re at. And that’s part of the thing about being a parent. But, yeah, colleges, and maybe it’s just iupui, but I have a feeling most colleges have people that get it and want to be surrounded by similar energy and optimism.

Action, I think, is a big part of it. People that just don’t want to spout ideas, but want to make the idea, or at least a prototype. That’s a big part of life’s puzzle.

I think a lot of people forget nowadays is ideas are cool, but it’s only 2% of the entire life of an idea. Absolutely. I’ve been talking to my father a lot about that.

He’s like, I have so many ideas. I’m like, well, let’s get working on them. Cause you could have a million fantastic ideas, and if you don’t, if you don’t make them, you know that.

And that’s the beauty of, you know, the college setting is there’s the excuse and the encouragement and, like, the curriculum to move forward with those ideas in the community and those relationships, holding you accountable and encouraging you through that process. It’s, I probably have said the word special like ten times now in this, but, you know, and it’s appropriate for an interview with Yuseb, but it, that to me is one of the most special aspects, is just this, like wonderful culmination of
that stuff. But you had mentioned, you know, on campus and outside of campus, you know, your work and your life, it’s, it’s the same with business owners.

You know, I think like being an instructor, you’re almost running your own business. You have your employees, which are your students, and you have a directive of like, we got to get all this done. It’s, there’s, there’s similarities, for sure.

And one of the biggest similarities that people in positions of running businesses and organizations and instructors have is how in the heck do you balance that when, especially when you’re involved, you’re not just going to check in and out. How do you balance the work and the life? Is that a question? If you want to answer it? I’m afraid to answer for, for many constituents and family members that might be listening, and they probably already know that. I don’t have it figured out, but I would
say I don’t know if you ever figure it out.

Life’s always changing. I thought I had it bad before I had kids as far as being a balanced person, but I definitely feel like my kids have brought me back home more, a lot more, probably the majority, and it’s something my wife and I kind of take temperatures on very frequently for both of us. Are we present with the kiddos, with the boys in our case, and each other, and then the work and presence is really difficult.

It’s easy to do physically, it’s harder to do mentally and spiritually, especially for folks that care about the work, care about the business they’re running, care about the constituents they serve, in my case, my students and my peers and colleagues and the research that we do also. So it’s like kind of torn between yourself in all the right ways. It’s a wonderful problem to have and kind of like, I probably say the most fulfilling blessing to have is to be torn by things you love.

No matter what. It’s a good problem to have. Yeah.

Yeah. I’m super excited to say I have that problem. I know lots of people, even friends, that don’t like, the work they do, and it’s really easy to leave it.

And sometimes I’m jealous of that, but most of the time, I’m not. I think it’s admirable that you were honest and you said you’re still figuring it out, because I’m pretty sure that most people and positions like. Like yours, it’s a.

It’s a difficult puzzle, and the game pieces are always moving. It’s not always the same. And so it’s just doing your best to manage that and making sure, like, for me, having a daughter, that has become a really big pillar where it’s like, that is home, that is.

That is priority, and so never, ever forget that. Yeah, it’s. It’s actually probably saved me, um, because I could have worked happily and forgot a lot of things, you know, over the next 40 years, but the boys kind of pulled me out of it.

And you even saying that, I mean, I know you personally, and before you had kids, and you were always focused on family. Yeah. That is one thing that I. That stuck with me.

Friends and family were like, your pillars even before that, so I thought you did a good job before that, but I knew how committed you were to the work and to teaching, so I saw that as well. I would say it’s kind of like, that’s so good to hear from your perspective, but, like. And maybe we are hard on ourselves.

It’s always in your head, like, am I spending too much time on the. On the work, the passion projects? Who are the families you want to check in on? And I think maybe always worrying about it means you probably are doing the right thing. It’s when we forget or we just let people fall through the cracks that life’s out of balance.

And that’s always been my thing. I don’t want to let anything or anyone important fall through the cracks. I think everyone struggles with that.

And it’s funny that the more connected we are, it’s just as hard to let people. Things fall through the cracks. You get caught up your career, in your family, in your life, and you’re like, I haven’t checked in.

Like, I know. I owe our. Our good friend Chris March, who’s out in Australia, a message.

I just realized, oh, my gosh. I didn’t respond to him. Oh.

But he uses Facebook messenger, and I prefer email and. But it’s all good. It’d be a good excuse to check in with him.

But, I mean, I think you absolutely nailed it. Is that if you are thinking about that, if that’s kind of on your mind, then you’re probably doing better than you think because you care. It’s a sign that you care.

Yeah. We also need to be. I’ve been saying this to my wife a lot in our conversations about presence.

We need to be kinder to ourselves. We’re only so capable, especially as we get older, and more responsibilities and priorities shift. We have to be kinder to ourselves and kind of take care of our, I would say, mental health, maybe more for, like, what I would call spirit and passion.

