There are several Innovation Forums planned at Autodesk University on Tuesday November 29th, and well worth attending.  I worked with a great team for one of the speakers that will be thought provoking on the research to find the origins of humans. Specifically I worked on a project where paleontologist Louise Leakey used Project Photofly now named Autodesk123D Catch in Kenya to capture the rare million year old hominid skulls in a textured 3D model to share with the world.

Louise has been doing this research since age 6, this is not a typo. She comes from a long family of researchers, and the Leakey family is world renowned for their research and discoveries. I am sure that you too will be thoroughly engaged in the research on the origins of our species with Louise Leakey.

We will also have some skull replicas to show people. Some of the replicas are 3D printed and some made from cardboard using 123D Make.

I think it's great that Autodesk has allowed me as a part of a great team including Gregory Miller of Autodesk and Max Ehrlich of ME3D to work with Louise, advancing her non-profit goals, as we help paleontologists, students & researchers globally with design and reality capture technologies. That is genuinely imagining, designing & creating a better world.

More about the speaker Louise Leakey PhD and the Turkana Basin Institute:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louise_Leakey
• Louise Leakey digs for humanity's origins at TED 2008
• Louise Leakey @louiseleakey on Twitter
• The Turkana Basin Institute http://www.stonybrook.edu/tbi/
• The Turkana Basin http://turkanabasin.org

Creativity 2.0—Making Design Personal Again

Tuesday, November 29, 3:00 p.m.–4:30 p.m.

What is the nature of creativity and the creative process? How do we teach creativity? How does a company like Nike equip its design professionals and encourage creative collaboration with each other and their customer? How can you apply lessons from creative Hollywood storytellers as you narrate your own design story? Join this diverse community of world-renowned speakers to explore the origins of creativity and how technology can be applied to creative questions:

• Sir Ken Robinson, creative expert, educator, author, and British knight
• Mark Foster Gage, principal and architect, Gage/Clemenceau
• Rob Barnette, digital creation director, Nike
• Louise Leakey, paleoanthropologist with the Turkana Basin Institute
• Alex McDowell, acclaimed artist and Hollywood film production designer
• Saul Griffith, inventor and recipient of a “genius grant” from the MacArthur Foundation

Don’t miss this fast-paced, jam-packed session built on the model of TED conferences and presented by the world’s most creative professionals who work at the juncture of creativity, community and technology.

Cheers,
Shaan