It's been quite the week! It's difficult to put it into words, summaries are endless, these are just text-s on a screen. I've got to warn you, it's Torrey week here at Biola University, which means the schedule is completely gnarled up, meaning my schedule is a mess, meaning this blog post will more than likely be shorter than the norm. It's okay, it was meant to be.
The funny thing about this week is the stories that went down are not meant for this blog. Normally, and most always, I share with you stories, normally, and most always, in depth. These shared stories are meant to be public, i.e. you, can see, read, laugh, and ponder. The stories from this last week are on a more personal level and involve other people that may or may not want their stories posted on this here blog. That sentence makes this week sound SUPER INTENSE, I'll leave that up to you to make assumptions. The funny thing about blogs is it feels like a journal, scratch that, it IS a journal; I'm sitting here alone on my couch, writing to myself about my experiences, my thoughts, my dreams. No one is here looking over my shoulder, no one is here influencing what I write. So, naturally, anything and everything is fair game... well, it WAS. After getting into a number of sticky situations, I've learned that this blog is actually read by actual people and it is possible to offend, misinterpret, exaggerate, enunciate any and every word that I write.
So, that said, I'm going to describe the week in careful vagueness:
Last Wednesday: good conversation, learned some things.
Friday: GREAT, tried new things, enjoyed company, learned about each other, airplanes.
Saturday: Family, soccer, Trop 205 Restaurant style
Monday: Encouragement.
Tuesday: Change of plans. We'll see what happens.
Boom boom bam. There it is, that was the week in all it's vague glory, but in its ambiguity, it honestly was an INCREDIBLE week. Learned so many new things, had so many solid conversations, and went on a limb, took a risk, got adventurous, and Friday happened, for which I am very grateful. Mistakes were made, lessons were learned. Seems like the only way to learn things these days is to mess up in the process.
I talked to a friend of mine earlier this week about life experiences. For some reason, I was intrigued by the fact that memories are only contained within time. You went to the "best concert of your life," after the end of the concert, it's over, forever. There is no returning to the concert no matter how incredible it was. "Man, last night was so fun! I wish I never had to go to sleep!" Last night was last night and it will always be "last night." Unfortunately, you can never experience "last night" again. Luckily, through the joy of memory, we can remember details and, in a sense, "relive" the situation. But still, it went down in history and stays in history. So, for this reason, the term "carpe diem" applies consistently. Make EVERY DAY unique, individual; make it stand out amongst the rest of history. You're never going to be able to return to these moments, no matter how great they are, and if you can recognize this fact, you can treat every moment as a once in a lifetime opportunity.
So with that, LIVE IT UP today. Always be looking for that one moment that goes down in history as TODAY. Yesterday, Ms. Kylie Tyndall asked me what my "favorite part about today" was. I didn't have a good answer.
Today is interesting. I am wearing numerous colors all "close" but "no." Can you tell from the picture? My point exactly. I am wearing a blue tie with a black shirt. Brown socks with bluish-gray shoes. They are close, but they are not happening. Here's the thing, I've been dabbling around, thinking about my future, my career, and right now, my major and/or classes I will be taking next year. Right now I am a film major and an art minor. I really like art. I really like film. They technically are close; both arts, both very visual, both "unconventional" majors. They are "close" but "no." Nevertheless, I'm working on a way to combine the two, use aspects of both in both. Work them together like they were meant to be together. I don't know. I grip my head. We'll see what happens. Either way, it's unconventional.
In other news, I recently completed my latest photography assignment: the portrait. This one was different for me for a few reasons. First of all, the teacher said to make sure you have as much light as possible, so, being me, I shot completely at night. Why? I'm not quite sure. It was a challenge and I had a few ideas. Second, I went home for a bit (over spring break? I don't remember) so I decided to shoot a few buddies from home being, in order, Mr. Beau Akers, Mr. Scott Weir, and Mr. Patrick Greene.
There is story. I had this idea to go up to Black Canyon, a really narrow, windy, mountain road hidden away in my city and shoot a roadkill-type shot. I called up Mr. Beau Akers and Mr. Scott Weir and we headed up the hill, taking precautions, bringing traffic pylons and finding a spot where we would be able to see a car in the distance. We went at 10:30 in the evening because it was really dark and (hopefully) no cars would be on that road. We get up there, it's creepy, we set up in the middle of the road and do the shoot. Right as we finish, we see a car coming up behind us. PERFECT TIMING. We couldn't believe it, it couldn't get any better, praise God we didn't run into trouble.
