WAR

I've been avoiding subtitling Training. I don't know why. But that's delayed sending it out to film festivals. I haven't even begun researching on film festivals. But today, after an easy morning, a quick trip to the gym, and a spaghetti lunch from Pancake House, I went home, sat down, and watched an episode of Generation Kill.

I made a list of 25 Things About Me on FB, and I forgot to mention that I love war movies and shows. I like World War II stuff like Band of Brothers and Memphis Belle. But I like modern wars too, shows about a small group of men trying to make their way through a mission or a whole damn war, like M*A*S*H or The Unit. And then lately, because of a discussion about The Wire, I've found Generation Kill.

It all started when Zig mentioned liking the gritty, realism of The Wire over the idealistic and lofty The West Wing. And it's true, The West Wing is so noble and inspiring, you know it all can't be true. Not wanting to miss out on another supposedly great series, I planned on watchng The Wire too. But five seasons of dense material daunted me. But in Wikiing the show up, I've found out that the writers (David Simon, Ed Burns) have a new show out about a battalion in the second Iraq War. Also, it's a 7-part miniseries. Bite size.

So it's really good, and actually funny. In the way that war is absurd funny. And like Band Of Brothers, you spend the first ep figuring out who's who. But after that, it gets rolling, literally. But after five eps, I figure, the dialogue might be more street and rough, but I don't think this is how soldiers talk either. Essentially, people on TV talk a whole lot more than people in real life. In the end TV will be TV. That doesn't mean it can't be great TV though, and it only becomes a bad thing if you confuse it will real life.

Anyway, like I said, I sat down and saw an episode. I eventually got to starting on Training. But right as I was about get a lot done, I get a call from an agency contact asking for my portfolio by tomorrow morning. So I spend the next couple of hours cobbling together an updated folio, rushing off to Fuji Wilson to have it printed (traffic) and getting back in time for an 830PM shoot.

But it's all good. In between the rush print job and the 830PM call time, I've found time to have a meal at North Park, and to write this thing down.

the first album

Corporate Lo-Fi, a sort of superband/side project, announced it's March 09 album release on their FB group. Coming from guy who has no idea how to appreciate hip-hop, I hope it says something when I say that I'm looking forward to this one.

And you know, if that is the album art, it's pretty neat work.

I got rhythm, I got music

I've never been a gamer. Well, not the hardcore type, at least. My list of games played would include the following: Mario Bros, Contra, Battle City, Galaga, Command & Conquer, Rainbow Six and, my all time fave, Sim City. I like them either mindless and easy, or slow and methodical. Also, none of these games have been in vogue for some years now. I usually let my brother get into them first and then I borrow the installer CD.

So I'm rather late on this whole Wii/Guitar Hero thing. But I got to play it today, and good God, I need a home theater because I want to buy and install the whole thing. I will get the drum kit and bass guitar too. It is awesome. It's the only way I can live out my rock star dreams.

Friends who know me know that I can't clap in beat to save my life, so playing any of the instruments in Beginner mode was already a challenge for me. But I want to play it. I know I can do it.

friday

Well, there was traffic to begin with.

And then we found out that there wasn't a single ping pong table in the Rizal Memorial Sports Complex. Which, by the way, also houses the Philippine Sports Commission.

Then we got pulled over by a cop on a bogus traffic violation.

But we got to bowl at MCS, and in between games, we had an awesome Japanese meal (my second for the day) at Little Tokyo. And I found out, after my meal and after feeling a bit warm, that my Japanese grapefruit soda was actually a beer with high-calorie content. It was on the packaging, I just couldn't read it. It might also be considered a girl's drink in Japan.

photo from this guy's drink review

Then we couldn't get enough players for a poker game.

But I got home early, found time to read, and got enough sleep. All in all, a good day.

Yes We Can!

Obama is almost President Of The World and suddenly everyone's feeling optimistic.

A bunch of former employees (op-managers, IT specialists, engineers and chemists - geeks, really) are making a bid to resurrect Polaroid, sort of. They've acquired the equipment, leased the factory, and have given themselves exactly 12 months to make something happen. They even have a countdown on their site.

They've called it The Impossible Project, for chrissake. It's hope we can believe in!

I wanted to do nothing today. I wanted to laze around and watch an NBA game. And I did. I saw Cleveland rout New Orleans, 92-78. But after the game, I decided to get off my ass and be productive.

I went for a swim.

Had a light lunch.

Edited photos from yesterday's shoot.

Fill out warranty forms online.

