Winter and Spring

I made this using random stuff in deviant art. Check out more about it here. 

All done in a year

      I have been looking at internships around the country and realized I didn't have a demo reel. One of those things that seem most important in showing off to people that you in fact know how to work a camera, an edit bay, and a producer. So, I sat down and checked out some of the videos I did while working at the school.

      It's pretty funny to see them a few years later. I think back about how much of my life was spent shooting and editing, and then suddenly having no real access to video equipment.

      Anyway, for these videos I used a flipcam, and a Canon ZH-1. The ZH-1 is basically the Canon version of a flipcam with a mic input. They are not really built for sports, and I had to hand cam it most of the time.

     

     I still shudder every time that camera drops in the middle of a goal shot. The editing was done by me, the shots were done by me, and the extra titles and other stuff were done by me. The only thing not done by me was the title bar, which I also edited to move in and fade in the name. My voice seems a bit slow while announcing the shots, and all I can say is that I was constantly told to speak slower. 

   

   In case you are wondering, that was Tango music. I used after effects to create the lap animation. The big ugly Finish sign and background was actually my first time making something like that in Photoshop. The opening way amazing animation was done by Devin, who was the school After Effects man.

    A major school office was getting torn down and then rebuilt during the summer. There was also a display for the Haunted Lagoon at the Polynesian Cultural Center with a giant scary doll in it. I used Final Cut Pro color correction to change the colors around and create new styles for edits.

    Paradise Noir was a lot of fun to make. One of my coworkers was from Hong Kong and didn't know what Film Noir was. So she complained that I had made the title bar a weird color. Once again, Final Cut Pro color correction, and a lot of extra planning to do this one. It took me a day to to everything. I think I stayed overly long with the walking through book cases deal. I should have also found the places where they were whole book shelves were empty because the school had everything on e-book format now. 

I edited this one, did the title bar, and some of the camera work. I also lost my phone on this trip.

    This wasn't for work. I was in a class on documentaries, and we decided to research and do a video on the Hukilau. After the presentation on the video someone asked what the Hukilau was? I felt like an idiot, the research had made us forget that no one knew the really important part. Hukilau was a show done by the people of La'ie. They would bus people in from Honolulu, and do a big show and dance on fishing, dancing, and other Polynesian cultural things. It eventually inspired the school I went to, the Polynesian Cultural Center next to my school, and the common greeting in Hawaii the Shaka.

     The editing was done by Tama Soli'ai. I did camera shots, and looking up B-Roll footage. Tama was amazing and really this was his project. I tried to be the big video guy, but was too caught up with work and other things to really finish stuff up. Tama went out of his way for 3 weeks to get every edit down. I helped out with some effects and movements. I also taught Tama how to use Final Cut Pro.

     My major help was doing audio correction and filtering for the interviews. The microphones kept doing weird things and I had to correct for that. I used Final Cut Pro.

     I was assigned to do a presentation on Millenarianism for a history class. The biggest mistake you can find is that long pause at the naked Legos. It was done in a day, and I had to do major research at the same time. I can now pronounce eyafyalayogl much better.

    The ironic part about this video was that I did it for a McDonalds Angus Burger. A friend called me up and asked if I would shoot this commercial for him. They had a script and ideas for shots, so I took the shots, did the announcing, and made up the graphics quickly. This was done with a digital videotape and it had to be transferred to my workstation. I had to filter out odd stuff that happened during the transfer. I think this was my best job being an announcer.

      During this same time I worked on the weird news blog for the Ke Alaka'i, my favorite article was on the Beard World Championships because a friend and her daughter went there an I got pictures and interviews with them. 

      Also during this same time I was a cameraman for the TV Station at the school. I did get to direct one show. It was a live shoot of a speech. That was a lot of fun and I really wish I could have done more of it. Sadly, I was getting stretched too thin, and in a month I had to go Ke Alaka'i as my only job, and then quit the Ke Alaka'i as well. It was really hard, but I was failing classes to make videos better.