We're in the car, trying to find a spot to turn around because this road is a tiny two lane curving around the mountains. So Mr. Scott Weir decides to pull a u-turn without a turn-out, which would have been fine. However, as we are perfectly perpendicular to the road, and right in between two blind corners, we get stuck in a hidden ditch right after the asphalt stops. We are stuck and start freaking out BECAUSE THERE IS A CAR BEHIND US making its way up the mountain. After we realize flooring it in reverse is doing no good, Mr. Beau Akers and I jump out and attempt to push the truck out of the ditch, and to our pleasing, it worked. We jump in, exhilarated, and make our way down the mountain. The car never came. In fact, it had stopped before it got to us on the side of the road. It could have been a very sticky situation, praise God is didn't become one. That's one half.
I shot one roll that night and I pushed the ISO on the roll one stop because my shutter speed needed to be sped up to prevent a nasty 4" exposure. That would be no fun. So I pushed the ISO and shot the roll. However, I forgot to mark which roll I pushed the ISO on. Now, I'm assuming most of you reading this don't have a clue what this means or why it's a big deal; just know that I was in a nasty situation and if I didn't develop the right roll, one or both of my rolls would be ruined and I would lose my work. Naturally, I didn't want to lose my shots. So here's what I did. I would choose one roll to develop the correct time. If the shots were ruined, I would know I picked the wrong roll and I would carry on to develop the second. If I picked right, the first roll would be properly developed and the second pushed roll would need special treatment. It was 50-50 chance. I knew that if I was meant to have these shots, I would pick right. I flipped a coin and developed the first roll to find I had PICKED RIGHT! I was ecstatic.
Now I had to figure out how to develop the pushed roll. As I worked with my teacher to figure it out, I realized I had pushed the ISO not just one stop but four full stops. I had turned the dial one to the left, and that put it at the top ISO; I went from 400 ISO to 6400 ISO. The photography books said not to push more than 2 stops, I pushed 4 stops. I went for it. I had to develop for twice the time, twice the time in anticipation to see if they turned out.
After it was all finished, I looked at my roll of 36 pictures, probably 8 turned out. 3 of those 8 are below. I still can't believe it all happened like that. Blows my mind. Enjoy.
Oh film. I'm growing to enjoy film. But why? Digital is so much easier, faster, and many other pros. But I like film a lot more now than I did at the beginning of the semester. Makes it interesting.
In other news, this past Saturday was my floor's, Stewart Backside, GYRAD (get your roommate a date). What this means is, as a floor, participants scrounge around to find dates for their roommates/friends to accompany them on a specific event, in our case, to the Santa Monica pier for a photo scavenger hunt. I don't know if GYRADs are a Biola deal, but I like the idea. Moving on. To make a long (and I mean long) story really short, I had the privilege of going with Ms. Monica Hopson. It was a good time, cruising around the pier looking for different things such as a purple dinosaur, yellow umbrella, snow cone vendor, surf bum, and the like, as well as enjoying authentic Santa Monica Pier pizza. The game was to see who could take a picture of the most objects, then getting extra points for different things such as the both of you in the shot with your object. We almost pulled out a win, but Mr. Joey Hocking and his date were just too good. Anyway, it was an evening worthwhile. Enjoy 3 of our photos, from first to last: COWBOY HATS, DEAD FISH, and ROCKS (we used sand, we got extra points for creativity).
En otha new, we gots videa, some videa for y'all folks. Enjoy dem, enja dem lots.
First up is some prime advertising. This viral commercial was put out by Pixar to promote their upcoming film, Toy Story 3. Because one of the main characters in the next segment of the Toy Story never existed, Pixar, in their brilliance, created a faux-1983 commercial for the bear known as Lots-o'-Huggin' Bear. ABSOLUTELY BRILLIANT. This "commercial" is so perfect, so VHS-dubbed, that it completely leads the viewer to believe it was a real commercial twenty-some years ago. I can't get over it.
The next is also advertising but in a much more somber, morbid kind of way. Nevertheless, this is also an advertisement worth watching. Very well done.
Ah, the airplane. Airplane's blow me away. I can't start thinking about airplanes because I'll just flabbergasted and amazed at the animal we call humans. That's a different story though. Here's a video showing an airplane being built. Pretty legitimate if you ask me, and those are some serious stencils.
Lastly, check this dude's antics as he rounds third base, running towards home plate, spot on through flying towards him, catcher obstructing this running path...
