Georgia is apparently one of the least-restrictive countries when it comes to drone photography. But that’s all changing a week from today. So Amos Chapple, “one of the early pioneers of drone photography,” headed there “to make one last aerial record of Georgia’s mountains, lowlands, and cities before the new rules come into force.” The results are stunning.
Clearly, the good folks over at the Guardian read this blog. I mean, how else would you explain this, published just three days after I posted this? Let’s just say that it’s getting increasingly difficult to type these days, what with one finger on the pulse of international popular culture.
Oh—and do buy Mr. Wilson’s album, would you? It really is quite good. Be prepared to make some room in your music library, though (you do have one of those, right?), because you’ll be wanting everything he’s ever done.
From Frank L. Cioffi’s indispensable One Day in the Life of the English Language: A Microcosmic Usage Handbook (2015), comes this sage advice:
The “rules of English” that we were taught, still remember, and even live by provided guidelines for grade-school students, namely, children who were gradually acquiring an understanding of formal English, and who had to be weaned from their childish language. For example, we were taught not to start sentences with conjunctions such as and or so or but. We were taught not to end sentences with prepositions and not to split infinitives. As far more sophisticated users of language, we understand why these rules were created, and though we don’t invariably break them, we also understand that it’s not necessary to blindly or mechanically obey them. In fact, we realize how important it is to routinely question these rules, and to discover their margins and limits.
Went hiking last week with a couple of old friends. And, as middle-aged guys are wont to do, we spent some time complaining about the current state of affairs re politics, education, and pretty much anyone younger than us.
At one point during a conversation about music, someone asked, “Is anyone even making good pop music anymore?” (I should mention here that, at one point in our lives, we were all professional musicians; the other two still have careers in music.) “As a matter of fact,” I began…then told them both about my long-time love affair with the work of Steven Wilson.
Wilson released a new album last Friday—To the Bone—and it’s exquisite. I’d go on in greater detail, but Daniel Cordova over at Metal Injection says it all in just a single paragraph:
This record reminds me a lot of another prog giant that also dabbled in pop. Fight me if you want, but that dude’s name is Peter Gabriel. Like Wilson, Gabriel started out in a progressive band before going solo. Each of his solo albums expanded his sonic pallet with a variety of instrumentation, influences, and effects. Peter Gabriel tapped Tony Levin and Robert Fripp (King Crimson) and Kate Bush to play on various releases. Over the years, Wilson recruited Marco Minneman, Guthrie Goven, Nick Beggs (Kajagoogoo), Adam Holzman and recently Craig Blundell and David Killar. In 1986, Peter Gabriel dropped the goliath album So which featured tracks like “Red Rain,” “Sledgehammer,” “In Your Eyes,” and many more great proggy and poppy tracks. It took a while to get here, but the point is that To The Bone is Steven Wilson’s So. Albeit, the state of music as a whole is in an entirely different place than it was when So dropped. To The Bone doesn’t have the chance to be the international best seller So is, but it is on the same creative level.
Be sure to check out Cordova’s entire review. Then go over to Wilson’s YouTube channel, where he’s uploaded three videos from the new album. Then, of course, buy the damn record.
It’s been a long week. A tough one, if I can be honest. So rather than hit you over the head with an annoying grammar quibble or bore you with a personal anecdote, here’s something fun: a four-minute time-lapse video showing the construction of a Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87pNldMBJcA
Have a swell weekend, y’all.
Thanks to a drier than normal summer, the huckleberries weren’t nearly as big—nor as plentiful—as in years past. And for a Wednesday, there was a surprising number of people on the trail. But Harrison Lake was still its usual glorious self, and the huckleberries were still tasty.
Side note: Yes, the water looks refreshing after a fairly steep climb. No, it’s not warm. Not at all. The feeling returned to my extremities some time around 3:00 this morning.
Even as 2017 seems hell-bent on making 2016 look positively sane by comparison—no mean feat, that—a story like this gives me faith in our species.
Like an idiot, however, I also read this. So…one step forward, two steps back. Maybe I should just quit reading altogether.
For no reason whatsoever, here are some random bits of completely useless trivia. Feel free to astound your friends with any or all of them.
Your odds of either winning the lottery or becoming an astronaut are roughly the same (~13 million : 1).
Casu marzu, a sheep’s milk cheese enjoyed by Sardinians, is mostly rotten—and includes live insect larvae for added flavor.
While more people speak Mandarin, English is the most widely spoken, in that more countries have declared it their official language.
There are only two Shakers left in the world.
A Korean superstition holds that, if you eat damaged or asymmetrical food while pregnant, your baby will be ugly.
Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch is a Welsh railway station. The name translates to “St. Mary’s church in the hollow of the white hazel near to the rapid whirlpooland the church of St. Tysilio of the red cave.”
After being out of college for more than five years, I have homework. Homework. Thankfully it’s fun, interesting, and awesome homework.
My one-year-old Shiba Inu, Remi, just advanced to the intermediate level of obedience school, and I couldn’t be more stoked. We adore the trainers, they have a great reputation in Spokane, and I – hands down– would recommend them to anyone with a dog. Every class feels like you’re watching a kid learn to read, or seeing a baby take its first steps. It’s THE GREATEST. Which makes the idea of homework great, too—because you get to bond with, learn from, and teach your furry BFF.
It wasn’t until I actually downloaded the homework that I got discouraged.
Great design is everywhere. So’s good design, mediocre design, and…bad design. But bad design somehow SCREAMS at you. It refuses to be ignored.