     So that was my life and love during those years I worked video at BYU-Hawaii. Not a 3 minute video, its true.

Surfing Demon

The entire reason why I made it into a demon is two fold. The first is that I couldn't get the human form correctly so I have it armor to cover it up. Then the face wasn't working, so I gave it a skull. Whats a skull without flames. I hope you all enjoy it. 

This is just to show the progress I have made so far. I sort of feel like I am failing here.

work in Progress: Surfing Samurai

   I am working on a new one, but it looks like it will take some time. This is the outline for its beginning. I will try to update with how it looks stage by stage. I am basing it on the picture below.

Cold Mountain

With Snow

Without Snow

I basically did a trace of this, and then colored it. 

Rooster in the Water

I have been wanting to make this picture for a while. I don't know if it is done yet. It just looks done enough now.

Oh you know its about to be awesome.

I thought of another one.

Fun game to play with friends. Take a movie, and replace one word with poop.

Ukiyo'e Attempts

What I was trying to do

What I wasn't trying to do

I really like Ukiyo'e art. A lot of my art projects that I do involve stuff like this, and usually fail. Today I sat down and just looked at a piece. The Library of Congress has some great stuff. The purple distater was an attempt to draw a small village. I never even got to the village before I saw the failure. Then I looked harder and found a beach scene. I liked it and found that it was the style I wanted. Much nicer. Yes, this was all done in photoshop and illustrator.

Drive to Scotland: Walmart

At one of the many stops here, I found a walmart with some um, local food for sale. I was told it was caught this morning. This brings up the question, how?

Rats are folks

Henry runs past the door and into the closet. A giant rat is sitting there, lazily eating someone’s lunch. It looks up with indifference and nods to Henry. Miik jumps in and sees the rat.
“Ah, Schnookies, That's my lunch!” yells Miik.
“Yes ][ Wait, I just realized something. You named the rat Schnookies.” Henry
“Yeah.”
“So, when you saw all of those shredded papers over the floor, you were yelling at the rat?”
“Yeah.”
“And when the printer stopped working because the wiring had gone missing?”
“I was really worried about him that time. Poor thing might have electrocuted itself.”
“Yes, I can understand that. How long have you known about ‘schnookies’?”
“A few weeks into the job I guess. I was cleaning up a mess and spotted him. He even helped in the clean up.”
“How?”
“He knew where the cleaners were.”
“I see, so not only is there a giant pet rat in the office, but it seems to be doing the job of a paid employee.”
“Well, no, maybe 30 percent of my job. It has been helping out for a while now. Millicent over in receiving-”
“More people in the office know about the rat?”
“Well yeah, most of us do.”
“Who doesn’t?”
“Well, you I guess.”
“Why?”
“We figured you caught on. I mean, have you noticed how many times we yelled her name?”
“Millicent?”
“No, Schnookies.”
“So, she has been causing damage?”
“No, she has been helping out with the clean up.”
“And, what else?”
“Delivery chores and the like, nothing too strenuous. The worst job is the interns, they have to clean up her bed.”
“The interns clean... She has a bed?”
“Yeah, over at Ed’s desk, just check next to it is a crib.”
“What about his children? I thought he brought his children here?”
“Why would his wife let him do that with a giant rat running around?”
“So she knows?”
“She prepares his meals on Tuesdays?”
“Tuesdays.. and the other days of the week?”
“Well it depends on the day. Usually we do a sign up for Fridays or a weekend, but Frankie does Mondays, and lets see Jeff brings spare burgers for Schnookies on Wednesday. Then I guess its your wife who brings in the custard and other stuff on Thursday.”
“My wife knows?”
“Well yes, she even gives him a bath. Those nights she tucks her into bed at night and sings those lullabies.”
“So, my divorce, with my wife, wasn’t because she was sleeping with another man?”
“Well, yes, after you kept screaming about the rat all that time... you mean you have been saying her name thinking it was a swear or something?”
“Yes, thats exactly what I thought.”
“Oh, that explains a lot. See, she was so turned off by the way you would scream about the rat that she practically got pushed into Jared’s arms.”
“So, my entire life has been destroyed because I didn’t know the office kept a giant wild rat as a pet?”
“yes, I suppose so sir.”
“Then, I guess its ok.”
“What do you mean?”
“That’s my lunch the rat is eating. Oh Schnookies I hope you enjoy it.”

