Did any forum members attend MICE and watch this? I did ... and I was really confused as to what was meant to be happening. I drove down from Sydney on Friday under the somewhat misguided idea that I was going to see the most awesome display of unbelievably creative Latte Art on the planet in 2014. I used Saturday to see exhibits thinking that I'll attend the finals to see the best, and sat through the finals on Sunday thinking ... WTF?? Don't get me wrong, they ALL poured with great precision from what I could see sitting right smack bang in the middle of the stand in front of the LED screen. The camera work was quite poor, lots of shots of the competitors faces, the photos, their eyes from across the top of the espresso machines, wrong aspect ratio on one camera, and plenty of partially obscured shots of actual pours at the same level as the rim of the cup. Not very enlightening. The MC could have taken any number of opportunities to explain the point of the competition, what the judges were looking for, scoring, etc, but no. All he wanted to do was get us to clap and make noise. I left at the completion of the final round and didn't bother going back for the presentation. I know "SACRILEGE, HERESY, stone him to death"! But hey, I was expecting to be stunned and wasn't. The rest of my two day visit to MICE was truly excellent so I have no regrets in going, but would I attend another Latte Art Championship based on my recent experience? No. I'm going to contact WCE and ask them to explain the event, see if I can get any useful insights for a total latte art competition dunce like me. Somehow I suspect not much will be forthcoming.
