this is a scan from playing with white paper. the negative was pretty darn dark. i think what happened was i had elmer too far back and the flashes hit him. the look quickly grew on me. when the ambient light was so bright, it was difficult to tell where the flash was hitting at all. i probably would have seen it on the polaroids, but my first pola shot turned out so great i shot the rest of the time on 120 (didn’t want to press my luck). i’ll have to keep that in mind for next time.
i’ve been drooling over 8×10 portraits for days now. the tones are incredible.
oh man.. how i pine for the ansco now. need to save up again so i can get back into LFgoodness.
my friend elmer came over; he wanted some new pics and i wanted to try the above shot in 4×5. shot two rolls of 6×7 on 120, and various polaroids. everything worked out perfect. pretty proud of this image.
i took advantage of the great light on my apartment’s patio. i used flashes to brighten up the backdrop but used ambient lighting otherwise. even though i’ve been obcessing about lights, today was great practice using available lighting.
i’m finding large format up to the task of anything i want to do. i’ve wanted to try some techniques i’ve read about and i’ve been able to do them all without too much effort.
what a great feeling it is — tools not getting in your way towards a creative goal.
i have some ideas about stretching my current darkroom limits.. and i’ve been thinking about the project with coworkers. and i have another idea for a series of portraits.
a group of germans walking down the sidewalk; the leading woman was missing her two front teeth.
two drunks arguing over the meaning of entries on a receipt for booze.
a guy with a mullet playing chinese chess with two girls.
woke up. cofee as usual, but late. did dishes and trash. sorted out old cds and cases that are mismatched. imported a bunch of music into itunes.
been listening to rick wakeman and earth wind + fire all day long.
saw a movie.
nobody is saying much to me about cars. i’m going for the really fast one.
i have a photo shoot tomorrow morning.
damn, time — i mean real time — to myself is what i needed. it gets better: i have tomorrow, too. in fact, i have so much time off saved up i have to take it. that and i have three comp days stacked up. i owe me.
you know what would be the best best best bestest present for me ever? a copy of the out-of-print new age album, 101 North. i’d be your friend forever. maybe i’ll write something about that album next time.
oh man, i’d totally kill for that album.
oops, i forgot paper. i meant to go shopping for a roll of seamless paper today.
this week has been murder on my nerves.
every day at work has been dealing with large, complex, annoying issues. audits that are getting blown out of proportion. multiple hardware failures in the backup system and no end in sight. i’m on the verge of putting everything on hold so i can concentrate on one issue at a time. like that will happen!
then every day after work i had to drive to my dad’s house, which is the most stressful drive i ever take.. only to get to his house, which makes me itch all over from the cat dander. sometimes i change clothes just for visiting his house. every time i get home from the house, i take my clothes off and take a shower. like clockwork.
so after a gruelling week i get home to my apartment, which is a wreck since i’ve barely been home. i can’t even sit down because my couch is full of clothes. today i threw crap to the floor, almost yelling as i did, and turned on the air conditioner and music.
i have to wake up early tomorrow for some work tasks, then i am triple-booked for the day, none of which i can really get out of.
not to mention i have my own things i need to get done this weekend. i’m on the verge of buying a new car, which i am not looking forward to.
i’m already getting a hard time about it. but i’m really getting sick of thinking about other people and not spending enough energy on myself.
i already laid the groundwork for taking some time off. it is SAD that i have to take away work time just to get time to myself.
i’m just glad i don’t have any ice cream in the apartment now.
today i officially turned on virus scanning for email on the server i run. my mom writes back, saying she’s proud of me. so my new tag line is — offramp.org: kid tested, mother approved.
since yesterday afternoon, it’s picked up 18 infected emails. load on the machines are significantly higher. i need to save up for a new shell host. finally replace the ultra5 with a 1u server. i should bring my camera next time i’m at the colo. i’m proud of what i’ve been doing.
went for a great drive today. before i left town, i picked up some new music. one of the discs is a compilation of ryuichi sakamoto, one of my favourite artists. i have to go back and check, but i think i own eight of his albums now. i own more of his than any other artist. this compilation came with a dvd of videos.
today was all about being mellow.
i woke up and took care of my errand at the credit union. turns out the indian woman who works there lived in indianapolis. we chatted about our moves to california.
i had lunch at lucy’s tea house, one of my favourite places. followed up with a scoop of jasmine ice cream. so good.
i went home and fell asleep on the couch.
for dinner i went to clark’s. burger with canadian bacon, fries, rootbeer.
i took my laptop to dana street, where a string quartet was playing. i chatted onine with edicus, who i’ve been chatting with off and on for a year and a half. he was at his parents’ house.
came home and watched waking life.
now i’m listening to this number called peace piece, this very mellow piece by bill evans. it was listed on jeff bridge’s playlist on the itms. he’s right, it forces me right down. mellow.