And I did an inventory of all the equipment I have on me. I did it on Excel, complete with serial numbers, dates of purchase, price paid and vendors. I dug up old receipts, and was focused and efficient. It was really fulfilling.

I found the receipt and warranty card of one of my favorite cameras. It was the black version of the rugged and all-mechanical Nikon FM2N. I shot a lot of my favorite photos with that FM2N, including the stuff that made it to my first exhibit, Carnival Photography, and that black and white photo at the top. I still have the camera, complete with venerable and beautiful brassings.

It was my second camera and I thought I had gotten it 2000. The receipt says I got in '98 from the Nikon Center in Mega Mall. That must've been the infamous Columbia dealership near the skating rink. I do remember that day I got it. I was nineteen and was very nervous about carrying twenty grand on myself. I got my dad to go with me. He went with me during his lunch break, made me do all the talking with the saleslady, and forked over some of his hard-earned cash.

My dad was also the guy who got me my first camera. I can't remember if it was before or after my first workshop. My dad had just gotten back from a business trip, and while on layover in Hong Kong, he got me the then ultramodern, almost-professional F90x. I was flabbergasted. It was the camera I was telling myself I'd get when I was older and better. But my dad, who was hobbyist himself, got a bit excited.

That was over ten years ago, apparently. The world's gone too fast and digital. I've since made a living out of taking pictures and it's been fun. I have (some of) the guts to carry a bigger sum of my own hard-earned money to Quiapo for new equipment. But I still remember that afternoon when my dad, in his white, respectable barong, took his first born to the mall to get his stuff.

Obama's People

David Axelrod by Nadav Kander

Hillary Rodham Clinton by Nadav Kander

Josh Lyman Rahm Emanuel by Nadav Kander

Via A Photo Editor.

The New York Times commissioned one of my favorite photographers, Nadav Kander, to shoot Obama's staff in his distinctive style, for their special Inauguration issue.

The geek in me appreciates the great behind-the scenes-feature too. So that's how Kander lights. Interesting.

sketches

If I remember right, when I was a kid, I wanted to be a sketcher. I didn't know shit about art, but I knew I wanted to draw. I think I started by tracing. Then I'd draw bahay kubos, horses, and soldiers (I think I wanted to be in the infantry). I later found out that my dad could, and still, draw pretty well. They gave me pens and paper and let me have a go at it. As I got older, I drew portraits of US Presidents (Lincoln) and Philippine heroes copied from a series of children's books. I also drew my own comic book heroes and such, and wanted to have my own strip like Hägar The Horrible.

I also used to paint. I also later found out that my dad's lolo was a working painter. But I had no talent or patience to master the medium. It was such a tedious process mixing paints, linseed oil and hardening compounds. I wanted something quick. Which is why I suppose photography is perfect for me. But maybe, for the heck of it, I should start sketching again.

The only reason I thought about this is because I came across the blog of one Rommel Joson, and I think his stuff are awesome.

i'll be fat

Fatter, to be honest. Anyway, so I tried The Baconator from Wendy's. Here's what it looked like in the ads:

And here's what was delivered:

Was I disappointed? Hell no. In this day and age, who really thinks they're going to get what they see on TV and on print. Especially when it comes to food.

Also, the Baconator was GREAT. How can you go wrong with the taste of melted cheese, greasy meat, and bacon? Bacon is awesome. There's nothing like wafer-thin, crispy fat attached to a dead and deep fried pig. In this world. You know what was really considerate and thoughtful of Wendy's to do? There was nary a superfluous, sacrilegious veggie in sight. None of that awful, sickly tomato liquid to run down your neck. No leaf of lettuce to dillute the taste. No pickle to make me gag. (I could've used some onion though.) And I washed everything down with a thirst-quenching Biggie Iced Tea. None of that sugar-free stuff.

Anyway, based on this spot on review, (which bases this on Wendy's corporate site) a Baconator, in terms of bad stuff, is the equivalent of each of the ff:

Sodium (1920 mg)

180 Pringles potato chips
132 Doritos Cooler Ranch chips

Calories (830)

10 Rolling Rock Light 12 oz bottles
4 Dodger Dogs
5 7-Eleven Cola Slurpees 12 oz
3 Chili Dogs from The Varsity in Atlanta
33 tablespoons of Oscar Mayer Bacon Bits
83 Life Saver Five Flavors candies
166 Starbucks coffees of the week 12 oz
4 Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnuts
Enough Pam No-Stick Cooking Spray to cover 138 10-inch skillets

