How Can I Ever Leave?

I had a burst of WHAT THE HECK ARE YOU DOING, YOU LOVE LIVING IN LA! anxiety today. Yesterday I mentioned I was going out shooting today around LA, which I did. And as I was once again blown away by Los Angeles and her culture, I was immediately very sad and anxious at the thought of leaving (even knowing I was leaving for another city didn't help). I LOVE this city; this conglomerate, spread out, proud, glamorous, gritty tinsel town. It's a crazy place, full of brilliant talent, and broken down yesterdays. I'm a sucker for this place, it's LA.

So we started out our urban photo adventure at a derelict totally sketchy section of the LA river.


Honestly it turned into more of a recon mission, as we were NOT prepared for where we were going. It was an underpass of the 5 and the 110 freeways, covered in all sorts of tagging and great old architecture.


It is no doubt trespassing (some of you may know, trespassing is my favorite crime), but more than that it was terrifying. I barely had enough time to snap a few shots (seen on this blog) before I was so scared of getting killed or raped by some gang of homeless people that we had to leave.


We didn't even make it down to the bottom, though honestly, we're not sure we even saw anyone...but still...too scary.


We vowed to go back with more protection (aka big guys and probably my pocket knife, not kidding). It was so amazing, a hidden gem of gritty LA. I must go back.


We stuck around this rundown section of town, full of good working people, criminals and meth addicts. All of which we I'm pretty sure we met up with somehow or another.


South of the overpass is an abandoned prison, shout out to the C block - large print on the cement building says C block. I would like to figure out how to get closer to that.


All the buildings were covered in steel bars, and half were abandoned.


The barbed wire was also abundant.

We then made our way into Silver Lake, center of Los Angeles's indie music scene (home of Elliott Smith, Rilo Kiley, Silversun Pickups, Karen O to name a few) and cool urban wall art, aka murals.



Of course, first up was Solutions Audio, with it's immortalized mural, featured on Elliott Smith's Figure 8 album cover.



Then we spent some time around Silver Lake and Echo Park on Sunset. No building in the area is plain.


Everything is so colorful, and people will put a mural anywhere.


The area's still seedy...strewn with the days after "better days"...and plenty of dark alleys to get into trouble in.



We then headed back toward home through some of the most azn places in LA. We wanted a good, disreputable, authentic asian meal. So we headed through downtown, and shot this building on the way. It's right near the music hall and library, but I don't remember seeing it before today. More interesting architecture.


So we ended up at a Vietnamese Restaurant. It was amazing, the only thing we could read on the menus were the prices. So I chose my meal by pointing at a picture...and yes it was so good. Then we topped it off with a crazy coconut milk drink, boba style, but not boba. I really enjoyed it. All in all a pretty great day.

Holy cow, my brother and I are watching The Decent right now, wow, what a scary movie.

Song For Sunshine

What a lovely Saturday. I just walked home from work, it was perfect...shady, slight breeze, 80 degrees. I love this time of year. Spring and summer bring out the best in me: I always feel like doing something, I read tons, I look better, and am definitely more fit...I feel more inspired overall I think.


Well, don't worry I won't bore everyone with how these were made, but I threw these together yesterday. I'm pretty excited tomorrow I actually have like a amateur photography shoot planned, another photo hobbyist and me...Long Beach Harbor and LA River...I'll put some of the pictures up. Well, maybe I'll go to a park now.


PS Congrats Jacob Zuma, don't mess it up...yeah, I'm watching C-Span right now, wow.

Alone in Kyoto

Well I was perusing the internet, and inspired for my next Gimp divertissment:


Okay, so the few of you who do read this are probably thinking, "wow we don't care about your fake Photoshop or the things you make"...or maybe "seriously, you need a life." But, I can't help it, I like to take pictures, photo manipulate, and mess around on computers. So, I thought maybe instead of just posting the finished result, I do a little writing about how I made this...so if you want you could do your own. (Which fyi I post these because I usually have no reason for making them and therefore nowhere else to put them except the internet, and also I'm proud of how much I'm learning about these programs). Well, really you should stop reading now if you really do not care about how to make something like this...because the rest is just a sort of tutorial.

Okay, these are all done on Gimp - an open source graphics editor, so if you too wish to have Photoshop but cannot afford it due to the astronomical price, try Gimp, it really is a nice alternative and best of all FREE. Now for a bit of a tutorial:

Open up Gimp and make a new image. Mine was 1600 x 1200, fill in the background with black.


