An Astronomer In Hollywood

New Blog

2008-02-22T12:42:00.002-07:00

In order to keep things a little more organized in my life, I've made my own WordPress blog on my website. I will no longer be posting to this address. Please go to:

The Cutting Room Floor

Slusho Zoom!!!

2008-01-07T16:28:00.000-07:00

What I've been up to for the past few weeks:

This is my official entry to the Slusho!! commercial contest. It is a fictional commercial for a fictional drink that may or may not somehow play into the new film "Cloverfield," produced by J.J. Abrams.

Or doesn't it?

For those of you who think that sounds vague, let me explain:

It is.

Last summer, the movie "Transformers" opened in theatres across the U.S. (yeah, I loved it, so sue me). Immediately after the first East Coast screenings let out, Google began getting hit with thousands of searches for things like "mystery jj abrams trailer transformers" and "transformers trailer monster movie" and "1-18-08" and "free porn." With the exception of the last search, all of this was seriously pleasing the folks over at Bad Robot productions. Why? Before "Transformers," audiences were treated to a movie trailer (or "preview," if you will) consisting of a sort of first person video clip of what appeared to be a monster attack on New York City. It began with the taping of a surprise going away party and ended with the severed head of the Statue of Liberty skidding down a SoHo street. Vague bits of dialog like "I saw it! It's alive! It's huge!" could be heard through the chaos of the crowded streets below, as the party-goers evacuate their apartment and attempt to glean more information. The audience was given nothing more than the name of the producers ("Lost" creator J.J. Abrams and his parent companies, Bad Robot and Paramount Pictures), and what seemed to be a release date of 1-18-08. A wave of "what the f*@$?!" spread across the crowd. A massive viral marketing campaign was born...

Youtube was soon inundated with pirated copies of the trailer, the web world was abuzz with "what's it all about" speculation, Paramount pictures was "denying" involvement in this titleless production, and geeks and "Lost" fans like myself were salivating over having a new way to waste precious time.

Fine. What the hell does this have to do with some slushy drink thing? Honestly, no one knows! The drink was first mentioned in an episode of "Alias" (also created by Abrams, also a show that I love). Additionally, in the original trailer, one of the characters from the film was wearing a slusho! shirt. It didn't take web geeks like myself long to find the slusho! web site, where even more oddness was revealed (like a donkey swimming underwater while thinking of a blue oven mitt and a bizarre story about some "secret" deep sea ingredient that is evidentially used in the manufacture of slusho).

Now it appears that some company called "Tagruato Corp." has been harvesting this slusho ingredient (?) using off shore oil rigs, one of which (according to foreign "news sources" whose videos are available on YouTube) was just destroyed this last weekend, as the monster makes its way to New York City. Also, the main character from the movie trailer, Rob, has announced on "his" MySpace page that he is going to go work for this company...

This kind of realtime buildup to movies and alternate reality gaming is fascinating to me. The Internet is becoming an increasingly collaborative and accessible space for the human race.

I'm really looking forward to the film. At this point, I have an almost scientific fascination with it. I'll only be disappointed if, like so many other movies this year, this turns out to be yet another zombie movie...

Snowbird on Cable

2008-01-04T13:19:00.000-07:00

The title of this post sounds like a casual observation. Birds are frequently found perched on cables when it's snowing.

While that is very true, that's not what this post is about. Ahem.

My film is going to be on the IFC three times (that's thrice) this month:

Tue 01/08/08 02:50PM
Tue 01/15/08 12:50AM
Mon 01/28/08 10:50AM

All times are Eastern Standard. Check it out if you haven't already. Chances are, if you read this blog, you have already seen this film. You've never seen it on cable, though! Think about it...

If you haven't seen it and don't have cable but would like to see it and don't have cable so you can't see it on cable, you can watch it online here: Snowbird on IFC

I'm in a bit of an idiotic mood...

Cheering for Phil!