You have to protect it, and that means priorities and conversations and, you know, relationships also get restructured. Yeah. Well said.

It’s nice that you and Leanne have a good rapport to communicate those things with each other. We tried, and she’s a teacher as well, and so you. You guys are perfect for each other.

Make sure she knows that. That’s why I wanted to get it on the record. Yeah, we.

We definitely keep each other in check, and I think, you know, it’s too easy to get on the comfort contentment trade or, like, just getting the job done at home and work, and there’s so much more. You know, we’re young parents. We’re not young in our relationship, but it changed our relationship 1000% when we had boys, and we definitely sacrificed each other to be there for the boys early on, and we’re just starting to figure out how to protect a relationship and take time for ourselves.

I think that’s probably something every relationship goes through. I was just about to say, now I can speak to that. All your focus goes on that, and also, you’re tired, and then you’re trying to work, and it’s like, okay, where is the time to have these special moments? Whereas before, like, thinking about before kids, I’m like, oh, my gosh.

We could just, like, go and do whatever. Yeah. Wow.

Or nothing. Or nothing. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Love you guys. Hope you hear this in 20 years name and creator show. Oh, man.

I hope this is what I was just thinking when you were talking that, like, it’s actually cool because these moments are captured and, like, how you are right now, and, like, our kids could come back and watch this, and they could experience, like, who you are in a different way. You could revisit yourself, just. Just as a side thought.

Yeah. But before I forget, going back to kind of, like, previous days, there’s this super. Speaking of, like, co curricular activities, there’s something that was ultra special about our university IUPUI, which I should say, IUPUI stands for Indiana University.

Purdue University Indianapolis. It’s a wonderful, wonderful name, but now it’s IUI, and Purdue has their own thing. So I don’t know if you’ve heard the news, and it probably doesn’t matter to your audience.

Starting in 2024 fall, the universities have separated. From a legal standpoint, they’re no longer on the same campus, although they’re in the same city. So students can’t mix classes anymore, for better or worse.

But it’s kind of clearing up some competitive aspects that weren’t nice to the benefit of all, in particular the city. There’s going to be two our research one level entities, both Purdue and IU, within a great city that’s seen a lot of investment come into it from around the country and around the world. So, yeah, it’s no longer IUPUI, it’s now Indiana University Indianapolis, and I think they’re settling with Purdue University Indianapolis.

Okay. But, yeah, so kind of, I think even some of the buildings will still be in the same place, but we’re no longer competing for classes or research dollars. It’s all, it’s all open competition, which is good for everybody.

We might be asked to edit all that out. We didn’t say anything bad about it. I think it’s, I think it’s, you know, that the honest history of, like, because for me, it’s really interesting that they made it work this long.

That is absolutely impressive. And I think it’s a testament to both schools that they were able to hold hands through throughout a journey. And I think as you move forward, especially nowadays, maybe it became harder, is making sure that all of those eyes are dotted and t’s are crossed for just the technicalities of running a school rather than just doing your thing.

But then they had this added pressure of making sure that they were working together, too. I think that was a testament of, like, how that could happen. I don’t, I don’t know how many places in the world that that has happened, but that’s, that’s really cool.

And I don’t even know how many years that was going on, but it was many tens of years. Yeah, 40, I think it was four decades. And I would say it definitely worked because we were successful, and many other thousands, probably over 100,000 students were successful during that time of that enterprise and that collaboration, and it was a plus for the city.

And I’m really looking forward to seeing how the competition increases the experience of students and faculty, and hopefully it keeps a lot of the talent in our state and in our city. Because I think for a long time it was like, how are we going to get out of here? But now Indianapolis is kind of a destination. Its more affordable for many companies to set up shop here.

Its a talent hub and we have a lot of technical expertise. So im pretty excited to see how we contribute to Indianapolis ecosystem for business. Absolutely.

I think also there’s still going to be that cross collaboration. Like if there’s a cigarette chapter in both schools, they’re going to have events and you guys are going to talk. So there’s still going to be that collaboration.

So I think there’s always that healthy aspect of it. Yeah, I really hope so. Really hope so.

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Call me directly at 727455. And now back to the episode with my friend Josh Damon and Zeb Wood. That’s exciting.

We got news on the show. Wow. Yeah, it’s been.

I don’t know how I ever told you about it. They announced it a year ago, almost a year ago, and it took a year to figure out how to do it. And we have one more year to prepare for it.

Okay, cool. At least you got some time. But that’s exciting.

I might have heard a whisper, but I’ve been a little busy. Sure. But that’s.

That’s interesting to go back to. What led to that is that the computer graphics department of the Purdue side led by Mark Bannatyne. He.

There was this Poland study abroad. Yes. And you could go to Poland and teach for an entire month in two different cities.

And, uh, I had the honor to go one time. And, uh. And you’ve been several times.

Twice. Yeah, twice. And I think it may be a good three times.

