When I was growing up, I loved loved magazines. I'd always tear out fashion pictures and make collages from them. I loved them (magazines) for the beautiful pictures, and I still have an attachment for beautiful pictures because it defies reality.
In 7th and 8th grade a friend and me designed clothes together and I thought about being a fashion designer. Yet I look at that world now and go...nope! I'd rather photograph it. I discovered a blog, Design Scene, which is now my current addiction instead of magazines, it just cuts right to the gooood stuff, and since I haven't looked at a magazine in such a long time, it's fueling my unfed desires.
I love this shoot done in Elle magazine (spring 2010) with Keira Knightly, it's soft, romantic, and some pics have a bit of playfulness to them. They're photographed by Carter Smith and I believe he did a beautiful job. Anyways, enjoy.
Elle Magazine: Keira Knightly
Want a Piece? My Rebel Re-Label Project
So I did end up sticking with Orbit Gum for my product project. My best friend helped me come up with a name as long as ideas. Since sugarfree gum contains sugar alcohol, if eaten in excess, this can cause diarrhea. Sadly, I've tested this and it proves true. So I've renamed my product MoreShit! A sort of half rhyme with Orbit, and it now (in my fantasy world at least) comes in Laxamint. Which by the way, in my search about different things for Orbit, I've found that laxative gum already does exist, so my product will have a spot on the market. Heh heh.
My bestie also gave me the idea of a sort of Bertie Bott's every flavor theme, which I think is another great idea considering Orbit gum has every unnecessary flavor out there possible.
After I finished my product, I wanted to see how it fit back into the world! I went to the liquor store by my house, asked to place it on the shelf, I did, and photographed it. Oh, my bastard child from Orbit fits so well into the gum social scene.
Some technical stuff if I must, I created it in illustrator, I found an Orbit box template off the internet (thank God for the internet) and I just used the box outline. I pretty much started from scratch. except for the ying yangish "O" logo in Orbit. That I used Live Trace and recolored it. I created a signature in high school in illustrator, but that's about all the work I've done in Illustrator. So this project I shall say was a bit of a learning experience. A good one mind that, and I tried keeping it simple for myself. Anyways, hope you find some humor from it, and enjoy. :)
Sculptor: Kate MacDowell
As I was browsing one of my favorite art magazines I enjoy from time to time, Hi-Fructose, I came across Kate MacDowell and her sculptures caught me off guard, I loved it. Here's an excerpt from MacDowell's statement:
I chose porcelain for its luminous and ghostly qualities as well as its strength and ability to show fine texture. It highlights both the impermanence and fragility of natural forms in a dying ecosystem, while paradoxically, being a material that can last for thousands of years and is historically associated with high status and value. I see each piece as a captured and preserved specimen, a painstaking record of endangered natural forms and a commentary on our own culpability.
Check out more of her thought provoking work, here.
Food for Thought: Woody Allen
"To love is to suffer. To avoid suffering one must not love. But then one suffers from not loving. Therefore to love is to suffer, not to love is to suffer. To suffer is to suffer. To be happy is to love. To be happy then is to suffer. But suffering makes one unhappy. Therefore, to be unhappy one must love, or love to suffer, or suffer from too much happiness. I hope you're getting this down." Woody Allen.
Photo Shoot: Scouting
I've had my eye on this little place that's relatively close to my house for quite some time. Today I actually decided to go out and check out the area for a photo shoot I want to do in the near future. Probably won't be until summer, but that's okay.
It looks like if I do a shoot here, it's going to have to be quick, and I hope my model is up for the task of hopping over fences because this place is not open for public use. I am a little concerned about the water, but we won't be dabbling too much or not at all in it. So when I've got more free time, I'll be planning the details. Fun fun :)
Photography: Chad Riley
While on my internet craze today, I stumbled upon a new photographer that I like. His name is Chad Riley, and while I do not know much about this guy, I do know his client list includes brands like Coca-Cola and Volcom. He also does shoots for Radiant and Zink magazines. Anyways, I like his stuff. Chad Riley Photography.
