Doug Smith Media

Going Home.

2012-02-02T20:44:00.000-08:00

After putting it off for several months, I finally found some time to make it home to Southern California to spend some time with my mom and brother. We didn't do anything too extravagant, but it was great to catch up with the family. I know San Jose and San Clemente are only six-seven hours away from each other, but it still feels like we're on opposite sides of the planet sometimes. I hope that I can see my family more often this year. For now, these photographs will remind me of the great times I had.

A Boy and his Camera.

2012-02-02T20:34:00.000-08:00

So, this past week I turned a whopping twenty-three years old. My awesome girlfriend treated me to a day in the city and a stay at the awesome OMNI Hotel in the heart of San Francisco. We got there in the afternoon, and just walked the streets until it got dark. I brought my x100 along and snapped a few photos. Unfortunately, the camera died midway through our walk. No big deal though. I couldn't imagine having a better day with the girl I love.

Random Beat(s)

2012-01-25T21:11:00.000-08:00

A few photos I forgot about, both of which featuring the very sexy Fujifilm x100.

Totally Forgot About This.

2012-01-25T21:07:00.000-08:00

A few days ago, I came across an edit that I had shot the material for. This last summer, I shot my first corporate commercial with one of my buddies Ben Zhang. The commercial was for a bottling company called Aseptic Solutions, and it was an amzing experience. I worked with some very cool people. I'm stoked on how professional it looks. A great piece to add to my portfolio! Check it out.

Dream Lofty Dreams.

2012-01-25T20:11:00.000-08:00

I've been bit by the loft bug... bad.

Since as far back as I can remember, I've always wanted to live in a loft. One of those old, rustic looking buildings with exposed brick and metal support beams. One with hard wood floors and oversized windows that pour in sunlight. You know the kind of place I'm talking about. The hard part is finding the perfect place.

I'm not sure exactly what attracted me to the loft style living space originally, but I know seeing this guy's toy collection in his space sure guided my interest. The toy collector's name is Pirovino, and he has one of the most epic KAWS collections I've ever seen. Come on now, all six 4 foot Companions. This guys is oozing money.

For the last six months, I've been legitimately looking for lofts of all shapes and colors throughout all of California. From Los Angeles to San Francisco. Don't get me wrong, I've found plenty of amazing loft units for sale, but none are in the price range that's feasible for me. I found a few that are so-so in San Jose (where I'm currently living), but nothing too special. I thought all hope was lost, until I stumbled upon a newer condo complex through a random google search.

The complex is called Plant 51 and was converted from the old Del Monte pineapple cannery into high end lofts and living spaces. How cool is that? This place isn't one of those fake loft complexes that are made to look old and aged. This is the real deal. This is one of those complexes that has history, and that's what I love.

As a sort of spur of the moment whim, Jenny and I decided to head down to Plant 51 to check out the units for sale. Most of the units were just above our price range, but there's no harm in ogling. The sales rep showed us three level lofts, two level lofts, and a few flats. They were all awesome. Jenny and I were obviously leaning more towards the two level loft, but that fact that none of the available units had any exposed brick walls was a huge letdown. It was still great to see the units in person.

A few weeks later, we returned to Plant 51 with Jenny's mom and our pug Coco. This time we wanted to get some different reactions. We wanted to see how our dog liked place, since their "pet friendliness" is one of the big perks. This time around, we saw a lot more units than the first time. There was one corner unit that we saw for the first time, and Jenny and I instantly fell in love. I was under the impression that there were no two level brick lofts, but I guess there was still one left. This unit had two huge brick walls, black metal support beams running through the unit, and floor to ceiling windows. Needless to say, it was perfect. The only downside was the small upstairs bedroom. We saw some other units that day, but nothing stood out to us like that corner loft. Below are some photos of the unit.

Now, a week later, Jenny and I are still talking about how much we love that unit. With all our tastes and things we already own (vintage cameras, toys, art, etc.), everything would look perfect in that loft. It is very much our style. Not to mention, it's a few blocks from the HP Pavilion, right next to the train station, and a block from a dog park. Can you say perfect?

I am currently going through the mortgage financing phase, but I'm trying not to get my hopes up. Having only worked for 6-7 months after graduating is what's really hurting me right now. Mortgage brokers like to see borrowers working for at least a year before lending to. I'm hoping that having my mother as a cosigner will help things happen, but only time will tell. I'm going to try my hardest to get this dream home. For now though, it is just a lofty dream.

Fuji x100!

2012-01-16T17:49:00.000-08:00

This is the best street camera on the market. Hands down.

Virtually silent, very discreet, has that old analog 35mm feel, and an f2 lens to boot. This is my kind of camera. Excuse me while I wipe up my drool

Here are some pictures taken by me and Jenny in the first week of getting the camera.

On Thin Air.

2012-01-16T17:47:00.001-08:00

Trying out some levitation photos with my girl.

Neglectful Blogger.

2012-01-16T17:36:00.000-08:00

I'm the kind of person who loves to start things, but has the hardest time finishing things. Blogging is a good example. After an event takes place, I mean to write/blog about it, but something else distracts me. Then something else happens that I wan to post, but I know I have to post the fist event. Before I know it, I have a back log of events and I end up neglecting my blog altogether.

Since I've last been here, I've gotten promoted at Apple, met new awesome people, went to Las Vegas, went to Zion, celebrated my girl's 21st birthday, bought clothes, thrown away clothes, bought more toys, sold more toys, taken more photos, discovered new music, hung out with old friends, girlfriend got a job at Starbucks, found a number of new artists I'm psyched on, Chili's and Pluto's are my new favorite restaurants, taken up the role of beer connoisseur, enjoyed drinking Blue Moon, been eating more red meat, spent the new year's with my love, actually stayed awake to see the ball drop, driven my dog to the pet hospital after eating a bee, seen a number of new and classic films, and other things I can't quite think about right now.

Here are some of my most recent instagrams that have been taken over the past few months

I'm sorry blog, I'll try and be better.

Love,
Doug

Mandatory Funny Dog Picture.

2011-10-25T22:36:00.001-07:00

This dog...

New KAWS.

2011-10-25T22:27:00.000-07:00

Everyone has their addictions. Mine is vinyl, and I can't get enough of it.

Over the past few months I have calmed down on my vinyl purchases in an attempt to focus my collection. As of late, I've been really into work by the artist KAWS. So much so that I've acquired a number of my favorite pieces by him.

Here are some of my my recent additions.

"KAWS Vader" - KAWS x Lucasfilm

"KAWS Pinocchio" - KAWS x Disney

"KAWS Hennessy" - KAWS x Hennessy VS Label

It's Benn Awhile.

2011-10-25T22:19:00.000-07:00

With my new job and all these side projects I have going on, it's been awhile since I've been able to snap some photos. Luckily, my girlfriend needed someone to help her with her portrait assignment for her photo class.

After setting up the flash and getting the proper exposure, I began snapping away. As much as I'd like to take credit for the costume and posing of the subject, that was all Jenny. I simply chose the compositions and fired away.

After selecting a few images that I liked from the batch, I began the arduous task of post processing. Given the style of the subject matter, I really wanted the images to look old and vintage-y, much like that of an old photograph. I may have gone a tad oveboard, but I like how they turned out.

Below are two of my favorites,

New Job!

2011-10-25T22:03:00.000-07:00

I gots me a job at apple and I couldn't be happier.

I now reside at the Apple Store at the Oakridge Mall in San Jose, California.

Home Sweet Home (Temporarily)

2011-10-25T21:52:00.000-07:00

When housing arrangements didn't pan out as I had hoped, my girlfriend's mom offered to let us crash at her place. In the mean time, we're just trying to save every bit we can for wherever life takes us next.

Although we'll only be living here for less than a year, we couldn't help but unpack our things. This meant unboxing a number of our collectible cameras and toys. Here are a few photos of our current room setup.

Remember those Crappy School Photos?

2011-09-05T17:51:00.000-07:00

Because I work as a student portrait photographer, Jenny and I did a little photo shoot with a background from my work set. We had a lot of fun with these...

We put our cheese factor on full blast for this photoshoot, even the pug had to get in on the action!

Wedding Video is Up.

2011-09-03T11:27:00.000-07:00

Here is the Ceremony/Reception edit

And here is the Photo Engagement edit

A huge thanks goes out to Deneka and Job for allowing us to document their beautiful wedding. It truly was a pleasure to be a part of it!

I Couldn't Help Myself.

2011-09-03T09:50:00.000-07:00

Renowned vinyl toy artist Huck Gee is on a roll this year with toy releases. First he had the Skullhead, then came the Raku Dunnys, then came his figures in the 2011 Dunny Series, and now Gold Life? Huck you're making my wallet cry in pain.

Well needless to say, when I heard Huck was having a series release all of his own I knew I had to start saving. Past release of his stuff told me that these were going to sell out fast. The set was set to release on Thursday, September 1st, but he was doing a pre-release signing in San Francisco on Wednesday.

After work Wednesday, I booked it over to KidRobot San Francisco to meet up with my girlfriend and my friend Shelby who were saving my spot in line. I got there about 5pm and didn't get into the doors until about 7pm. When it came time, I bought myself a case of 16 blind boxes and and the Kabuki 2-pack (Black Edition). I had Huck sign both dunnys in the 2-pack, talked for a minute, and then headed on my way.

It's funny because every release I'm at with Huck, he remembers me as "the Subaru Guy", because we talked briefly on Flickr about our cars. He is also the proud owner of a Subaru STI.

Having not eaten really much of anything that day, we headed over to Squat and Gobble Creperie to feed our faces. As we were waiting for our orders to come out, we began viciously tearing apart our blind boxes. My eyes lit up when four boxes in I pulled the rare chase Tarzo Rifleman. This is the first time I've pulled the rarest figure in a series, so I was stoked. After having opened the entire set, I had almost the entire collection minus the white ninja and red geisha chase.

I knew there were some quality control issues going into this, but I didn't see many marks on mine. These figures look great and the accessories are awesome. Huck Gee really outdid himself!Unfortunately, until I move into my new place, these guys will have to chill on a dusty shelf or in their boxes. Soon enough I will be able to display the proudly amidst all my other Huck toys.

Here are some fun photos I took of a few of my favorite figs.

Painting in the Night.

2011-08-27T11:26:00.000-07:00

Got the urge to go out last night and do some night photography. A few buddies of mine and I headed over to Natural Bridges State Beach with our camera equipment. The sky was overly hazy and was reflecting the orange glow from the surrounding houses and streetlights. This meant that with long exposures, the sky looked a bright orange color similar to that of sunset. As I began testing out some settings, my friend Shelby offered me his recently acquired Gary Fong Lightsphere. This is basically just a huge diffusion screen that mounts over the flash to give off a nice even glow. It worked great and I may have to pick up one of these in the very near future.

For each photo I took that night, I basically ran around whatever subject I was photographing and launched the flash a number of times. It was a lot of trial and error, but I'm very happy with how a number of the shots came out.

Check them out!

Random Beat #2.

2011-08-27T11:21:00.001-07:00

Ever since I've started up working at my job for Lifetouch School Portraits, I haven't had much time to shoot my own stuff or work on any personal projects. One day when I got home from work, my girlfriend and I got the "photo bug" that could only be cured by embarking on a spontaneous photo safari. I've had this idea of a shot for awhile now, and I was finally able to capture it. I saturated the image slightly and added a vintage film texture in photoshop. Check it out below and have a nice day!

Bokehlicious.

2011-08-27T11:15:00.000-07:00

A friend of mine told me about a photography shooting technique called a "bokeh panorama." This is where one uses a fast lens with shallow focus such as a 135mm to take multiple pictures of a subject against an out of focus background. In post, these photos are then merged together to show a wide shot that has very narrow DoF, a trait uncommon with most wide-angles. As always, my girlfriend Jenny was ready and willing to be my test subject yet again. Shot came out pretty awesome although I wish I had gone a bit less crazy with the dodge tool on photoshop...

48 Hours of Pain, Tears, and Joy.

2011-08-27T10:34:00.000-07:00

Every year around this time comes the San Jose 48 Hour Film Festival, and each year I vow not to partake due to the stress of last year. Well once again, I got roped into working on another film. It's not that I don't enjoy making films in the least, it's just the stress of delivering a final product in 48 hours...

From writing, to production, to editing, to sound mixing, to exporting, there is so much that needs to happen in such a short time frame. The group I was working with are a great group of people that I love collaborating with. We all motivate each and always seem to be on the same page in terms of ides and visuals.

As with all 48 Hour Film Projects, we were given a few required elements to include within our film

Mandatory Elements:
+Inclusion of a chair (we had fun with this one)
+Line of dialogue: "Give me some kind of sign"
+Inclusion of a "recycling expert" character
+Someone with the name "Ian Jeffers" or "Eileen Jeffers"

PRODUCTION (8/12-8/14)

Luckily we drew the genre "horror" for our film. We knew we were going to go way overboard with this genre, but that was sort of the point. So after agreeing that we would use the super awesome abandoned naval base of Fort Ord as our location, we wrote our script. We finished our script by 11pm-ish friday night before heading home to get some props and few hours of precious rest.

The next morning we were off. As we drove into the town of Marina, CA, we were all giddy with excitement. The fog that had crept over the town in the middle of the night was perfect and looked straight out of a... well... horror film. We spent all day shooting at various locations throughout the fort. This place is a haven for people like me. This will be the third project I've shot here, and I still get excited every time. I highly recommend checking this place out if you find yourself ever down this way.

We shot until the last speckle of day disappeared behind the horizon. We drove home to begin the arduous task of post production. I was exhausted, but I knew we needed to have a rough edit done before the morning. I stayed up until 3-4am completing this task. When my eyes would stay open no lon ger, I trudged off to bed. I woke up around 8am the next morning knowing how much work we all still had to do.

A few members of our group recorded foley while Ben Southward and I worked on mixing the sound and adding in the music. We began our final export close to two hours before the due time. This was just to make sure we weren't down to the line like last year. Sure enough the film exported in about 45 minutes and we were in the clear. I wish we had time for some color correction, but honestly I don't think we could have made it.

A half an hour left to go, and we headed over to the meetup location at a bar and billiard room in downtown San Jose. We made sure we had all the necessary documentation before turning in our film and packet. That was it. We had finished. We all took a sigh of relief and smiled as we realized we had just completed our second film created in 48 hours.

SCREENING NIGHT (8/18)

After having caught up on sleep somewhat, my team and I were all excited to see our hard work displayed up on the big screen. Camera 12 Cinemas in downtown San Jose was the place to be Thursday night. The theater was packed and our group had to split up because of this, which was unfortunate.

Overall, the films were very well done. Some of the works made you question if the filmmakers didn't have some sort of head start based on their production value and sound work. EIther way, the films were extremely enjoyable.

When our name "Surfin' Kitty Productions" popped up on the screen our team and friends screamed with excitement. The film was awesome on the big screen. There were definitely a number of minor problems with the film, but nothing too drastic to take the viewer out of the film. We got a few laughs, which was awesome too, considering we mad a horror film...

As for now, I don't plan on doing anymore 48 Hour Film Festivals anytime soon, but I wouldn't mind making the San Jose 48 Hour Film Festival into a yearly tradition! Looking back on the whole situation, I had a blast and learned a lot. I'm not a huge fan of the sleep deprivation that comes with the film festival, but that's sort of the challenge. It feels almost like a marathon for filmmakers!

Here is our final film as it was presented to the audience at the screening. Since then, I've only done some minor color correction work. Enjoy!

**UPDATE**
I just received word that our film was nominated for 4 awards (best screenplay, best makeup, best cinematography, and DUN DUN DUNNNN, BEST PICTURE!). Fingers crossed!

Our First Wedding.

2011-08-01T14:38:00.000-07:00

No not mine, but a cute young couple local to the bay area.