Road Trip to the States: Air Silos

While driving underneath the ocean, these silos are sort of the breathing points. I thought I would get a headache or pass out, but there are signs that say these things are ahead. Generally speaking they are a mile or two apart so I can hold my breath for a long enough time.

The shininess you see is unknown, but I would guess it is water. Look at those tunnels, that isn't metal you're looking at, its concrete. The shear engineering here blows my mind away.

Some of you may know this, I am moving to Scotland for graduate school. I thought it would be fun to show some of the pictures on my road trip. This is the I -Chi Hu'a Hu'a. It comes off the Interstate Highway here and merges with Maui and Kauai traffic to drive all the way back to the mainland.
     I really don't think I can hold my breath long enough for this trip....

E3

I don't normally write this stuff, but E3 has really caught my attention. So, expect this part right here to be uploaded full of game info.

Sony is saying 3D is not doing what it should, and that they are not interested in showing off a new system. It sounds like they are scared.

Zombie U is just insane. It could be the last great Zombie game.

Tonight Unreal Engine 4 will be revealed. 

Morals of Pokemon

“Steve, why does the copier seem to jam every time you use it?”

“Cause I’m gay?”

“I doubt that, are you pulling it out instead of letting it print?”

“Not that I am... wait, I thought you would do more than that when I mentioned I was gay.”

“I sort of already knew.”

“Yeah, but you’re Mormon.”

“And?”

“And I’m gay, you know, you should be mentioning how I shouldn’t be getting married since your favorite book says so.”

“And you should be lighting me on fire and talking to the governor of the state on how to properly eradicate the Mormon problem.”

“Wait, you honestly believe that?”

“Not really, but that is what is being told to everyone Mormon I know.”

“That has to be some kind of joke right?”

“I wish it was, honestly I’m starting to think its all Pokemon.”

“Ok, I want to hear this one. You think this is a game?”

“Pretty much. Most political stuff today is about one side versus the other. We each choose our pokemon and the statements that go with that argument are around four. This works especially if talking about subjects that people know very little about. Minorities get placed in, scientific ideas, stuff like that.”

“Wait, my sexuality and your religion are pokemon?”

“Pretty much.”

“So, you’re Kadabra or something?”

“Not bad, the spoon bending is a nice touch.”

“Right, so what am I?”

“Mr. Mime.”

“Really? I figured I was Jigglypuff.”

“No, thats another minority group.”

“Women?”

“African American.”

“No, I don’t see it.”

“That’s because you have never imagined Jigglypuff saying famous movie lines.”

“I am meowthing tired of these meowthing Poliwags on this meowthing train.”

“Igglypuff, I am your father.”

“I like big butts, and I can not lie.”

“Ok, I see your point. But let’s be honest here, you are just holding onto some small symbol that has no meaning.”

“I can’t speak for other religions, but marriage is really big within my own. We have to go through all the other ceremonies in the temple before we are married. It’s expected to continue on even after death.”

“Yeah, but we’re not going to harm that.”

“Maybe, Mormon’s don’t like anyone ever telling them how to view marriage. Keep in mind, we were willing to be wiped off the face of the earth by American Cavalry a hundred years ago over the same subject.”

“Yeah, and you backed down.”

“So, you are threatening to wipe us out?”

“No.”

“Then I would say that destroys your argument.”