i wonder what it would be like living in a loft. not a ratty warehouse, but a modern loft. i wonder if i could rent space for a day for a shoot.
today i sneered at a little girl.
i was on the tail end of a shitty day.
work has been full of backed up projects, an off-track project with no coordination, and continued quirks of a new data center.
i left early today to do computer support at my dad’s house. by early i mean i left my usual time, since i finished up early and then got caught up with crap as i was trying to leave.
i had spent some time doing research so i knew what components i needed to upgrade my stepbrother’s computer. i picked up two sticks of pc2100 ram, and a 8mb buffer 7200rpm disk.
i wanted to upgrade his disk without reinstalling windows. i was dumb for thinking this is even possible with modern utility software. not seeing into the future, i picked up a copy of disk image. $65 down the shitter.
the ram upgrade was a no brainer. i installed drive image and copied the disk from the old drive to the new drive. it took 15 minutes. the computer came up with the xp boot-up screen off the new disk but crashed. i could just not get it booting off the new disk. so freaking close.
to make things worse, my dad was asking me what the problem was. i wanted to tell him the thousands of software engineers at microsoft had better things to do than make their software easier to manage.
while i was doing this computer work, two more tasks queued up: first, see about upgrading the ram in my dad’s computer. second, see what was constantly running in the background. he was already receiving my subtle hints that i wanted to leave, so those got postponed.
the two queued tasks perpetuate my reason to visit the house — to work on computers. as if my unsually stressful job dealing with computers all day and on weekends isn’t enough for me.
for me, 2004 is the year of hating windows. i even got rid of it at work. linux there. my new laptop is a mac.
my desktop at home is still windows, for the time being. my desktop at home is very stable and reliable. i spent some time setting it up and i don’t mess with it. i just use it. and i can’t remember the last time i had to reboot it. it’s on twenty four hours a day for who knows how long. many months on end, at least.
so after doing everything i could to leave my dad’s house early, i felt my anger rise. it’s dangerous, feeling angry when you’re driving on the freeway. i could feel it in my face. i decided on my way home that i was to pick up some medicine.
on my way into the grocery store, i yielded to a woman driving a corvette. her license plate read VETTEGRL.
on the checkstand one of the tabloids read, HALF OF U.S. HOOKERS ARE ALIENS, and showed a woman with very large alien style eyes talking to a guy sitting in a car. still my demeanor was poor.
on the way home i remembered what my manager said about our last move weekend when i got so mad i spend some time sitting on the floor in the corner cooling off. he said he wished he had a picture of me then because he’d never seen me so angry.
so i’m going to dish up some medicine and cool myself off.
tonight i kept thinking about images. on my shopping list: white paper, time, film, and nerve to ask someone to stand and model.
once again the secret tea society meets. as of today we are all card carrying members.
jeff bridges‘ book, pictures is great. it really makes me want to pick up a pano camera. i have been lusting after swing lens panos. bridges uses the widelux.. very sexy..
this past weekend jon and i went shooting around san francisco. we ended in chinatown then later north beach, where i shot this one. the lighting seemed just right and the atmosphere was perfect. i was drawn to this scooter in this alleyway. i shot several frames of it across two rolls. it’s the kind of shot that makes the weekend worth it.
i went out to get some pearl milk tea.
the night was charged. the moon was low and large (a blue moon in fact). as soon as i pulled up to villa street, a fire engine roared by with its siren blaring. lots of people were out walking.
downtown was busy. i always check to see if the old man is working in the gelato shop — not tonight. i always walk past the pet store to watch the huge groupie in the tank that faces out onto the sidewalk. i stopped into the bookstore. nothing doing. i keep forgetting they don’t carry the magazines i’m interested in.
i eventually made it to the tea shop. it was busy. on their monitor was playing a stylized music video.. some asian (chinese?) pop star. i wanted to ask what his name was so i could listen to the song that was playing at home, but i didn’t have a pen to write it down so i never asked.
the video made me think: do i have style?
i looked at what i was wearing: grey tshirt, blue jeans, white socks, grey underwear, blue shoes, blue jacket.
where is my style, exactly? in the way i communicate. in my photography. in my work. it wasn’t too difficult to find.
a more interesting question for myself was, what does my style mean? where does it fit into things? that too was easy to answer: i want it to be what people remember about me when i’m gone.
sadly, to myself, i’ve been in my slowly moving career for the better part of a decade. i’m not on any fast track to management, consultancy, nor promotion. i don’t contribute much to my local community aside from local tax revenue. i’ve never met anybody famous, and i certainly won’t become famous. i haven’t spawned any innovation or authored any publications. i haven’t broken any laws, aside from a few vehicle code violations. i’ve done my share of no-nos, but by and large i don’t rock the boat.
this style thing is growing on me. when people point out some photograph or image to me and say it’s like my style, that warms my heart.
i’m glad i have a creative outlet. it means i am human, a person, an individual. working on my own style and going with it is my new reason to live.
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