Andrew Cichowski, one of our good friends, was asked by one of his colleagues to document their wedding. Because Andrew was hard at work in Med School over in Chicago and was no longer local to Santa Cruz, he was unable to photograph the wedding. He threw our names out there for her to consider as replacements, and after a few emails, we were hired!

I've filmed one wedding in the past, but have never photographed one. After some discussion, I turned the bride-to-be on to the idea of having a video done in addition to photographs. She loved the idea.

We met the couple for the first time back in June to talk and take some photos for their photo engagement. We decide upon Panther Beach as our location, and man was it beautiful! We ended up getting some great sunset, golden hour shots.

A month later, the big day came. We all had butterflies, but we knew what we had to do. Jenny, armed with a Canon 5D and a Nikon D80, was in charge of photos. A friend, Ben Bunch, and I were in charge of capturing video. We mapped out all our locations beforehand so we could reduce the risk of getting in each other's shots. All in all, a very stressful day that went very well. We came back with hundreds of great captures as well as some absolutely stunning HD video. I can't wait to show the happy couple our work!

Here are some of our favorite captures from the day.

We just finished making them a custom book and are still hard at work on the edit. I'll post the final edit of the day as soon it's done.

If you're interested in any wedding or event coverage please don't hesitate to contact us at info@athousandwordsandframes.com or check out our site at AThousandWordsAndFrames.com

Aseptic Solutions Corporate Commercial (Teaser).

2011-08-01T14:22:00.001-07:00

Ben Zhang, a good friend of mine who I met through UC Santa Cruz's Film program, contacted me with a great job opportunity. Apparently, a filling and bottling company (Aseptic Solutions USA) that his family works for was looking to update their company video. Given the caliber of the job, Ben asked if I could help him out.

I wrangled up all my camera equipment and headed down south to sunny Orange County where I stayed at my mom's place. For the next three days, Ben and I spent countless hours in Riverside, CA filming in and around the company's facilities. Being a huge fan of shows like "How It's Made," I was in heaven. Each piece of machinery was engineered to perform a specific task in the mixing/bottling process. I told Ben that I could easily spend weeks inside the facilities just filming anything and everything. From an outsider's perspective of the multi-million dollar bottling industry, it was interesting to see the process behind what it takes to make, fill, bottle, pack, and ship many of the beverages that we enjoy at home.

For now, Ben has only edited together a teaser, but I cannot wait to see the whole thing!

Another Go.

2011-08-01T14:03:00.000-07:00

After the recent success of our Build-A-Bear Smallfrys commercial, I was motivated to enter another video contest on potent.net. This time around, Jenny and I collaborated with another stop frame extraordinaire to create our entry. A few months ago, Kip and I worked together on the rather dark comedy short film "The Life of a Carrot", which turned out great.

So without going too much into it, please check out our entry below. You can bet it has some stop-frame animation in it!

Film Versus Digital.

2011-07-14T11:33:00.000-07:00

As much as I love the ease of use of digital, there's just something about film that keeps me coming back for more. It could the fact that every picture costs money, which forces me to think about the picture I am composing. Or it could be the fact that film slows you down in an effort to check all your settings. Or it could possibly be the thrill of waiting weeks until receiving your pictures back and discovering past memories and events that you had documented prior. Whatever it is, I love film -- its look, its feel, its aesthetic, its method, its everything.

I still use my digital SLR in terms of metering and focus to copy over, but the results are always much more astounding on the film negative/positive when compared with its digital counterpart. There are a number of jobs where digital is the necessary tool of choice because of its immediacy, but if I have the time to slow down, I'd highly consider selecting film as my medium.

For reference, here's the image I took on my Canon 5D DSLR (large amount of post work done).

And here's the image I took on my girlfriend's Medium Format camera (no post work done except for removing dust).

My girlfriend is kind enough to let me use her beastly Mamiya RB67 camera so long as I buy film for it. FIlm is something I've been meaning to explore more and more of, and now that I have a bit more time on my hands, I have no excuses.

I Love to Flash.

2011-07-14T11:29:00.000-07:00

Finally took the plunge into the world of off camera flash photography and bought myself a Yongnuo wireless trigger system. This little device connects your camera to your flash wirelessly so you can move your light source independently. On a recent trip to visit my mom down south in sunny San Clemente, Jenny and I gave our new toy a go. We headed up to the scenic bluffs that overlook all of Orange County's coast. We also happened to catch the sun just as it was setting behind the ocean.

Here is one of Jenny shot with a Canon 580 EXII fired from the right of the subject with no bounce or diffusion.

I still have a lot to learn in terms of making the lighting appear natural and deliberate. Since getting the wireless trigger, I've also invested in a bounce umbrella and stand to help with diffusion.

Here are two photos of my pug Coco that we used for Graduation Thank You cards.

Derailer.

2011-07-14T00:56:00.000-07:00

Yet another film I was fortunate enough to help out on. This one centers around an injured downhill mountain biker who doesn't let his handicap dictate his life. Simple story, great visuals, compelling storytelling... what else do you need? Director Eric Gillespie has a bright future ahead of him in terms of action sports filmmaking. Good luck my friend.

Dinapoli Tomatoes.

2011-07-14T00:41:00.000-07:00

About six months ago, I was approached by a local tomato company centered out of Los Gatos, CA to help create an edit for their upcoming site. The point of the video was to showcase how the organic tomatoes were grown and harvested. I was to use footage that had already been shot, which proved difficult considering it was shot on one of those camcorders that records straight to DVD. We worked through all the hiccups and after a number of e-edits later, we had a finished product. I had a wonderful time working on this project with Rob Dinapoli of Dinapoli Tomatoes and hope to callaborate with him and his team in the near future.

The final edit can be viewed on his site: www.biancodinapoli.com

or you can check it out here. Please heed the SD footage.

Smallfrys Contest.

2011-07-05T23:48:00.000-07:00

**UPDATE** We Won!!! Build-a-Bear purchased our commercial for $7,500! Feels good man.

In an attempt to make some money, a few friends and I got together to work on short spot hosted by poptent.net. The contest was to make an advertisement for Build-A-Bear Workshop to promote their new "Smallfrys" line of plush animals. After much debate, we settled on a concept that involved a monster costume, which we all hoped would set us apart from the competition. On Friday, David, jenny, and I got together and bought all the necessary building materials to create our epic monster. The green fuzzy fabric we got shed like no other. As much as I'd like to say David and I contributed equally to the building of the monster, it was really all Jenny. As the only one who knew how to operate a sewing machine, David and I were sort of at a loss. Thanks Jenny for your master craftiness!

Here is the head of the costume Jenny made. It sort of resembles an Admiral Ackbar...

On saturday, we met up in Millbrae with David and his girlfriend, who is also conveniently named Jenny (hinting at sarcasm here). David's Jenny had found not only a house, but a mother and daughter who were willing to act in our commercial. We met the family and thanked them for helping us with our project. The daughter, who was about seven, was a bit timid at first. Although, once Jenny put the monster costume on, it was nothing but giggles. Even from behind the camera, I could not stop cracking up. The way the mouth on the monster sort of sagged and flopped when Jenny talked was hilarious.

Millbrae was already excruciatingly hot, but to be in a green fuzzy monster costume was torture. Because of this we had to shoot quickly so as not to overheat our awesome actress Jenny. Both the mom and the girl were extremely good sports about doing things a number of times from different angles. It was both a challenge and a blast to work with a child actor. you really have to break down an action into steps otherwise our young actress would rush and blend all the actions into one. She was great and we got some really genuine expressions and emotions out of her.

When $7,500 is at stake, it's no wonder there were so many last minute entries. After the contest closed yesterday (July 4th 9pm), there were 138 video submissions in total. I feel a little better about our commercial being one of the "staff favorites" along with 26 other videos, but there are some really great professional-looking ads in the running. All we can do now is keep our fingers crossed...

Check out our entry!

Hester Prynne.

2011-07-05T23:36:00.000-07:00

Here's another short film I helped out with from my Film 196 class taken at UC Santa Cruz. I was Director of Photography on this particular project. After numerous complications with actors bailing, I think the film came out as good as could have with the script revisions. I was also fortunate to work with a great group of people who all have their unique passions, which helped make this film so much stronger in the end. I mean come on, who else has an orchestra score their senior thesis film?

Synopsis:
"There are skeletons in Robert Cleaver's closet. When Robert's wife, Martha, is late to meet him at the theater for a showing of "Hester Prynne" - a theatrical interpretation of Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter" - Robert can do little more than wait and dwell in his thoughts. That is until the show starts. To Robert's surprise and horror, he witnesses the skeletons he had been hiding manifest themselves onto the stage."

Warning: *MATURE CONTENT*

Peace by Piece.

2011-06-21T00:58:00.000-07:00

One of my good friends and classmates Ben Zhang recently uploaded his senior thesis film. Not only is this a truly inspiring documentary that portrays the long-term effects of love and perseverance, but I helped DP a number of the shots within the film. I am extremely honored to have been a part of this project and to have met the couple portrayed within the narrative. Please check it out!

And Just Like That, I'm Done.

2011-06-21T00:38:00.000-07:00

It's been a fast four years. I didn't think my years at college would fly by like they did. Since starting at UC Santa Cruz four years ago, I have met so many awesome people, many of whom I can see as being lifelong friends. I have learned so much, both inside and outside the classroom. And even though the film major proved to be a bit of a letdown, I hope I have made those important networking connections to carry me on to the next chapters of my life. So what's next? Grad school? Nine-to-five job? Well, for now it doesn't matter. All I'm concerned about at the moment is just taking a few weeks off to relax. I'm looking forward to a very restful next few weeks. Real life is knocking at my door, but I'm in no rush to answer.

Here are some photos of my graduation from Porter College.

"Parallels" is a Wrap!

2011-06-13T16:28:00.000-07:00

My screening for my thesis film I made while attending UC Santa Cruz was this past Friday. As stressful as it was, I think it was received very well. I was lucky to have worked with a great group of passionate people. I was also fortunate enough to have the privilege of filming in Saturn Cafe, the awesome vegetarian all night diner located in Santa Cruz, CA.

For those that don't know, my film was an attempt at portraying two seemingly unrelated stories on screen simultaneously. Using a mix of graphic matches, similar visuals, and juxtaposing elements I wanted to connect the two stories beyond the confines of their isolated frames.

The saying goes, "We are our own worse critic." This holds extremely true for this piece. I was on the fence about so much stuff. Because of the level of attention that had to paid to timing actions and image composition, I became extremely burned out. I'd wake up sick, sore feet, and back, but in the end, it was all worth it.

If I were to go back and do it again, I probably wouldn't have made a film like this. With that being said, I've have learned so much from this experience. So, if hypothetically I was to make another split screen film again, I'd be much better prepared.

Please enjoy!

Here are a few of my favorite still from the film

The Life of a Carrot Ain't Easy.

2011-06-09T02:17:00.000-07:00

As a last minute project for a film class, I decided it was time for another stop frame. One of the topics for the project was food, so I decided to make a short that focused on the fictional life of a carrot. I worked in collaboration with an awesome stop-frame animator (Kip Radt) who dealt with all the modeling and animation for the film. The final production is comprised of over 3,500 images and took about 20+ hours to complete.

So without further adieu, please enjoy this dark comedy showcasing the life (and death) of a carrot.

Vinyl Update.

2011-06-02T01:01:00.000-07:00

2011 has not been kind on my wallet in terms of vinly toy releases.

First, my pre-order of "Inspector Cumulus" arrived in the post. What a great piece. Adorned with a bowler hat and a smoking pipe, Inspector Cumulus is on the job.

Next came Kidrobot's Mascot Number 19. This is the first KR mascot that's come out since I've been into vinyl toys. This toy was designed by none other than MAD and themed to have the appearance of a riot cop. Quality control on this figure is top notch and the accessories (helmet, shield, baton, and donut) are awesome additions.

Lasty, I picked myself up a set of Huck Gee Raku Dunnys. Had to wait over 2 hours to get these guys, but the wait was worth it. The Dunny came in both a "night" and "day" version and had very unique, real-looking accessories. The clothes are made out of real cloth and the ropes and ties are made out of real fibers. Huck Gee definitely outdid himself on these. It was also cool because after picking these up at the KR release party, I got them signed by the man himself, Huck Gee. It was funny because Huck recognized me from our last encounter when I talked to him briefly about owning an STI. He has since labeled me the "subaru guy." Can't complain with that.

Random Beat.

2011-06-02T01:00:00.000-07:00

Don't Worry, Just Breathe.

Goldfish.

2011-06-02T00:48:00.000-07:00

Here is a short film I helped a friend shoot for a film production class at UCSC. Although I was not the primary DP, I did help out on a lot of the shoots including the epic last shot. Please be aware that this film features mature content and themes. Definitely not for the faint of heart. As much as I'd like to say no goldfish were harmed in the making of this film, I can't because that would be a lie. Please enjoy for what it's worth.

Description:
Arthur wants to be a writer but is stuck working as a file clerk in a legal office.
He's not very good at his job. Arthur puts all his energy into his dream of
getting published instead. So he lets the files stack up at work, dishes and bills
pile up at home, and messages go unanswered on his answering machine.
When Arthur is abruptly fired from his job, and his goldfish dies, Arthur's loses
his will to live. He's never tasted the success of recognition. It just doesn't seem
worth trying anymore. Then again, for somebody in the habit of failing as much
as Arthur, even "ending it all" is a challenge.

Little Big Things.

2011-06-02T00:36:00.000-07:00

Thought I'd try my luck with Gizmodo's photo challenge of the week, which conveniently happened to be macro themed. I busted out everything mini that I owned as a means to try taking an array of different images. I ended up taking five that I was pretty psyched on it. I was upset to see the photo I had chosen for submission did not make the cut on the Gizmodo photo list. Maybe my action figures weren't "mini" enough, despite everything being taken on a macro lens. Oh well, can't argue with an excuse to take photos.

"It's... A.... "

"Please Don't Show These to Darth..."

Eye of the Beholder

Chillin' With My Bear

Yaya

They See Me Rolling.

2011-05-07T07:19:00.001-07:00

Rolling shots are something I've been meaning to do for a longgg time! The only problem was that we needed another car to take pictures from. Luckily my friend ben, who has been getting the mod bug as of recent, came to our aid and offered his car.

Friday afternoon around sunset, Ben, Jenny, and I headed North on Highway 1 along the coast just as the sun was setting. Ben drove his car while Jenny leaned out to snap some photos of my car. After some time, we turned around and swapped positions so that I could take a few rolling shots of my friend Ben's Versa. Here's one of my favs that Jenny shot.

After this, we dropped my car off back at home, grabbed Jenny's '93 Miata, and headed to a nearby parking lot. Along with trying to the get the hang of Jenny's stick shift, we just hung out and snapped some more photos. The photo below is one fo my favorites. In order to achieve the shot I had to be in Jenny's trunk hanging my camera and fisheye out as far as it could go. Not to mention I was attempting to shoot each frame at 1/10 of a second while she was turning around the light post. Not as sharp as i would have liked, but I love the feeling of movement in the frame. Looks almost like she's drifting around the corner.

Had a great time last night, hope to do it again after I get some more stuff for my car!

New Filmic Endeavor.

2011-05-04T11:19:00.000-07:00

As for every film production student at UC Santa Cruz, it is a requirement to take some sort of senior production course before completing the major. So for my advanced film production class (196), I have decided to tackle a very challenging style for my upcoming film.

I am attempting to tell two seemingly disconnected stories simultaneously with the aid of split screen. Using a number of graphic matches and similarities/juxtapositions within the frames, I hope to unite the two images. In the end, the two stories will merge and come together, but both sides will still remain somewhat separate and disconnected. If this was not already a challenge enough, I also plan on telling one of the two stories backwards. I just pray I don't give my audience a headache. It will be an experiment, that's for sure.