Oh, my goodness. Really? But I think it’s probably best that we didn’t go at the same time, um, for. For our long term health.

But I. For me, that was pivotal because I realized, oh, I can teach, and this is really fun. And also, it just instilled how important traveling was that there’s this entire world outside of the walls of Indiana and the US, but, you know, for you, what would you say are kind of the biggest impacts that that did to you? Yeah, I would say without study abroad, I think the order of operations and my growth to be an educator was, first, studying abroad in Poland, and then second, leading SIGGRAPH, a
student community on the college campus. And I relate those very much together because I learned in my first study abroad to Poland that everybody had the same concerns, whether you’re in Indiana or Poland, politically, socioeconomically, relationship wise, how to say hello.

You know, what curse words were? You know, how to talk to women, all, like, all the stuff. Exactly the same. And for a little, for a kid from a rural area, that’s not so rural anymore.

We love you, Westfield. It meant the most because I went from like a fly on the wall wallflower to saying, wow, my ideas, my concerns, my worries, the things I love are the same everywhere, the same to any human being, even across the world. And coming back from that first trip, it just said, why are you being to me, it said, why are you being shy? There’s so much to learn from other people around you.

And for me, that was the rest of the year at IUPY, and then I got to go two more times and lead outside of classes with SigGrApH. And student government was the other big influence in my life. Yeah.

And I think most colleges have these programs where they’re incredibly funded or you can offset funds. Second to SiggrAph, I would say, study abroad, and having those realizations about other cultures and people around the world was the catalyst to my entire career. Yeah, I agree.

I think back to that time consistently, and when I do, it’s just. It, like, transports me to this. This growing mindset that happened within a month’s time, where my eyes became bigger, and, you know, same with the siggraph journey.

And I forgot I was in student government, too. It’s funny our parallels on these things, and it makes sense, because you encouraged me throughout my process to do this. I owe you a lot.

Likewise. I can’t probably give it enough credit. And, like, for me, my parents were very encouraging of me traveling.

My dad was like, if I can’t travel, you should, you know? So I’m gonna live vicariously through you. I think my parents were super scared at the time, but now they do all this sorts, all this travel, so maybe I inspired them to get. Get out of the US a little bit.

Oh, I’m. I’m sure of it. Yeah.

I love your parents. Me, too, man. I love your whole family.

You. It can. You can see now that I know all of you so well, and even your friend circle, who are now my friends.

You can see this genuine care for each other and this genuine passion for, like, that, that you respect and you love the community that you’re in. And that ripples across everything. Because I’ll tell you, when you and I were breaking into the siggraph community and we would go to these conferences, there was something to our vibe that people were attracted to because they go, wow, there’s authenticity there.

Maybe they care. There’s love there, and it kind of just shines through. You can’t hide it.

Yeah, actually, I think I had maybe a drink or two too many and talked with, I believe it was Nico Gonzalez about. I was like, because we were at some apartment party or house party after a conference evening, and it’s always the same people showing up year after year, and that’s something that he mentioned. And I kind of went on my soapbox moment, and I was like, it’s because it’s a family, and we’ve created something within the larger conference to be proud of, to connect each other to
opportunities.

And that’s what the world’s been doing for many, many years. Years. Hundreds of years.

The people that have the most success have the greatest networks. And in our case, the network had an added element of friendship and almost to a family point. Yeah.

Even though they weren’t blood related, we all had the same interests and maybe came from similar means and backgrounds and wanted to see each other succeed. Yeah, it’s very clear. I mean, it’s so cool, you know, like, Jeremy, we, you know, unfortunately, you weren’t able to go, but we all get together at certain times, and it’s.

It is. It feels like a reunion. You know, it’s wedding.

We. We all had a house. We are all sleeping at the same house.

And it was like, this is awesome. And you get to catch up with each other, and it’s like you were transported to the past, but with all these new stories. And some of the.

The people who we’re surrounded with are doing incredible things, which is super cool. Yeah. Almost impossible.

You know who you are. Yeah. Super proud.

Well, speaking of the impossible, I kind of wanted to get your perspective on, uh, before we go into our rapid fire session. Oh. I wanted to ask you what is the most exciting emerging technology that you’ve seen from the, you know, the academic side of things? And you’re.

You’re. You’re staying on the pulse. Very much so.

And I just want to hear, like, what’s the most exciting thing that, that you’ve been involved in or that’s, that’s up and coming? Well, outside of the things that I’m involved in, I really think there’s an opportunity to positively use machine learning and artificial intelligence to identify, like really early on, different diseases. And we have faculty within my school that are like mining vast, vast collections of DNA from certain sectors of the world to, to notice precursors and signs of
cancers of diseases years before they happen. I just find that incredibly inspiring.

And ive lost people to cancer, both my grandparents to cancer, and thats super encouraging that within my lifetime, that might be figured out for many different diseases and cancers in our realm. I think the multiverse or virtual reality in many different levels or environments or places to connect is pretty awe inspiring and also pretty scary. I deal with VR and augmented reality prototypes, conversations almost on the daily.