Fat grams (51)

10 Dolly Madison Zingers
3 orders of A&W cheese fries
4 Dairy Queen banana splits
22 Oreo cookies
51 cups of Froot Loops
10 servings of KFC mashed potatoes with gravy
22 Mrs. Paul's Crunchy Fish Sticks
23 3 Musketeers funsize snacks
1 Sara Lee frozen cheesecake
6 ounces of Oscar Mayer hard salami
19 Chips Ahoy cookies
4 Jimmy Dean Pancake and Sausage on a Stick, chocolate chip flavored
68 Aunt Jemima microwaveable pancakes

A whole frozen cheesecake?! That means it's all good. But check on me in the morning.

geezer

A friend of mine brought it up after seeing Benjamin Button: Did forty-year-olds in the 60's really like The Beatles?

I don't know. But it makes me wonder, what the freak did my parents, who were in their teens in 60s, listen to? Did they ever like music the way I like music? If ever, when did they stop listening? And did their music ever inform their adulthood?

Speaking of adulthood, when I was younger, I often wondered what ever did make old people seem so terrified. It was like life had given them so much cause for fear. You could see it in their eyes when they ask you to come home early, to stay away from certain people, to do what they do.

That was just two years ago. Nowadays, I'm slowly coming to grips with the terror of life myself. And I wonder if I can, if haven't been yet, make it out unchanged.

Maybe not, because as it is, I've gone soft. I like early nights just after one drink (or no drink). I watch, or at least say I'll watch, what I eat. Staying in is suddenly always appealing.

Going soft also means suddenly liking black and white photography again. Or finding nice photos nice. And then there's also liking old OPM. I've been meaning to look for Odette Quesada and Ric Segreto lately. Maybe these things were always cool and being young just made you want to push the boundaries a bit. And getting old is all about self preservation.

book ends

So, the last time I checked in on about books, I was re-reading Dumas. Yeah, that's not happening anymore. In my re-reading of The Three Musketeers, I now remember that I love Dumas because of The Count of Monte Cristo, and that love was reaffirmed by Georges. Musketeers was fun, but over the holidays I've added more books to my already towering pile of pending books. I had to move on quickly.

And I moved on to Alan Moore's Voice Of The Fire, which starts off with a story of a prehistoric man. It's the prehistoric man's narration so it's written with a limited vocabulary and syntax. It's a bit daunting but it's genius when you realize that the evolution of language affects the evolution of a consciousness that affects the evolution of language that affects... Anyway, this chapter is hard to read, and it's a hard way to start the book (whose chapters you can read out of sequence, I think), but I'll make my way.

But that's become increasingly difficult to because a friend came home from the US and got me this:

With a mouthful of a title, The Macrophenomenal Pro Basketball Almanac is a Freedarko.com-produced book. Borne out of a blog, you'd think that it's just an example of new media trying to sell more via old media. But maybe the blog was already brilliant to begin with because it's actually a funny, articulate, well-designed book on the significance of particular NBA players in... everything. I think. I'm still trying to figure out if it's about the myth of players, their impact on culture, and others things, significant or otherwise. But if for nothing else, it really looks great. Check out some of the pages I ripped from Amazon:

The book I really asked for, and got (score!), was Annie Leibovitz at Work. I'll be honest, based on that cover, I was hoping for lighting diagrams and some technical how-tos. How amateur fanboy of me, I know. But it's all behind-the-scenes narratives, and anecdotes about some of her famous pictures. A lot of which I already know about from her older monographs. But it's a nice, gorgeous book to add to the collection. I haven't gone in beyond the first chapter so I'll have to wait to see if I there are newer stuff in it.

One of my favorite books from last year was Michael Chabon's Gentlemen Of The Road. Not only because it's written in serial format ala Dumas, or that Chabon lists Dumas as a major influence, but because it's a fun, swashbuckling adventure with a lot of heart (ala Dumas). Anyway, I liked it so much that I got a copy for my eldest godson. He's turning 9, and let's see how his mother explains war, swindling, gender-bending, and the other exploits of a giant African Jew and his bosom buddy, a Frankish Jew, in the Middle-Ages.

The Frankish Jew, I hear, is an homage to a character named Elric of Melnibone, created by Michael Moorcock (to whom Gentlemen is dedicated). I obsessed about Elric and was about to give up finding the books here. I even downloaded the ebooks already. But I dropped by National to spend the GCs I got for Christmas and look what I found:

They had two covers available. One was a minimalist white cover with a nice Tolkien-esque illustration. And there was this gaudy one. I picked the gaudy one because the Foreword was written by no other than Alan Moore.