Here is a recent fram grab from the male's side of the film.

Also, a friend linked me this short film entitled Symmetry by a company named "evernone." It is very effective in the way it plays with the split screen imagery. Overall, a really beautiful film that really challenges the emotions and expectations of the viewers.

Haha

2011-04-25T10:50:00.000-07:00

Too funny. My friend Shelby had a little too much fun in Photoshop. Apperently I like to give Kaws Companions piggy back rides...

Spontaneous Trip to the City.

2011-04-23T15:38:00.000-07:00

To relieve the stress of school and bills, I headed up to San Francisco with a few friends and the pug. There was nothing in particular we went there for, but just needed an excuse to hang out in the city we all love.

While there, I mentioned that I wanted to get some shirts so my friend Shelby took us to The Hundreds store by Union Square. This place looked like the bat cave inside. The lights were dimmed and store appeared to be carved out of the inside of a rock. Props to them on the look and feel of the place. I definitely got the hater vibes from some of the employees because I wasn't decked out in Hundreds gear, but that's what expected in those high end clothing boutiques. I picked out a limited San Francisco Hundreds shirt, and we were off.

Eventually, we wound up on Haight Street again. We grabbed a bite at a place called Cha Cha Cha. The Fried Platanos (bananas) were delicious. Definitely a place I'd love to go back to. We peeked in a few of the other stores and I ended up getting another cool shirt featuring the Star Wars AT-AT walker with a dog cone on. Around 7pm, all the stores started closing so we figured it was a good time to head out.

Before heading home, I took Jenny and Shelby up to a place that looks out over the city. The sun just so happened to be setting so I snapped a few images while there was still some light left. The image below is heavily photoshopped, but the sky was gorgeous.

While walking around trying to find the best angle for the city with my telephoto lens, I noticed my car was looking extremely photogenic. I snapped a few hundred photos or so of my car just hanging out on the side of the road with the wheels turned in. I think a few of them came out pretty cool.

Overall, had a great time with some great people. Hope to go back again soon!

Today, my Pug Turns Two.

2011-04-20T11:11:00.000-07:00

Today (April 20th), my pug Coco is two human years old. I'm not sure how long this is in dog years, but I know it's up there.

I got Coco when she was about 3-4 months old, so having her and taking care of her this long is a big deal! I feel like one of those dog weirdos who treats their animal like a human, but my pug has a personality like no dog I've ever seen. She's down to lay around all day or go for a five mile walking adventure around San Francisco. She has a multitude of very unique expressions that always put a smile on my face. She's what I look forward to go home to after a stressful day of work or school. Just the way she waddles her butt and barks to greet me whenever I walk into the room. I love this pug, and today is her birthday.

A Source of Inspiration.

2011-04-20T10:56:00.000-07:00

Today, I decided to check my YouTube messages and came across this awesome little note:

"Hey Doug, ive been following your work now for the last few weeks and each one of them are amazing in their own way. I'm only 17 and currently a year 12 student down in Australia which is our final year of schooling and for our media subject we are required to produce a short film due around november and i am currently looking into any ideas i can, i just have to say that your videos have inspired me the most and ive put together a few ideas inspired by segments of your work. I just wanted to say thankyou and if you can give me any tips that would be great, i love the film aspect of media and i wish to pursue it further as an occupation hopefully. My only video on my account was created when i was at the age of 14 from memory my first ever film and sice then have only created 2 more. Thanks a lot and i will let you know when i have finished this piece i will be working on although it will not be ready for a matter of months.

Chris"

I really like what sites like YouTube and Flickr have done. They allow their users to look at different artists' work from all over the world. It's great to know that I can be a source of inspiration to someone thousands of miles away in Australia.

Here's a film Chris made when he was 14 entitled "Real Life Pacman." Great work buddy, keep it up!

Bazooka Lens.

2011-04-18T11:12:00.000-07:00

I was a bit hesitant about loaning out a Canon battery to a friend this weekend, but once he said I could borrow his Canon 100-400mm L lens in return, I was sold. Needless to say, I spent a good amount fo time this weekend playing with the new glass.

At 400mm, the background is soft and creamy, giving the image an almost dream-like element. It was a bit tiresome to hold this beast of a lens up, but the trade-off was well worth the sore muscles. My only qualm is that the auto focusing mechanism was a bit slow. This could aslo be the result of my Canon 5D's measly number of AF points. My girlfriend and I took our pug to romp on the beach while I snapped some photos. Because of the slow autofocus, only about 10% of the images were in focus. After awhile, I gave up on the autofocus and just went straight manual. This was a little better, but it was still hard to tell if I was shooting at critical focus. I'm sure with some more training and use with the lens, I'd get the hang of it much quicker. Luckily, I was able to get some really awesome photos that I'm happy to walk away with.

Thanks Eric for letting me shoot on your beast of a lens!

Here are some of my favorite captures from the day, most of which were shot at 400mm.

Still a Child at Heart.

2011-04-11T17:13:00.000-07:00

When I was a child, I promised myself I would never lose my fascination with building things. Well, somewhere along the way, I did. A few years back I sold every lego set I owned for a measly $200. This ended up being the worst decision of my life. I figured selling my legos and other toys was just a part of growing up. Unfortunately for me, there isn't a day that goes by where I'd love just to dig through the hundreds of legos that I used to own to create a space ship or whatever crazy creation I have in my mind.

Since then, I've never really wanted to get back into legos. They're fun to build, but they end up just sitting around afterwards collecting dust. And, let's be honest, they're not exactly the cheapest toys. I love looking at all the new models and sets that are coming out, but I can never bring myself to get one. Every time I just convince myself that I don't need it or that I have no room for it.

All this changed a few days ago. Gizmodo.com, a popular tech and gadget blog, had a post about a new lego set that just came out. Apparently, Lego has a new line of models called the "Architectural Series," in which they recreate famous buildings and landmarks with lego bricks. The pre-existing models were nothing to write home about, but the one Gizmodo was unveiling looked awesome. Lego decided to do a rendition of the Farnsworth House in Plano, Illinois.

Over the past year or so, I have really been getting into design and architecture. Every week I look forward to reading the new issue of Dwell magazine to see what new modern designs people are integrating into their homes and offices. With this in mind, I knew I might have to indulge my childhood fantasies with my mature interests. So yesterday, my girlfriend and I headed over to the Lego Store at Valley Fair Mall in San Jose. I wasn't even sure they would have it in stock, but sure enough there it was right at the entrance. Before checking out, my girlfriend and I meandered around the store recalling all of our past lego escapades.

Back home, we tore apart the box and began constructing our new model. This thing was beautiful. The people at lego really did an amazing job on the interior. If you look through the planes of glass (clear plastic panels), you can see an array of tiny modern Lego furniture. The tiny white bricks were a pain to line up straight, but it's this sort of detail that really adds to the minimalist physique of the house. I don't plan on deconstructing this model anytime soon as it is a beautiful piece of architecture and design unto itself.

Here are some other shots of the Lego set.

Custom KAWS Dunny.

2011-04-10T10:42:00.000-07:00

Sorry about the recent bombardment of KAWS-related posts. Much like how young children go through their "cowboys and indians" phase, I'm going through my "KAWS" phase. I have some other projects and films in the works as well, but more details will come later.

One of Brian Donnelley's most sought after vinyl toys is his "companion" figure. The piece loosely resembles a zombified Mickey Mouse character with a skull for a head and X's for eyes. On eBay, KAWS Companions can go from anywhere between $1,000 to $1,500, so it's no surprise people love this design. One day, I hope to add one to my collection, but for the time being, the cost is way too much. But alas, there is a short term solution to feeding my KAWS appetite, a custom KAWS Dunny.

I've seen it done once before on Flickr, but in the black/white mono color scheme. So with the help of my girlfriend, who is a master of clay sculpting and detailed painting, we decided to make our own. We used multiple photos for reference and began sculpting the teeth, cross bones, and buttons. The next day we began primering and painting. A few hours of meticulous detailed painting and we were done. Jenny did a great job on all the little accents, including the iconic KAWS X's, which I think she got down perfectly.

So now, even though we don't have a real Companion to add to our collection, at least we have a 3" custom version. Because we had so much fun making the custom dunny, we plan to make the two other colorways (black and mono) in the next few weeks!

Below are some of the "making of" photos for our custom KAWS Dunny!

And here he is in all his glory.

And here he is in our collection.

KAWS Fever.

2011-04-01T10:52:00.000-07:00

I was afraid of this. When I was first introduced to the vinyl art toy scene, I could not believe people were spending well over one hundred dollars on what is essentially plastic. Now I am one of those people. It takes a lot for me to justify spending a good amount of money on an art toy, but every now and again that one toy comes along that I cannot pass on.

For the last few months, I've been a KAWS addict. I'm constantly checking eBay and Kidrobot Forums daily to see if anyone has posted a toy for a killer deal. Most of the time, the prices are too crazy, but on occasion someone posts a KAWS piece for a low price in order to move it fast. One afternoon, as I was checking eBay expecting to be disappointed yet again, I saw a deal that I could not believe. A KAWS stormtrooper going for half of what it normally does. I knew there had to be a catch, and there was. The toy had no box and had two small marks on the back of his head. For many die hard collectors, this was a major turn off. Everyone wants their toys to be in pristine shape. For me, I could live with the downsides of not having a box. Because I wasn't planning on displaying the stormtrooper backwards, the marks on the back of the head didn't concern me. I eagerly hit "buy it now" and that was that. I was now the proud owner of a KAWS stormtrooper.

The funny thing is, the first place I was introduced to the KAWS stormtrooper was actually on Rob Dyrdek's show Fantas Factory. This was well before my obsession with collecting vinyl toys.

A few weeks later, my girlfriend texted telling me that I got a box from Hong Kong! I still had two hours left of the class I was in, but all I could do was think about getting home and tearing apart my new package. Finally, I got home and was able to check this guy out. My first impression was that this piece is SMALL. From the pictures I had seen online, it appeared much bigger. It's still one of the biggest toys I owned, but I imagined it a few inches taller. Regardless, the sculpt of this piece was awesome. So much detail! The marks on the back of the head were barely noticeable. I quickly made room for my stormtrooper next to my KAWS Milo.

The next day, I decided to take some photos. This vinyl piece is easily my most prized toy in my collection. It could be my childhood obsession with Star Wars or simply the fact that the sculpt is very well done. Either way, I love my new STORMTROOPAAAA!

SoCal and Back Again.

2011-03-25T22:24:00.000-07:00

Spring break was a much needed time to relax and allow my mind to turn to mush. Two ten page papers, a final exam, and an 8 minute short film meant I had plenty of reason to relax with a week off with no responsibilities.

My girlfriend and I started our vacation off by heading to Mountain High in the middle of the night. The plan was to get to there when it opened, but that meant driving all night long. The idea sounded a lot better in theory. My body was exhausted after a long day of running errands, so I was quickly getting more tired as time went on. My girlfriend and I ended up switching off every so often so that the other one could sleep. When we were getting close to the ski resort, we learned that the grapevine part of the I-5 was closed due to snow. This meant we had to backtrack and take an alternate route. Eventually we got to Mt. High about a half an hour after opening, but because of the snowy conditions, there were hardly any people there. It's times like these I love having a car with all wheel drive! It sucks putting on chains when it's dumping snow outside. While snowboarding, we met up with Peter, one of my old friends from high school. We snowboarded until our muscles told us enough was enough.

After snowboarding, we said our goodbyes and headed off to Orange County where my mom and brother live. Got in around four-ish and took a much needed nap. We spent the rest of that night just hanging out with the family and catching up. I also showed them the film I had been working on for the last ten weeks ("Rise and Shine") for my film production class at UCSC. We went to bed early in an attempt to catch up on some more lost hours of much needed sleep.

The next day we headed off to Encino near Hollywood to hang out with our friend and big-time film editor Nick Rood. He was kind enough to let us stay in his super awesome bachelor pad of a studio. Unfortunately, because of all the rain, half of his carpet got soaked. This meant that we had to move all the furniture from the wet part of the room over to the dry side. Besides the misplaced furniture, Nick did an amazing job with the setup. There were film poster covering every square inch of wall space, a sweet wool shag rug, and an awesome photo of Nick and my girlfriend as Star Wars characters.

Nick took Jenny and I around to do all the touristy stuff he had meant to do eventually. We grabbed a bite to eat at the famous "Pink's Hot Dog Stand" where I ordered a Mulholland Drive hot dog comprised of meat, bacon, mushrooms, and nacho cheese. Arterie clog to the max. After this, we checked out Studio Depot, a lighting and camera equipment rental house where Nick works. This place was a candy store for me. They had everything a filmmaker could ever need and more. They even had green screen booties for, you know, those times when you want to have invisible feet...

After this, we headed up to Runyon Canyon, a popular running/walking trail that looks out over all of Los Angeles. It's funny because living in LA most of my life, I had no idea about any of these places! I guess I just sort of took the city for granted, and never really did all the things that people come to LA to do. Either way, I'm glad I got a chance to check this trail out. The view was beautiful, and if that wasn't perfect enough, the setting sun was casting a golden glow over all of LA.

We spent the night visiting Jenny's sister who also lives in Hollywood before scouring the streets to find restaurants that were open at 11pm. We ended up just heading back to Nick's place to order a pizza. We put on a movie (Last Exorcism), but I passed out before the intro credits came up. Nick and Jenny quickly passed out as well. A good way to end a great day in the city.

In the morning, Nick had work so we grabbed some breakfast at an IHOP In Westwood before he left us. We mulled around in Westwood for awhile checking out the random camera stores and clothing shops. I was stoked to find where the Banksy piece was behind the Urban Outfitters. Unfortunately, it had been painted over.

This was the Banksy piece before it was painted over.

That night we met up with my aunt and her three kids who had recently moved down South from Connecticut. It was a bit jarring to see my family from the east coast hanging out on the west. It almost felt like we were all back in New York, where the rest of my family lives. We had some Italian and caught up with each other.

The next day, Jenny and I woke up at the crack of dawn. Thursday (3/24) was the release of the highly sought after "Huck Gee 8" Skullhead Dunny." We packed the car with blankets and jackets in case of rainy weather and made the trek back up to LA. Oh man is traffic bad. People aren't kidding when they say LA traffic sucks. I was cruising along the freeway at 75mph and out of nowhere, hit a parking lot of cars that weren't moving. As with any release, I feared that all this lost time would result in me coming away empty handed. After finding an alternative route, we wound up at Kidrobot LA two hours before opening (11am). Seeing that the line was only five people long, my girlfriend and I decided to take a stroll down Melrose avenue. We grabbed a coffee and just admired all the graffiti and urban art covering the surround sidewalks and buildings.

We spent the next hour and a half waiting in line in front of the store, eagerly anticipating its opening. It always gets me every time that the people who wait for these releases are not children but adults, some of whom are well into their thirties and forties. I don't know what it is about waiting in line for these sort of toy releases, but it feels cool to be a part of something not quite understood by most of mainstream society. Who in their right mind would wait two hours for a piece of plastic? I would! I also want to thank my awesome girlfriend for sticking it out with me in the line. Luckily for us it wasn't raining so it really wasn't that bad.

At 11am sharp they began letting people in to get their skullheads. I bought mine and that was it. Before heading off, I took my new companion out of his box just to see for myself how cool this piece really was. Easily one of my favorite art toys in my collection! Before heading back home, we made a quick detour after spotting an OBEY stencil up high on one of the buildings. Being a huge Shepard Fairy fan, I snapped a few photos before leaving. No doubt that this stencil would be painted over in the next few days.

