A conference on Friday discussed Gov. Bill Richardson's $10 million media arts incentive.
Eric Whitmore of UNM Art Technology Center said after years of discussion on how to get people from all media fields together, the governor's office suggested this conference. More than 300 people attended.
The conference focused on where the media industry was going in New Mexico, he said.
During the conference, there were several sessions about media-related fields. There was also discussion about how educational institutions are planning on using the money funded by Richardson's $10 million incentive for the media industry in New Mexico.
Whitmore said the College of Fine Arts at UNM is planning to expand what it does in the media and train people to work in media fields.
"Economic development is a problem in New Mexico, because they can't find people to work," Whitmore said.
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Richardson has been encouraging Hollywood to shoot films in New Mexico, Whitmore said, but people are recognizing that until New Mexico has a homegrown industry, it will only act as a support.
Christopher Lee with the New Mexico Film Office discussed a program that trains people to be film technicians. Lee said the program took two years to establish, and they are presently working with colleges all over the state.
He said New Mexico has a huge explosion of film incentives, and there is a lot of interest in doing productions here, but there's not enough crew.
Lee said one of the state's incentives reimburses production companies who hire local crew. In addition, the production company gets 50 percent of the money back that it paid the crew, he said.
Lee said he was pleased with the conference turnout.
"It was helpful giving people the big picture of what New Mexico is doing and what the governor is trying to do," he said.
Whitmore said starting next fall, there will be more equipment and faculty to support training for media-related fields. The Arts Lab at UNM has received $3 million to develop an interdisciplinary media space.
"It's a space where people can work on collaborative projects, and it will support new classes," Whitmore said.
Ed Angel, director of UNM's Arts Technology Center, said he hopes this conference will get students and faculty involved in activities sponsored by them. He said the conference demonstrates the University's commitment to being involved in technology within the state.
One of the projects Angel spoke of is an interdisciplinary center with the High Performance Computing Education & Resource Center. Angel said there will be a studio to do a variety of projects, involving every college on campus. There is also talk of new classes that involve the media in fine arts, business, engineering and continuing education.
"It's going to evolve into a new interdisciplinary minor and eventually into a major," Angel said.
Angel said he is optimistic about a potential curriculum change within the University. There are prototype projects going on this spring and media-related classes will begin in the fall.