Okay go to your layers menu, and create a new layer...I called mine violet. Select the gradient tool (the can like icon that fades from gray to white). Change the color to #b10993 and the shape to radial, change the radial opacity to 50. Select somewhere near the middle of your image and drag the cursor to a corner.


Create a new transparent layer - I called mine Eclipse. For the next step, I actually used a brush I made (with someone else's help, but now I know how to make brushes too! cool). I'm not going to go into brushes now though, you can simply select the elipse selection tool. Change the layer opacity to around 60. Draw a circle, and fill it with white. Add a number of different sized circles (though be aware we will add more, so don't over do it). When you finish, select none( Select -> none) and then add a Guassian Blur (Filters->Blur->Guassian Blur) radius 30.


Create another transparent layer, call it eclipse 2 - put the opacity of the layer around 60 again. Go ahead and add more circles. Then Gaussian Blur this layer with a radius of 10.


Create another transparent layer, call it eclipse 3. Draw in anymore circles you want - layer opacity still around 60. When you've finished, Gaussian Blur it also, only with a radius of 1.


Now, create a new layer - call it Clouds. Fill it with white. Now go to Filters->Render->Clouds->Difference Clouds. Change the detail to 4, and check randomize and tileable (this is what I did at least...have fun with it). Then change the layer menu mode to overlay.


Create another layer (I know I use like a million layers) - I called mine Gradient. Once again, select the gradient icon, this time change the linear to shape and the the gradient to FG to BG (HSV counter-clockwise). Now I set my foreground color (the color boxes at the bottom of the icons) to white and the background to the violet from before. Apply the gradient to the layer (I did bottom corner to top). Once again change the mode to overlay.


For another fun gradient, select Full Saturation from the gradient menu...more colors in the spectrum if you want.

Okay a few finishing touches for the background. Select your eclipse layer 3, and change the layer mode to Grain merge. Select eclipse layer 2, and change the layer mode to Hard Light. I added a border, by changing the canvas size (1650 x 1250), adding a layer at the very bottom and filling it with a dark gray. And Voila! this is cool on it's own. (Thanks to PA blog).


When I finished, for some reason the feeling of the image really reminded me of Lost in Translation (is it weird that images have feelings to me? Songs do too.) So I decided to keep going with it...get some more practice as well. So the next step was adding the "Lost in Translation" text. One thing you should know, Gimp's font selection is severely lacking, so I'd suggest downloading more (dafont has a bunch on free good ones).

Create a new layer - call it text. Choose the Text icon (an uppercase A), write in what you want, place it where you want, the size you want, color, font, etc. Merge this with your text layer (from the layer menu, layer->merge down). Now from the layer menu choose Alpha to Selection. Then, from the image Select->Grow, grow it by 10.


Create a new layer - call it text glow. Fill in the selection with a dark gray or black. Move the layer behind the text. Select none, and the Gaussian Blur, radius 45. Duplicate this layer, and Gaussian Blur that layer with a radius 30.


For the final part, select an image you want on the foreground...I chose Bill and Scarlett as you saw before. Open up the image, and you will have to select the portion you want in your image with the paths tool (the old school pen top icon on the top right corner). Zoom in on your image, and start outlining the parts you want with the paths tool.


Once you've finished outlining, go to the paths tab on the layers box, then the paths menu...Paths menu->path to selection.



From the image, Select->Feather, and feather the selection by 2 or 3 (more if your image is very large). This will make your selection not so sharp around the edges. Now copy the selection and go back to our original image. (Be careful with the sizes of the two images, make sure they are comparable, or what you want at least). Create a new transparent layer, and paste on your selection. Move it around however, and even mess with the opacity, coloration (dodge/burn will darken or lighten, color menu for other cool things) etc.


Here's an alternate version I did:


Don't worry, I didn't use the paths tool to select the cherry tree - that'd be crazy, another trick though. I did darken the background, and made the cherry tree slightly transparent.

Well, if you made it this far, I guess you like Gimp too. Any questions, let me know. And I swear, I'll get back to normal blogging next. Also, listen to Alone in Kyoto by Air. It's featured in Lost in Translation and a great song by its own right. Ciao.