Back in Orange County I had a teeth cleaning appointment. They found a cavity so that was awesome. I spent the next two hours drooling out of my mouth like a fool. Back at home, Jenny and I went for a quick run to get ourselves back in the groove of working out. Later that night, we headed off to Jenny's dad's house to eat dinner and hang out. The food was delicious, the wine was tasty, and good times were had. After getting back pretty late, I setup the film Watchmen on the iPad. Just like all movies I try and watch when lying down, we both quickly passed out.

The next morning we finished packing and said our goodbyes before shipping off. We made it a point to stop at "The Bagel Shack" on our way out. They're the only place I know of that has a French Toast bagel. I don't know how they do it, but it's delicious! Other bagel chains really need to get this recipe, because nothing else compares. After bagels, we stopped by at my aunt's house to check out her place. Having only lived there a few weeks, it looked really nice and homey. It's really cool to see my family starting to move to the west coast. After saying our goodbyes to my aunt and cousins, we began our six hour trek back to the homeland.

The break isn't officially over, but I feel like I've done so much in such a short amount of time. There was never a dull moment. I was also able to finally take care of a lot of business that I've been pushing off for so long. It's always good to see family as well. I'm hoping that this last quarter at UC Santa Cruz doesn't kick my ass (I doubt it will), but if it does, at least I'll have these good times to look back on!

"Rise and Shine"

2011-03-20T20:16:00.000-07:00

In an earlier blog post, I mentioned that I was working on a short film for a class I was taking at UC Santa Cruz. Well, I'm done. Boy, does it feel good!

This film was a challenge to say the least, but that was sort of the idea. What's the point of making a new film if it's just like one you've already made? So for this film, I wanted to merge both live-action footage with stop-frame footage into one connected narrative. My other challenge was to stop frame a person, rather than a mound of clay or an inanimate object.

I definitely cannot take all the credit. This film was a collaboration between a few highly talented individuals. The main actress Kat Brown was as dedicated as they come. She had to perform every movement in the stop frame bit with her eyes closed, as well as having to keep her body extremely still. I still don't know how we were able to pull off some of the movements that we did in the film. Jennifer Kehl, my girlfriend and animator, spent as much time as I did behind the camera grueling over the animations of all the objects you see moving around onscreen (i.e. iPod, toothbrush, bagels, etc.). She also was a huge help in coaching Kat on how to move in slowed down movements. Lastly, David Lockwood did a brilliant job in creating an original score for the film. The music is phenomenal! I was honored when my teacher asked if it was copyrighted because I guess it sounded that good! I cannot wait to work with these individuals again on future projects!

A big thank you goes out to all the extras and people who made this film a reality. I'm extremely proud of the way it turned out. I hope you will enjoy it as much as we enjoyed making it for you!

I've Come a Long Way Since Dunnys.

2011-03-20T19:22:00.000-07:00

Most vinyl collectors will agree that Dunnys are the gateway drug to vinyl toy collecting. There are so many different Dunny artists from so many different series, that it's easy to find a design or character that attracts you. Not to mention, they're cheap enough where you don't feel bad about getting a few every time you go to an Urban Outfitters or a Kidrobot Store. The problem for me is that having too many just creates clutter. They all just sort of blend together into a mashup of colors and hues. This is why I've decided to sell a large majority of my collection.

In an effort to refocus and slim down my toy collection, I've decided to sell 82 Kidrobot figures. It's pretty insane to think that I own that many 3" figurines. Yikes! I still have about 40 designs I'm still holding on to, but it feels good to get rid of the excess. This will also free up some space for some upcoming releases I'm looking forward to, such as the Huck Gee 8" Skullhead.

If anyone is interested in purchasing any of these Dunnys, feel free to contact me here or email me at dougandrewsmith@gmail.com

Here is the link to my SALE on the Kidrobot Forums!

Big News in the Land of Vinyl.

2011-03-13T22:59:00.000-07:00

Well, I should be writing my term paper, but a quick break on the internet has led to a mandatory blog entry.

First and foremost, coming up on March 24th, Kidrobot is releasing their first 8" Dunny of 2011. The Dunny will be by artist Huck Gee, and will be an alternative colorway to the 8" "Glow in the Dark" Skullhead released at SDCC 2010. I'm so excited for this release because, despite the fact it being a "Dunny," Huck went ahead and cut the ears off the traditional Dunny mold. This toy will no doubt stand apart from the many 8" Dunnys crowding my shelf. Another reason to love Huck is that he works locally out of his San Francisco studio and he drives a Subaru Impreza STI! The release is limited to 650 pieces worldwide, and there's no doubt in my mind they will sell out in hours. Good luck to everyone trying to snag a piece.

The other big news is the recently leaked Dunny Series 2011 series set to come out around summertime. I hate to say it, but Kidrobot and Dunnys are slowly losing their appeal to me. It just seems like so many variations are coming out too often, that the individual designs lose their attraction. In the next few weeks I plan to sell a lot of my 3" Dunnys in favor of larger, more limited edition toys on the market. There are a few 3"ers that I really enjoy, but for the future, I plan to only grab the designs that I really like as opposed to trying to collect a whole completed set. Needless to say, the leaked photos of the 2011 Dunny Series has some pretty sweet designs. I'll have to see them in person first, but their are definitely a few that catch my eye!

Meet Milo.

2011-03-10T23:02:00.000-08:00

So a few posts back, I wrote an entry about the artist KAWS. I mentioned that he had a release coming up, and that I was going to try to snag one. Well guess what. I am now the proud owner of a KAWS x Bape "Dissected Milo."

They had three colorways, but I went with the brown. I actually spent a little more than retail to pre-order one from Toyqube, a KAWS authorized reseller. On February 25th, I along with the rest of the world (or so it seemed) logged on to kawsone.com in hopes to get a figure at retail price ($180). I tried for the black one, but after a frenzy of server crashes, they were sold out. I read somewhere online that they sold out of their stock in a little under 22 minutes. There was 1,000 figures per colorway, so you do the math.

About a week later I got my awesome little guy in the mail. I can see what all the hype is about! These things are top notch. Medicom Toy Company does an amazing job when it comes to quality control. The only drawback to owning this piece is that I have no other KAWS pieces to accompany my Milo. Maybe one day, but for now I'm happy with my first KAWS piece.

Random Beat.

2011-03-03T09:03:00.000-08:00

A slow shutter shopping cart photo; it's been done before, so what? I gave it a go. The cart isn't as sharp as I would have liked, but I'm happy nonetheless.

Short Film Idea.

2011-03-01T17:24:00.000-08:00

This is my attempt at creative writing.

Working title: “My Life Sucks.”

Synopsis:

A man, who daydreams of a better life decides to take action against his drab day-to-day lifestyle. Constantly looking upon past times that bring him joy, he is constantly reminded of his insignificant existence. I plan to pay extremely close attention to style in this film, possibly telling the entire narrative through a series of point of view shows. With the addition of a wide-angle lens, and a harness to mount the camera on my face, I plan to be able to use both hands as I interact with the world around me. I feel that it is the common route for student filmmakers to make films that deal with anxiety, depression, and suicide. With this film, I hope to transform that stereotype and offer salvation by giving the main character what he desires in the end of the film: a life free from bounds and limits where he can truly live at peace. At the conclusion of my film, I attempt to question the audience whether this is the story of a man who has finally found happiness in the afterlife, or if it is about a happy person dreaming about the ordinary, mediocre life he could have lived.Most of my past work has been very light-hearted and comical, so I want to challenge myself with creating a more dramatic story line. I would like to shoot in and around the San Francisco area so that I may be inspired by the urbanization and the new surroundings of the big city. The shooting of this film will no doubt take multiple days and multiple locations. Because of the lack of coverage of each scene (all shots will be most likely form POV), I will be sure to focus that each shot is carefully constructed and that camera movement is appropriate and deliberate. I have written my script and am ready to get started shooting as soon as the quarter begins!

Treatment:

Images of past events pass through my head. The memories feel so real. I can almost touch them, almost feel them, almost interact with them. For some reason, I can tell something is off. My mother is pushing me on a swing. I smile as the breeze flows carelessly through my hair. I jump into the pool. The floaties help me stay afloat. I can’t help but pretend I am a submarine searching for hidden treasures. I’m eating ice cream with all the fixings to make diabetic scream. The ice cream drips on my clothes and face, but I am indifferent. I’m building legos. I shove the instructions aside as I attempt to build what I see in my head. My mother tucks me in and kisses my forehead. She begins reading me a book. I don’t care for the story. The sound of my mother’s voice keeps me interested. As my mind succumbs, my eyes begin getting heavy. I do not resist the tendency to close them. I am asleep. In this moment I am happy. Too bad real life isn’t like this.

An older me wakes up in an undecorated studio apartment. A picture of my current girlfriend stares at me from my nightstand table as my eyes begin to focus. I quickly check my watch before exclaiming, “Shit!” I rush to get ready. I make coffee, take a shower, brush my teeth, shave, check my watch, put on my work attire, tie my tie, look in the mirror, grab my thermal mug and coffee, and head out the door. As I wait on the corner for my carpool to arrive, I see happy people all around me. Couples are gossiping, children are laughing, and everyone is happy, except for me. A high end luxury car pulls up and I get in. I greet my coworker Tom, who quickly apologizes for picking me up so late. I tell him, “It’s no problem.” As we drive to work he begins telling me about his life. Tom is married with two kids. Because his wife is the daughter of the CEO of the company, he had no problem moving up to head supervisor. As for me, I’m just a lowly office clerk. Everyday from 9-5 I log data, send out faxes, make copies, and make sure not to get in other people’s way. Tom also makes it a point to brag about his upcoming trip to the Bahamas with his family, courtesy of his wife’s father. Inside I hate him and his life, but I just smile. At work I do what I do everyday. I copy documents, type data entries, eat my pathetic ham and cheese sandwich, and count the seconds until I can get home and do it all again the next day. Tom has to work late tonight so I am forced to take the bus back home. I could never afford a car so I’ve always relied on others to get me around. As I step out of the office, it begins to pour rain. Luckily, I remembered my umbrella. As soon as I open it, the wind takes a hold, and blows it from my grasp. I chase after it. The umbrella eventually ends up in the street where a car promptly runs over it. I begin to walk back toward the bus stop as the rain beats down upon my head. Walking towards me is a man in a baggy sweater, hood pulled over his face. I feel out of my element but I continue to walk towards him. As I pass him, he bumps shoulders with me, knocking me aside. I shake it off and continue to walk past him. A few seconds later I hear the sound of footsteps getting closer. I curiously turn around. A fist comes flying from the sky and makes contact with my skull. I hit the cold, hard sidewalk like a bag of wet cement. Everything goes dark and I close my eyes.

Eventually I come to. When my eyes begin to focus, I notice a large amount of pedestrians standing over me. An older gentleman asks, “Are you okay?” I quickly rise to my feet and push past them. As I walk away from the situation, I begin rubbing my forehead, where a splintering headache has begun to develop. I bring my hand down and notice some blood on my hand. I should get this looked at, but at this point I just want to get home. I finally reach the bus stop where I stand and wait. I reach for my wallet in my back pocket and notice it is missing. I check my pockets, and nothing. I have no choice but to walk home. As I walk home, I notice a homeless man sitting on the side of the building. I notice he is holding a cardboard sign that reads, “At leest I am free.” I think about those words for the remainder of my walk home. As I walk up to my studio apartment, I notice a piece of paper stapled to the wall. As I approach, the large lettering is as clear as day. The paper reads, “EVICTION NOTICE.” I don’t know why I ever decided to live in this part of the city, the rent is astronomical for something that is the same square footage as my cubicle where I work. Paying rent has always been a struggle for me, so it’s no surprise that the landlord is kicking me out. According to the notice, I have one week to move all my stuff out. I enter the house and turn on the lights.

Even with the lights on, my apartment still feels dark and depressing. I microwave a cup of noodles and grab a Budweiser from the fridge. I sit on my broken Ikea couch and flip the television on. Every channel is a montage of commercials telling me how to get skinnier, look younger, and have a large genitalia. I let the sounds of the commercials fade out as I reflect on my daily ooccurences. Bad luck seems to follow me wherever I go. My quiet time is interrupted by a phone ring. I answer the phone. My girlfriend of 3 months is on the other end. The way she says, “hello’” I already know where this conversation is going. She proceeds to tell me that things just aren’t interesting anymore and that she feels like I’m holding her back from experiencing life. She’s probably right. She concludes the conversation with the famous last lines, “It’s not you, it's me.” After a pause, I say, “OK,” and hang up the phone. I snap my phone in two pieces before throwing it to the ground.

Outside, I lock the door to my apartment. Images of when I was a child being passing through my head. I walk along the dark empty streets of the city. I enter my neighborhood hardware store. I find what I am looking for and head to the checkout line. I look down at my one item, a ten foot line of woven rope. I feel weird just buying this one thing, so I look around the checkout line for something else to buy. I see a magazine on exotic beaches across America. I pay for both the magazine and the rope with a check. I walk home, taking time to look down at my recent purchases. An image of my mom swinging me around by my arms is overlayed onto the dark city surrounding me. I get home and take the items out of the bag. I put the magazine on my coffee table. I flip through it to see a wide assortment of beaches. I put the magazine back down and reach for the rope. I begin tying a very distinguished knot. The hangman’s noose knot looks a lot easier to do in the instructions. Finally, my poor attempt at the knot seems good enough to complete the action it wass designed to assist with.

An image of me as a child waking up in bed appears. I begin to tie the noose from a support beam in my apartment. The younger me pushes the door to my room slightly ajar. The sounds of crying can be heard from another room. Back in my apartment, I am staring at the noose. I walk away and go to my desk where I grab a piece of paper. The younger me creeps down the hallway. I see a light at the end of the hallway. The crying gets louder. I can tell by the deep sobbing, it’s my father. I peek in and see him with his head in his hands seated at the kitchen table. He notices my presence and looks up at me. I freeze. Something is terribly wrong. Back in my apartment, I am scribbling my poor attempt at a suicide note. I throw the first version away before grabbing a new piece of paper. I begin to write again. The image of my father staring at me with his tear-stricken, beady eyes haunts me. In a deep, low voice, he says, “There’s been an accident.” A blur of lights passes through my line of visions. Car sounds are heard. Back in the apartment, I finish writing the last word to my note. I step back to put the note on the desk on the note. It reads, “At least I am free.” I look further up on my desk where I have a framed photograph of my mother. I reach out to touch the cold, frigid glass separating me from her warms, smooth skin. I grab a chair and walk over to the noose hanging in the center of my living room. I stand face to face with the noose. In this moment I am extremely nervous. I begin blinking. My heart rate begins to speed up. Flashes of oncoming cars are seen. I blink faster. The image of my living room begins to fade. Blurred lights overpower my vision. The sound becomes too much to bear. Then all becomes quiet. Black is all that surrounds me.

After a few seconds, I wake up. I blink my eyes a few times allowing my vision to become sharp. I am on a sandy beach, like the one from the magazine. I look around and notice my girlfriend to my right. She smiles at my with a tender gaze. I smile back. I proceed to look at the horizon. A group of migrating gulls fly through the sky. The sun beating down on me feels good. In this moment I am happy. In this moment I am free.

A Filmmaker's Paradise.

2011-02-28T15:46:00.000-08:00

There's always that location that we as filmmakers dream about shooting at. For me, it was always an old run-down building of some sort. About two weeks ago I found this location with the help of a few peers.

This past weekend, a few friends and I went down south for a good ol' fashioned photo/video adventure. Our destination was Fort Ord, an old abandoned military base located in Marina, California. This was only my second time here, but after the first trip, I really wanted to go back and make a short film.

This place is just eerie. From the random baby strollers, to the "666" graffiti on the walls, to the stray shoes that line the street, this place just reeks of creepiness. We started out filming in the pool area. The what once was an olympic sized pool was now just an emptied garbage pit filled with empty spray cans and broken furniture. The vastness of this location led for some really great shots on the Canon 16-35mm wide angle lens.

