Living Dead

by admin Posted on February 14, 2012

I’m finding it difficult to know where to start. As I write this I’m sitting in the black and white lab at Art Center, waiting for a contact print to pop out of the RC machine. It’s 5:30pm and my day and work  is not even close to being done  here. Forget about that. Let me just start off by just  saying this:  life gets hectic.

Life gets really hectic sometimes. But I also find it exhausting running around all of the time talking about how much there is to do and how little time there is. It’s so easy to get down on yourself for not accomplishing the things you want to accomplish within the time contraints you’ve been given or even within the limits you’ve set for yourself. Every day I find myself coming up with lists upon lists of what I want to accomplish and the pressure builds as the days pass and the “to-do” list grows.

Recently I was given an assignment in which I was expected to create a book cover from a unique title. I searched the internet after class and discovered a few options. The title which stood out to me the most was seemingly comical – People Who Don’t Know They’re Dead. My mind immediately started racing as I began to think of a way to interpret this title. Most of my ideas were rather literal. The assignment itself was extremely conceptual – something that in the past I strayed away from for fear of the end result being “cheesy” or “cliche”. Fast forward through the next class meeting and a discussion I had with my instructor and I was on my way towards a new concept for this title that I began to actually believe in. This class has given me a lot of insight into how I work as an artist and photographer. I’m slowly learning to pay attention to the actual steps that I take when working on a project. I’m beginning to realize that often times this is more important than what is actually produced in the end. In retrospect, I learned a great deal about myself while making this photograph – from brainstorming to the moment where I was waiting for the image to be printed. During the actual critique of this photograph there were a few different reads as to what was actually going on in the image. It can be metaphorical and it can be literal. For now I’d like to leave that up to the viewer. Over all it was an interesting journey for me. The image itself is unusual for me and it was challenging in more ways than I expected, but at the end of the day, I’m pretty happy with how everything turned out.

As for my own personal to-do list- well…there are a lot of things I’ve added to it since the start of this new year that I’m afraid are just going to have to be left undone. I’m learning to live my life day by day and not get so wrapped up in this never ending list I seem to be perpetually writing in my mind.

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Forward Motion – part II

by admin Posted on November 26, 2011

[Promise - digital]

“What nobody tells people who are beginners — and I really wish someone had told this to me . . . is that all of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, and it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase. They quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know it’s normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”

-Ira Glass

It’s hard to believe the fact that it’s been nearly three months since I’ve updated this blog. More importantly, it’s hard to believe that it’s been nearly three months since I’ve started my studies at Art Center College of Design in Pasadena. I’ve learned in my short lifetime that three months can really change a person.

Three months can take you from spending your day working a minimum wage job out in the desert day dreaming about what you’d rather be doing, to spending early mornings taking photographs then hopping in your car to drive through LA traffic to long nights in the darkroom making prints till you can’t see straight. Three months can take you from believing that what you want is a long way away and that you just might not make it, to realizing that what you want is right here and right now, and it’s more possible than ever. Three months can take you from sitting at home thinking about life, to getting up and actually doing something about it. Three months can teach someone a lot about themselves and how far they’ve come and how far they have to go.

[Carter - 4X5]

How far they have to go…

If there’s one thing I’ve learned since starting school it is that I have a very long way to go. But I know it’s going to be here before I know it, or maybe I’ll be there before I know it…

At any rate, finding a balance has been difficult. This school is more challenging than I could have ever imagined. After my first week of classes, I was shocked at how overwhelmed I was becoming, not only with the work load but with the pressure I began feeling placed on my shoulders. I couldn’t pinpoint where exactly the pressure was coming from or how to get rid of it, but I knew that it was there and that it was starting to tear me down.

Information was being shoved into my brain every moment of every day. I started thinking about what I really wanted to do when I graduate in a few years and suddenly I felt stuck.

The quote I posted at the beginning of this blog has a lot to do with what I dealt with my first month at Art Center. I struggled a lot with not knowing how I could improve. For the first time in my life, I was working harder than I ever had, and yet it still wasn’t good enough. I think that’s the most challenging aspect of this school. Granted it takes awhile to get ahold of your schedule and figure out how to finish everything simply on time…

But, getting to the point where you feel like you couldn’t have done more and realizing that it needed to be more does something to one’s self confidence.

 [Sharalyn and Benji - 35mm color slide]

By the end of the first month I knew something needed to change. I knew that if I was going to continue on with my schooling, if I was going to succeed and more importantly, if I was going to enjoy what I was doing, I needed to have a change of mind; a change of heart.

I spoke with a friend of mine who has now been at Art Center for almost three terms. He talked to me about how important it is to return back to what you knew and what made you happy. It’s important to push yourself on the side to do what you love, do personal work no matter how hard it is to fit inside your crammed schedule. When I took a look at my photographs that I made before going to school I had so many mixed emotions. I loved that work but I missed it. So much time had passed that I almost felt as if I no longer owned it anymore; that I could no longer claim it as my own. I felt out of touch and I felt that I had been stripped bare of what I knew and that I was starting all over again from scratch.