Wow, hitting the mommy demographic, and the indie, rough and tumble prod crowd too. LOL.

wonder years

[EDIT]
This resulted in a YM exchange with a buddy of mine. I think it's worth a repost here:

R: you seen this?
M: i just posted it on my blog
M: like 5 mins ago haha
R: advertising shits who think they've done something significant with their lives.
R: thanks for continuing to co-opt my youth, fuckos.
M: i liked it a lot haha
R: they're attacking you via your nostalgia.
M: im a sucker for that!
R: THEY KNOW.
M: its a WIN WIN!

more batanes

hoop dreams

I was never the athletic type. Although, in grade 5 or 6, I represented the class in the intramurals, competing in what might have been the 100m dash. Despite not being the leanest guy in the class, I had strong legs that gave me an incredible burst of speed. I was like a cheetah flying through the blades of tall grass of the savanna. Of course, I came in dead last.

Also, whenever I'd join basketball camp (MILO Best, if I remember right), I'd always sprain an ankle or a wrist and sit the rest of the workshop out. One time, I fractured my left forearm because I tripped and landed on it while were playing tag during recess.

I was, and am, lampa.

So I've lived out my sports dreams vicariously. Specifically through my NBA Fantasy League. Which, by the way, now merits a geek tag. But why? It's just like a virtual role-play, wherein you are General Manager of your own professional basketball team, complete with stats and live drafts. That's why.

But still, I don't doubt that (real) sports can bring out the best in you. Basketball in particular; just watch Samuel Jackson scream at and mold those kids in Coach Carter.

As of late, the most famous fan and player of the sport is Obama. In this Politico article:

"We hear all the chatter about Obama’s creating a team of rivals, much like Abraham Lincoln did. But basketball provides a better context for his choice of strong characters and former competitors. He’s simply not threatened by talent or old rivalries, and as a team leader, he wants the best and smartest players on his side. Accustomed to playing on teams, Obama is confident he can mold them into a unit...

Michelle Obama famously asked her brother, a college basketball star, to play Barack after they first met to see if he hogged the ball and called too many fouls. Basketball isn’t just a game — it’s a test of character."

In the end, basketball might even change the world.

laments

I like folksy, guitar music so much that, sometimes, I annoy myself. I think it all began with me tuning in to James Taylor as a kid, and liking guitar music accompanied by whinny or nasal voices ever since. These are usually songs about getting your heartbroken in some place where you're all alone to wallow in your own sorrow with dignity.

Of all the bands that figured in lists of best records of '08, I like Bon Iver and Fleet Foxes a lot. Both feature a guy and his buddies singing sad, wistful tunes while accompanying themselves on their guitars.

Bon Iver sounds like the type of music you'll create when you break up with your girlfriend, and your band, and hole up in some cabin in the woods. With a liver ailment. Which is all good since that is the exact context of singer/songwriter Justin Vernon when he wrote the music that eventually made up most of Bon Iver's debut album, For Emma, Forever Ago.

Fleet Foxes's, eponymous album, not borne out of a solitary, cathartic experience is a bit more lush. Yet, with all this exploration of the depths of solitude, of sad love, this musical and emotional hari kiri is strangely cleansing and uplifting. It's like that nice, warm feeling after a really good cry.

gone soft

I had a memorable trip to Batanes late last year. It was pretty much dark, mood weather for the most part of the five day stay. That was difficult for the travel and fashion feature we were shooting, but totally awesome for the stuff I like shooting for myself. Except that in my excitement, I dropped my medium format rangefinder (6x7). Instead of showing a single frame that corresponds to the mounted lens, it was showing two sets of semi-visible frames.. It was like some screw was knocked halfway loose somewhere in there. I was annoyed as hell. But I shot anyway, in that wonderfully foul weather, guessing that the smaller of the frames might to be the right one.

I got a roll back from the lab today. Half of the shots were from Batanes, half were from the tests I did to check for right framing and focus. I looked at the scanned files and saw my photos in perfect square format.

Good god, I turned my 6x7 camera into a square format! I checked the negs and saw that the lab just scanned it wrong. They cropped off a half a centimeter or so off both sides when they scanned my 6x7 negs.

Except now the images are really soft. So shit.

Chapel on the Hill

Two of my favorite people married at sunset yesterday.