Next, we started exploring the many barracks on the property. Every time I would open a door or walk up a flight of stairs, I was almost certain something was going to pop out. It's not like this place was home to thousands of murderers, but one can't help but feeling like you're not quite alone.

For the short I made, I brought along my Canon 5D Mark II, Indifocus Indislider, and ProAM Crane. With the exception of three or four shots, almost every camera angle was on the slider. I'm a camera movement fanatic, so I try and implement the use of a slider or dolly wherever I can. I also wanted to attempt an epic crane shot that would track upwards as my lovely subject Jenny walked down the deserted street. The wind was not very kind to my crane, so you may notice some camera shake in the final product.

We were losing light fast, so I tried to work as quickly as I could. Ideally, I would've loved to shoot a few more timelapses here, but that will have to wait until another day. A special thanks to goes out to my friends Jennifer Kehl, Ben Bunch, Andrew Cichowski, and Ally Bobus for being patient with me while I got my shots. Also, a big thank you to Ben Bunch for taking the photographs you see above. Without further adieu, please enjoy my short entitled "Ghost Town."

I Hate Pictures of Me.

2011-02-25T01:55:00.000-08:00

Yet this still doesn't stop me from taking self portraits. At least I have photoshop to help in the beautification process. Went a little overboard with these, but I think they turned out cool!

New Old Things.

2011-02-23T16:05:00.000-08:00

Jenny and I cleaned up the garage the other day because we'll be shooting a scene for my film this coming Sunday. It was actually very therapeutic. Every time we park our cars in the garage we promise ourselves that we'll clean up the ever increasing mess, but for some reason or another it never ends up happening. So this past Monday (President's Day) we spent a good majority of the day cleaning up and organizing everything. I'm pretty sure this is how the Presidents of the past would want us to celebrate their special day.

Upon cleaning up some old junk I've been holding onto in the garage, I came across a cool little gem I had forgotten about. It was an old 2006 Lego Exo-Force set. Sadly, this is the last Lego I own because I sold all of my other Legos on craigslist. I should have held on to them in case I could have passed them down to my kids one day. Oh well.

I no longer had the instructions so I found them online. Lego actually has an online database with instructions for every Lego created. I pieced the robot together in no more than five minutes. I forgot what a cool set this was. My new but old lego robot now has a home on my already over-cluttered desk. There's no way I'm going to sell this awesome guy like I did with my other sets. THis one is here to stay.

On a related note, here are some simply amazing Lego creations I favorited over on Flickr.

That's all for now. Have a nice day!

My Wallet Isn't Going to be too Happy.

2011-02-21T03:12:00.000-08:00

I feel kind of weird making a blog post about a new toy release, but this is a big deal.

So as of recent, my new goal in vinyl collecting is to snag a coveted KAWS piece. For those that don't know, Brooklyn based artist, KAWS (aka Brian Donnelly) is a huge figure in the contemporary art and urban grafitti scene. He creates his art through several different mediums, spanning from canvas, to ads, to toys, and even to lightbulbs. The problem with my quest for a KAWS piece is the ridiculous prices that these toys are sold for in the secondary market (i.e. eBay, forums, etc.). The only way to really avoid spending an arm and a leg for a toy is buy it on the release day.

So, the word going around right now is that KAWS is set to release his next Bape collaboration toy on February 26th, 2011. In lieu of his popular "dissected companion" toy, KAWS has adapted the same concept to the iconic Bape character "Milo." This piece is half monkey, and half anatomical sculpt of the innards of the monkey, split right down the middle.

Even if I can manage to purchase one on release day from KAWS's site kawsone.com, the price still verges on the level of expensive. At 15,540 Yen, the toy will cost approximately $186.00 USD. If someone would have told me a year ago that I would even contemplate dropping this much cash on a piece of plastic, I would've called them crazy. After doing much research, the initial cost of this piece does not turn me off as much. Even though the figure is close to $200 with shipping, other KAWS pieces with the same initial price point go for upwards of $650 on the secondary market. I do not plan to sell the piece, but if times get rough, at least I can make my money back, plus more.

The only dilemma I'm facing right now is if I can live with getting only one, or if I should shoot for the whole set. Unfortunately for me, getting the whole set would probably mean eating Ramen and bread for the rest of the month. Because I have tax refunds coming to me in the next few weeks as well as some overdue payments for past work I've done, I may pull the trigger on all three. Only time will tell. I am honestly just stoked to get my first ever KAWS piece!

Here's a few more views of the figure.

I ♥ Tea

2011-02-21T02:33:00.000-08:00

A few weeks back, Gizmodo had a "bokeh" photo challenge in which the assignment was to take a creative picture of out of focus light. Jenny and I had an awesome idea for a photo, but because of school and midterms, we were unable to put our idea into motion. Fast forward a few weeks, and we finally found the time to take our bokeh photo!

Jenny and I are both avid tea drinkers. We both have at least two cups of tea a day. Nothing beats that feeling of a nice hot cup of tea in the morning to warm the soul. With this idea in mind, we decided to take a photo that highlighted our love for tea.

To capture this image, we set up our Bodum mug and mini muffin on a dark wooden stool. A small desk lamp was used to spotlight the cup of tea from above. About three feet back, we hung up some old xmas lights in order to get our "bokeh effect". We strategically placed the lights, so that it looked as if the bokeh was coming out of the cup like steam. Finally, we poured the tea into the cup and began snapping away. As seen in the image above, we also played with paper cut-outs. If you cut a shape out of paper and hold it over your lens, you can manipulate the form of the bokeh. This proved to be a very cool effect in making the lights look like little mini hearts.

Because Jenny was ultimately the mastermind behind the initial idea, I acted as an assistant, and kind of let her do her thing. I tend to be a backseat photographer, so I really tried hard to just offer advice when called upon. Jenny also shot an exposure on her Mamiya RB67 MF film camera. Hopefully, when we get that back in a few weeks, it'll look just as good as the digital captures from that night.

When Jenny uploaded the picture to her Flickr, she wrote a sweet little poem to accompany the image.

"Every morning I wake up,
go to the kitchen,
make him tea,
wake him with a kiss,
and a nice warm mug
to start his day

this one's for you Doug
xoxoxo"

I don't know how I ever got so lucky. Thank you so much Jenny. The best part of my day is waking up next to you xoxo.

The Room.

2011-02-19T03:31:00.000-08:00

Haven't seen it? Do yourself a favor and get on it. This is quite possibly the best worst film ever. Between unnecessary characters, discontinuities, terrible acting, ridiculous dialogue, etc., this film is just bad in every way possible. The ironic thing is, it's so horrible, that it is in fact entertaining. So entertaining that the film has amassed a huge cult following, much like that of The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

When I heard The Room was coming to the Del Mar Theater as part of their midnight movie, I was stoked. I've always wanted to see this film in all it's horrendous glory up on the silver screen. So anyways, I just got back from the film about an hour and a half ago, and, wow! What an awesome experience. People were quoting the movie left and right and adding in their own wit and commentary to the mix.

Seeing it with a large audience was great because it was almost like a live-action performance. Viewers would use certain cues within the film to interact (via actions and speech) to what was happening on screen. Below are some of the common actions that I picked up on.

+ Every time a spoon was on screen, people began pelting the film with plastic spoons.
+ Every time the film cut to a scene of San Francisco, the audience would blurt out "Meanwhile, back in San Francisco"
+ Every time two characters were kissing on screen, the audience wouldsay, "NOM NOM NOM"
+ Every time the mother was on screen, viewers would yell, "Cancer"
+ Every time a camera would do a long slow pan (i.e. the Golden Gate Bridge), everyone would say, "GO, GO, GO, GO, GO!"
+ Every time a nipple was seen on screen, everyone would scream out "NIPPLE"
+ Every time a football was seen onscreen, viewers would begin passing around a football in the auditorium

These are jut a few of the things that I can recall from tonight. Even though I had seen the film before, I could not stop laughing. I love this film on so many levels. It's just something you can't stand to watch, but at the same time, cannot look away from.

Simply put, The Room is awesome. Tommy Wiseau is my hero.

Marks in the Water.

2011-02-17T16:30:00.000-08:00

I'm not to keen on those eyesore watermarks that are scattered across an otherwise beautiful image. I completely understand the need for securing one's work, but there are clever ways to go about protecting your photos.

I've always meant to try and design a semi-unique watermark that I could use appropriately on a photos I upload to Flickr. After fuddling around with some ideas, I came up with a solid design I'm pretty happy with. My goal isn't to put the watermark on every photo, but try and include it when it looks right.

Nothing too crazy, just a sketch of a 35mm film camera and the font "Die Die Die" which gives the look of text being scribbled on something.

Thus far, I've gone through and added the watermark to a few of my photos with borders. For the most part, I think they really give a sense of balance to the overall composition. Before, the black borders were too empty and distracting. Obviously, I liked the look, but I always felt like it was missing something. I think a watermark was just that thing.

Here are a few of my past photos that I re-edited to include my new watermark.

[EXPLORED]

2011-02-17T13:30:00.000-08:00

Taking photos is what's keeping me sane these days. It's almost like a form of therapy. I have so much stuff going on between school, work, and random film projects, it's rare when I have time to myself. Even when I have nothing going on, I still have the desire to be productive. This is when the thinking cap goes on, and I begin snapping photos of the things around me.

For Valentine's day, my girlfriend, pug, and I ditched classes and headed up to San Francisco for the day. With our cameras in hand, we walked around the city, strolling into stores that looked interesting. On Haight Street, there was one store, Loyal Army, that had an awesome collection of witty/random tees. There was one in particular with a pug on it that I had to have. It was fit for a girl so I bought it for Jenny. With our newly acquired shirt, we decided to do an informal mini photoshoot on a street running parallel to Haight.

I threw on the Nikon 80-200mm f/2.8 D and started snapping away. I love how flat the 80-200mm makes everything look. The background that extends hundreds of feet past Jenny, looks like it's a backdrop set a few inches behind her. The shallow depth of field at f/2.8 really gives the image that added sense of narrow focus. My only qualm with the lens is how soft it is, especially at f/2.8. One day I'll own the coveted Canon 135mm f/2 L lens, but for now the 80-200mm is a great alternative.

After posting this picture on my Flickr, it began to blow up. It received close to 100 views the first day it was online. Someone left a comment on the picture saying that Flickr decided this photo would be one of the 500 "EXPLORED" photos of the day. Not too shabby.

Here's the photo that was featured on the "EXPLORE" page on Flickr.

On a side note, here are some other random photos I have taken in the last week or so!

Valentine's Day Came Early.

2011-02-09T00:59:00.001-08:00

For this year's Valentine's Day, I was trying to figure out some presents my girlfriend would enjoy. I finally decided on some Guava Ginseng tea that we've both been craving ever since we left Hawaii and a few vinyl toys that she's hinted at. As you probably already noticed, it's not quite Valentine's Day, but yet I'm revealing my gifts. You see, my girlfriend and I suck at waiting to give gifts to each other. The day we get their present in the mail is usually the same day we give it to them. We just find it too hard to wait.

In past conversations, my girlfriend has mentioned her fascination with the vinyl toys known as "Lunartiks." It's hard to say exactly what the figures are based on, but they look like little aliens poking their heads out of cups of tea. Each figure is called by a different type of tea (i.e. Earl Grey, Cinnamon, Berry, etc.). They come in individually wrapped blind boxes, so there really is no say in which character you get. I thought it'd be fun to get two just so we have better odds of getting a cool one.

When they arrived, we each picked a box to open. I went first. I got Cinnamon. Next was Jenny's turn. She pulled out a gray figure with pink eyes. We searched on the box, but could not find that particular figure. A quick google search concluded that she had just pulled the rarest from the set. She pulled "Lady Grey" with a 1:80 ration. Talk about good luck!

While searching for the Lunartiks on various sites, I came across quite possibly one of the coolest vinyl pieces I've seen in awhile. There's no better way of describing it than calling it the vinyl toy version of me. It has the same grin and mop-top hairstyle as me! I figured my girlfriend would appreciate it so I added it to my cart.

She loved it. The quality of this toy was top notch. The figure also included a cloth sewn backpack as well as a little red wagon. I love when things come with accessories. Yet another cool piece to add to the ever expanding collection.

As with all my recent toys, a mandatory photo session followed.

Principal Photography Has Begun!

2011-02-09T00:15:00.000-08:00

In a nutshell, the film is about a girl who has been studying all night and has slept through her alarm. In an attempt to get her ready, things within her home begin animating themselves to get this girl to her test on time. A relatively simple story that focuses heavily on style, specifically stop-frame animation.

I made it a point to get started early on my short film for my Film 172 class. I'm doing a stop frame that will require countless hours and sleepless nights of post work, so I can't afford to leave it until the last minute. This past weekend I was able to shoot about 2/5 of my film. Arguably the harder chunk of the film. At least it's in the past, and the footage looks great.

My actress Kat Brown was kind enough to let me use her house as our location. This worked perfectly because I was going for the anti-dorm room look. Kat has obviously spent a good amount of time decorating her shelves and walls with vintage posters and knick knacks. Because of this, I had to do barely any set decking. Thanks Kat! I think the appeal of the room translates well to film.

On friday, we shot a quick bathroom segment. Then on Saturday and Sunday we did all the bedroom stuff. Luckily, there were a lot of shots that Kat didn't need to be in so she could relax while we animated things. For the stuff Kat was in, she did great, especially considering this is her fist time working on a stop-frame. There was one sequence where she had to stay completely still for forty-five minutes. I felt so bad. Unlike live-action where you just record, stop-frame forces you to slow down and break up ordinary, everyday actions into specific, exaggerated movements. It almost feels like slow motion when you're capturing the images.

Overall, I am very happy with the way our first shoot went. Obviously, there were times when we were all getting frusturated, but we worked through it. Thanks to my amazing girlfriend Jenny, the animation sequences look stunning. I don't know how she does it sometimes, but when you play the images back it looks perfect!

I can't wait to keep the ball rolling and shoot some more stuff. I plan to resume shooting on Sunday, Februray 20th. Fingers crossed for another successful shoot!

Mmmmm Bokeh!

2011-02-08T15:25:00.000-08:00

I'm obsessed with bokeh. For those that don't know, "bokeh" is a term used to describe the out of focus lights within a shot. The word stems from "boke" a japanese word, which translates to mean "blur" or "haze."

You might ask yourself, why would someone be infatuated with things that are out of focus? Maybe not. For me, it just adds that little something extra to your shot. When you see a shot in a film where someone in the foreground is in focus and the out of focus background is scattered with bokeh, I get all warm and fuzzy inside. This is why people pay the big bucks for fast camera lenses. The more the aperture can open up, the better the cameras's performance in lowlight and thus quality of bokeh is increased.

Last Friday, My friend Ben and I hit downtown Santa Cruz at around 11PM to do some lowlight camera tests. I brought my slider and intervalometer along to try and get some interesting images. We started off at the iconic Del Mar Theater, which has an epic marquee that flashes a multitude of green, blue, and red lights. After this, I told Ben I wanted to shoot on a highway overpass. We headed off to 41st Avenue, which goes directly over the freeway. On the way, I used Ben's suction cup car mount with fisheye to get a driving timelapse. We parked in an empty Home Depot parking lot and headed to the overpass. There was virtually no light, so I mostly shot long exposure timelapses. I wish there had been more cars driving, but honestly it was nearing 1AM. We eventually packed up and headed to get a late night meal at the only place open this late in all of SC, the Santa Cruz Diner. I wish I could do this sort of stuff every week!

Here is a short edit of some of the footage I obtained that night.

A Great Time Killer.

