Grenades = Happiness

Fun fact about me: I actually read. A lot. just not so much with theta giant 800 page newels. Most of this reading takes place on the internet, on various technology and video game sites like Engadget.com, IGN.com, New York Times (nyt.com), YouTube.com (oh wait a sec...), and Bungie.net. These don't count, you say? Save it for my lawyer.

Unfortunately, Some of these sites are blocked from my school's campus servers most of the time, which means I have less time to read everything I's want to. Unfair? Sure, but whatever, I guess I'm supposed to be doing homework or something, and not reading. Oh well.

Today, I actually did get a change to completely catch up with pretty much everything, including Bungie.net. Don't know who Bungie is? I forgive you. Don't know what Halo is? YOU'RE DEAD TO ME! I'll save my love for that game for some other time; I have something else to say today. 

Recently, Bungie has been hosting weekly events calling all Halo fans to participate in what they call "Bungie All Stars." This is where fans can submit screenshots or other artwork for a contest (of sorts) based on certain criteria for that week. Bungie will then post the best submissions onto their next website update. 6 weeks into the "All Stars", I finally had the opportunity to read the criteria and also have time to make something fantastic!

For week 6, the criteria were as follows:
"Using Halo assets or your own original art, create a forum avatar measuring 90 x 90 pixels"
We all had until February 17th (today) to submit our results. I went to work.

The first thing that came to mind was the classic "an apple a day keeps the doctor away" phrase. Hmmmmm. How could this apply to the halo universe? What keeps the Covenant (the bad guys) away?

Oh, of course! GRENADES! Here's an initial concept sketch:

The whole page.

Close-up. Original slogan was "On 'Nade at a Time"
Do you think that's Better? Worse?

About half way through the creation process, I decided to screen capture it, so show progress and my process of making my Halo avatar. Check out the following video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AXvlGFS9Qbo

And here's the final product. What do yo think?

Photo Composition

Today in my Photojournalism class, we worked on composition. What do you think?

WEEKEND CULTURAL ENRICHMENT #5: "The Art of Japan"

According to Wikipedia, Japanese art "covers a wide range of art styles and media, including ancient pottery, sculpture in wood and bronze, ink painting on silk and paper and more recently manga, cartoon, along with a myriad of other types of works of art. It also has a long history, ranging from the beginnings of human habitation in Japan, sometime in the 10th millennium BC, to the present."


The Japanese culture is rich with this stuff, so I thought it only appropriate to have it be this week's Theme. Are you familiar with the picture below? You should be.

'The Great Wave' by Katsushika Hokusai

Hokusai is probably Japan's best known artist. Living from about 1760 to 1849, he left over 30,000 different works of art, which ranged from woodblock prints, picture books, silk paintings, and even travel illustrations. His favorite thing to paint? You guessed it: the water. Water in motion was the best, especially waves. The white of the foam breaking into claws at the top, and how the massive wave formed the perfect yin to the yang of empty space below, all to come crashing down and start over. That's the inspiration behind the most influential Japanese painting in the world.


Japan has more than just paintings, however. To completely fulfill your weekend's dose of cultural enrichment, we're going to talk about other forms of media as well.


Movie: Castle in the Sky
If there would be only one thing Japanese art is famous for, it would be the anime, and Hayao Miyazaki is king. QUICK TANGENT ON MIYAZAKI: He's the world's prominent anime artist and a critically acclaimed movie maker. My favorite Miyazaki movie? Castle in the Sky!!

5 Second plot synopsis: a boy and a girl named Pazu and Sheeta find each other and team up to find a lost city floating in the sky.


So why should you watch this movie? It has beautiful animation, and, not to mention, an epic plot, epic robots, epic sky battles, epic chases, the single most epic trumpet solo ever in a movie, an epic pirate mom, and -- oh yea -- an epic floating city in the sky!! Need I say more? GO WATCH IT. 


TV show: Pokémon


In case you have been loving under a rock for the past 15 years, Pokémon is a world wide phenomenon. 

What started as a simple bug-collecting hobby of a young boy in Japan in the '60's and '70's grew to be a multi-million dollar franchise. Mainly consisting of the Anime TV show and video games spanning five generations, Pokémon also includes several movie spin-offs, manga, trading cards, toys, and books. Yes, you should watch the show, but only a few episodes, if you can muster it. The TV show is primarily for kids, and the same darn thing happens over and over again. Ash is training to become the world's greatest Pokémon master, and struggles with that while Team Rocket tries to poké-nap his Pikachu, only to fail and "blast off again!".

Despite the claims of many people saying the Pokémon is a fad, it's lasted this long, and because its been a worldwide phenomenon, it's sure to stick around for a while longer. Just ask any kid with the current video games. What started as a mere 151 Pokémon to catch, the latest 5th generation has brought that total up to 649! Gotta catch-em all, right Ash??

Pokémon games at-a-glance. click picture for more info.