[Calimesa - 35mm color slide]

I was terrified. I was terrified and scared about where to go from there. When I first started looking at colleges, I wanted to go somewhere where I was told to start over. I wanted someone to look at my work and say,”No, that’s not good enough, start again.” And, I got what I wanted. Yet now that I was there I felt that I no longer had the skill to continue on.

[Promise - 35mm color slide]  

A lot has changed within me in the past two months. Just a few more weeks and I will have finished my first term at Art Center. In a lot of ways it has been an uphill battle for me. I’ve pushed myself more than I ever have in my entire life. But I am learning, and I am growing. I know that I have good taste, and I realize that the talent is there. Learning how to process what I have discovered, and learning how to balance it with my past, and what is my present and what my future will be, is…a slow process. There is still a part of me that feels at loss for where to go from here, but I’m beginning to grab ahold of where my work is taking me.

[Cherry Valley - 35mm color slide]

In a way, coming home on the weekends has helped me be able to keep myself grounded. Returning to my home, to my roots, to the people who know me best helps me realize where I’ve come from. Though I feel I am starting from scratch, I know there is still a very large part of myself that I hold on to. The part that has made me into who I am as an artist now. I don’t ever want to lose that sense, and I don’t think that I ever will. Even on my most difficult days, I am still so incredibly thankful for the challenges that have presented themselves to me. God’s timing is impeccable and I know he has me right where I am for a reason. Looking back on the past three months I can see clearly how much I have changed.

[Carter - 35mm slide film]

I used to be afraid of change. I used to be afraid of the new. I wish I could say that I’ve completely let go of the fear, because I haven’t. Even so, I think it’s okay to be a little scared sometimes, but it’s what you do with that fear that means everything. You can’t doubt yourself. You can’t doubt what you’ve been given and you can’t doubt what you can become. My faith has taught me that over the past year. Fear sticks you in a box and tells you that you can’t come out; you don’t deserve to come out. But this is the greatest lie you  can ever tell yourself.

 [Linda Vista Hospital - 35mm color slide]


Part of pushing past that fear and leaving it behind can be called growing up. And it’s not easy growing up. But you know, anything worth accomplishing is never easy, but it is always worth it.

I’m looking forward to winter break. I’ve made plans and sure, I have a whole list of things that I would like to do and things that I would like to accomplish before I begin my second term. Yet I know it is not important to measure your success by the things that you accomplish. It’s about making steps, baby steps.

“Success is not measure by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds that you sow.”

[two photographs, 35mm color slide, taken in Pasadena CA, Yucaipa Ca]

I like that.

I like the idea that I’m a work in progress. I’m good with that. Sometimes the process is terrifying. Sometimes the process in uncomfortable. But it’s a process none the less. A process that I am willing to go through. And I’m excited. And I become terribly happy when I think about the prospect of what is to come. Being stuck? Not such a huge fan. As for failing? Failing… is okay in my book, just as long as I can learn from it and move on.

And I can do that.          I can do this.

 

[self portrait-35mm color slide] 

 

 

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forward motion

by admin Posted on August 31, 2011

Been a bit absent on here the past few weeks, but as you can see some major changes are going on! I finally broke down and decided to split my portfolio and blog. I admit I was a bit hesitant to let go of my sideways scrolling site…but it was definitely time for a redesign. I’ve been going through a lot of changes in my life as of late and it feels good to mix things up on the web too I think. Sometimes a fresh start is all you need to feel inspired. Things are still a litte bit under construction on here, but I hope to have everything sorted out within the coming weeks. Also, you can now make comments on my posts, so don’t be shy and let me know what you think. My new website with my portfolio will be up then too, so exciting! So many new things coming up, including school, which starts in just a week. I’m very eager to finally start my studies at Art Center. After being out of school for a year, I can tell my brain is ready to hit the books and get back into the classroom. INK magazine has some major changes in the works but I’ve got to bite my tongue and hold out on the details until it’s the right time. Regardless, I can’t wait to share with you some new projects and photographs I’ve been working on. I’m rather exhausted right now from a long day in Pasadena, so for now I’ll leave you with this image shot a few weeks back of the Summer Twins. They’re about to release their self titled album here in the states as well as in Japan and I was honored to be able to shoot the covers for both.

I’m looking forward to fall and the changes and challenges it will bring. Nothing feels as good as a fresh new start.

