Why present at TAGA?

The Call for Papers for the 65^th Annual Technical Conference has begun, and papers for both Technical Papers and the NEW Technical Innovations Papers. The conference will be held February 3-6, 2013, in Portland, Oregon. John Seymour of the TAGA Technical Program Committee and TAGA Technical Paper contributor shares the success he has achieved through TAGA.

I work in the research group for QuadTech. Our company develops and sells control systems for printing presses. My own work has largely been the measurement and control of color online (that is, on the printing press). I have also been involved in other products that we develop, including register control and web inspection. The majority of my work has to do with advanced research for new product development.  

I have been attending TAGA since 1993, and have presented eleven papers and given two tutorials for this conference. TAGA is the one conference that I try to attend every year.

Why is this conference important to me to attend?

It is worth my time because of the high quality of technical papers and the diversity of topics and of disciplines.

The TAGA technical papers committee is very diligent about screening out presentations that are largely commercials for products. Because of this, TAGA is the place to go where you can hear good, solid technical presentations without marketing hype. The technical papers committee actively solicits experts in the industry to present, so the papers are assured of having content that is both reliable and relevant.

TAGA has diversity in academics versus industry involvement. Currently, about 60% of the papers are from academic institutions and organizations. Roughly 20% of the papers are from industry. The remaining 20% of the papers represent collaborations between these two groups. TAGA fosters this collaboration, to the benefit of both groups.