We do a lot of training simulations in VR, one that we’ve announced most recently. We’re teaching dentists how to use an x ray machine in VR versus reality, which has a cool effect of not giving each other radiation to learn how to do x rays. But that’s small potatoes compared to my colleagues that are mining DNA to learn precursors of cancer.

But I think the multiverse outside of training, kind of like ready player one level where there’s places you can just not take the headset off and meet people and connect and maybe even work, is both exciting and terrifying. I have true concerns about real our realities, relationships, and how my kids will value those versus the ones that they value on what is currently social media and what might be something that’s more like an embodied social media. In the next ten to 20 years, I don’t think
I’m going to opt in.

I’m pretty sure I’m going to go to a lake in the mountains or a forest or something like that. But I definitely would keep my eye on that. And I think it’s a choice all of us will have to make on how much time we spend in somewhere that’s more flashy, maybe less physical contact.

And I think I’ll just end it with something I think about a lot, but don’t ever talk about, is how important physicality is to everyday life and proximity. I think it’s incredibly important. I don’t know if two generations from now it will be, and that’s pretty weird to think about.

Boy, I couldn’t agree more. Number one, I’ll probably have the house next door to you in the woods. My buddy lives out in Colorado.

He’s like my best friend since childhood. Shout out Danny sheeks. Hey, Danny.

He’s bow hunting. He has a house, and he hikes the mountain every morning with his dogs. He has his kids on his back.

And I just, like, there is something incredible to that connection. And I. It’s. It’s like any technology.

It’s. It’s really what we do with it and how we use it, you know, because people are absolutely terrified of AI, and justifiably. But also what you just said, where it could identify diseases early on and save lives or extend lives, that’s brilliant.

It’s the same. We were just watching Indiana Jones. Cause we’re gonna go see the new one this tonight.

And, and it reminded me of the quote by Oppenheimer, like, I am the destroyer of worlds, you know, where he. He was very big part of developing the nuclear bomb. However, that technology can also be extremely valuable.

And there’s, like, always two sides to the coin when you have these enormously powerful technologies where it’s like, how deep do you want to go into the negative or rather destroying people, or do you want to literally do the opposite, empower the world in a sustainable way for us to. To enjoy each other? And it’s the same with these virtual realities, I think. I think the Oprah did, like, a pledge a long time ago where it was like, you signed, and it was like, I’m not going to text and drive.

And I was like, that’s really interesting. Like, just by signing it, I did it less and. And it helped me.

And I don’t know if there’s maybe gonna be things where it’s like, I don’t know where. How we can limit that. And I’m not saying people can do whatever they want.

You could live in virtual reality, but I think you’re a hundred percent right that once you start to lose that, that abs, that the touch, the physicality, that. That humanity literally changes in that moment. Your relationships change through that process.

And I don’t necessarily think it’s for the better. Now, what’s beautiful about that is you could connect with people from across the world that you never knew and develop new relationships without that proximity. And so again, there’s two sides to that coin.

Yeah, I think. I’m really curious and maybe even excited to see how proximity, the definition of proximity, is kind of maybe moving away from the definition of empathy. Because I really think right now, and the only relationships I really want are the ones where physical proximity and empathy are tied to each other.

And maybe my biggest hope is if we do move to a future where many people opt out of moving physical location for a mostly digital, digital lifestyle, for lack of a better word, that I hope that they’re able to find meaningful, empathetic, and mutually understanding social moments with other people, whether they’re on the other side of the planet or right next door. I think that’s my biggest concern for my kids, at least. Yeah, yeah, same.

Same with me. We’re doing our best to keep our daughter, Nova, you know, from being glued to the screens. And so we just kind of.

We’re not exposing her to screens, and so she doesn’t know what she’s missing. Obviously, we, you know, she’s going to learn about them and be engaged in them, and at that point, then we’ll just have to limit it. But it is weird.

I have my phone on the couch or something like that. It’s not even on, and it. There is a magnetism.

She gravitates towards it. She could have toys surrounding it for some reason. That black mirror is.

She’s magnetized to it. It’s wild, evil, maybe. I don’t know.

Yeah. I mean, her parent or our kids parents talking about me and my wife, we struggle with putting it down, you know, and just putting it. Put it away.

Knowing. Establishing barriers, I think, is something people that are younger than me are probably even more, have more difficulty doing. Like, I grew up with typewriters.

I had a typewriter till I was 13, but still, the cell phone in particular is super, super. Too much of my life. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I do my best as well. Leave it at that. I want to transition to the rapid fire section, and I do want to circle back on truth telling because I think that.

Or maybe it’s another episode sometime. Well, I’m definitely going to have to have you back on. There’s no doubt about that.