“But you’re evil.”

“How, for defending something? Keep in mind, we defended your rights quite a few times. It’s just as symbolic to you that the word marriage be included as you think it is for us.”

“So you want to argue?”

“No, I want to do the opposite. We have a disagreement, and honestly most of it is being pushed up by people outside of our groups for some purpose that looks a lot like a pokemon game. Personally, I am not going to act scared of you, if you grant me the same.”

“Fine, but I got to know. What’s Charizard?”

“Republicans, and Blastoise is Democrats.”

“Then what about poor venusaur then?”

“The rarely used green party.”

I would update this week with a better picture but-

I am allergic to something in my bed. It might kill me

Rainy Day

It rained really hard today and I decided to break out my camera tape some of the awesomeness going on.







Wait, lets look at that one again, only lets have a picture of it.

It's the bird from the beginning of the blog. The long lost Crazy Bird! I live in the land of the crazy birds! I guess this explains why all of the potatoes are purple.

















My camera is amazing. I mean, right from my camera was that awesome video. You must admit my life is fantastic and there is no way whatsoever that I will show you the video I made that makes it obvious I didn't really know how to show off this beauty in an endited form.



Yeah, that video would suck. Aren't you glad that you never saw it? Me too. I mean, you need to think that my skills at videography are perfect in every way and that the first videos I made with my new camera and computer are so amazing that you need to hand me your money right now. Just randomly start screaming and hand it over. You do not need to see that I had no real idea what I was doing and all that.



Stand firm citizen, that is just some random girl at my house playing DragonVale. Ignore this entirely. Look at the amazing videos above and ignore this one. Yes, thats it. Phew, coast is clear Ra

Hey Look, the 80's

A friend drew a real life painting that looked sort of like this. She had a lot more design and better color choices.

Also, I did a video for class.



Each frame had to be 20 seconds long and I could only have 5. It was supposed to be kind of dull. Sorry about that. Also, my computer makes really ugly colors look nice. Sorry about that.

I got a new computer, and am working to get everything I want on it to work. For right now, enjoy this wonderful video from my webcam on how dull I am.

I have to get a new mouse, but I was able to make this self portrait using Illustrator and my webcam. I used this tutorial. 

This is a pretty direct quote from a friend. I tried out the new image creator on google Docs. Not so great in my opinion.

Rated M for Manly

OK, I think I figured it out. It isn’t a pretty answer, but I think I know what is going on. I have been wondering about why there seems to be so much hate within the gaming industry about the Wii.
Take for example this article on the future XBox. Here I will quote for you.

Just look at what happened with Nintendo's Wii. It hit the market without any HD output, reduced graphics processing capabilities compared to its competitors and an unwieldy, user-unfriendly interface for online gaming. Had it not been for the wider world's embrace of the console's unique motion control features, Nintendo would have had a disaster on its hands. It's no surprise at all that the Wii U is the first console announced for the next generation; Nintendo has some catching up to do.

So the Wii sold more than both of the other systems combined, and somehow it lost? It has ‘catching up to do’? At what point does it seem like stupidity to not notice that the narrative is not working that way at all?
When an entire Meme is about how much money the company has made over the years of the systems lifetime, I would say its time to stop saying that somehow the Wii, the DS, or Nintendo has somehow lost.
There are some outer reasons like, a Nationalistic promotion of XBox and PS3, or that somehow the Wii was a fad. I want to get a little deeper than that though, I want to see the reason why these promoted ideas are working on gamers everywhere.
First, off lets look at it from the proper angles. The majorly promoted hardcore games have a pretty common look to them.
Gears of War
Modern Warfare

Most any FPS shooter at this time actually.

They all look like this.