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Go Do

by admin Posted on August 6, 2011

Last week I scheduled a last minute shoot with a dear friend of mine from high school, Lindsay. I didn’t have a clear theme in mind, or even a location set, just one roll of 35mm film and the desire to make some photographs. She mentioned beforehand over e-mail that she was looking to get some head shots taken (Lindsay is an aspiring actor who moved to Fullerton to further her education while pursing a career in the art simultaneously.) But after a few e-mail exchanges, we decided to just have some fun with this one, use film only and take time to catch up. I chose to shoot at Prospect Park in Redlands, a location I’ve used dozens of times, if not more.It’s easy to get burnt out as an artist I think, that is, if you’re not striving to challenge yourself. Photographing the same people or using the same locations (however small of a factor) is one of many thing,s, in my opinion that can quickly get you stuck in a rut On the contrary, I’ve found that sticking myself in this type of situation can be the exact thing that helps challenge me. I find myself being stretched to do new things with my subject and the environment I’ve grown weary of.As we walked around the bottom part of the park which sits at the end of a very busy street, I took a look around at the palm trees, benches and running trails around me and ended up getting a little lost in a few memories from other times I had been there.

Different times, different faces. It’s funny how you can make a million and one memories in the same places and each time you return to them a different one comes to mind. Feeling a bit distracted it was tempting to turn on my “auto pilot” mode and bust out some usual poses and stick to my usual frames, but after picking out Lindsay’s dress that she would wear, a few fresh ideas started to creep into my head and I felt myself beginning to feel inspired.It’s always like that you know, sometimes it takes a few minutes to calm my mind and get in the mood. I think as artists we can take ourselves too seriously, in the fact that we’re there to do a job and make something look good. We forget what it was that made us get all mushy and sentimental about taking photographs in the first place. Don’t get me wrong, I think you can take both frames of mind to the extreme and end up losing yourself and your original goal, but a healthy balance of the two is just that, a healthy balance.After taking four pictures I knew I was still feeling a little stuck, so I started to walk around the corner in a direction I’d never gone before while being at the park. We walked up a slight gradient and down a small hill and then I noticed something. At first it looked like a palm tree that had uprooted and fallen over.

I couldn’t see the palms of it’s tops and thought it was odd that the trunk itself wasn’t pressed flat against the earth, but raised from the ground a few feet. My eyes started at the base (where I realized it was still well rooted) and followed it all the way to another palm tree sticking straight up. Now, granted this all happened in about .3 seconds in mind so it wasn’t long before I started running towards what i thought was a second tree and lifted up its palms to see if I was actually seeing things correctly. Somehow, the palm tree had fallen over,  had begun to grow in a complete circle and was now shooting straight up towards the sky again. If you take a look at the photograph you’ll notice there is a second palm tree beside it which has done the same.I couldn’t believe it! I suppose reading about it now, it may seem neat, but not nearly as exciting as it was for us when we first discovered it. I found myself sort of laughing at it as we stood there in awe. You have to admit, though palm trees have been known for branching out sideways towards a water or light source, I’ve never seen a palm tree grow in a complete circle. Can you blame me for getting a little sentimental at this point? Maybe I was just a little tired and exhausted from having a rough couple of days prior to the shoot, but for some reason this little nature spectacle seemed to really stick with me…

Almost two hours later I clicked the shutter for the last time and we started to head back to our own cars as I rewound the film.The truth is, after a few moments of semi-freaking out, we stopped talking about the tree and just starting taking pictures, and we didn’t mention it after that. But after looking through the images today I just keep smiling about it.Okay let’s be honest, if I was a poet, I might be going off right now into some huge metaphor about the palm tree and life and how incredible it was to see mother nature adapt and how we can all do the same no matter what trials come our way and…yada yada yada…But I don’t want to say of that and frankly I don’t need to. Because sometimes when you see little things like what I saw that day, you start thinking. Maybe it’s just for a moment, but it’s happening whether you realize it or not. And I don’t now if it’s a sentimental thing, or if it’s a girl thing, or an artist thing…or just an appreciation-for-the-small-things-in-life thing. Whatever it IS, it’s the kind of thing you want to hold on to sometimes.People always say that when you’re going through a rough time, it’s important to find one thing every day that makes you happy. And it’s important to DO things that make you happy. You’re supposed to find a hobby, you’re supposed to do something that distracts you. And though I can agree with these remedies on one hand (or survival tactics as some may refer to them), I don’t think it’s as important to distract yourself, as it is to slow down.

Yeah, I’m pulling that card on you. I’m telling you that it really is important to slow down and notice the little things in life. Sure, it’s cliche, and yeah, you may tell yourself that you already do. But things like that, can always be said over and over again and you’ll never need to not hear them.All I’m saying is this: Life gets crazy. Life gets sad. Things don’t always turn out the way you hoped, and situations can get messy. Sometimes the lists pile up, and sometimes your plans get thrown out the window. But the root of it all is this: you will adjust, you will move forward. You will get things done (in one fashion or another) and today probably isn’t the end of the world. So take a deep breath. Accept disappointment, except change. Accept that things aren’t always easy, and accept that being uncomfortable now maybe be the very thing that will push you forward into what’s next. You will adjust. You will grow. You will learn, you will be happy. You will.  (alright, I may have just made a few allusions to the palm tree, but don’t shoot me.) Life is beautiful. And it’s only cliche to say that because it’s written everywhere. And it’s only written everywhere because it’s the TRUTH. You’re not supposed to forget it. So don’t.

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