Sunday, May 31, 2009

Getting Away

As I mentioned in my previous blog, I had weekend plans for a camping trip with my buddy Corey. It was a awesome change of pace; we headed out to the Salton Sea on friday evening, after I got back from Grad-Review (I'm all cleared for graduation!!). We stopped, on the way out of town, to grab some film, food, and the bare essentials. The drive down went well, considering how much traffic you encounter on a friday evening in LA. We listened to the Lakers destroy the Denver Nuggets, talked about and listened to good music, and caught up on each other's  life and photography. When we got into the region in which we were going to camp we stocked up on firewood and plenty of lighter fluid and headed for camp. The tent went up without a hitch and the fire was blazing and roaring in no time. The high 70-degree weather made for an absolutely solid sleep, all the way through the night and I woke up shortly after sun-rise feeling rested and ready to take on the day. We spent the day exploring deserted buildings, decaying trailer parks and we even made it out to Slab-City! All-in-all, the get away was much needed and it was a fantastic way to spend my weekend!

Corey and I made the commitment to exclusively  shoot film so, unlike prevoius posts, I wont have to many images to share with you at this point; the rolls of film haven't gone out for processing yet but I did shoot  couple of polaroids of corey and one of a line-up of outdated photo booths.








Thursday, May 28, 2009

Business Busyness

I have totally been neglecting my blog, among many other things. School and work has set me off in a whirlwind and I've kind of been loosing touch with the little extras in life that really matter; take this blog for instance, I take great pleasure in sharing through this blog and I have been longing to make an entry. HERE GOES!

Adjusting to school has been going over pretty good. I'm loving my classes and loving being back in the arena with peers and friends. I get to see amazing work like this:



by my friend James

and this:


by my friend Garrett.

I've been working with a very talented and inspiring photographer, LeAnn Mueller, which has been fantastic; it's nice to still be a student yet find a place learning in the commercial "real world" after being gone and coming back home.

I spent some time with friends, this last weekend, at Noah and Mickey Trescott's farewell Barebeque.




























I worked on a couple of composites, for homework, with some friends, which was nice because it gave me a chance to catch up with some friends and get my work done at the same time.




I've been working really hard on getting myself prepared for graduation review, which is set for tomorrow afternoon; this is my final checkpoint before moving on to graduation (besides passing my core classes, which hasn't been a problem over the past three years so I'm not anticipating any more obstacles once I make it out of grad-review). I started putting together a portfolio that was fairly commercial, which mostly came from class assignments; after discussing the direction of my portfolio with a couple of friends I came to the realization that I needed to take it into a new direction to achieve continuity and flow; I came up with something that I am really stoked about!


















Beyond all this madness, I've been feeling the need to get out, take a break, and switch things up a bit. As fate would have it, my friend Corey called me today and shared a similar sentiment which pushed us toward making plans to go on a little camping journey. The destination is an obvious change of scenery and the fact that we have committed to leaving our digital cameras behind and shooting film has us pretty amped! I'll leave you with that; a story to look forward to!

Thursday, May 21, 2009

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

STOKED!

In the post "Cloud No. 9" I shared one of my most memorable and outstanding experiences, from my trip to Japan; a trip to Kusaka San's bicycle factory in Kobe. The following photographs are of the bicycle that he built for me. I am so happy to own a bicycle forged from the collaboration of such a great company and such an amazing frame builder; I truly feel lucky and I'm so excited to get it rolling!






I'll be posting a time-lapse video of my building it in the near future, so be on the lookout!

Tuesday, May 5, 2009

The Haps

I feel like I've been neglecting my blog; it's been a while since my latest post, and I suppose it might be because I've been relatively busy. Since my last post I've spent a week readjusting to LA life; driving a car, using a cell phone all of the time, getting used to the time zone difference, and preparing to be in a full-time school schedule again. I've been hiking in the hills, which I missed so much. I've been cycling with my friends and family, which is another things I missed a lot as well. Watching Lakers games has been a consistent plan for me, since being back; nothing makes you appreciate your local home-team like being away for a couple of months, while things are really heating up for the team!

Yesterday was my first day of class and my first full day back in Santa Barbara; I think I really missed the atmosphere in Santa Barbara and definitely at school. It blows my mind that I have less than four months until I graduate. I've been running, strong, year-round for the last couple of years and they seem to have flown by so quickly. I'll be a college graduate before I know it. I have been having reoccurring and simultaneous  feelings of joy, appreciation, craving and hunger; I'm so happy to be doing what I'm doing, I really appreciate and feel lucky for the eye-opening experiences which I was just able to experience, I'm craving new adventure, and I'm hungry for the bright future which lies ahead of me. Though, these feelings are both reflecting back on the past and projecting ahead to the future I am still quite awake and alive in the present moment. These reflections and projections are part of my present when retelling stories about my past couple of months or discussing my next moves; they add to my present. They insert positivity and happiness into each waking moment.

Yesterday was my first day back at school and I love my classes already. I'm being instructed by one of the most positive and inspiring instructors, I've ever had the pleasure of being taught by. I'm taking a business launch class which prepares students to graduate and transition into the professional market; it doesn't seem to hold much value among other students, but I really feel like its a valuable class and there is really a lot of good information to pull out of it, assuming one is open and receptive. Just yesterday we participated in some really powerful reflective writing exercises which really got me in touch with a couple of really strong parallels to what it is I most enjoy about life and what I most long to achieve within my photography. I walked away from that class with some clarity and a new perspective; it was truly a liberating experience.

The more I discuss business, the current state of the US economy, post-graduation plans, and human potential I keep alluding to the universality of my chosen profession and the possibility of nurturing what I want to do in far and foreign places. I keep saying and thinking how I could live somewhere else and begin my career in a foreign market; what's to stop me except my own fears or apprehension? I keep saying "I could" and it feels so real, almost right; I really can pick up and leave for a while, anyone could. So now here I am, less than four months away from graduation, with plans which are constantly loosening, changing, and morphing. I'm not exactly sure where it is that I'm going, but I have an overwhelming feeling that there is light on the horizon, that the future is bright, and that I can achieve anything that I truly want to!