2011-02-04T11:47:00.000-08:00

Checking Flickr has always been an integral part of my daily web browsing. So many good photos uploaded everyday. It's also exciting when you see photos that your friends post in the recent activity section of the page. Flickr is also a great way to meet other photographers and learn from them.

Recently I stumbled upon two photographers whose work I am greatly influence and inspired by. Their names are Rick Nunn and Connor Surdi. Both extremely talented photographers with very unique styles.

A few weeks ago, Mr. Surdi posted a photo as a part of his 365 project. For those that don't know, a 365 project is basically a photo a day for an entire year. Most people just snap whatever is around them without too much thought, but Connor goes all out with a crazy new photo everyday. Back to the story. So the photo he posted was of his bathroom, but with multiple versions of him within the space. Unfortunately due to copyrights, I can't post the photo here, but here's the link if you care to take a look.

Here's my version of the "multiple personalities" style photo.

I set my camera up on a tripod so that the framing would remain consistent across all the shots. I then proceeded to snap photos with me in different locations. I merged the three photos in Photoshop and did some minor color correction work to hide the blending across the layers. I'm very happy with the way this experiment worked out. I have some things in mind for a crazier photo of similar nature that I hope to pull off in the coming months. Stay tuned.

The Destroyer.

2011-02-01T01:48:00.000-08:00

After holding out for some time, I finally got my hands on a limited Buff Monster piece. I was lucky enough to snag one of Buff's web exclusive vinyl toys. This piece is entitled "The Destroyer" and is featured in the classic Buff Monster colorway of gray and pink. Only 99 pieces were made, and each box is hand signed by Buff himself. Cool beans.

Hopefully over time, I can acquire some more art pieces by Buff, but for the time being, I'm content with my little guy. At just over 11 inches tall, "The Destroyer" will annihilate anything in it's path. Do not under any circumstances tick this guy off!

Winter Wonderland.

2011-02-01T01:14:00.000-08:00

I was beginning to think I wouldn't make it up to the mountains this season. Because of schedule conflicts and money, any chance of snowboarding was looking grim. My girlfriend surprised me for my birthday by informing me that she booked us a place to stay in Tahoe. She even found a place that allowed dogs to stay, so we could bring our pug Coco.

We drove up on a Saturday after my girlfriend finished her shift at work. It was a nice drive filled with jokes and stories. We also popped in No Country for Old Men, because my girlfriend hadn't seen it. I forgot how beautiful the visuals were in that film. Not saying I was peeking at the movie while driving, or anything...

When we began our trek up the mountain, I was beginning to worry. The only snow in sight was the dirty, brown snow on the side of the highway. I was really looking forward to seeing some fresh white snow. We got to our hotel around 8PM where we unloaded our stuff. We were both starving so we headed over to Harvey's casino to grab a bite at the Hard Rock Cafe. For the last two years, Jenny and I have somehow always wound up at this restaurant. It's become sort of tradition to eat here when we come up. Also, because I just turned 22, I took full advantage of the drink menu. I ordered a Malibu fruit smoothie, which tasted amazing. To eat, I ordered the Granny Smith and Provolone Burger. I still have dreams about this burger. Probably one of the best burgers I've had in my life.

Back at the hotel we hung out with Coco before passing out. I slept like a baby that night.

In the morning, I stumbled out of bed to open the curtains on the window. I couldn't believe my eyes. The sky was raining snow. We could not have picked a more perfect time to get up here. There was about 3 inches of snow on every car in the parking lot. It was quite a sight to behold.

Coco was getting antsy so we took her out to do her business. She was not as stoked on the fresh snow as we were. I can't blame her, having to walk around in the snow with her bare paws exposed. We thought ahead and brought her her little snow jacket. Yep, we're the kind of people that dress their dogs up. Regardless, Coco did her biz and proceeded to high tail it back to the room.

Driving through the fresh snow was an experience that was both exciting and terrifying. My girlfriend was a bit freaked out when we started sliding around the roads. I had winter tires on the scoob, but even still I would occasionally lose traction. There were even a few instances where I was full on drifting around turns. I was having a blast, but I could tell my girlfriend wasn't as excited. I drove as carefully as I could from that point up to the ski resort.

Because of the snow conditions, we were one of the first cars to arrive. We fed our dog, geared up, and headed out. I always worry with snowboarding that I'll lose everything I worked so hard to learn last season. But just like last time, it all comes back instantly. The fresh powder was amazing to snowboard over. The mountain was practically empty and there were no lines anywhere. I could not ask for a better day to be shredding. I worked on a few technical things like butters and 180s, but I was just having a blast flying down the slopes.

About 2PM our sore muscles told us we should call it quits. We headed back to the car to meet a very anxious pug. We packed up and headed off. The drive home was just as relaxing as on the way up.

I had a great weekend! Thanks to my super awesome girlfriend for an amazing trip I will never forget!

Mac Heaven.

2011-02-01T00:28:00.000-08:00

My friend Ben Bunch asked me about a week ago if I would be interested in attending MacWorld, an annual mac product and accessory expo. Seeing that I had that Friday off, i was all for it. Ben, Matt Parcher, and I set off for San Francisco around 8:30AM to get an early start.

First thing we did when we got there was picked up our badges. I was stoked that they put my production company "Bokeh Pictures" on the name tag. We entered the convention like giddy school girls. It was a bit overwhelming at first, but we quickly got used to the layout. Because Ben, Matt, and I all had dSLRs hanging from our necks, we got a lot of looks. We also got a bunch of random people coming up to us talking cameras and technical specs. One booth even thought we were press so they gave Ben a coupon for a free iPhone case.

We easily spent 6+ hours at the convention just walking around checking everything out and talking to people. Just when we thought we'd seen it all, we'd find a new aisle that we somehow missed our first time around. The dangerous thing was, almost everything had a special "expo price." I splurged a bit and got some cool accessories for my iDevices.

First, I bought a "Pogo Sketch," which is essentially a stylus for the touchscreen interface. Obviously, I prefer physically touching the screen, but for drawing and doodling in apps like Adobe Ideas and Sketchpad Pro, the stylus is nice. It also works surprisingly well, you just have to make sure not to rest your hand on the screen when scribbling.

Next, I bought a "Glif." This ingenous invention is basically a kickstand for your iPhone. The Glif allows you to prop the phone up in either portrait or landscap as well as mount to a tripod. What I really enjoyed was talking to the creators who were at the booth. Apperently they aimed to raise $10,000 on a website called kickstarter.com, and they ended up raising well over $130,000. Overall, a very clever, well-designed piece of plastic that has multiple uses.

Lastly, I bought something I've always wanted, but could never justify buying. A company named Rain makes a very sleek looking MacBook Pro support riser called the "mStand." The fact that it was 20% off the MSRP was incentive enough to finally give in. The mStand looks beautiful on my desk next to the 23" Apple Cinema Display. I'm extremely happy with my purchase.

MacWorld was great! I had a lot of fun and can't wait to attend next year. Hopefully, Ben, Matt, and I can make it a tradition to go every year. Not to mention, MacWorld is located in one of my favorite cities ever, San Francisco. After the expo, we all headed out around town to snap some photos.

Here are a few of my favorite captures.

As many already know, I'm what you'd call an Apple fanboy. I'm big on design and aesthetics, so it's important for me that stuff looks sleek and matches. Apple does a great job at creating similar looking, simplistic devices.

Here is my most recent photo of my workspace. Notice the mStand and the Glif doing their respected jobs quite nicely.

Within White Fences

2011-01-31T19:01:00.000-08:00

As if I didn't already have enough going on in my life, I was asked by one of my friends David Murakami if I would DP his film. This dude knows his stuff, so I was more than happy to help him on his project. A few weeks later he sent the script out. Wow! Talk about ambitious. I have no doubt that David will put it off, but wow! Let's just say one of the scenes calls for a car crashing into a limo. I'm excited though to get the ball rolling.

To give you an idea of the caliber of David's films, give this a watch. Take into account most of these sidewalks were not empty when they filmed the scene.

This past weekend we had our first shoot. The scene followed the "hitman" character waiting at a bus stop. To say that the lighting conditions were horrendous would be an understatement. We had to rely solely on the one streetlight from across the street and the occasional passing headlights from oncoming traffic. It's times like these when I'm glad I traded in my HVX200 for a Canon 5D. I shot the entire scene at ISO 2500, 1/30th, and f/1.4. Talk about extremes. The final image is a tad grainy, but it has an almost gritty, urban feel to it.

Here are a few screen grabs from the footage.

I'm very much looking forward to working with the very talented cast and crew of "Within White Fences" in the oncoming weeks!

Seeing Double.

2011-01-31T16:05:00.000-08:00

I quite enjoy me some vinyl toys. No surprise. I check blogs like Spankystokes and Hello Vinyl daily to get the scoop on the newest vinyl releases. When Artist James Jarvis announced his Wisdom of Caleb series, I knew had to get one. The tricky part was deciding on which t-shirt design to get considering there were eight options.

I decided on the "Sausages" and "I Heart BM" ones. I couldn't get just one. My girlfriend found the BM hilarious, so that was that. I was lucky to get one of the "sausage" Calebs, which sold out pretty quickly afterwards. Not to mention the t-shirt poking fun at the infamous "Supreme" logo. Overall, really funny characters and top notch quality vinyl.

As with all my toys, I love photographing them. I try to find an environment that fits their character. So for my two Calebs, I put them in downtown Santa Cruz. I'd imagine they are both looking for the nearest public restroom to desacrate. These guys mean business.

Here are the photos.

While out, I also brought along another vinyl toy I recently picked up. This one is called "Sweety." She's an oversized candy with braces. She was more than happy to show me her pearly whites for this photograph.

Some More Long Exposures.

2011-01-31T15:34:00.001-08:00

Sort of addicted to the art form. You never know if you're image will come out good or not. Long exposures are guesstimation in it's truest forms. Here's a few captures taken at night on the UC Santa Cruz campus. Special thanks to Ben Bunch and Anthony Cote for hanging out!

Study of a Space/Style.

2011-01-31T01:13:00.000-08:00

For those that don't know, I'm currently a senior Film and Digital Media major at UC Santa Cruz. As with most students I have my qualms about the layout of the major, but my main concern is not getting into classes required to complete the major. I am also in what is known as the "production concentration," which basically means I'm focusing on the production aspect of filmmaking over critical analysis. I only have two more quarters left at this school, and I need to take two more production classes. Thank God I was able to get into the film production class I needed this quarter.

Film 172 is essentially an intermediate film production class. We are expected to have a decent knowledge of film terms and concepts. Making films is what I live for, so lectures for this class can get a bit dull. I understand the importance of the information, it's just a lot of redundant stuff most of us know already. Regardless, the focus of this class is to create one eight minute short film by the end of the course.

I had my idea for my short film even before the first day of this class. I've done a few stop frames in the past. Most notably "Sculpey the Slug" which premiered at that 2009 Santa Cruz Film Festival and "I-KAN Love" which won first place in IKAN's Short FIlm Contest. As an attempt to challenge myself, I wanted to raise the stakes. After seeing a few films online, I wanted to make a stop-frame with people.

Here are a few of the short films that inspired me.

So instead of animating an inanimate object or some clay sculpture, I plan to animate a human. Obviously, it would be easier to just film it like live-action, but that wouldn't quite get the look I'm going for. Also, I plan to tap into the imagination realm by including the animation of random household objects (i.e. iPods, pillows, slippers, etc.). The story I have planned is a bit elementary in terms of content, but this is more so I can focus on the style of the film.

Eli Hollinder, our professor for Film 172, gave us the assignment of studying a space/style. He recommended that we shoot in a space or in a style that we planned to use for our longer film. This was the perfect opportunity to try out the "style" of my film, because up until then I had never experimented with it.

After waking up one morning to catch the sunrise via timelapse, we set out to film everyday actions, but by taking bursts of photos. When we were all done, I think I had somewhere around 2400 photos. I then spent the rest of that day editing together the photos with sound. It was not always easy to pick the best sounds for each action, but I like the way the sound design turned out. Sound has never really been my forte, so I hope I can change that with this assignment!

After showing my class my work, they seemed pretty impressed. This was a big ego boost for me. Sometimes when you sit down with an edit for so long, grueling over the small, minute details, you can quickly lose focus of the piece as a whole. Many of the students asked how I did the intro timelapse/dolly shot. The teacher seemed pretty impressed with the work too. I'm happy with the overall outcome of the study and can't wait to get started on the real project! Check back in a few weeks and I should have the film online. For now, you can check out my tests below.

Cookie Monster NOM NOM

2011-01-31T01:04:00.000-08:00

Ever since I started using Instagram on my iPhone, I've made it a point to follow people I find interesting. I recently started following a user who constantly posts photos of their baking endeavors. I think her name is something like "artiki." Anyways, the other day she posted a photo of her "cookie monster cupcakes." Once I saw those, I knew I had to make them. Because my baking skills are way below average, I relied on the aid of my girlfriend to help out. We got all the necessary ingredients and began concocting our sugary little morsels of sweet confection. We let them cool over night and then in the morning Jenny and I decorated them in the image of the notorious "cookie monster."

They turned out delicious. We brought them to my girlfriend's friend's house who was having a party that night. That was the last we ever saw of them. I made it a point to snap a few photos to remember our tasty escapades!

Day or Night?

2011-01-31T00:45:00.000-08:00

I've been meaning to do some long exposures for awhile now. I've tried out a few beforehand, but nothing I was really too excited about. Long exposures alway seem more fun in theory. Actually being out in the frigid night air, blindly composing a shot, and then waiting several minutes to see your image is quite deterring.

With all that aside, the moon has been ridiculously bright these last few days. Ben, Jenny, and I headed out to the scenic bluffs on West Cliff Drive in Santa Cruz. Ben just got his new intravalometer, which allows one to take longer exposures than the cameras preset shutter options. I was down for the idea so my girlfriend and I put on every sweater and jacket we owned and headed out into the night.

When we got there, it took a moment for our eyes to adjust to the darkness. As mentioned earlier, the moon was so bright that it illuminated the ocean and surrounding coast. There were even a few brave surfers out in the ocean catching some waves, mind you it was nearing 12AM.

We all set out to take our photos. Ben with his GH2, Jenny with her Mamiya, and me with my 5D. I threw on the fisheye hoping to get some cool results. Focusing was a bit hard so I had to guesstimate. I set up my first shot, set the ISO to 800, the f/stop to 5.6, and the shutter to 30 seconds. As I waited for the image to finish exposing, I was convinced that this capture was going to be awful. When the LCD screen illuminated with the photo that was just taken, I lit up with joy. The exposure was spot on and the composition looked nice. Because of the moon, the sky looked blue as day, and the lighthouse in the distance looked like the rising sun.

I took about a hundred images that night. I was extremely pleased with the results. When I returned home about 2-3AM, I was so excited I began editing my photos. I only selected a handful out of the batch that I would upload. Here are a few of my favorites.

I also, shot a timelapse while I was there. Not too exciting, but whatever. I wish the photos were taking at longer intervals to show more of the clouds moving. Maybe, next time.

"Never Stop Rolling": An Autobiographical film.

2011-01-27T09:19:00.000-08:00

This past quarter I took an autobiographical film production course at UC Santa Cruz. I wasn't crazy about it, but it was the only production class I got into.

Just as the title makes it sound, it was a class where we had to make films about ourselves. As many of you who know me personally know I'm a pretty shy guy. So making a movie about myself, you know, starring me, freaked me out a bit. Just as with all film assignments, I put in a huge amount of effort forward on my projects. It was weird doing voiceovers and editing footage of me, but after the fact I quite enjoyed it. Filmmakers so often already include so much of themselves in their films, that turning the camera on themselves doesn't feel so unusual.

