I hit return,
and heard my cell phone's message alert chime. It seemed to happen before the
page refreshed. I was setting up my account on the T-Mobile website. The moment I
submitted the form, the system sent a text message containing a temporary password
to my phone. That's fast!
:::
Arnheim
is making me feel a little better about some of my frustrations using color in
my design work. He points out that colors behave differently, depending on
context.
Ever notice that colors in the little color chips of the Photoshop and Dreamweaver
color pickers look very different (overwhelming at times) when you use them,
say, as a background color for a page? The context has changed, and there's
no way the chip will predict what the background will look like.
On the subject of color harmony, Arnheim points
out that Ostweld and Munsell separately suggested that large surfaces (the dominant color in a scheme) should
be given subdued colors, and that highly saturated color should only be used in
small patches. This small stipulation is enough to turn most color harmony
systems on their ears, by the way. (pp 344-345, 348)
:::
Pop Philosophy and Affinity
Where did the “Boy Breaker” phenomenon start? I've been noticing
a lot of women wearing shirts that sport some variation of that theme. I saw
one
of the most sophisticated versions yesterday. The shirt
had a facsimile of the Blockbuster Video logo with text that read “BOYBUSTER.”
Is
this “I
am Woman – Hear me roar” redux? Maybe not so political this time
around... I reads one part self-affirmation, one part (psycho-sexual) power.
It seems that certain thematic phrases catch on, and the t-shirt makers are
quick to capitalize. Take a walk past the Greenwich Village t-shirt shops,
and you're likely to see a dozen or more of the most popular cultural themes,
rendered at varying levels of quality.
People buy t-shirts and advertise their philosophical position via their
clothing. It's all there for the passerby to read and respond. The
like-minded may give a knowing
smile and a nod. Those with a different attitude may choose to keep their
distance.
:::
His Own Private Dictionary
A girl on the bus turned her body to face the front, looking away from the
teenage boy, who could have been her brother, sitting across the aisle. She looked disgusted.
‘A couple is two,’ she said.
‘I don't use it that way,’ the boy grinned. ‘When I say a couple, I mean a
few... Sometimes I'll say a couple, and I'll mean a hundred.’
I guess he's used to bein misunderstood.
Happy Birthday, Mom! Happy Birthday, me.
:::
Rock & Roll heaven? Elvis & Jesus on the same train...
Seems the world never tires of guys hawking things in rubber suits.
:::
Warren has a funny reinterpretation for the name of a chain of eateries around
Manhattan. He refers to ‘Le Pain Quotidian’ (The Daily Bread)
as ‘Quotient of Pain.’
:::
Seconds
before the shot, I turned to Denise and said ‘This
looks like the assassination of Lee Harvey Oswald,’ then BLAM! Sharon
(Boomer) is fatally shot.
The only thing that could have made it more classic,
would have been to do the shot Peckinpah style (slow motion), with Boomer's
face scrunching up the way Oswald's did.
“Peckinpah, with the help of the brilliant editor Louis Lombardo and cinematographer
Lucien Ballard, developed a stylistic approach that through the use of slow-motion,
multi-camera filming and montage editing, seemed to make the violence more
intense and visceral.”
– Sense of Cinema
The pièce de résistance was the droplet of
blood from her mouth spattering on the metal
flooring, mimicking that famous
Doc
Edgerton
photo, and mirroring the shot of the droplet of blood that spilled from ‘Chief’
during the earlier interrogation scene with the XO. [Hey! Both those shots were in slow motion, à la Peckinpah.]
In the words of Prince, ‘Cut
you, cut me; both the blood is red...’ [from the song Race]
Yeah,
I'm a Galactica fan.
:::
A Month in the Creative Cave
For the first time in a month, there's no critique to attend. There will be
no going into Manhattan to print, or shoot in the studio.
I have made a new collection of
images, though they don't quite feel like a complete body of work. Still,
they're tighter than anything I've ever done photographically. They're
a departure, too, because they were all made in a studio, with a much greater
degree of control than I exert in my street photos.
I understand lighting
a bit better, and I have the sense that fashion shooting would mostly frustrate
me. I also have some
new ideas about markets that would be interested in my photos. Art and commerce
can coexist, without my having to think ‘commercial.’
Best of all, my work is stronger than ever, partly because I have a clearer
sense of what my photography is about. This past month at SVA was time well
spent.
:::
Stumping the Dictionary
An ad on the subway touts that they know the meaning of the word bathysideromophobia,
and where you can look it up. I tried dictionary.com. No luck. I googled. No
luck...
Knowing that ‘bathys’ refers to ‘deep’ or ‘profound,’ I hacked the word
apart, and found that sidromophobia is an ‘abnormal and persistent
fear of crossing streets.’ So, they may actually have a typo on the poster,
though bathysdromophobia didn't come up on dictionary.com or google,
either.
On the other hand, there's siderophobia – the fear of stars...
So, maybe it refers to the fear of [movie?] stars crossing the street... I
dunno.
:::
A newspaper headline
from last week read ‘State Lotto Sales Plummet $44M.’ Hmmm... you mean maybe
the poor folk who spend way too much money (see also hidden regressive
tax) on Lotto, might actually be catching on that it's a losing proposition?
