[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/31050579[/vimeo]

There was a point in my undergrad when I watched “The Cruise,” a brilliant documentary that follows around Timothy “Speed” Levitch, a New York tour guide/philosopher.

The next day, my friend assured me, we were going to have the unreal privilege of actually meeting Levitch, who was scheduled to speak at our college that day.

At the time, I thought there is no way this was going to happen. It would be like never being exposed to the Beatles and then, the day after you see the movie Help!, being told that Paul McCartney is speaking at your college and you’ll just be able to walk up and shake his hand and tell him that whole Beatles thing was pretty cool.

That’s how it felt at the time. I’m telling you. Watch the movie and you’ll understand.

Unfortunately, it was too good to be true. Old “Speed” got tied up at the airport and no one was able to pick him up, so for my friend and I, that dream was deferred.

Not so when my Echo Magazine teacher told me that The Goggles, a Canadian duo who were the art and creative team of over 30 issues of Adbusters magazine, were coming to Columbia to speak about their experiences as designers and creators.

In preparation, my teacher had us watch “Welcome to Pine Point,” The Goggles most recent (and most successful) project; an interactive documentary about a small town that completely disappears off the face of earth.

As a journalist, watching this was like watching a 5000 word caterpillar morph into a beautiful multimedia butterfly.

And when we got the chance to talk to them in person, (which we did) it was so interesting to hear the way this project came about. What started as a book (that’s what their base is in) about the death of photo albums, turned into an online interactive project.

They said they considered so many variables, from the sound design to the way the short movies inside the documentary looped to let you know it was time to keep clicking. Listening to the thought they put into this (and it took them years) made me really want to have multimedia in my own thesis.

Nice to know that some people are still willing to take the time. And kudos to Columbia for actually getting those people off of the plane and into our classroom.

(Take 30 minutes out of your daily life and watch “Welcome to Pine Point.” It’s amazing and touching. Here’s the link again.)