ECHO is an annual conference for church leaders that love using media, technology, and the internet to be more effective in sharing God’s story.  Conveniently hosted in Dallas, it’s easy for everyone to get there.

Make your plans to attend ECHO again this year and join us for breakouts with this amazing list of ECHO breakout speakers.

Here’s why you should go:

• To discover new forms of media
• To be inspired to use media in new ways
• To learn how to create original forms of media
• To move beyond what’s been done and dream about what’s next
• To turn ideas into a reality that impacts others for Christ

Here’s what you can expect:

• Speakers and classes that challenge you to raise the standard of media being created for the church
• To learn practical techniques, tools, and skills geared toward helping you do what you do better
• Opportunities to connect with others who share your passion for creating and using media
• To find and learn about new resources for media and technology

We will, no doubt, be using tweet-ups to spontaneously gather so make sure and grab a hashtag……. @cynthiaware.  Ok, who’s gonna be there?

If you’ve heard me speak at any conference or read any of my recently published articles, you know I often underscore the idea of using technology to foster collaborative ministry efforts.   The internet facilitates collaboration (and crowdsourcing) and allows us to network our ministry efforts, linking together in new, often innovative ways.   Using online technologies to spread the word, we can pool our talents, resources and vision and start grassroots movements that can eventually have huge results (i.e. TWLOHA).

Here’s a simple upstart example, Art for Huruma is a  an artistic collaboration between Barton Damer and Promise Tangeman Wurzell designed to raise money for a childrens home in Kenya.

Bart is a Dallas based designer whose work you are likely very familiar with if you’re a regular reader since I’ve blogged him extensively and Promise is a ‘jill of all arts’ who I met briefly in the green room at Catalyst West Coast a few months back.

During the month of July, the two artists will pass artwork back and forth to come up with one artistic collaboration of the minds (hearts).  Barton will begin the artwork (likely brightly colored gangsta style) and post the first phase on Monday, July 6th.   Within a couple days, Promise will update the artwork with her touches (hopefully vintage glory) and post the results on her blog.   The cycle continues back and forth until each artist has developed the artwork 3 times each with a final consultation to complete it.

Follow the progress of the Art for Huruma project throughout July by checking back at either artist’s blog.

Tees and poster prints of the final artwork will be printed to raise money for Huruma Children’s Home in Nairobi Kenya.

Please help spread the word about this project since both artists are really excited about the opportunity to change the world with their God-given talents!

The ECHO Conference 2009 dates are set, the website’s up, and speakers are being added.  If you have any interest in church multi-media & technology, you won’t want to miss it.

Besides great keynote speakers, it’s a wonderful nerworking opportunity located centrally in Dallas.  This year it will be held at Irving Bible Church.

Just some of the people I got to have conversations with at last year’s conference include:

• Brad Abare (Church Marketing Sucks)

• Barton Damer (Already Been Chewed)

• Scott McClellan (COLLIDE Magazine)

• Camron Ware (Visual Worshiper)

• Tony Steward (LifeChurch.tv)

• Ben Rugg & Jim Elliston (Clover)

• Greg Atkinson (Church Video Ideas)

• Anthony Coppedge (Church Media Consulting)

In fact here’s a link to some of the photos I shot of Barton Damer explaining how he comes up with his amazingly cool graphics.  You won’t want to miss it.

Just got a Facebook message from graphic savant, Barton Damer, that he’s put up a blog to serve those interested in using church media.  Although I’ve been a fan of Bart’s work for some time and even interviewed him here at The Digital Sanctuary in a three part series earlier in the year, I hadn’t met him in person until this year’s Echo Conference.  Although my photos don’t do his multi-media tutorial session justice, I still have snippets of it on my iPhone (below).  What you can’t see is that there were dozens and dozens of conference attenders sitting with gaping mouths while Bart did his visual multi-media acrobatics from the stage.

The goal of blingin’ Bart’s blog, Already Been Chewed, is to educate, motivate, and inspire churches to use media as creatively and effectively as possible.  The posts are related to digital art, motion graphics, video, web, and live productions – and how they can be used in the church.  The intent is to help you serve up something fresh on “Sundays” because nobody likes to be fed something that has Already Been Chewed.

