Nothing beats finding a band that really appeals to you. The thrill of playing a track and feeling that sense of connection. As thought I song was written for your ears alone. Everything just fits together.
Well that's all good.
However.
All of these wonderful exciting things just happened to me. I was listening to Squeeze on YouTube -- who remembers 'Cool For Cats'? Well I do. I wish I didn't.
Squeeze's first album, 'UK Squeeze' (or simply 'Squeeze' just to frustrate your google and/or ebay search) is a post-punk wave of musical credibility. Maybe.
Well, unlike 'Cool For Cats'.
For whatever reason I became determined to own this album on CD.
Yeah. I know, right? (We're talking about different things).
Surely such a great debut album would be readily availible for purchase. Generally an older album like UK Squeeze would set you back less than $10. A price I'm willing to pay, to have a solid copy, of an equally solid album.
As aforementioned, the band clearly didn't have the foresight to predict the modern day search engine, and how album titles that are open-ended, or, even worse, the same as the band name, make it virtually impossible to find amongst a back catalogue of 14 studio albums.
The cheapest I could find it on ebay (on CD) was $30 including shipping. Something I wouldn't even pay for a new release CD. Let alone a 1995 issue.
In an attempt to legally acquire the album by any means possible, I resorted to my foes, iTunes and BigPond music, which did little to improve the offering.
Nothing.
Apparently UK Squeeze was so widely unsuccessful, it's not worth selling. Ever.
I will continue my search. In the end, I'll probably just purchase it on vinyl and enjoy it the way it was made to be heard.
Saturday, April 23, 2011
Monday, March 28, 2011
When your music collection does unexpected things...
I have accumulated more Australian Crawl records than I initially realised. The things you find when you're not looking...
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Short film footage, with Pentax K-5
I spent last weekend shooting the outdoor scenes for a short film I'm working on, currently titled, 'Stephanie And Her Little Dead Friend'.
Below is some footage from the shoot:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=phCAJl0yghY
Being my first decent shoot with the Pentax, there were a few moments of forgetting to lock the exposure and keeping consistency with aperture. Overall it was a great experience, with our two young actors performing brilliantly. The final output of the film will be accompanied by our voice over, which was recorded late last year. The film is somewhat different to anything I've previously worked on. Not only did I do the cinematography for this project, but I also had a large part in writing the poem, used for the voice over, that runs for the 5 minute duration.
As a side note, K-5 issues were what could be expected. The sensor heats up rapidly, and won't cool unless the camera is shut off for at least 10 minutes. The usual for a DSLR, but still somewhat frustrating when trying to shoot half a film in one day. Overall I was pleased with the final footage. The anti-shake worked wonders, with smooth compensation, which meant I had to physically rock the camera at times, to create the dream-like look we were aiming to create. A great camera to shoot motion on. Already Nikon has patented a computer style fan to cool it's sensors, and the world of DSLR movie making takes off. It's an exciting time to be a digital film maker, with high quality, high control methods becoming increasingly accessible whilst still maintaining a high level of professionalism.
References:
http://www.petapixel.com/2011/02/17/nikon-may-use-fan-to-cool-down-its-mirrorless-cameras/#more-22115
Below is some footage from the shoot:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=phCAJl0yghY
Being my first decent shoot with the Pentax, there were a few moments of forgetting to lock the exposure and keeping consistency with aperture. Overall it was a great experience, with our two young actors performing brilliantly. The final output of the film will be accompanied by our voice over, which was recorded late last year. The film is somewhat different to anything I've previously worked on. Not only did I do the cinematography for this project, but I also had a large part in writing the poem, used for the voice over, that runs for the 5 minute duration.
As a side note, K-5 issues were what could be expected. The sensor heats up rapidly, and won't cool unless the camera is shut off for at least 10 minutes. The usual for a DSLR, but still somewhat frustrating when trying to shoot half a film in one day. Overall I was pleased with the final footage. The anti-shake worked wonders, with smooth compensation, which meant I had to physically rock the camera at times, to create the dream-like look we were aiming to create. A great camera to shoot motion on. Already Nikon has patented a computer style fan to cool it's sensors, and the world of DSLR movie making takes off. It's an exciting time to be a digital film maker, with high quality, high control methods becoming increasingly accessible whilst still maintaining a high level of professionalism.