I mean, what do you want to say about the. Well, I think, you know, you experienced it as a student first. And I don’t get to tell people enough that my perspective on maybe why I have a certain reputation, and people I really respect have similar reputations for cutting a little too deep, whether it’s feedback on a piece of art or how you execute an idea or.

Or even your work or lifestyle. And I’ve only articulated a handful of times when people have asked me, why do you do that? I think the relationships and mentors that I’ve had in my life, starting with my parents and people that I still gravitate towards, get to the point and try to figure out when I feel attacked, they’re trying to figure out my deepest motivations. And when there’s a conflict between my motivation and my activity or actions, that’s usually when the critiques cut the deepest.

And to maybe put it a different way that most people would understand from a faculty member to a student is if I’m not saying something that stings a little bit, I’m probably already opted out and I’m distracted by something else, and you’re not getting the best performance or feedback from me. So whenever I have students, and it’s becoming rarer and rarer, come to me one on one and say, you know, what you said was super valuable, but it really hurt. And I usually start with, that’s because I care
and I didn’t want to waste your time.

And what I see more and more through educators and just, like, relationships is kind of this, like, facade of niceties in such a way that we’re all spinning each other’s egos. And that’s just not what humans are for when it comes to being there for each other. We’re here for mutual growth, mutual understanding.

And whether I like it or not, somebody that can cut to the real truth or the real issue at hand when they’re, when they’re critiquing me or talking to me, that means we’re light years ahead. Had they just said, great job, see you later. You know what I mean? Oh, man, absolutely.

You. I mean, that’s unbelievably valuable. And I think it’s, it’s great that you, you, your response to students like that is it’s first because I care, because that is absolutely so true, especially in our industry, where it’s very visual, where you see a design or a thing that’s not functioning.

If it’s bad or if it doesn’t function, that’s not acceptable, it’s not going to succeed, it’s not going to do well, and that person’s going to be bummed eventually. But if you can cut it off quickly and say, look, you’re trying hard, but this particular piece of it isn’t working, and you say, but this is like, you’ve done great with this triangle over here, and that’s a great, great shape and good sizing, but you’re missing the mark with the typography or whatever it is. That is absolutely
enormous, and that’s what keep things progressing.

And it’s, it’s funny because, like, in an academic setting, you would think that most people are there to like I’m gonna grow. I know I’m gonna get grilled. This is not gonna be easy.

The, the fact is it’s gonna be hard, and so much is going to change, so might as well embrace it. But then outside of university, that should be our mindset forever. It’s wild that people just get stuck and that they’re afraid of constructive criticism or, I believe this one thing, and that’s what I believe, and you can’t change my mind.

In that case, I’m like, okay, then we probably don’t have much to talk about. Why are we talking? Yeah. And conversely, I can’t control how my students react to feedback or even receive feedback, but I can control how active I am and not candy coating things.

And I would challenge anybody in a relationship that is from appointed mentorship, which I would consider faculty, professors, teachers, k through twelve. If you’re saying good job, you’re probably lying and you’re probably being lazy, and that’s really hard to come to terms with. It’s something I do every day, and it’s especially hard when we are in an ecosystem where classes have to grow to be financially critical to the unit, to the school unit, to the campus unit.

How much time can I truly be truthful when I have a class of x versus something with another zero next to it? And then you can come back to the AI conversation. There’s people all over the planet that think AI can give that truth and feedback, and that’s not what I want. Yeah, that’s a different realm that you’re in now.

I mean, I think for, like, programming, you can pop in your code and say, is this correct? What’s wrong with the code? There’s something to that for visual stuff. That’s gonna be harder. How can it know that that logo is going to work long term for that brand’s, you know, you know, life cycle? There’s, there’s so many dynamic pieces to that, but it’s.

I realized that I was, like, leading to that question way early on, and then we got diverted, so. Yeah, I’m glad that you brought that back. Oh, good, good.

Yeah, I have much more on that, but it’s, you know, that’s why I do what I do. Yeah, I think. I think, absolutely.

We’ll have to have a round two. But, you know, before we wrap up, I do want to do a rapid fire because it’s always so fun. I know, right? So it’s, it’s just the same kind of common questions that I ask every guest and, and just to hear the similarities and also just some tangible things for people listening.

It’s, it’s maybe cliche, but I have fun with it, and everybody who’s done it so far has fun. So I’m semi nervous, but I’m gonna do my best. I think that you’ll do great, and I think you’ll really like this first question, especially just one word answers or one sentence answers.

How’s it work? We had Doug Jackson on two episodes ago, and he’s a lawyer, and so he’s gonna have the record for the longest rapid fire. It definitely doesn’t have to be one word. You can expand upon it.

So your call on it, it’s your rapid fire, but, yeah. Okay. Okay.

So, number one, what is your biggest source of inspiration? Humans, man. Probably research. I really geek out on what we’re finding out about the universe, the new telescopes, this gravitational telescope.