If you wanna know a bit more about Bart you can check out the Barton Damer 2007 motion graphic reel here.

Additionally, here are a couple of background facts.  He began his career as a graphic artist working for a design firm just outside of Washington DC.  After a couple years he really felt called to use his artistic talents within the church setting.  Over the course of 7 years in full time ministry he was able to use use his skills for print, web, video, and live production.  He served as the new media director for Frontline at Mclean Bible Church, a church of 12,000 before moving to Dallas, TX in March of 2007 to be a Creative Director for RT Productions Inc.  (Igniter Media, COLLIDE Magazine, Worship House Media, Whiteboard and Echo Conference).

Barton has been featured on the web as a contributor to the popular Gomediazine. His tutorial on Creating Intricate Patterns in Illustrator is recognized by Smashing Magazine as one of the “Best of Illustrator Tutorials” and PSD Tuts featured his Bling Effect tutorial in a post about Great Photoshop Tutorials.

This is the final post in the Barton Damer Interviews, a brief series designed to spotlight the visual media of an artist serving the Church in an innovative way.  Barton's work, an artistic feast for those hungry for new and creative ways to express faith, is easy to access through the links found below and throughout this series.

In concluding the interview, I asked Barton what he sees as the future of faith-inspired media. 

The future of Christian media is going to happen outside of the church walls if things don't change.

Media is hot right now and a lot of churches are buying into it because that's what makes them "innovative."  I have to wonder if media will become the bus ministry of this era.  Everyone used to have a bus ministry, right?  We weren't reaching people if we didn't have a fleet of buses and a full-time staff person to service the buses.  And it's the same way these days.  It's common to have HD projectors and and a motion graphics guy on staff. 

If media is going to remain a valuable part of the way churches serve and share the gospel, we need to start seeing media as a ministry…  not as an accessory or simply a marketing tool for better announcements in church.

Part One: Motion Reel, Digital Art & Motion Graphics and Motion Graphics Reel

Part Two: The Creative Media of Barton Damer / Bio & Current Status

Part Three: BartonDamer,  In His Own Words

Part Four: The Future of Christian Visual Media

How important do you think visual media will be for the Church?

ECHO Live VJ clips from barton Damer on Vimeo.

Background and Training Yes, I know you've been waiting for it, in his own words…..

I began truly seeking the Lord around 16 years old…  but a very large movement in my life from the Lord was when I was 18.  I was taking Public Relations as a major and blew out my knee skateboarding. 

For over 2 months, I limped around on crutches while I waited to receive surgery over Christmas break back home.  While laid up, I was taking an entry level art class that was required as part of the major I was studying.  So, I poured all my free time into my art projects, having no idea I could draw anything other than skulls & bones off of skateboarding graphics from the 80s!  That injury really allowed me to pause and reflect on what God wanted for me rather than what I wanted for myself.  The rest… is History.  I changed my major to Commercial Art.

Even though I went to school, i would consider myself "self taught" when it comes to the computer. I had good training with traditional techniques but back then photoshop was on like version 2 or something like that and our teachers didn't even know much about it.

Today, I use illustrator, photoshop, after effects, cinema 4d, and final cut pro. I used to build websites using flash and dreamweaver about 6 years ago, but realized I hated it pretty quickly. I like developing the graphics for web, but making it function properly is not my gig.

I had done frame by frame animation for the speaker intros so I basically copied and pasted all the frames (8 frames/second) and put them onto a shirt. the video is here:

http://gallery.mac.com/bartondamer#100074/Tim-20stevens-20WEB&bgcolor=black

or here: The Whiteboard Session Speakers

Part One: Motion Reel, Digital Art & Motion Graphics and Motion Graphics Reel

Part Two: The Creative Media of Barton Damer / Bio & Current Status

Part Three: BartonDamer,  In His Own Words

Part Four: The Future of Christian Visual Media

Barton Damer Interview, Part 2

In this ongoing series of posts, I explore the creative genius of Barton Damer, a leader in innovative graphic arts, design and media.