References:
http://www.petapixel.com/2011/02/17/nikon-may-use-fan-to-cool-down-its-mirrorless-cameras/#more-22115
Friday, January 14, 2011
Bokeh
EDIT: What's Bokeh? ...You honestly can't google it yourself?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bokeh
Copy/Pasted from my facebook page:
Bokeh is the quality or appearance of the 'blur' in a photo.
It's best described as the shape that lights go, when they're in the background of a photo (out of focus), taken at night. Sometimes they are round, other times a hexagon.
Whatever shape the aperture is, that's what shape the bokeh will be.
*
When I first heard of people purchasing their quaint Bokeh sets from photojojo.com, I was somewhat unimpressed. It was similar to the feelings I have towards the Toy Camera Movement. Boring. Simple. Creatively limited.
A cheap effect, where the user has little control, and the image aesthetic is restricted to what the company (might I say, 'the man'?) lets the user create. It all seemed like a bit of a fad to me, until I came across a video on petapixel, showing how bokeh could be harnessed as a story element, as well as an aesthetic. The short film, 'Light Works' is a brilliant piece, short, to the point, and taking the use of bokeh beyond a kitsch, indie-kid market, and putting it in the hands of professional film-makers.
'Light Works' can be seen here:
http://vimeo.com/18158884
Inspired, and armed with a stanley knife, I created my own bokeh in the shape of a lightning bolt. Shot some HD footage. Attempted (and failed) to Twixtor some of the footage.
The size of the shape, has to be tiny, in order for it to work. The lightning bolt is around 10mm long and 5mm wide.
So here's the result of my first attempt. I think I'll try some words down the track, as well as varying light sources.
Bokeh Kits at PhotoJoJo
http://photojojo.com/store/awesomeness/bokeh-Kit/
Creators of Light Works
http://supernormals.org/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bokeh
Copy/Pasted from my facebook page:
Bokeh is the quality or appearance of the 'blur' in a photo.
It's best described as the shape that lights go, when they're in the background of a photo (out of focus), taken at night. Sometimes they are round, other times a hexagon.
Whatever shape the aperture is, that's what shape the bokeh will be.
*
When I first heard of people purchasing their quaint Bokeh sets from photojojo.com, I was somewhat unimpressed. It was similar to the feelings I have towards the Toy Camera Movement. Boring. Simple. Creatively limited.
A cheap effect, where the user has little control, and the image aesthetic is restricted to what the company (might I say, 'the man'?) lets the user create. It all seemed like a bit of a fad to me, until I came across a video on petapixel, showing how bokeh could be harnessed as a story element, as well as an aesthetic. The short film, 'Light Works' is a brilliant piece, short, to the point, and taking the use of bokeh beyond a kitsch, indie-kid market, and putting it in the hands of professional film-makers.
'Light Works' can be seen here:
http://vimeo.com/18158884
Inspired, and armed with a stanley knife, I created my own bokeh in the shape of a lightning bolt. Shot some HD footage. Attempted (and failed) to Twixtor some of the footage.
The size of the shape, has to be tiny, in order for it to work. The lightning bolt is around 10mm long and 5mm wide.
So here's the result of my first attempt. I think I'll try some words down the track, as well as varying light sources.
Bokeh Kits at PhotoJoJo
http://photojojo.com/store/awesomeness/bokeh-Kit/
Creators of Light Works
http://supernormals.org/
Friday, December 31, 2010
Review: New Order - 'Power, Corruption & Lies' (1983)
Alright, more than a little in common.
Power, Corruption & Lies is one of my favourite albums of all times. It someone manages to go from slightly grungy post-punk in it's opening song, Age Of Consent, before stripping right back to the thudding synth guitar of, We All Stand. I always find the combination of these two songs quite jarring. Age of Consent is filled with life, it's like a teenage road trip, with laughs, booze and good times on the beach. We All Stand seems to be the reality at the end of the holiday. Or the hangover. The guitar seems to slide slowly across the track, meandering softly and almost painfully in it's juxtaposed pace to the previous track. The repeated phrase of 'three miles to go' emphasises this journey through the album.
My favourite track on the album is 5-8-6. It's bouncy synth is addictive and infectious. The theme with the album seems to be experimenting with tempo and mood through the pace and timbre of the synth. The result really is a turbulent ride of mixed emotions, being pulled between sluggish bass and upbeat party anthems punctuated with the classic 80s sound of snare driven drums machines.