I come not to bury, this idea which has been said before many many times, but to point out what is really happening. These games are being promoted as manly, and that’s why they have problems. The characters all have gruff manly voices, and are muscled up and do dangerous things.
No, I don’t mean they are manly, I will show you a manly deep game at the last part, no, this is the image of manliness. It is sort of easy to figure out why as well.
Let’s look at the common game maker. I highly doubt he grew up with any hard life aspects to him. In fact, almost every single presenter at a trade show seems to want to portray themselves as really manly and tough.
I went to a videogame bar the other day to see what it was like. The colors were drab, and everyone there was playing dark and dingy games. The thing is, we live in freaking Oahu. There are actual dark and dingy places here, and also beautiful green ones.
There was a sign up that girlfriends and wives could play free. If that sounds like a sexist attempt to lure in girls to attract more men, then you may have noticed I called this place a bar.
The next thing I noticed that most of the kids playing were playing rated M games. We have had a real problem with this where I work since the big popular games are all rated M -in movie terms this is the same as R- and many of the people coming in are not old enough to play these games. Eventually I just said no, they could not play. I can’t say I am happy with everything about this, for instance Halo 3 is M and seems far tamer than the other games offered, but it is what I got.
When I tried finding other games with lower ratings, I noticed something really big. The majority of the games were rated M. In fact, the games all had the same feeling to them. The dark gravely voiced men.


Yes, those were the majorly promoted recent games. I heard the trailers to them at Gamestop and couldn’t tell the difference.
So, the major hardcore games are supposed to be manly, and have an archetype to how every game is supposed to be. There are others, but they are not the common ones.
So lets look at the Wii now. The games are majorly promoted with bright colors, and fun for the whole family.

This image base seems to work fine, until you see that it goes against how manly gamers want it to be.
After visiting the bar, I went to a Long’s Drugs and it was brightly lit, had colors everywhere and was majorly promoted to women. I don’t mean that in a kind of sort of way, I mean it was obvious that anything for men was being sold to women to buy for men. A beard trimming kit was in the make up aisle.
Now this wouldn’t be a problem except that the Wii is being promoted with similar ideas. Let’s look at its shell first of all, it is white with easily defined buttons and a light for where the game goes. It is cheerful and happy.
The Wii games are also just as happy, and I admit after watching some of the videos I felt a desire to be happy with these games as well. This is a pretty obvious trick of marketing, but that is the narrative Nintendo wants to give.
Let’s compare that to the narrative of the manly dark and grizzly games. It is the same promotion, only instead of happy it promotes manliness.
So, being a man, why do I not care about these games? I think it’s because I don’t have a problem with my manhood anymore. Yeah, this gets deep, sorry. I don’t know the exact moment it happened, but I do know an obvious sign. I was in Wrestling and quit because I didn’t want to feel angry anymore, in fact, I was tired of it. I don’t want you to think that I stopped being angry at things, I just no longer desired it.
It sort of works out when I grew up all over and did a lot of things that are considered manly like fishing and hunting, along with seeing the poorer parts of town and the things involved with that. These ideas are romanticized as manly and tough even though really its just common life for most of my friends who lived in it. Fishing for instance is not that big when you are constantly going into the woods for camping anyway.
So this archetype of manliness happened and I got over it. I would bet that the majority of guys who stopped gaming had similar things happen in their lives. They stopped worrying about their manliness since they obviously accomplished it already.

There aren’t a lot of chances to do manly things within a suburban neighborhood. So, the boys trying to be men attempt to recreate them using videogames. It is an attempt to relive all of the manly things they have heard of, in other words, it is their manhood practice before it is time.
Women got it too, just not in the same way.

Go ahead and think about high school for a minute. The basic set up was that certain people met the ideal woman or man image and that others were not that. So there was a constant attempt to be like that person.
In fact, much of the entertainment for teens of that age seems to be the idea of being an adult and knowing what you are doing. Usually this is shown in a pretty strange light.