As a designer, I have the privilege to be able to correct bad design and point out how good design – even just basic principals – can elevate any piece. Take the below single page from Remi’s homework packet.
Technically, there’s nothing wrong with it. It’s all the same typeface, the body copy is consistent, and the header is larger and bolder to set it off. But click to the next image and see what happens when I take that same copy and apply hierarchy and comfortable spacing (both in the margins and in the leading).
Don’t your eyes instantly feel more comfortable? The left and right margins give a visual break while your eye tracks from one line to the next. They can rest and read at the same time without straining. Which means you actually want to read it. And if you want to read it, there’s a better chance you actually will, right?
“Good design, when it’s done well, becomes invisible. It’s only when it’s done poorly that we notice it.”
– Jared Spool
Jean M. Twenge, professor of psychology at San Diego State University, has been analyzing generational data going back to the 1930s. In a thoughtful—and thought-provoking—article in the September issue of the Atlantic, she turns her gaze on today’s teens. “The aim of generational study,” she writes, “is not to succumb to nostalgia for the way things used to be; it’s to understand how they are now.” And how are they? Not good:
Even when a seismic event—a war, a technological leap, a free concert in the mud—plays an outsize role in shaping a group of young people, no single factor ever defines a generation. Parenting styles continue to change, as do school curricula and culture, and these things matter. But the twin rise of the smartphone and social media has caused an earthquake of a magnitude we’ve not seen in a very long time, if ever. There is compelling evidence that the devices we’ve placed in young people’s hands are having profound effects on their lives—and making them seriously unhappy.
The “lonely, dislocated generation” is in trouble. But Twenge sees some hopeful signs. Read the whole thing.
A pattern of vertical and horizontal black lines.
Primary colors.
Straight-sided geometric shapes.
Asymmetric balance.
Simple enough composition, yet in the early 20th century, when Piet Mondrian – one of the founders of the Dutch De Stijl movement – applied his aesthetic of total abstraction as a model for harmony and order into his paintings, it shook up a Western world just emerging from the thicket of Art Nouveau. It signified a radical shift towards abstraction and rationalism. Mondrian’s compositions would be crucial in the development of Modernism throughout the century. His work to this day permeates our culture, its influence appearing in decor, cakes, Katy Perry, Nike, the White Stripes, Yves Saint Laurent, and even in the meticulously designed coasters of a certain design firm.
Explore his life and work at this superbly designed digital archive.
hipster (noun) a person who follows the latest trends and fashions, especially those regarded as being outside the cultural mainstream.
I have a serious issue with this word. As you can see, the dictionary definition describes a hipster as being one who follows the trends outside of mainstream culture. I look around now, however, and in my “culture,” what used to be considered hipster is becoming mainstream. So, by definition, these individuals are no longer hipster. My problem with this is that, without changing anything about myself, I have, by definition, become a hipster.
Ah brevity, the silver stag we chase through the woods; the tightrope we walk between too much and too little. It’s like the sound of a chord as a few choice words intertwine. Whatever comparison suits your caffeine-addled mind, it’s that elegant economy, written or verbal, we strive for when searching for what to say.
Which brings me to Hemingway, who, despite being dead, turned 118 a couple weeks ago. Some of us have visited his grave, others, read his books; all of us, however, should take some time out of our day to read his famous six-word story:
For sale,
Baby shoes,
Never worn.
Here’s to you brevity, you cheeky eel.
Just like in Seinfeld, I’m going to provide you with a movie pick of the week – but with a couple of key differences. First, I’m not going to send you a package in the mail with the play button from my VCR. Mainly because I no longer have a VCR. And second, the movie pick is terrible. So terrible, in fact, that it holds the record for lowest grossing film of all time at a whopping $30. And that’s if you don’t count the $10 worth of refunds.
The movie is called Zyzzyx Road. Find it. Watch it. You’re welcome.
It’s always interesting to visit museums, especially when traveling to a city you’re experiencing for the first time. On a recent trip to the Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal, we came across Fatigues by Toronto-based artist Abbas Akhavan.
Is that really a deer?
The whitetail buck was lying on a wooden floor, carefully placed in a corner near large white walls, and, of course, well-lit. I began to read the artist’s statement: “Fatiques consists of a series of animals stuffed and laid right on the floor in different locations around the exhibition gallery.”
Hmmm…okay.
There was also a screech owl, a gray wolf, a red fox, a black bear, and a North American porcupine, among others. “While taxidermy animals are most often exhibited in posture suggestive of their grace or agility in their natural state,” the statement continues, “those of Abbas Akhavan are mounted in positions that evoke their vulnerability and show them as inanimate creatures, consigned to a state of perpetual silence. By avoiding giving them narratives or prominent displays, the work hopes to avoid dramatizing their deaths in order to prompt consideration of the precariousness of life.”
All right, I wondered, what constitutes art? And what might a first-time visitor be thinking? Will he ever come back? And why isn’t the tongue hanging out of the deer’s mouth?
I’ve seen plenty of dead deer in my lifetime, but they’re usually on the side of the road. (And when they’re stuffed, they’re positioned upright.) But seeing animals sprinkled about inside the museum was unexpected. Imagine the conversation between the artist and the curator…
Perhaps author Joyce Carol Oates put it best. “My belief is that art should not be comforting,” she wrote. “For comfort, we have mass entertainment and one another. Art should provoke, disturb, arouse our emotions, expand our sympathies in directions we may not anticipate and may not even wish.”
Which explains why, two weeks later, I’m still thinking about it.