Short Sands, Oregon
This Friday, in Ann Arbor, Brother Forest is firing up the Yellow Barn for the latest HOTT LAVA experimental film/music happening. There’s lots to get excited about with this one: unFact (David Wm Sims of Jesus Lizard) and Noveller (Sarah Lipstate playing some of the most amazing guitar to her own films), Indonesian shadow puppetry by Patrick Elkins, a gnarly performance piece, a set of films from Burton Theatre plus HOTT LAVA shorts. And then a dance party afterward featuring JURY DUTY with Geoff Perrin.
A doozy of a time brewing a half hour west of Detroit. More info here.
I’m leaving today for two weeks on the west coast, flying into Seattle and meeting up with my brother to on his moving trip to Tahoe, driving with Jim and a friend down to San Francisco over the course of the week and meeting Michelle there when she flies out, house sitting in Cole Valley and seeing clients and old friends in the area for a week.
But the real significance (photographically) is that this is the first real trip if any length and splendor that I’ve taken with out bringing a film camera of any kind. No 4x5, no Mamiya 6, no Hasselblad, not even the little Stylus Epic.
I decided a few weeks ago that i would spend a month shooting nothing but digital, to “make sure I hate it as much as I think I do.” And given the kind of trip I’m going on (camping, hiking, wandering neighborhoods), bringing one camera and (comparably) few accessories seems luxurious.
I think I’m settling on certain contexts requiring certain equipment, and as much as I’d look to capture some Fern Canyon on 4x5, flexibility just makes too much sense in this case, and if my own film bias is the only reason I’ve been lugging a bag full of medium format gear everywhere I go, I want to figure that out right now.
So here we go, putting my money, and my 5D2, where my mouth is.
Nicety #1: Not having to show TSA how to use a film changing back to figure out that the sealed Kodak box isn’t a bomb.
Slab City, California
My friend Todd has a blog now for the funny-shit-he-types-on-stuff: iheardyoulikeitraw
Jokulsarlon Lagoon, Iceland
Saline, Michigan
Good buddy Joe McEachern, bio-diesel mechanic extraordinaire, on a recent episode of Motor City Motors on the Discovery Channel, helping to convert a 4-wheeler into a fryer-grease powered Batcycle.
Lodi, Michigan
“Brazilian born, Connecticut based, Dalton Ghetti carefully crafts the tips of pencils into amazing micro sculptures. These miniature masterpieces are a side project for the professional carpenter, who has been perfecting this art for the last 25 years. Dalton uses a razor blade, sewing needle, a sculpting knife, a steady hand and lots of patience to meticulously carve the graphite which can take anywhere between a few months to a few years. Over time he has broken many works in progress and keeps them in what he callsthe cemetery collection. One of the most fascinating things about these tiny works of art is that he has never sold them, only given away to friends as gifts. - Kid Robot”
Ugggh this makes my head hurt.
As someone who purposefully blocks aisles to keep people from jockeying to get off the plane before the people in line in front of them, I empathize with this guy a little too much. I just wish I was able to quit a job in this kind of style.
On Monday, on the tarmac at Kennedy International Airport, a JetBlue attendant named Steven Slater decided he had had enough, the authorities said.
After a dispute with a passenger who stood to fetch luggage too soon on a full flight just in from Pittsburgh, Mr. Slater, 38 and a career flight attendant, got on the public-address intercom and let loose a string of invective.
Then, the authorities said, he pulled the lever that activates the emergency-evacuation chute and slid down, making a dramatic exit not only from the plane but, one imagines, also from his airline career.
On his way out the door, he paused to grab a beer from the beverage cart. Then he ran to the employee parking lot and drove off, the authorities said.
And it looks like he’s being immortalized as a folk hero. And in Hong Kong Animated News style!
Detroit, Michigan
Rattlesnake Island, Lake Erie
Mojave, California