Where has the time gone? Last time I posted something was back in spring, I completely skipped summer! I wasn’t in crygenic freeze or anything, I was just too busy to get a thought down that wasn’t under 140 characters.
The most notable thing I did this summer was enroll in a design class at Art Center’s Art Center at Night program. I took a class called Design 360, which is like a sampler platter of all the disciplines that Art Center has to offer. It was nice to know that there are at least 13 other people in the world who wanted to do something artistic when they were in school but ended up not pursing anything remotely artistic (in terms of a career path) and decided they wanted a second chance. Well, that was more or less our collective story.
I had a lot of fun trying to be a teacher’s pet and an A student. I learned how one combines process and creativity and applies it to any work that has to be done to meet the needs of a client. We my favorite of the topics covered was probably product design with graphic design coming in second. Surprisingly, photography was not a session that I enjoyed at all. I also did not enjoy the day before the final was due and sleeping for only 3 hours. (Oh, riiiight, that’s why I don’t want to go back to school.)
My resolutions have been going well(ish)Â 365 is on track, 24 books is pacing slow (I’ve been buying more books than I can read though) and 12 items is pacing too quickly! Currently at 15 books finished and in the middle of reading 2 now. And I can’t buy anything until November… but at least I’m not overspent AND I have saved an amazing amount of money this year from not buying clothes. Gee who’d have thought?
Patrick and I have done lots of fun things together like glow in the dark mini golf. Planning vacations that we won’t go on to exotic places like Seoul, Berlin, Riviera Maya, and New York City. Last weekend we went to LobsterFest where he de-shelled his first lobster. He didn’t really grow up in a seafood kind of family, I don’t think they have oceans in St. Louis. Hell, we even got our motorcycle licences on American Badass Weekend (aka 4th of July Weekend).
My little IndieClick was bought by Demand Media. When I say “my” IndieClick I don’t mean I started it or own it, I mostly mean that’s been not just work but a big part of my life for the past 5 years so I feel like I’ve put a lot of myself into the company. It’s awesome to see what has happened to it. Our new CEO is Richard Rosenblatt, who sold Intermix Media (MySpace) to News Corp (Rupert Murdoch), which is kind of amazing. Then he started another company which bought my company, also amazing.
The downside to all this is that now I work in Santa Monica, which sounds horrible, I know. This is the worst thing to happen in the history of things! The problem is that I live across town from work (the “town” being the City of Los Angeles), instead of at least living on the same side of La Cienega. Almost all my friends are on the east side, the food is better, the extracurricular activities are better, the snooty hipsters are better. Instead of spening 20-30 minutes riding the train in to work, I spend 1h 40min riding a train and bus.
I will now leave you with this which Clint shared with on Google Reader:
Running on Empty (Revisited) from Ross Ching on Vimeo.
With “Carmageddon” looming in Los Angeles, I decided to take my “LA with no cars” video and re-edit it with new music, coloring and opening shots. Editing was done in Final Cut, coloring done with After Effects and shot on a Canon 60D.
Music: Wim Mertens – Often a Bird
Here’s the basics:
1. Record for 20-30 mins.
2. Go frame by frame and grab pieces of the road that aren’t obstructed by a car. Eventually, you will have every piece of the road.
3. Put the static image of the road in with the moving background.
For more information see: http://rossching.com/running-on-empty