Wrapped Up in Books

For an avid reader, like myself, the long-awaited summer always brings rays of sunshine and a plethora of books to lose yourself in - I love it. So, in true blogging fashion, I have decided to post my first list...*pause for effect*...yes that's right Five Books You Should Read This Summer, fyi I don't really buy into the whole light summer read category, I read just as many "heavy" books in the summer as winter and same for "light" books. Now the airplane read is a different story...I completely understand wanting an easy, fast read for travel...convoluted? Anyway, in no particular order FIVE BOOKS YOU SHOULD READ THIS SUMMER:

POISONWOOD BIBLE -Barbara Kingsolver

Subtle and complex; very rewarding and beautiful. This book follows the Price family from Southern living to the Congo on a Evangelical mission. The tumultuous emergence of the Congo into the post-colonial era, parallel with the tumultuous experience of the family. The book may be read as a stab against religion and patriarchy, but I disagree, it is deeper and much more than that - don't be dispelled thinking it anti-God. Okay, it was on Oprah's book Club list, gasp, but really it isn't mainstream fluff, trite or contrived...just appreciable on many levels. Ambitious, successful and beautiful.

EVERYTHING IS ILLUMINATED - Jonathan Safran Foer

Hilarious, heartwarming, brilliant. I LOVE this book - okay I love all the books on the list, but this one holds a special place. A young Jewish man (non-coincidentally also named Jonathan Safran Foer) sets out in the Ukraine to find a woman who saved his grandfather from the Nazis. He is accompanied by his tour guide, the incredible delight, Alex (whose "premium" English is a highlight of the book, simultaneously mauled and gloriously funny...he calls Jonathan "Jon-fen" and constantly uses improper synonyms, for example "I fatigued the thesaurus you presented me, as you counseled me to, when my words appeared petite, or not befitting." As the internet axiom says, parts are laugh out load funny...imagine his Russian accent for the perfect effect in your head.), his psychosomatic blind grandfather and his "seeing eye bitch" Sammy Davis Jr Jr. This book really is a treat, but it's not all laughs, as the book delves into the devastated Eastern Block landscape and past. Sidenote: I feel the movie adaptation is well done, and also a good see.

WHITE OLEANDER - Janet Fitch

I first read this gem as an impressionable 15 year old, and have picked it back up many times since. This book really is a breathtaking interpretation of the prolific theme: search for self. The protagonist, Astrid, begins her journey at age 13 and we follow her through adolescence. I should mention, this book is not for the faint of heart, parts are...R rated. There is so much beauty and utter devastation in this book. It will make you want to cry, laugh, and...cheer I guess is the right word. If you have seen the movie, it does not do the book justice (though I liked the movie, I had to think of them as separate entities). This really is a GOOD read.

THE EMOTIONAL BRAIN - Joseph LeDoux

Where Do Feelings Come From? Dr. LeDoux's non-fiction answer to some very interesting questions regarding the nature of human emotions, sentience and the mysterious connections between the brain's biology, its chemistry, and our "being." Questions like: What happens in our brains to make us feel fear, love hate, anger, joy? Do we control our emotions, or do they control us?" are answered. Our nature is so complex, and how interesting to think about our reactions and even "personality" as a biological function of our nervous system. This book was very enlightening, engaging, and accessible to the neuroscience layman.

A MAN WITHOUT A COUNTRY - Kurt Vonnegut

Part autobiography part Kurt's hilarious, witty outlook on life, art, politics, himself, and of course America. This book is great and a quick read, very funny, very real, very RECOMMENDED.

A few notable mentions: Life of Pi - wow, intense social commentary, The Bell Jar - follow the breakdown of the protagonist and Plath herself, deep penetration into the dark corners of the human psyche.

My pick for the Classic read of the Summer:
LES MISERABLES - Victor Hugo

Hands down, I cannot describe how much I love this book, but it's more than love, deeper and more encompassing of so many feelings. Did you ever see Love Actually? Remember when Emma Thompson's character is explaining how Joni Mitchell taught her how to feel? In some respects I feel the same for this book. I laughed, I cried, I loved, I learned, I hated, I smiled, etc. Yes, this book is very long, but please please please don't get the abridged version; experience this majesty with all its intended words (yes Hugo will go on for many many pages about the battle of Waterloo, and French sewers, but this will all add to your knowledge, the story, and an character development). If you have seen the movie, be prepared to be blown away by the book...it is that much better. It actually took me awhile to even appreciate the movie, you really do get to know your characters in the book, so when in the movie a character reacted a way they would not in the book I felt betrayed...but that's my own issue. Buy this book, read it, love it.

The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill

Snow Globe

Most recent Gimp pursuits:

Taken in Los Angeles Union Station, part of my morning commute.


Lucent Dossier show, at Coachella, April 19 2009.



Acrobats at the show, April 19 2009.