You know, my understanding from a scientific perspective is minimal, but maybe wherever I can find advancements in humanity and the potential for our growth and understanding of this reality is always something I’m looking for every morning. Yeah. So I’m going to take a transcription of that so that whenever anybody asks me that question, I swear I could just copy and paste that answer.

Excellent. Yeah, that is spot on for me. I mean, obviously we get along for reasons, but that’s awesome to maybe spin it in a different way.

I’ve always liked finding parallels between how people get things done, you know? A good mutual friend of ours, frank Ty, always relates how movies are made to cooking and the ingredients and the aromas and the feelings and vibes that a cook would have and how you try to match storytelling, whether it’s ratatouille or elemental, the new Prix film. The experts in our world try to always find parallels to other experts on how they do their thing, and I always get really inspired by that. Oh, yeah.

Ed Catmull from Pixar, he, there’s one quote that always stuck with me. I saw like an early keynote and a quote from him at Siggraph and it was art inspires technology and technology inspires art. There.

Our communities, whatever industry you’re in there is cross like collaboration. There’s, they’re feeding each other in some way. Like, for instance, Doug in being in law, laws affect creativity too, or what we do with AI.

I mean, there’s so many crossing of professions and stuff like that. I love, I love Frank’s way of saying that, that it’s like cooking, because that goes, that goes really deep. Also, one thing about cooking is timing and making sure everything comes out right.

And baking it for however long is appropriate for that particular ingredient and the preparation of that. Do you need to let it thaw? Like, for ideas, do you need to let it thaw before you actually put it on the burner? Well said. Yeah.

I think timing is one of my biggest weaknesses. That’s the toughest. That’s very tough.

Coming from a musician myself, timing’s tough, but I’m. I really hope Frank will be a guest on this show. I’m sure he would, but I’d love to have him on.

He’s such a good dude, and he’s super successful over at Pixar, so it’s so inspiring. We were talking about being surrounded by people who. Who do awesome things that we’re connected to, and it’s like, what.

What a model. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Rapid fire usually is not so rapid, just to let you know.

Okay. But it’s. It’s good.

Yeah. And now we can’t air this episode. Sorry.

All right. Okay. Do you have a favorite book? Yeah.

Servant leadership by Robert Greenleaf. He’s also Hoosier outside of study abroad. And Sidgraft’s probably the most impactful waffle.

Would you look at that? So this one that I’m holding in my hand. Exactly that one. It’s kind of the idea.

For those of you who don’t know, it’s kind of the idea that through serve, serving others and society, you can find a form of true leadership and maybe legacy. Yeah. And I would say whether it’s my ego or not, that’s my motivation, is to lead by example through the service of others and the communities that.

That we try to serve through my classes. And hopefully. Hopefully it’s one way to live.

Oh, that’s a great way. And I would say personally, but also you could pull our group and people who have interacted with you, they would. They would agree with that sentiment of what you’re trying to do.

I think that would be top of the list on descriptors of Zeb Wood. Just. Oh, yeah.

Good. I can stop now. Yeah, no, no, we still need you.

Have you read that yet? Have you? Are you through it? No, I’m working through it. Yeah, I’m. I’m right here.

So probably. It is great. Yeah.

Probably the most impactful areas of that whole text and all his follow up texts is how the church serves in the future. And that book was written in the eighties or maybe late seventies, and is still, in my opinion, relevant to what the church or churches could be for all other sectors of life. Yeah.

Really powerful. Yeah, absolutely. That’s huge.

What about favorite musical artist and album? Chris Cornell’s up there. Rest in peace, artist wise. Dude had some pipes and some lyrics.

I really like Radiohead, as, you know, massive attack and Radiohead and Chris Cornell are probably on repeat on my late night creative sessions since college. The college years. It drives my wife crazy just listening to the same stuff.

But, yeah, I have to say, radiohead, massive attack, and Chris Cornell and all his many, many endeavors. Sweet. Go wrong with Radiohead? No, there’s something to them.

They cat. I mean, man, if I could interview them and. And get into their head, I’m sure they’ve done plenty of interviews, though, so it’s, like, not necessary.

But my goodness. On capturing vibes and put transporting you to a very particular feeling, massive attack does a great job. That, too, where when you listen to it, you’re.

You are in a different place, and that’s the beauty of music and really good stuff, where it’s like, I feel I’m literally in a different realm right now because of what I’m hearing. Yeah. I have zero expertise or talent in music, but I would tend to agree that both massive attack and Radiohead, for me, are, like, this juxtaposition of light and melancholy in such a strange way.

Their music just weaves those together in every song in a way where the vibe is totally different from anybody else, and it just puts me at rest creatively and lets me work a long time. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Well, cheers to that. I couldn’t agree more. So that’s the correct answer.

Yes. Scoring a plus on this. Hopefully three out of three.

Okay, here, you’ll like this one. How do you define success? That’s a scary one to answer. Maybe I haven’t answered it for myself, Josh.