Book:
I have no idea! Do yourself the honors of Google-searching manga and origami books. :)


Music:
Unfortunately, I don't know anything about Japanese music either, but check out this techno video anyway:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hAhYa9QvYi4 

Game:
It's got to be Pokémon, right? WRONG. This weeks video game is called Muramasa: The Demon Blade.

Why was this game chosen? What does it have to do with "The Art of Japan?" Everything. Most games these days rely on incredible graphics and insane realism. Well, this Wii-exclusive title has both of those things, yet non of those things. Why? because none of the graphics in this game are computer generated. They are all hand-painted in the classic Japanese style. Certainly a computer was used to put it all together and give the game life, but absolutely none of it was made with the assistance of technology.

So while this may be one of Wii's most beautiful game, it also is all about story, depicting classic Japanese tales and myths. 

Want more:

Watch a video review of the game HERE.

Watch some additional gameplay footage HERE.

Getting tired of listening to the same darn things over and over on your iPod? Or maybe you are bored of an entire music genre? Based on the current music industry trends, you may be. 

Enter Pomplamoose: a one-woman, one-man band boasting a plethora of intriguing musical talent. Found on YouTube, Twitter, and MySpace as “Pomplamoose”, this band is comprised of the lovely Natalie Dawn and groovy Jack Conte, who both reside in the San Francisco area. What makes their music so fresh and fun is the fact that it’s an entirely new genre of music, what they have dubbed as the “VideoSong”.

What makes this different from a music video? Dawn and Conte have established a few rules on what constitutes a VideoSong: What you see is what you hear (No lip-syncing for instruments or voice), and if you hear something, you will see what made the sound at some point in the video (no hidden sounds). And that is another thing that sets Dawn and Conte apart from other musicians; they create their music on their own without the assistance from any big music label, and every instrument or sound you hear is produced by the duo.

That means that every instrument they use from the guitar, the piano, the drums and the sounds from their voices or clapping, are all their own work and mixed for your listening and viewing pleasure. One of their videos even has an accordion!

Individually, they are brilliant. Natalie is very calm and folksy while Jack borrows some similarities from the likes of Radiohead and Incubus. They both have their own individual YouTube channels which stand out from the crowd , but the real party is them working together in the form of Pomplamoose, as any of their fans (myself included) will tell you. Their music is mostly from their own creative genius, but they also do mix-ups of other classics like “Nature Boy”, “All the Single Ladies,” and “Beat It”.

They have their own album on iTunes (music version only), but if you want to have some good fun on YouTube, then check out their channel and watch for yourself.  Their VideoSongs are free!

Check out their YouTube page HERE.

Evolution of YouTube

Companies always try to make things better, and in the case of YouTube, things are constantly changing, for the better.

One of the original video aesthetics, circa 2007.

Newer video aesthetics, circa 2008

Current design, November 2010

Using High ISO

Above: Flash looses detail and blinds the subject, in this case my dog, Buddy. Below: 10 seconds later, I used a much higher ISO, which in this case made the photo much brighter and added significantly more detail. Cool, huh?

If your camera has a feature called "High ISO" then you should use it. Because I said so. :) I don't know what it means, but honestly, it works like magic, so you don't really need to know what it stands for. 

ISO is essentially a way a camera takes a picture by keeping the lens open for longer than normal. More ISO = more light, which makes it ideal in low-light situations. It is particularly useful to use during dawn and dusk hours, where using a flash would not be optimal. 

Check out my examples below:

Using higher ISO isn't always optimal, but use it as much as possible for better looking photos!

WEEKEND CULTURAL ENRICHMENT #4: "Halloween Weekend"

Happy Halloween people!

This weekend's culture enrichment is obvious, is it not? In honor of the holiday and it's spooky traditions, that's what this update is all about!

Halloween shares its origins with Celtic festivities and an old Christian holiday 'All Saints Day.' The name comes from a Scottish variant of 'All-hallows-eve' which was the night before 'All-hallows-day' which was believed to be the time of year where the veil between our world and the spirit world was thinnest.

If you want more info on the origins of halloween, look it up.

As far as media is concerned, when it comes to halloween, you want to be so scared out of your pants that you can't pee anymore. Why? Because we love the adrenaline rush that comes with being scared and it's HALLOWEEN!

game:
dead space

movie:
exorcism (see ign's top scary movie list)

Book:
Inspired by the classic children's book 'The Jungle Book,' 'The Graveyard Book' is a perfect quick read for this weekend. Scary? No. This story is about a Kid who's parents get killed by a murderer and ends up being adopted by some ghosts in a graveyard. Awesome? Very much so!! Even though it's a child's fantasy novel, it is one of my favorites, and gives interesting perspective to growing up, the afterlife, super powers, and anything that crawls in the night, and not specifically in that order.

Read it. Go now.
NY Times review.

Song:
The Ghost Busters' theme song. Need I say more?

Music video:
Basically the most iconic music video of all time, sparking major world-wide intrigue and causing a generation of amazingness, this video is with out a single shadow of a doubt the best thing you will ever experience as far as pop-culture '80's songs go:

Michael Jackson's Thriller! Watch the video HERE.
More Info.