The film below was my second assignment for this class. Our prompt was to make a film about a memory experienced three different ways or times in our life. I decided on making a film about my memory of skateboarding. According to the teacher I didn't quite follow the prompt, but she still gave me an "A" for all the effort I put onto it.

So check it out, "Never Stop Rolling."

Also, every week we had to do vlogs (video logs) about ourselves. I had some fun with them. Most are just whatever.

iPhone app OCD and my new love affair with Instagram.

2011-01-27T09:09:00.000-08:00

I honestly think I have iPhone app OCD. I'm always checking online and in the app store for the newest and greatest apps. Right now I've been really getting into photography apps. A few months ago, I strictly stuck to Plastic Bullet. It was great, but the randomization of the post process got a bit annoying. If I had a particular style in mind I'd often have to wait 10-20 refreshes until i got exactly what I wanted.

The two camera apps I've been using as of recent are Camera+ and Instagram. Camera+ needs no introduction. It's simply a great way of taking photos and making simple tweaks to them. Instagram is a nice little gem I discovered while in Hawaii. Let me just say that I'm loving it!

So the appeal of Instagram is that not only is it a photo manipulation app, but it integrates social networking amongst other photographers and instagram users. The app square crops your pictures and allows users to choose over 10-20 filters to add to give it an aged, vintage look. But what I really love about the process is after you take your photo and decide on a filter, you upload it with a caption and a gps location point. In short it gives a context for all your random phone photos. It is very similar to Facebook's news feed, in which photos from people you follow are updated in a real-time list.

Gizmodo did a recent article on it that I found hugely enlightening. One of their main points for why this app is so great is simply because big time corporations and companies can't really get in on it. It's a very specific social networking site that calls upon its users to create the content for others to see. My only qualm with it is that more of the people I know aren't on it. Hopefully it will catch on, but for now, I'm having a blast using it.

FIND ME! Username @kmper02

Here are some recent Instagram photos.

Mahalo Xmas.

2011-01-27T02:14:00.000-08:00

Christmas time has always been a semi-weird time for me. I love giving and receiving gifts, but it always feels so forced. Why does there have to be one special day a year where we give our loved ones things we think they'll like? Is it to simply let them know we care? Maybe it's because my family is so spread out across the US, I've never really had a big family gathering. Either way, the days surround xmas are a great time for catching up on much needed rest. Also, Starbuck's has those awesome peppermint mochas. So for this xmas season I just hung out with the girlfriend and her family in San Jose.

On the 25th of December, instead of opening up presents, we were booking it down to LA. My girlfriend and her mom wanted to visit their daughter/sister. While they were doing that, I drove down to spend some time with my mom in Orange County. It all worked out quite nicely. My girlfriend's sister was even sweet enough to get my dog and I a little Hollywood star of fame with our names on it. Thanks Jyoti!

On the 26th of December we drove back to San Jose. Normally we would have taken our time, but we had to catch a flight the next morning out of the San Jose Airport. We were heading off to the beautiful garden isle of Kauai. My girlfriend's mom, with the recent passing of her father and an overbearing work load, needed some time to relax, and what better place than Hawaii. Kauai is great because of its lack of modernizations we take for granted. They probably had two or three traffic lights on the island. Jenny's mom agreed to pay for my airfare as an xmas present to me, which was extremely thoughtful and unexpected. Luckily I had a $250 United voucher that I could help her out with. The only downside was that we had to leave our pug Coco at home with one of Jenny's cousins.

Before we knew it, we were in the air. It rained on an off when we got there, but the weather was great. A bit humid, but honestly what can you expect. We went kayaking, snorkeling, hiking, played with sparklers, took photos, you name it. The island is so small you can drive across it in about an hour. One thing I will miss is the honeydew melon italian ice and the kona coffees we got each day. One thing I won't miss is all the roosters everywhere. Kauai is overrun by hens and roosters. According to our tour guide on the kayak trip, there is a 5:1 ratio between roosters/hens and human. Seeing a rooster roaming the parking lot of a Costco is just simply something I never thought I'd see.

I wish I had more to say, but honestly we spent most of the time just relaxing and doing touristy things. Thanks Jenny and Laurie for an amazing trip!

As always, here are some photos from the trip.

"Wrxtacy"

2011-01-27T01:48:00.000-08:00

WRX+ ecstasy=WRXtacy

Sometime around December, I decided enough was enough. I had to shoot something. I figured my car would make a good subject, and it was something I've been meaning to do for awhile. So around 8pm in the pouring rain I drove up to the UCSC campus in search of a covered location. Because most of the students were away for winter break, I had the campus all to myself. I ended up pulling into a vacant parking garage on the north side of campus. I parked my car and began shooting. What you see below is the result.

The Happiest Car EVARRR!

2011-01-27T01:27:00.000-08:00

My girlfriend used to roll around in BMW 325i wagon. It was her dad's, but because he had a company car, he let her borrow the wagon. Well long story short, he lost that job and had to take back the beamer. This left my girlfriend without a car. I don't mind driving her around, in fact I love driving my car, but it begins taking a toll. When I have to drive up to the UCSC campus multiple times a day, it puts a lot of mileage on the car. It also doesn't help that I have to put premium gasoline in my car.

My girlfriend knew this was bumming me out. So on began the car search. The thing about her is she can't just buy any old piece of junk car. She wanted to find a car that fit her personality and that she would enjoy driving. She was also very adamant about getting a manual despite the fact that she's only had one lesson ever. I mentioned awhile back I thought Mazda Miatas were cool, but figured it would be out of our price range. A simple craigslist search proved otherwise. Miatas are dirt cheap. From that point on that's the only car she was looking into.

We checked out one or two before we finally settled on an awesome little white one. The owner was a huge Miata enthusiast, which is always a good thing. The car had aftermarket springs, O2 sensor, new wheels, radio, roll bar, and a front strut brace. This was the one. A few days later the dude dropped it off her mom's house in San Jose and we signed all the paper work. She was now the proud owner of 1993 Mazda Miata MX-5.

The next day, we took it out for a spin. As I mentioned earlier, my girlfriend and I had only received one stick shift lesson. We weren't so great at it to say the least. We stalled numerous times, but it was loads of fun switching the gears. My girlfriend ended up picking it up quickly and in three days time she drove it over the treacherously windy Highway 17, back to our home in Santa Cruz. I drove behind her just to make sure nothing crazy happened. Just our luck, it began pouring on the way home, but my girlfriend drove on like a trooper.

All in all, she loves the car. It can be a bit of a bummer driving on the UCSC campus or in traffic, but otherwise she's loves driving it. This is also good for me because it means I can let my Subaru rest more often. I also find it funny that my girlfriend is getting the "mod bug" as they say. She has plans to paint the car graphite gray and get some wider wheels for that aggressive stanced look. For now though, she rocks a mustache decal on her front bumper. 'Stache Power!

Makin' Munny.

2011-01-27T01:10:00.000-08:00

So, I've already done a post about vinyl toys, and my fascination with them. What's cool is a company that goes by the name of Kidrobot has a line of DIY toys that you can draw on. Essentially you can make your own vinyl toy. Over the past few months I've been dabbling with this medium. I really like the idea of creating art on a 3D canvas. They have templates to practice your design on, but I prefer just free-handing it.

Here is one of my recent DIY vinyl toys.

Also, here is one the my girlfriend Jenny made.

And here's a short video of me free-handing a Munny with Sharpie.

A Gift for a Photographer.

2011-01-26T19:05:00.000-08:00

My girlfriend and I have been together for two years (on November 20th). I'm writing this post a bit late, as with all these recent posts. Life has the tendency to consume me so I rarely have time to update a blog. I'm trying to change this for the new year. No more of this updating my blog with posts that should have been written 6 months ago!

Back to my girlfriend. She's awesome. Truly one of a kind. She loves trying new things. When we started going out, she told me she had an interest in photography, but had never really done it. I set off to teach her all I knew. She learned on a good ol' 35mm film camera, which is the way everyone should learn. DSLRs are just too easy. Film is much more exciting, plus it's what all the present day DSLRs are based on! She picked up everything so fast. Eventually we began researching other formats (i.e. medium and large format). So for our one year anniversary, I get her her very first MF (Medium Format) camera. A Yashcia-A Twin Lens Reflex. This is one of those old vintage cameras that is just awesome to look at.

So for our 2nd year anniversary, I decided I had to outdo my last gift. Since we had a photography theme going on, I decided to do some more research. I eventually stumbled upon a company who goes by the name "Mamiya." At one time, these medium format cameras were the top dogs. They held their own against Bronicas and Hasselblads. But because of the digi-craze, no one wants a film camera anymore. This means exponetially lower prices on pro film gear. I lucked out winning a Mamiya RB-67 camera and kit on eBay. I won't say the price I paid for obvious reasons, but let's just say I got everything (camera, 2 lenses, prism viewfinder, shutter cable, 120 back, 220 back, polaroid back, and 6 rolls of 120 film) for less than the price of a entry level DSLR. Not sure if that made sense, but I got a great deal on it.

I let her have the camera a few days early and she loved it. The negatives/positives are teck sharp. Not to mention the camera is a beast. At least 5 pounds, which can get tiring to handhold. Either way, the camera is great for any analog lover.

Here's some recent photos taken on the Mamiya.

If you care to take a look at my girlfriend's lovely photos, here's her Flickr

Somebody got some new wheels.

2011-01-26T18:49:00.000-08:00

Wheels are expensive. Luckily for me there's a brand called Rota that makes replica wheels. These wheels use popular designs and tweaks them to resist infringing on existing patents and copyrights. I finally got the funds to buy me some Volk TE37 replicas, known as the "ROTA Grids." A lot of people hate on Rotas saying they're structurally weak wheels, but for the price, you can't really complain! Plus, I got mine used for $900 and they came with tires. The Grids normally cost around $999 plus the cost of tires. I later found out that the tires I got retail for about $340... EACH! They were in perfect condition too. Apparently they're "run-flat" tires, meaning that if you get a flat, you can still drive up to 100 miles at 60mph. WOAH!

The only downside was that when I got them, they were white and a bit scratched up. I figured that since I got such a good deal, I'd get them professionally powder coated. Big mistake! You see, I wanted a dark gray gunmetal-ish color for the wheels. The guy at the paint place gave me a pamphlet with hundreds of different colors. I went with the color I thought most closely looked like a dark gray. Turns out the gray I chose had a very noticeable blue tint to it. In the sun these wheels looked like a pastel blue. I was not stoked. I drove around with them for a week hoping I would change my mind, but it only got worse. Finally I said enough was enough. I headed down to Autozone and picked up some flat black wheel paint. I spent the next weekend re-painting the wheels. It took all day, but I'm really happy with the finished product. Not a huge fan of the "murdered out" all black look, but it's better than it was before! Overall I'm excited to be driving in a aggressively stanced car. Not slammed, but riding "practical low." I can still make it over speed bumps just fine.

East Coast.

2011-01-25T16:12:00.000-08:00

Early August my mom, brother, and I headed off to New York yet again. My mom's entire side of the family still lives in and around New York so we try and do a trip once a year. My mom decided at a young age that she wanted something new and decided to travel cross country to California. This explains the separation between the family. None of her family ever followed her. For them, New York was just safer than picking up and moving somewhere new. As much as I love visiting New York, I'm so glad I grew up in sunny California.

Back to the trip. Well, not much happened. Hung out with some relatives, ate some food, walked around the city, and that was about it. When I'm in New York, I feel like I'm still just back at home. We don't really do anything to make me feel that I'm truly in a new place. The highlight of my trip was seeing my grandpa get stuck in a children's massage chair. I don't think I've ever laughed that hard in my life. I also talked my aunt into taking me to the NYMOMA in the city. Because of the crazy parking prices we had to speed walk through the art exhibits. Next time hopefully I can stay longer.

Here are a few photos from my trip. I didn't take too many simply because I spent most of my time indoors. Oh well, there's always next time.

POV: a short film by me

2011-01-24T16:30:00.000-08:00

One thing that really churns my butter is film students that don't make films outside of class. If students love filmmaking as much as they claim they do, how come most of them only having made 2-3 short films over the entire course of their academic career? Sorry, just venting.

Over the summer (outside of school), I did short series of tests that ended up turning into a short film. All the shots were taken from my point of view, hence the film's title "POV." The subject matter is rather elementary, but this was a test for me to see if I could pull something like this off and make it look decent.

So with a Canon 5D and belt in hand, i set to work. I tightened the neck strap so that the camera was pressed up against my neck. I then proceeded to use the belt to attach the camera grip to the bottom of my face. The camera sat a bit lower than eye level, but honestly it had the same effect. The great thing about these HDSLRs is their small size and weight. With the addition of a wide-angle lens, in this case a Canon 16-35mm, I was able to shoot extremely wide.

I started out by just trying out some everyday activities with the camera: waking up, brushing teeth, pouring cereal etc. I dumped the footage onto my computer to check it out. The footage was awesome, and was exactly what I was going for. The gears began spinning and I figured I could turn this concept into a short film. Twenty-four hours later I had a finished piece!

I often get asked if I have any pictures of the rig on my head. The answer is no. I cannot even begin to imagine how ridiculous I looked walking around and driving with the rig on. People probably thought I was trying to commit suicide via camera straps and belts. Whatever works for ya right? If I ever decide to tackle this style of film again (which I intend to do), I will figure out a better method of attaching the camera to my face.

Without further adieu, here's my short experiment turned short film...

HELLAFLUSH.

2011-01-24T15:50:00.000-08:00

Or how they say it on the internets: Herra-frush.

Recently I've been researching stuff about the modified JDM car scene on the web. More often than not, I cross paths with Fatlace.com, which includes subsidiary companies such as Illest, Hellaflush, and Slammed Society. You've probably heard of them if you're into cars. At first glance, the movement looked a bit ridiculous to me. For those that don't know, cars that are considered "hellaflush" are clean cars that have wide wheels with large offsets, stretched tires, negative camber, and sit millimeters off the ground. Most the cars featured on their site have trouble going over the smallest speedbumps, that is to say if they don't just take the speedbump with them. As a company and a brand, I love the logo and typography they use. They do a really great job with the designs and illustrations on their graphics. Also, on their blog, they have a lot of content that caters to my interests: vinyl toys, interior design, electronics/gadgets, etc. All in all, cool stuff, but not for everyone.

Give them a look if you haven't already! www.fatlace.com

For those that still don't get it, here some visual examples of "h
ellaflush"

Retarded

Clean

Because the company is located in the Bay Area, they host car shows every once in awhile. So one weekend I headed up to San Mateo with my girlfriend and dog to check out the eyecandy. There were some amazingly clean cars. Also, I don't think I've ever seen so many Canon 5D Mark II's in one place before. This show was a haven for car enthusiasts an photographers alike. My favorite was the slammed Toyota Prius. A little ridiculous, but just goes to show the movement reaches all car enthusiasts.

Here's some photos I took at Hellaflush's "BBQ By the Bay" in San Mateo, CA.

Also, here's a cool little video someone made of the event.

Hella Flush BBQ Coyote Point from iPhilms on Vimeo.

Hmmm, Vinyl. That's Like Plastic Right?

2011-01-21T10:48:00.000-08:00

Vinyl toys! Plain and simple. This is my embarrassing, compulsive new obsession.

Sometime during the Spring quarter at UC Santa Cruz, a few friends and I made the trek down to Disneyland in sunny Anaheim, CA. While there, I noticed they had these weird Mickey Mouse figurines that all had the same basic shape but different designs. The catch was, you never knew which design you were going to get because they were each individually sealed in boxes. Some versions of the figurine were much more rare than others. I kept telling my girlfriend I thought they were cool, but I didn't want to spend $10 on one. The sweetie that she is, bought me one. I eagerly ripped it open to see what I got. A weird burger design was printed on the figurine. Compared to the other designs I was pretty happy on my pull.