Life Drawing Class: Value
Just before spring break in my life drawing class we got into value. We started just separating planes on the figure when we did quick gesture drawings, then we moved onto longer drawings. It has certainly gotten a lot more exciting in the class. These are some of the things I've done in class and one picture is my homework assignment that I drew of my lover.
My professor basically says to think of ourselves as sculptors, we carve the form (light) out from the dark. We do a quick sketch, marking where important points are and the basic form of the figure, then we squint hard and unify the darks. After we carve out the strong light, then move onto getting into detail and middle values. Our movements get smaller and smaller.
I would have never thought I'd be able to draw the figure but my professor, Cynthia Grilli, in my opinion is amazing. Here's her website if you want to check it out.
Quote of the Day
So a good friend of mine gave me a quote to cheer up.
Things are Looking Up
I did not want to wake up this morning, I just slept and slept til about 9 am. I couldn't sleep anymore, but I still did not feel like doing anything. Well I got up, had a bowl of ice cream for breakfast, haha, then got ready. I needed someone. So I called up my lover, headed over there and chilled for a few hours, and I feel really good. I do. That doesn't take away the massive amount of work I now have left to do, but I feel like doing it now instead of laying around all depressed like earlier this week.
Not Feeling It
This week has started out craptacular for sure. I just have so much work that needs to get done and on top of that there's drama with one of my friends. What an emotional and stressful week this has turned out to be. Ick, I Hate drama. That's right, with a capital H. Oh, it's entertaining on TV, but no so much in life. Now I just really don't feel motivated to do anything. I have my project I need to complete by tomorrow, and I just feel like sleeping. I wish I could escape, if only for a day...
Photo Shoot: Locker Room
I want to do another photoshoot. I have somewhat of an idea of what I'm going to do, but need to tweak out some details. My last shoot (one that I actually set up for) was about a year ago. It was in the Cal State Long Beach art locker rooms, which are all tagged up and always changing.
I was photographing these two girls that were in my 2D art class first semester of college. They were crazy, wild, and lively and I loved that!
I have a new model, a friend that I haven't talked to in ages, and I'm super stoked for it! It probably won't happen til summer, seeing that end of the school year gets busier and busier, but that gives me more time to plan, and maybe hopefully, get a new camera. hehe.
My Next Project, Ads, and Ideas
The current project I'm working on right now is called "Rebel Re-Label," it is basically where we take an ad or product, re-interpret it, and relabel it. In my thought, spitting back out our regurgitated ad and feeding it to the masses. I'm leaning toward doing Orbit Gum for some reason. In my research for the product, I've stumbled across some cool websites.
One of them is Coloribus, which is an advertisement archive. It's dangerous because I could spend hours looking through intriguing ads rather than working on my actual project. Yet it's cool seeing some of the creative things people do and put back into the world.
Another site I came across was SmartAssRadio (10 Worst Orbit Flavors), where they talked about the 500 (literally) different flavors of Orbit Gum. That was my humor for the day, hehe.
So I'm still in the process of coming up with a hopefully clever title and motto for the new Orbit and it's flavors.
Printed Blog Book
So if anyone ever wants to have their blog made as a book, they can go to Blog2Print and have them make it. It is $14.95 to have a 20 page blog book printed and I think that is a really good idea. I might have to do that in the future sometime...
Food for Thought
I found this quote on my friend's facebook page and I really like it, don't know who it's from, but I'm posting it here to share because...well, sharing is caring heh heh.
"To get something you never had, you have to do something you never did. When God takes something from your grasp, He's not punishing you, but opening your hands to receive something better."
Artist: KuKula
I was looking at wallet cases from Classic Hardware and absolutely adored the artwork printed on the case I bought (of course, that's the main reason why I bought it, hehe). So I thought I'd share this delightful artist that I newly discovered. Some of her characters have an Audrey Kawasaki-esqueness to them, where the figures are mainly all girls with heavy eyelids and pouty lips.
The artist goes by the name KuKula. She was born in a "relatively isolated village about an hour north of Tel Aviv" and grew up around Holocaust survivors, thus most of her work contains a girlish sweetness combined with "real life horror" themes. It brings depth to her artwork. After KuKula received her degree in illustration, she moved to the San Francisco bay area which is where she currently resides, creating intriguing contemporary pop culture artwork. KuKula Land
