We had an awesome time at eGames yesterday, the annual gaming conference organised by the Knowledge Oasis Muscat. It was a great opportunity to meet people interested in gaming and technology and it was also a opportunity to hear about the latest applications of serious gaming (gaming for educational purposes), virtual reality gaming, and gaming for the promotion of heritage and culture in the UK. And oh yeah, there was a bit on mobile phone gaming, but we’ll talk about that in another post.

The eGames conference is not your average gaming expo, you will not likely hear about the latest PS3 or Wii game in it, but instead it will hear a lot about using games for creating new effective methods for teaching, the usage of gaming for spread and preserving art and culture, and the usage of gaming for the promotion of tourism.

The majority of speakers were experts in alternative uses of gaming from the UK. Interesting examples were showcased by PIXELearning illustrating the possibility to create effective training programs using virtual words such as a GTA-like game used to train medical staff.

The second most discussed topic at eGames was the use of gaming for the promotion of tourism and culture, which is a topic that our country Oman could benefit easily benefit from if implemented well. Oman is a country rich with culture and unique architecture which the world would enjoy seeing and exploring in cyberspace for sure.

eGames first day was concluded by a session of mobile phone games, which we will discuss in a separate post for reason’s you will soon know! You can learn more about the topics discussed at eGames by viewing the conference’s blog here.

The Gulf Photo Plus community has announced its annual educational photography workshop event, Gulf Photo Plus 2008. The Dubai held event will have this year more than 90 workshop sessions on various photography topics delivered by about 15 international high profile photographers over the period from the 30th of April to the 4th of May. The event sessions will cover topics such as composition, commercial photography, lighting, post-processing, product shots, and many others. Learn more about the Gulf Photo Plus 2008 and check out their early bird discounts at this link.

Earlier this evening we attended the opening of Anna Mair’s photography exhibition at Bait Al Baranda Museum. The event was inaugurated by Anna’s cute little daughter Aria and her school friend Menaa. Anna’s photography was beautiful, the place was nice, and we managed to chat with a number of interesting people at the event including Anna herself. The event will be open to the public from Saturday the 9th to Thursday the 14th of Feb, make sure you pay it a visit if you have the chance. You can check out some photographs we took at the exhibition after the jump.

New details are emerging about the upcoming eGames 2008 conference to be held next month in Muscat. Profiles of key speakers can now be seen on the eGames Oman Blog, such key speakers include David Wortley – Director of the Serious Games Institute at Coventry University; Professor Lizbeth Goodman – Founder and Director of the SMARTlab Digital Media Institute and the MAGIC Multimedia & Games Innovation Center, Gamelab and PLAYroom; Dr Sara de Freitas – Director of Research at the Serious Games Institute at the University of Coventry; Mike Gogan – Blitz Games; Dick Davies – Executive Producer of Ambient Performance; and many other experts who will share their experience in the fields of gaming for education purposes (serious gaming), using virtual reality games for the promotion of tourism, and mobile phone gaming.

You can learn more about of these speakers and the eGames conference on the eGames Oman Blog.

Oman3D recently interviewed Anna Mair, an American freelance photographer living in Oman. Anna’s photographic work has been on NationalGeographic.com and she won first place in the Apex Oman Today Photography Competition. Anna’s first solo exhibition, “I:Woman:Flower”, will be held on the 7th to 21st of February 2008 at Bait Al Baranda museum in Muscat. We interviewed Anna to learn more about her experience living as a mother and photographer in Oman. Click here to view the Interview with Anna Mair.

Knowledge Oasis Muscat (KOM) has announced that its annual gaming conference eGames will be held on the 31st of March and the 1st of April 2008 at KOM HQ in Rusail. (See our coverage of the last eGames here.) The conference will focus as usual on gaming for education purposes, gaming for the promotion of tourism, and mobile gaming – all of which are fields that the Sultanate of Oman and local business could make use of.

The sessions of the conference will be delivered by a number of academics, virtual reality game developers, and telecom industry professionals. A workshop on Second Life on the second day of the conference will be conducted by David Wortley of the Serious Games Institute of Coventry University.

Conference entry fees, if any would be charged, have not been announced yet. Conference updates will be posted on the Public Establishment for Industrial Estates (PEIE) Blog.

The Sultan Qaboos University (SQU) held the Design Forum 08 yesterday, an exhibition for students to network with graphic design companies in Oman. The event was inaugurated by the Undersecretary of Education and was carried throughout the whole day. TBWA\Zeenah, Landor, the Scientific College of Design, Alzahra College, and other design related companies and institutions and Oman3D participated in the exhibited.

Learn more about this event after the jump.

The SQU Design Forum 08 opening included a couple of speeches on design and the awarding of prizes to the winners of the latest design competition at SQU, one which was for designing the banner for The Day of the Sultan Qaboos University – a contest which was won by Oman3D’s own Haitham Al Busafi (Conceptoo).

During the exhibition we introduced Oman3D websites to the visitors and were pleased to meet some of our existing members who came by our stall for a chat. We provided the stall visitors with the Oman3D monthly newsletter subscription form so that they can stay in touch with us via email.

The event also included a number of workshops and lectures by professionals and academics in the design industry, the most noteworthy of these was a lecture on branding by the Landon consultants, the international strategic branding firm  that is currently in the process of creating the new brand identity for the Sultanate of Oman.

We had great fun at SQU’s Design Forum 08 and were pleased to see this sort of events here in Oman. Lets hope we get more of them soon!

The Sultan Qaboos University ‘Design Forum 08′ conference and exhibition will be held tomorrow the 15th of January at the Conference and Exhibitions Halls of SQU. The conference will have presentations from a number of professionals in the design industry and will provide visitors and students with the opportunity to network with other professional graphic designers in Oman. Entry is free to all, the program will start by 9am and the exhibition should be open until 5pm.

Feel free to come visit the Oman3D stall during the event!

The latest graphic design event in Oman is going to be organised by the Sultan Qaboos University (SQU) and is going to be titled “The Design Gathering: Designs that Deserve to Last”. The gathering that will be held on the 15th and 16th of January at the Exhibition Hall of SQU will include several workshops, a competition, and an exhibition for the works of students in SQU. Entry is open to the public.

The organisers of the Oman Web Awards made a press release today announcing their acceptance of submissions for their upcoming Oman Web Awards 2007.  We believe that the Oman Web Awards is a scam to collect extortionate entry fees and sponsorship fees without rewarding any of the winners selected randomly by unqualified judges who do not have to give any reasoning behind their scores. The competition that is publicised as a promotion of creativity, web standards and intellectual property does not mention the names of designers and developers who actually make the websites and does not use web standards on its own website to start with. Enter this competition at your own risk.

Read about how I fooled them to join as a validator last year at the Oman Web Awards.

Read about our participating in the Oman Web Awards 2005.