Needless to say, I was hooked. I love art, but could never justify spending upwards of $100 on a print (at least back then). My friend Anthony also picked up a mickey mouse figurine. He got a paint by numbers design, which was also a clever take on the character.

Skip forward a few weeks, and I was a madman. I began researching brands, companies, and artists to see what sort of stuff was out there. I never realized there was such a huge market for vinyl toys, but let me tell you, it's a bit insane.

Companies will produce a toy in a limited run, creating anywhere from 1 to 1,000 pieces. The tricky part is, if you don't snag one before they're sold out, you're out of luck. If you really have your heart set on a particular toy, you may have to resort to eBay (aka "evil Bay") where flippers will often charge double or more for a toy. There are so many artists with so many unique styles that it's hard not to find a toy you're psyched on. Right now, I'm a huge fan of the artists Frank Kozik, Sket One, Buff Monster, Huck Gee, and Shepard Fairy.

What turned into a giggly school girl obsession has moved more into an investment plan for me. Now I don't buy every toy that catches my eye. Instead, I wait it out to go after a piece a really like. It's much easier to flip pieces from a limited release than it is to sell common toys that were made in huge quantities. Obviously, my goal in life isn't to liquidate my collection, but if times ever get rough, I'll have a nice security blanket to fall back on.

Another reason my girlfriend and I really enjoy vinyl toys is because, well, they serve as really great photographic subjects! They're posable and they'll stay still for you while you compose your shot. I've also been trying a few outdoor shoots with them as well. Below are a few of the images my girlfriend and I have taken over the last few months!

It's hard to say if this addiction is a fad. I'm not sure if I'll ever lose interest, but for now I love it. I was never really into collecting things, but I think I finally found my niche! I just have to be careful not to go overboard...

Magic Bullet Looks Fans Have a New Calling.

2010-06-04T09:55:00.001-07:00

Red Giant Software, creators of video coloring software like Magic Bullet and Colorista, just made a super awesome iPhone camera app: Plastic Bullet!

The whole idea behind this of this app is to give iPhone pictures the "lomography touch" common with most plastic toy cameras. Having shot on a Holga medium format film camera, it is safe to say that the outcome is always a surprise. Vignetting, light leak, and distortions are all common with these types of pictures, and add to the appeal of these imperfect camera devices. Plastic Bullet takes this concept and uses it on pictures taken with the iPhone. After a picture is taken or is chosen from the camera roll, Plastic Bullet will randomly combine different filters to give you a truly unique picture. There is no control over which filters the app uses, but one can refresh the pictures as often as they'd like to see more filter combinations. This app has completely replaced my traditional camera app altogether. I am still dumfounded as to how a cell phone can take such high quality, interesting pictures. One of my favorite apps by far and the $1.99 price tag is much cheaper than buying a $25+ Holga.

Here's some recent pictures taken on the app Plastic Bullet:

Working Spaces.

2010-05-24T00:48:00.000-07:00

My workspace was recently featured on setupsandspaces. I was contacted on Flickr by another member who showed interest in a few photos I had online of my desk setup.He asked if I would be so kind to take pictures of my desk as well as fill out a short bio on myself. My photos and descriptions would then be featured on a site showcasing different work spaces from all over the world. This seemed like a great opportunity so i took advantage and had everything done the next day.

Check it out: WWW.SETUPSANDSPACES.COM

Lensbaby.

2010-05-24T00:41:00.000-07:00

This lens can easily be described as the poor man's tilt shift. This unique lens can be adjusted so that the disorted vignetting effect can be placed wherever the photographer decides. The lens itself is very soft and dream-like. When I get some time I plan to shoot some sort of experimental, dreamy short film with the Lensbaby.

Here are a few of my first shots on this lens:

Sticker Bombed.

2010-05-24T00:37:00.001-07:00

Over the years, I've realized that I love changing things up. So over the weekend, I "sticker bombed" my car's center console. After seeing a thread on Nasioc.com, I decided to try it out myself. I love the way it came out!

Contomporary.

2010-05-24T00:26:00.000-07:00

Contemporary art is all based on conviction. If you believe your blue painted canvas is worth millions, then it's worth millions. Just ask Yves Klein!

Inspired by my Contemporary Art Appreciation class, I decided to have a go at trying to produce a contemporary work. I decided to combine several portrait photographs of faces I had taken into one dismembered portrait. I employed color and unequal squares to further contrast the pieces of the face from the whole. I think the final product has an interesting look to it and maybe one day I'll have it hanging in my future house.

Jennifer (2010) - Doug Smith

Self (2010) - Doug Smith

Coco (2010) - Doug Smith

iPad.

2010-05-23T23:43:00.000-07:00

The iPad is so in right now. On April 3rd, 2010, Apple unveiled their revolutionary new product, the iPad

I tried my best to ignore the hype surrounding this product. Everywhere I looked people were talking about it. Come D-Day (April 3rd), I went on with my day. The closest Apple store was located in Los Gatos, which was 45 minutes away, and I wasn't going to be standing in line waiting for hours. It hit the afternoon, and websites that I frequented often such as Gizmodo were bombarded with iPad postings. I couldn't deal with it any longer. I talked to my girlfriend Jenny about how badly I wanted one, and she told me she would make the trek to the holy land of the Apple store and purchase one... that is if any were left. She agreed to go halfsies with me because she would use it just as much as I would. I frantically called around to all the Apple stores seeing if they had any left in stock. Only one store in the West Valley Fair mall in San Jose had some left. I had to finish up on a film shoot I was working on, but my girlfriend flew over to San Jose to snag the last iPad. About an hour after she had left I got a call from her. Nervously answering the phone I asked her, "What's up?" She said, "Good news and bad news. Good news, they have iPads left in stock. Bad news, they only have the 64GB versions, which retail for $699." This was a little more than I wanted to pay. I would have been fine with the 16GB, but now that wasn't an option. I figured this was day one, and Jenny had driven all the way down there so.... "Let's do it," I yelled into the phone. She happily said, "Okay," and that was that. Two hours later she was back home in Santa Cruz and we were syncing it up via iTunes. I still had some more work to get done on the shoot, but my brain definitely wasn't all there. During a much needed break, Jenny and I found a quiet corner and just sat and stared at our sleek new toy. We had no idea where to start. From flicking, to pinching, to tapping it was a touch screen orgy. Many people on set shyly came up to us asking, "Is that the iPad?" and "Can I touch it?" We divulged in our spectators wishes so long as they did not hoard our new gizmo. I was nervous telling Jenny on the phone to go for it, but holding that piece of aluminum with a gorgeous glass screen, I knew it was well worth the money. No regrets here!

It's been over a month now, and Jenny and I have been using the iPad daily. There will be days where I won't even touch my laptop. Jenny uses the iPad for taking notes in her classes. She says it's so much easier to tote around a 1.5 lb tablet then it is a bulky computer. Plus the sex appeal of the chic new gadget has everyone in her classes focusing on her more than the content being presented in lecture. As soon as textbooks are available for the iPad, this will be the ultimate learning device.

I on the other hand, have been getting a lot of use out the iPads numerous apps. I was never big on the news before the iPad, but having such a content rich application as USA Today and New York Times, make reading news stories a pleasure. The Netflix App is great for those nights when you want to stay in bed an just kick back and watch a film, in fact Jenny and I just finished our third season of Weeds on the iPad. The games look phenomenal on the tablet as well. Plants vs. Zombies, Angry Birds HD, Flight Control HD, and Asphalt HD are all must haves. All the other core apps (mail, calender, etc.) work great utilizing the bigger screen. I'm proud to say that I finished my first iPad book. I bought the book Caught via Apple's iBook store because it was advised by recent purchasers as a great first book to own on your iPad. The ability to change the font and print size was great so that the content was the perfect size. Once more books become available, I cannot wait to order some more.

The iPad is still in its primitive stages, but its slowly getting there. New apps are coming out everyday that are making the device an essential tool in anybody's life. The main qualm people seem to have with this product is that one cannot so much create content with it. I do agree with this, however, Apple made this device for people to consume large amount of media (films, pictures, mail, news, magazines, YouTube, etc.). I cannot wait to see where app developers take the iPad and it's features down the line, after all the success of this product is mostly relying on them.

SFMOMA

2010-04-14T10:42:00.000-07:00

Took a trip with a few friends yesterday to Schan Franchisco. I had to go to the Museum of Modern Art for a class I'm taking, but we figured it would be a great opportunity to take some photos. The inside of the museum is extremely photogenic and the architecture is beautiful. Andrew and I were on 5D's and Jenny was on her D200. Probably snapped close to 1,000 pictures, although I'm really on pysched on maybe ten of them at most. Just the way it works I guess.

Regardless, here's some favorites from the awesome day!

Can't wait to go back!

SARA.

2010-04-14T10:39:00.001-07:00

Need I say more? No. Just watch.

Sara *Official Teaser* from Nick Rood on Vimeo.

New Toys.

2010-04-09T16:50:00.000-07:00

I jumped aboard the HDSLR band wagon and picked myself up a Canon 5D Mark II. Seems like such a simple concept. Put a camera function in a high end DSLR, but no one was prepared for what happened next. HDSLRs blew up, and boy did they blow up big! Now TV shows, documentaries and even Hollywood productions are using these cameras.

The appeal for me lies in the fact that despite being a video camera, they still look like a still camera. This low profile look bodes well when recording clips in risky locations. For example, say you need to get a scene at a nice restaurant, but the restaurant won't allow you to film there. Just tell them your taking pictures and shoot your entire scene without ever getting noticed. Eventually people will catch on, but for now, bask in primitive glow of the future.

I bought the camera from Adorama (refurbished) along with three great lenses: the 15mm f/2.8 fisheye, 50mm f/1.4, and the ridiculous 16-35mm f/2.8. The first day I got the camera I had to shoot something. With all the camera stuff I have lying around, I figured why not shoot what's accessible? It seems like everyone who does a so called "camera test" always films their pets, so i kind of wanted to shy away from that and do something new.

Enjoy my first short short film shot on my Canon 5D Mark II

After the second day of owning this camera, the liveview function started to get buggy... mind you it is refurbished. I had a warranty so I sent it in for servicing. What I hoped would be a simple routine fix turned into a month long waiting period where I was without a camera. I still had my Nikon D200, but that's no fun! Finally, one day it unexpectedly showed up at my door, fixed and all. I wouldn't be surprised if the original camera was so messed up they had to replace it with a new one. Regardless, I have been shooting on religiously since I got it back

Another fun toy I got was an intravolometer. This device allows you set electronically set the camera to take pictures on a set interval, which is perfect for timelapses!

Here's a boring timelapse of me washing my car with the 5D + intravalometer

To really test limits of this camera, I brought the 5D up with my girlfriend and me on our last snowboard outing in Tahoe. I must say, this camera can take a beating. Cold, water, moisture, wind, everything that came the cameras way didn't hinder it in anyway. Filming with the 15mm fisheye also helped with notorious"rolling shutter" problem and makes handheld footage actually... watchable.

I am currently shooting a new film entitled Sara on this camera with my housemate Nick Rood and Jennifer Kehl, so stay tuned!

Text too much?

2010-02-04T12:00:00.000-08:00

If so, there's a support group for you! My housemate Nick Rood and I decided it would be funny to make a short film about a support group that caters to those who have extreme addictions to texting. The film follows six individuals in their attempts to talk about their problems and control their texting addictions.

As Director of Photography on this project, we shot this short on my HVX + Letus 35mm setup using Nikon primes. I was hoping to get my hands on a HDSLR for this shoot, but things didn't work out. As much as I love this setup, it's often times a burden when I'm rushing to change camera setups. Regardless, I think the images turned out very good. We had the camera on cranes and dollies for a number of the shots as well. Below is a picture of the camera setup we were using on this production.

"Texters Anonymous" Trailer

And here's the actual film

And of course Nick took it upon his self to make a behind the scenes for the film

Good ol' Film.

2009-10-24T21:04:00.000-07:00

Film is a medium of the past, right? For some, this is true! Why pay for film stock and developing fees when you can have unlimited takes on a digital video camera?

Many people forget that digital is an instant gratification version of film. ISO, iris, shutter speed... what does this ancient language mean? Nowadays we can just turn the camera on, put it on auto, and press record. Done! Sure this is nice for the quick YouTube video or shot of your friend singing "Mother Lover" drunk... but honestly? Why wouldn't you want to control your image?

Don't get me wrong, high end digital HD video cameras with manual settings are awesome. I love my HVX200 35mm Adapter rig. But in a way, I still feel like this is cheating. I could never imagine sites like Vimeo or YouTube catching on if 8mm and 16mm cameras were still the norm. In a digital age where everything is instant, why go back to film?

I decided to pay my respects to film and its history by investing in a gorgeous Bolex H16 16mm film camera. Without a doubt, the best $235 I've spent on eBay. When I got it, I had no idea where to start. I started fiddling with knobs and cranks to see what they did. I hate reading manuals unless I absolutely have to. For the Bolex, I definitely will have to spend a good amount of time reading up on this 60 year old camera to fully utilize its functionality. But just to say that I've atually shot 16mm film is awesome. 16mm is the "HD" of our grandparents. Even today, some low budget films such as The Wrestler and Hurt Locker are still shot on 16mm. Something about digital will never compare to the look of film. Sure we can fake the "look" in editing, but it will never truly be the same thing. The random bursts of light flickering as each frame passes through the projector is hard to replicate. The random film burns that occur when the film gets overexposed or too hot. These and more are all characteristics of film that can never be mirrored in digital video cameras. Many Directors of Photography (DoP) who shoot high budget Hollywood films swear by the use of film over digital. Only with film are you able to capture extensive amounts of detail in both the highlights and the shadows (aka dynamic range). Film is and probably will always be the norm for big Hollywood productions. The quality and dynamic range of each film frame far surpasses anything obtainable on a digital camera.

I am very excited to shoot on my 16mm. As soon as I get a decent C-mount lens for the Bolex I hope to shoot a little short film test. Considering you only get about three minutes per 100ft of 16mm film, it kind of has to be a "short" film. Anyways, until that time, here's some photos I've taken of my camera. Something about old cameras and the way they look just has that sort of vintage appeal that makes it a piece of art.

Here's my newly acquired Bolex H16 16mm film camera in all it's glory!

Playing With Lenses.

2009-09-30T23:12:00.000-07:00

I recently did a quick shoot where I tried out a bunch of borrowed Nikon lenses on my 35mm adapter. I used a wide assortment of lenses to portray how they uniquely depict the image. Any of you guys who have a 35mm adapter or are considering investing in one can get a better idea of which lenses give off the image/look you want (distorted image, wide DOF, shallow focus, flattened space, etc.). I personally loved the shallow focus on the 180mm and the 105mm, but I also loved the cool effect the lensbaby created. There's a time and a place for every lens, but here's a rundown of a lot of common lenses one might have to choose from on set.

I've Got the Pug Fever!

2009-09-30T23:11:00.001-07:00

I GOT A PUG!!! Anyone who knows me knows I am crazy about pugs! From the collection of stuffed animal pugs, to my pug calender, to my hand sewn pug pillow that my girlfriend made me... It's hard to ignore that I have an obsession.

While visiting New York, my aunt took me to a pet shop, which had an assortment of very cute puppies for sale. Admist all the barking and yapping, I saw the cutest docile pug eyeing me from across the room. I went over to her, and instant chemistry. I played with her for a bit before leaving to head back home. I had no intention of getting a dog, especially not while I was in New York. Something about this dog I could not get out of my head. So for the next 3-4 days I weighed the pros and the cons of finally getting that pug I've always wanted. In the end, the pros outweighed the cons, and long story short, I am now the proud owner of a 5 month old pug puppy. She's the best dog anyone could ever ask for. Friends for life.

Here's a short film I made on the first day I got Coco the pug!