Barton began his career at a secular design firm in the Washington, D.C. area.  (The story of his conversion to Christianity will be in the next post.)  After a couple years he felt called to use his gifts within the church setting.  Over the course of more than 7 years, Barton honed his artistic skills for print, web, video and motion graphics.

The latter part of those years, he spent working within a local Washington, D.C. congregation, Mclean Bible Church, where he was involved in creating media content as well as live production.   Mclean, located just outside D.C., is a church that serves about 12,000 weekend attenders.  You know it's near and dear to my heart since some of my closest friends are members there and when visiting them I've blogged my trips.   I now have the explanation for why some of Barton's artistic style has seemed vaguely familiar.

While at Mclean, Damer was able to create content for main services, youth events, and the young adult services, better known as Frontline.  He was also part of a team that launched the very first offsite McLean location. 

Today, Barton Damer is a Creative Director at RT Media Group.  RT Media maintains four points-of-presence on the web: Igniter Media, Collide Magazine, Worship House Media, and Echo Conference.

Additionally, Barton works with various agencies and freelance clients.  He is also a creative contributor for tutorials written at Gomediazine.com – real world advice from working artists and designers. 

Remember, you can view more of Barton's work at Barton Damer.  And here's a handful of his video clips (Truveo Clips tag: Barton Damer).  But of course, enough of the facts; let's get on with the interview…..  next post.

Part One: Motion Reel, Digital Art & Motion Graphics and Motion Graphics Reel

Part Two: The Creative Media of Barton Damer / Bio & Current Status

Part Three: BartonDamer,  In His Own Words

Part Four: The Future of Christian Visual Media

Recently, COLLIDE Magazine published an article I wrote (Technology and the Virtual Church) and used some cool graphics with it that caught my attention.  Somehow, they felt familiar, like I'd seen the style before.  In fact, I was certain of it.

Then I realized I'd seen similar artwork at conferences, on t-shirts, in video and in magazines lately.  Surprisingly, I've traced all of it back to a single artist – Barton Damer.   I wanted to familiarize myself with his work so I interviewed him. 

Barton is a a thirty-something resident of Dallas, Texas, who, besides being a skateboarding enthusiast, is setting the world of Christian graphic arts on it's occasionally uncreative ear.  You can count on seeing a lot more visual media authored by him in the near future. 

In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this glimpse of his work, Barton's Motion Reel, Digital Art & Motion Graphics; it's your teaser in the first of a four part series.  And, it's well worth the visit.

Part One: Motion Reel, Digital Art & Motion Graphics and Motion Graphics Reel

Part Two: The Creative Media of Barton Damer / Bio & Current Status

Part Three: BartonDamer,  In His Own Words

Part Four: The Future of Christian Visual Media

Great news if you're looking for the place where media & the Church converge.  COLLIDE Magazine has a brand spankin' new, redesigned website.  It's less than 48 hours old.  

And how can I resist mentioning COLLIDE when several Digital contributors are featured in the magazine's new May/June issue.  Odd happenstance?  I don't think so; it's more like Spirit-led inspiration if you ask me.  

Our Digital contributors in COLLIDE include:

Aaron Linne (Mr. Vimeo himself) His article, Stop Throwing Sheep, explores how we can use Facebook applications to spread the messege.

Cynthia Ware My article, Technology and the Virtual Church, was written to inspire early adopters of new media technologies to forge ahead.

Joe Suh (MyChurch.org founder) Joe's interview explains how social networking can serve local churches and facilitate their members connecting online.

Additionally, there are a lot of other good resources, articles and reviews in the magazine and while you're visiting the new website, it's easy to get a risk-free issue or subscription. 

Congratulations again, Tim Stevens, on Pop Goes the Church making the cover with some amazing graphics by Barton Damer.  And speaking of Barton and his way good digital media skills… you didn't think I was going to forget to show off some of his video maneuvers did you? 

Not when they feature this August's Echo Conference…..

ECHO Full Promo Video from barton Damer on Vimeo.