I mean, I think it’s. Maybe for me, it’s changing, and I agree. Like, some of these questions are intended to, like, I haven’t really thought about that.

Yeah. Yeah. Maybe I have to spend some more time on that.

I have about another month before school starts, but I would say if you’re always challenged and maybe a little bit of afraid with the things you do in your relationships and your work, then you’re probably successful. Money is a byproduct of those challenges, so it’s never really been high on my list, although I would like my kids to be protected financially. Yeah.

I think as long as theres meaning, and within that meaning, theres a bit of a fear to what youre doing. Next in the form of challenges or unknowns, then youre always growing. And that growth is probably the reason why were here.

I hope to always be a little worried about what im doing next. Making mistakes and having conversations around those challenges and finding people to help solve them. That’s.

That’s like the secret sauce for me. I couldn’t agree more. I love that.

Four for four. Four. We got two more.

Yeah. It’s a rhyme. Cool.

Okay. What is your favorite technology tool? My brain. So some wetware, not hardware.

Oh, I’ve never heard it called that. My favorite technology tool. And, you know, for your audience, just.

I’m a person that teaches digital technology, media, how to make 3d things for games and films. I’m like in tech all day most of the year when I’m teaching it. But I would say probably none of that is my favorite.

My favorite is the tools that can connect me to like minded individuals, to careers, for my students, to networks unknown. So I would say, like, LinkedIn probably is the most powerful technology tool of our time. Yeah.

And then similar competitors are probably the most distracting tools of our time, like Instagram and Pinterest and Facebook are very dangerous versions of what LinkedIn has seemed to figure out. Yeah, I would say this is my favorite tool from a pragmatic standpoint, I’ve never really thought about these things as tools. I really like playing video games.

I do it a lot less. I would have said, like the PlayStation 220 years ago, but. And that’s kind of helped.

Or make me arrive at the types of things I teach now. But definitely the tools to connect with a purpose is probably my favorite. Like, you can reach out to any expert, just like I was talking about earlier.

The power of a college campus is going to somebody, an expert, and something that you’re interested in. That’s what the Internet and LinkedIn is, too. But in particular, young people, my constituents just don’t tend to do that until they’re desperate for opportunity when it’s been there their entire lives.

It’s kind of a weird phenomenon. I like that, though. The tool that is your favorite is a connection tool, and that doesn’t surprise me one bit.

Like who you are, you know, argue that that goes like a plane or a car to get to one another, to reach physical proximity when you can’t otherwise daily do that, you know, is a. Is a very valuable tool in that regard, too. Yeah.

Yeah. I guess I take vehicles. I probably take too much for granted.

We probably all do. Yeah. But vehicles in the form of proximity, pretty important oh, yeah? Yeah.

I mean, I drive 80 miles a day just to go to work, to have the types of conversations we’re having right now. So I would say that’s probably close. Second, now that I think about it, I’m glad I brought it up then.

Okay, last one. You’re doing so good. Excellent.

A plus. What do you love doing most outside of work? Outside of teaching? Trying not to get too teary eyed, I guess. Trying to make sure my boys have the same memories or experiences that I’ve had or, like, whatever a better version of that is.

I feel incredibly privileged and blessed to have the parents that I have and the extended family and friends that I have. And I definitely see that as a priority for my kiddos. And they’re super lucky.

We’re super lucky to have every summer as away from work as we want it. I’m still working on things, but we’re together 24/7 every day from June to August, with a little extra on both ends with me. So it’s also, it’s, you know, my favorite thing, and it’s my biggest fear that they’re not getting the, they are, they are not getting the same memories.

And they’re only four and, and one and a half. You know, there’s some, there’s some science that says kids don’t even remember year four, what they, what they experienced. But I. Maybe I’m just trying to get a head start.

Yeah, that’s my favorite thing. Cool memories. That’s huge.

And, like, connection to your children. There’s nothing bigger. There is some science that my wife has told me about where up until seven, that’s when so much is soaked in that sets the tone for the rest of their life, too.

So it’s funny that they don’t. You, you can’t really recall those times, but how integral they are to the future. It’s interesting dichotomy.

There’s. Yeah. I find myself asking, and my parents never did this.

My dad was more of, kind of like, the less you say, the better. The more you feel the better. But I always ask my oldest, my four year old, like, do you feel safe? Do you feel loved? What’s your favorite things? And I think he likes articulating that, but I think it’s probably more greedy on my part that I’m checking some boxes.

I definitely want them to have the same experiences, but I also want them to be their own men. Yeah. So I don’t know where every, I’m sure every dad on histories wanted that.

And when it starts to happen. I’m looking forward to it. Oh, yeah.

They’re. They’re lucky children. There’s no doubt about that.

Your students are all lucky. I’m lucky. So.

They’re. They’re ultra lucky. Maybe our kids will date and we can, like, really bring the families together.