I remember when I flew to Singapore to catch a band in ’06, Kara got left behind because of some passport issue, and Pia and I flew ahead. We were staying with their friends, people I hardly knew then. I knew I’d be all right because Pia and I talked during the whole flight, much to the annoyance of the old man seated in front of us. We talked about the need for personal projects, the benefits of living a part of your young life abroad, and the coolness of kids growing up in another culture. It was easy.

Dino was just, "this guy," in that conversation. Then when she and Dino finally got together, I was really happy that I could talk to someone about the Star Wars Expanded Universe and displaced 80’s music.

It was a really nice wedding, complete with a photographer running into the wind chimes in an untimely moment, and the priest getting lost in his script. I think it was cool compared to a lot of these staged, ultra-managed wedding events.

Also, after the wedding and after dinner, it was like were all just hanging out, making silly jokes. Just like the times before they were married, and we'd go to the movies, get quiet dinners, or talk in the Salcedo parking lot after patintero.

the grind

Working for 2009 officially begins tomorrow. And today, while I sit and do nothing while waiting to attend the wedding of close friends, I can't help but feel antsy about the things I have to do. It's the feeling I get when I know I've procrastinated, even if i haven't. This is like advance guilt. When you think about it (or when I think about it, just to feel better) the holiday hiatus was even productive. I mean, at least I got my archiving done. Last year it took me 'til middle of last year to archive 2007.

Anyway, while I sit here and wait, I might as well make a list of things I want done (or have to do) in the first two working weeks of January. You know, just to get into the right frame of mind.

1. Subtitle Training.

2. Make a list of film festivals, of their requirements, and start sending out subtitled Training.

3. Upgrade my equipment. I'm one year behind on this and the money I put aside for this upgrade went to the short film already. Haha.

4. Redesign my website so I can push my work (see #8). I actually got in touch with the designer before the holidays, and we're set to resume talking about it... around now.

5. Get started on Gray Area stuff. Somebody bought the building and we're not renewing our lease. We have a couple of prospects for a location to move to, including a possible partnership with another studio. I got to set up that meeting and talk to our studio manager about meager months ahead while we're in transition.

6. Talk to my accountant about lowering her fee. I agreed to her high professional fee because I needed help straightening out my tax stuff from 2006-2007. Now that that's done, mostly, I need to keep my own overheads down.

7. Get my own space.

8. Send the folio out and get higher paying jobs to offset everything.

You know, this is why they say that most men live lives of quiet despair.

dirty movie

I saw Zack and Miri Make A Porno before Christmas and I liked it enough to pass on poker last night to sit through another go at this sweet and tender movie. Sweet and tender aren't words I'll usually attach a movie about making an adult movie, but Kevin Smith knows how to squeeze some heart out of the banality of malls, comics, and the mind-numbing day job. So what's getting a little warm, fuzzy feeling out of a porno?

Also, I could sort of relate to a lot of things in the movie. There's Zack (Seth Rogen), not quite a fine specimen of man, yet attempts finds his place in this world... making a porno in a coffee shop. Well, I didn't make a porno, and while the idea is suddenly appealing, I kinda knows what it feels like when Zack has to come with something to shoot, when he has co-workers who look up to him to make decisions, when he wonders if anything he's doing is actually worth it because he just want something better out of life.

Haha. Anyway, so there. Oh, and Elizabeth Banks is cute, Craig Robinson (Darryl from The Office) is funny, and Justin Long has an awesome cameo.

credits

I began this blog over a year ago because I had a then untitled short film I wanted to make. Well, I got it done: I wrote it, directed it, and screened it for friends and family, and somewhere in that time line, I figured out a title.

TRAINING, along with some trips and a certain reunion concert, was a highlight of 2008. I'm so thankful I got it done. I loved the experience of making it and the people I made it with are a big part of my life. Thanks, all of you.

The transition from 2008 to 2009 wasn't as smooth as I wanted. I've come to have mixed feelings about some of my relationships. In the garish lights of the holidays, the inadequacies are ever more glaring. Maybe it's just the holiday blues, but things are always a changing and in some things, I better be changing myself. I'll work it out, no worries.

More seriously, in the past couple of days, I've learned that bad things happened or are happening to people I love. I don't really know what to say about these things. This too, I'm still working out. But I want to say that I love you all, and I just want you to be all right. Somehow I don't say that enough, and I'm changing that.

I'm here now. New obsessions or not, throughout all the adventure and the uncertainty, in the euphoria of pleasure or in the depths of sorrow, I want to keep going. I owned you, 2008. 2009, you're next.