When you reach adulthood, it will seem strange and even stupid. In the above movies case, it seems almost illegal what all happens. If you realize it is a 13 year old girl, the entire situation she is in with her boyfriend causes a long moments pause. Go ahead, let it register that the Jennifer Garner character would be chased by Pedo Bear and feel awkward. I let my baby sister watch spiceworld but not this one for that reason.
The idea works so well that at times you end up wanting to kick yourself. Go ahead, think about all of your complaints about Star Wars, now ask if it’s because Anakin isn’t a gravely mouthed hard drinking warrior? Is Jar Jar Binks really that scarring to your childhood. Were there problems? The same ones as the first films actually. What happened was the majority of complainers remember the movies as children and allowed the love from childhood to continue on to enjoy the darker elements of the movie. The prequels made them face that reality pretty harshly.
Thus, the harsh response to the Wii wasn’t just some marketing scheme, it was a question of a person’s masculinity. The fear of not being manly is so strong that the response -along with some nice marketing dollars from Sony and Microsoft- have made a sign of derision from players. It gets a little worse. You see, the game makers themselves openly hate the system.
Nintendo in response tried to make more game maker centric games. They all failed. So, Nintendo is now making a system just for those game makers. Yet, it isn’t really. It’s still got the Wii sensibilities and ideas. It is still for everyone and not just people who want to be men.
Microsoft and Sony have come out with their own versions of a Wiimote, and the Kinect has some pretty nice games actually. The original article was that the newest XBox will be attempting to copy off the newest Nintendo system, and that the newest Playstation should as well. Kind of odd when you realize the writer says that Nintendo needs to catch back up.

Hipsters

Generally when thinking of Hipsters I get them mixed up with someone else. Time travelling men wearing fedoras and ugly scarves and listen to music I have never heard of sound more like Dr. Who than some form of hip urban culture.

This made me realize something wrather interesting and I want you to follow. I think that there have been more hipsters in history than meets the eye.

Renaissance Fairs

Let’s be honest here and think about what all had to happen. A group of people had to decide to no longer follow modern thought and dress up in clothing and styles that were way over and done with.
They listened to music no one had heard before, and were happy to do this. It gets more interesting though, if you ever look at the clothing styles you realize that people are wearing clothes from different centuries and getting along just fine.

But technology has problems with people of the past, namely Apple not existing in most of it.

But if we just leave it at wearing clothes way older than necessary, and music older than needed, there are even more than that.

Lenard Cohen

The poet/songwriter who has written all sorts of songs you have heard of... sort of. I can prove he is a hipster, just one picture will do.

In case you didn’t hit the above link on songwriter, yes, he did write that song that you heard on Shrek, only better. But if we count this, then we have to include old people in general. I’m not going to, but I guess you could, if you were mainstream.

Hippies

Yeah, they were cool in the 60’s but they disappeared and became normal people later on right? Right? Wrong, there are the Rainbow Gatherings. They still gather and find ways to meet up even today. It is all sorts of weird.

Heck now that I think of it, we have to include the tribes.

Native Americans

I lived on the Navajo Rezervation -yes they spell it with a z- and the Yakama, and the Pueblo Rez as well. I think I saw more apple computers and hand desgined things than anywhere else. The trucks were all beat up and old, and the hair styles looked like someone did it by hand. So yeah, Total hipsters. Get this, the houses the Navajoes lived in were called Hogan’s. If they don’t like the house, they just burn it down and build a new one.

Time Travelers

Let’s be honest, it makes total sense. They show up dressed in the wrong clothes, surrounded by people who have no idea what they are saying. This is going to happen a lot.

As it can Dr. Who, as it can. I blame Bill and Ted.

Yes, them. You see, at the end of the first movie, they had travelled in time to the exact spots of witch burnings -Joan of Arc was burnt as a heretic- and rennaissance fairs -Napoleon wanted to date Joan of Arc so he started having them. They caused the entire Hipster thing on accident to get a good grade for class. By and far, a most excellent prank by these bodacious members of history.