Some epic proportions. Wow. Yeah.

Yeah. Because my daughter’s just about to turn one, so. Well, either way, they’ll be friends, that’s for sure.

Yeah, me too. Okay. I got a couple more things for you, and then it’s.

It’s not always hard. It’s not always easy to wrap up conversations with you. Like, we could literally talk all day and we have, so.

But I wanted to ask. So we’re out of rapid fire, by the way. Okay.

You won’t. Yes. I’m sure all of your interviewees win.

Yeah. It’s a good thing. Okay.

So what are you in the future? What’s. What’s your career trajectory? What does it look like in five to ten years? Well, I’m going through my promotion process as we speak, so I’ve had some time to reflect in this area. I’ve.

I’m no longer director of our media program and I have some, like, fear of missing out and influence, but I also have, like, maybe more control of my time than ever. And I’m starting to. Starting to feel what that might mean.

I won’t really know what that means until the semester begins. Not having all of my colleagues to protect and vision castform, but what I’ve been telling my readers and my promotion documents, my goals are, are to continue the collaborative class, the client class, and scale it towards a more focused mission. I don’t have all the answers on this yet more focused mission on creating more companies and scaling other companies that need people like us.

So it’s like part, I think I said I want to be somewhat responsible for the growth or start of 100 companies by the time I retire. And they’re not going to be all animation companies. And it could be as small of an influence of like, maybe I’ll even put your awesome company and companies on the list towards a 100.

But having some inspiration or direct influence and connecting talent to those companies and growing them is a legacy I’d like to leave. And the other main line item that actually is measurable is I’d like to figure out ways to connect people like us at IU and Purdue. Ipy what it once used to be to $10 million or more in scholarships, for travel, for conferences, for just going to college.

So finding entities and corporations that are willing to sponsor certain amounts every year for the next 30 years or so, totaling ten mil or more. It’s probably not big enough of a number, but I’ll start there. That’s reasonable.

But, yeah, with your gumption, I think 10 million, you’ll hit that quicker than you think. Yeah, I think what I’m. I think probably the biggest area I have explored, and maybe somebody finds this interview can help me out, is like, how connecting internships and co ops while students are in school to working for companies like yours or Fortune 500 or Fortune 100 still counts as a scholarship.

So just like, making more bridges to industry for student experiences is a big one. Or maybe getting students to go to co working spaces and starting companies with those stakeholders and things like that. Yeah, I think I’m going to find a lot of meaning in those two goals in particular.

There’s a lot of meaning there. That’s super exciting. Number one, you can absolutely chalk naming creative up as one of those 100 businesses.

There’s no doubt that you have a connection to that. So. Awesome.

Yeah. Thank you. Well, thank you.

I think that number is also too low for most, even most professors. I think I’m at, like, 20 already. So I would.

I would say you already probably have a really solid list, which is cool. Yeah, definitely. And I was gonna say, you know, because you had mentioned that, you know, people who might be able to help you in this journey.

I mean, that. That is one of the many goals of this podcast, is connecting you with people you otherwise wouldn’t be connected with, potentially. And so your information will be in the podcast notes.

People will be able to connect with you after listening to this. So as much as you want them to be able to connect with, 100,000% reach out, please. All right, cool.

We’ll end it with this. I want you to leave the listener with a piece of advice, something tangible that you just. That you feel very passionately about, that you would have loved to hear, that you think could be important for someone to hear right now.

That’s incredible power. You know, it’s hard to articulate, going back a little bit, the inherent value to being able to say that your perspective and truth to another person, and they. And then them also receiving it, like, in a pure way, but you can’t control that.

So I guess my advice is, as much as possible, try to find yourself in a place where you’re not just coasting along in your relationships or your mentorship or your leadership with others, because young people know, especially really young people, know, when you’re just checking in peers, no patterns. And if you continue to coast, they’re going to pull away. And the people that matter most to you will never forget it if you do start coasting too much.

So I would say just check yourself. Try to be honest from a point of love and period and growth and remediative hard problems, both internally and like in society, will cure themselves. Yeah, I think I’ll stop there.

You weren’t kidding. That is powerful. I mean, that’s fantastic.

And, man, I couldn’t agree and resonate more with, like, all of what you said. I just want to thank you. It’s hard to articulate how important you’ve been in my life and how much I cherish our friendship, because that’s the most important thing.

We’ve been colleagues. You’ve been my professor, etcetera, my mentor. But really, like, being your friend and sharing the world with you and growing with you has been an extreme pleasure.

And I’m continually inspired and I hope to be able to thank you more as we move forward in our lives. And so it means a lot that you’re here doing this interview and just being yourself. You’re a good man, zap.

Thanks for saying thanks. I think doing what you’re doing now is plenty of things, but if you can pay it forward, that would be even better. Thanks.

Will do. Okay. All right, cool.

Well, I’ll be talking to you soon.