The use of repitition of lyrics - 'I see danger - danger - danger' and the often, not quite timed nature of these, with the previous syllable of a word getting tacked on, creates an authenticity to the album, which is missing in so much modern music. These days little errors of this nature would be re-recorded or edited into oblivion. The album is also noted for it's drum timing errors, which the band members describe as giving it a certain quirkiness and individuality.
The album is now viewed as a link between disco and the house scene, which would develop in the late 80s. When disco became a dirty word, New Order took an old sound and made it their own through technical innovation and their own sound developed from the Joy Division days.
What more to say. The album really does pull together as a whole and showed New Order's ability as a group to find their own style and shake off the pressure of creating a Joy Division album or writing music and lyrics in the style of Ian Curtis. The first New Order album, Movement had been their bridge to a new beginning. A must listen, the album has something for a range of music tastes. I can see it remaining one of my favourites for a long time yet.
References:
http://www.neworderonline.com/
Image scanned by:
http://www.niagara.edu/neworder/graphics/pcal.jpg
Saturday, December 18, 2010
Street Photography
I took to the street yesterday, for the first time in... let's say 3 or 4 months, to take some digital street photos.
More recently, I've been shooting film on the street, so it was nice to have the benefit of auto-focus and to instantly review the photos. Despite these luxuries, I think the past month or two of shooting film have done me some good. I had a few shots I was quite pleased with, and felt more confident with shooting quickly.
There are some pretty classic 'Melbourne' images here. Very basic post-processing. However, I don't feel they really need a lot. It all seems to be there. Perfection in street photography just doesn't sit right.
I'm still looking forward to the purchase of a new camera, 10MP can become a bit restrictive when shooting the street, especially as the sensor on my current camera is far from stunning. Until, then, I make do.
For more photos from this day, go to:
http://redbubble.com/people/jyve
More recently, I've been shooting film on the street, so it was nice to have the benefit of auto-focus and to instantly review the photos. Despite these luxuries, I think the past month or two of shooting film have done me some good. I had a few shots I was quite pleased with, and felt more confident with shooting quickly.
There are some pretty classic 'Melbourne' images here. Very basic post-processing. However, I don't feel they really need a lot. It all seems to be there. Perfection in street photography just doesn't sit right.
I'm still looking forward to the purchase of a new camera, 10MP can become a bit restrictive when shooting the street, especially as the sensor on my current camera is far from stunning. Until, then, I make do.
For more photos from this day, go to:
http://redbubble.com/people/jyve
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
Fixing Cameras
Last week, on the way to the local Town Fair, I ambled into a garage sale and discovered an Olympus 35 RC and a Sunpak Auto 200 flash, for the total of $5. The camera came complete with manual, spare lens cap and what looks like a spare camera back
The flash is in perfect working order, which is fantastic. However it's appearance in my life came a little late (2 days after the purchase of a Vivitar 283 Thyristor, the classic flash of the 70s and 80s. The Vivitar will still get a work out, though, as it is directional and has a higher level of control.
And so begins my first camera 'fix up' job.
The Olympus needs a little bit of TLC. I'll be ordering a new light seal kit, as the foam is deteriorating (a common issue with a 40 year old camera). Fortunately, kits are easy to come by online and cost around $10AU. The tricky part, comes with ensuring no sticky foam falls onto the lens. Seeings as the camera only cost $3, I won't be too upset if things go pear shaped.
The self timer also jams, which wouldn't be a major concern, except that it seems to find itself jammed without being touched, at inconvient times. Like when you want to take a photo.
I'm also pleased to announce that the Fed 3 arrived today, all seems to be in working order - and I've found an English translated manual, so I can figure out what some of the knobs and buttons do. It smells like the Soviet Union and new leatherette. Relatively unpleasant, but somehow full of adventure, excitement and vokda fuelled mischief.
The flash is in perfect working order, which is fantastic. However it's appearance in my life came a little late (2 days after the purchase of a Vivitar 283 Thyristor, the classic flash of the 70s and 80s. The Vivitar will still get a work out, though, as it is directional and has a higher level of control.
And so begins my first camera 'fix up' job.
The Olympus needs a little bit of TLC. I'll be ordering a new light seal kit, as the foam is deteriorating (a common issue with a 40 year old camera). Fortunately, kits are easy to come by online and cost around $10AU. The tricky part, comes with ensuring no sticky foam falls onto the lens. Seeings as the camera only cost $3, I won't be too upset if things go pear shaped.
The self timer also jams, which wouldn't be a major concern, except that it seems to find itself jammed without being touched, at inconvient times. Like when you want to take a photo.
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