Village Photo Contest

So I live in the apartment village at Butler, right next to Hinkle Fieldhouse. They had a photo contest recently looking for interesting views of the place. I decided to use my Holga to make it looks like the village (built a scant 4 years ago) was around in the 60's. This was all well and good, but I couldn't any of the photos that I wanted to come out to come out so I just submitted a picture I took a few years ago from a Nikon D40 or somesuch. I finally scanned my photos that did come out in addition to two pics of my car from my house back home.

Without Troy - Official Trailer and Poster

Soon those posters will be plastered all over the Butler Campus. I can't wait! Oh and before I forget, If you go here you can watch the trailer in Hi-Def. And if YouTube is more your thing go here.

Instamatic 124

I love my camera collection. One of my favorites is my Kodac Instamatic 124. Its so small and simple that... well I'll let you see for yourself.

Isn't that neat looking? I have the original box with flash cubes and instruction manual and everything. The manual is amazing check it out:

I doubt anybody thinks these are as interesting as I do. Manuals to old cameras are so full of wonderful illustrations and depictions of people having way more fun than you can actually have with a camera. It helps that I'm just not getting into analog photography. It's so weird to get into the mindset of permanence and lack of control. You can't change what you've shot and you only have so many shots to take. You naturally want to have absolute control to make those the best shots ever, but you really don't have any control. Leastways I don't.

Without Troy Week 8

That's a wrap! We got the group back together for one last night of shooting and brought a community with us. About fifty friends, family, and helpful acquaintances joined us to be extras in a huge scene. Check out the pictures to see what I'm talking about.

My uncle played the priest and my mom and aunt joined the crowd too. Afterward a few friends gathered at Tom, Austin, and myself's apartment for champaign and carrot cake. All and all a fantastic way to end shooting.

Houston pt 2

Whoa, I've been gone too long. Houston was fun, but it's good to be back home again in Indiana. Here's me with the stuffed gator.

Trevor snapped some of these. We found out lator that Dilligaf means "Does it look like I give an F?" We had no idea it was an acronym at the time. Here's another view of our swanky hotel room. They sealed the toilet paper with baseball diamonds.

Houston University's letters are UH so everything is labled "uh". This trash seemed like a freshman in a senior biology class. We ate at a real life texas restaurant that had a (and I qoute the locals) "big ass f'n armadilla" outiside. As in "You won't miss that big ass f'n armadilla".

I stole this breakfast from the hotel. I could have signed it to the room, but I didn't know the protocol so I walked in, got my food from the bar, ate it, and walked out. Nobody said a word to me. Later I saw all the birds downtown. This was an omen of ill portent.

Seriously, those pictures do not relay the message. All the birds. All of them. The omen was almost definately a warning about the wrestling finals.

It's a good thing that I ran Track and Field instead. Thanks for looking at my pictures. Heres a slideshow so you can see all of them.

Houston pt 1

On our way down to Houston we stopped at a gas station/casino in Louisiana called "Black Gold." There was a stuffed Gator inside. Trevor had to pose for it.

The hotel we're staying at is "The Inn at the Ballpark" which is way swanky. It's baseball themed. This is not unlike an eight year old's bedroom. After we settled in and set up our streaming rigs we stopped at Walgreens where we found this.

More pictures to come.

Ultimate Wii Championship

I mentioned a while back that I guest starred in a new sketch from Random Acts. It was a big relief to act instead of direct. Well they finished the sketch and here it is.

I tried to channel Kurt Angle as best I could. Stealing his Intensity Integrity and Intelligence line was a joke on set. I guess I should know by now that when I do something stupid in front of a camera it's gonna be on the internet.

There's some pictures from the shoot.

Watchmen Review

So I saw Watchmen at the midnight release and I that I am the far opposite of the target market. I've read the book a dozen times (official count) and I am a director myself. I went in with an exact vision of what I wanted the movie to be. I was shocked, not at what was taken out, but what was added. Director Zack Snyder added more sex and violence than I ever would have predicted. Of course, all is not lost.

As I said, I am not the target audience. The movie does something very right. More than anything it begs viewers to read the book. A queue has already formed for all my friends who want my ragged old copy. I've been trying for years to get my friends to read it. In this, Zach Snyder did what I never could.

Going to Houston

I'm spending spring break in Houston TX. If you think I'm going there to party then I'm sorry to disappoint. My real reason for the trip is to produce a wrestling tourney for the NCAA. I won't be posting much while I'm on the job, but I'm sure I'll have a lot to post about when I get back.

To hold you over, here's a picture of Nic's dog. Her name is Indiana.

Ephemera pt 2 - Elvis Costello

Welcome to part two of my series cataloging brief moments in my life.

Elvis Costello is seriously one of the coolest people ever. His music is some of the best in the past century and he maintains a sense of humor that few men of his caliber posses. (check out his appearance on A Colbert Christmas for proof) I was lucky enough to meet him.

He played a concert at Butler University and gave a presentation on his rise to stardom to the cool kids of the Media Arts department. At times he would just break into "Angels Want to Wear My Red Shoes" and his voice would absolutely fill the little room. (he was actually wearing red shoes if my memory serves) When I got his autograph and posed for the worst cell phone picture possible I was still hours away from seeing his full performance that night at Clowes Hall. I lament my inability to express how haunting "I Want You" really is live. I was sitting in the furthest row of the highest tier, but when he stepped away from the mic and sang unamplified it felt just as loud as when we were in the little room.

Sketches

I am like many college students. I don't pay total attention in class. Thankfully I am in the Media Arts program. This lets me do my own work and not take a lot of actual classes. Alas, I've had to pick up a minor. I tried for computer science but I realized that I am terrible at math. I settle for a concentration. This was fine, but that meant I needed as second concentration.

I already had a could history credits so I've been trying to finish it off there. I'm currently in Civil War Through Film. Sound fun right? It would be but it turns out, I can't stand the Civil War. I just never see what other see in it. (don't try and convince me, I've heard it) As a result I spend most of the time doodling on my N770. Here are the results.

Without Troy - Seven Weeks

"Thats a wrap on primary photography for Without Troy." It was with little fanfare that I uttered those words in the freezing cold Safeway parking lot. I think after spending most of the weekend moving at double speed to get everything done and get everyone back inside for hot cocoa, those words didn't hold much weight.

Didn't Joanna do a great job with those pictures? She's gotten so much better since we started this project. It's kind of disappointing that there won't be more days on set for her to take pictures on. Did you take a look at her artsy post? Joanna has become my unofficial co-blogger at this point.

So we've officially entered post production. Damn. I'm going to be spending way more time in the edit bays. I'll be trying to knock out rough edits soon. We'll also be knocking out some music tracks with our musicians. I've already been in talks with David Keim who is doing all our incidentals. You'll remember him as having done the music for Random Action ep5. Not only is he a great musician and composer but he also puts up with my complete lack of musical knowledge.