2007-10-31T16:05:00.000-06:00

Yesterday, I got a call from a police officer. He didn't identify himself as such immediately. He mentioned that he had gotten my phone number from my friend Phil Rowe, who is a fellow filmmaker. He staggered through his first few sentences while I waited for him to ask me for a favor. Perhaps he needed an editor, a 3D animator, or someone to do some web video thing. This is what I have grown to expect from conversations that start with "I got your number from..."

This would have been great. I could use the extra cash these days. I'm saving up for something big. Actually, anything other than what followed his awkward introduction would have been great: "Are you related to Phil?"

I wasn't prepared to answer that question. Something inside of me said that the answer he wanted to hear was "yes," but my hesitation caused him to inform me that he was a police officer and that my friend had been involved in a car accident. The gravity of this situation gave me the sudden urge to tell the truth. I was not related. But I gave him information on how to find a relative (his daughter). After that, I couldn't get any information out of him, other than the fact that he was in Boulder. I offered to help in any way that I could and let him know that I was close, if they needed anything. He simply told me that he had my information and would have the hospital get back to me if there was any news.

And with that, he left me hanging. I contacted Carl, who is also very close to Phil, and told him what had happened. He called the emergency room. They told him Phil was discharged. What a relief! Seemed like our friend was involved in a minor accident and walked right out the door! I spent the next four hours in this blissful and ignorant state of mind.

We got home that night and were somewhat concerned that we still could not get in touch with Phil. I called the emergency room back, telling them that I was just confirming that he had been discharged and that I was trying to get more information about what had happened.

"Rowe? No. He was not discharged. I'm sorry someone told you that. He is in surgery right now- in Intensive Care. His condition is listed as critical." My stomach dropped as my world got slightly smaller and blurred. How could this be? How could they mistakenly list someone in critical condition as "discharged," which is the opposite of said state?

I couldn't think to ask any more questions. I poked and prodded as much as I could, but the person with whom I was speaking admitted that she did not know any details. I hung up and told Carl the news.

We quickly made phone calls to see if any of our other friends had any information, but it was the first anyone else had heard about the situation. Not knowing the details was killing us, so we called back and asked to be transferred to someone who knew what was going on.

The story pieces came together: Phil had experienced a massive heart attack while driving and ran his car into a tree. He was undergoing heart surgery that was expected to last six hours.

Carl and I drove to the hospital. We knew that we could not see Phil while he was in surgery, but we wanted to try to get as much information as we possibly could and to have a "presence" there. Luckily, Carl is a much better liar than I am and when asked what his relation to Phil was, he quickly and simply answered: "adopted son."

"I'm with him," I grinned, stupidly. It worked. We are now officially family, which made things easier until his daughter arrived today. We were given the whole story. Turned out our dear friend needed a one inch tear in his heart fixed as well as a triple bypass surgery.

"It's a miracle he's alive," the surgeon informed us.
"That's interesting," I replied. "Yesterday I got a fortune cookie that said 'You will soon bear witness to a miracle.'"

She showed me the goosebumps on her arm.

After hearing the details and bonding a bit, we all agreed that Phil was quite fortunate, and had a good, strong heart.

The next day, we visited our groggy friend. We quickly informed him of his adoption of Carl, lest we be kicked out of the recovery room. He smiled and nodded at the news, clearly glad to have a son. Incidentally, his daughter is happy to have a brother.

I had been working on a costume for Halloween. I was going to go as the indestructible cheerleader from "Heroes." I had studied her costume and made it from scratch. I was prepared to singe it and put some fake blood on it to make it look like her famous train wreck adventure. I never got the chance to do this. I also never made it to the party I was supposed to attend.

Not wanting the costume to go to waste, I decided to give it a purpose. I post a picture here. Cheers for Phil! I wish him a speedy R-E-C-O-V-E-R-Y!!!

update: this post was delayed in publishing. I've had very little free time. For a couple of weeks, recovery was difficult for our friend. I am happy to report, however, that, as of 11/30, he should REALLY be discharged in just a few short days! This past month has been... interesting. I've exchanged glances and short words with so many different people at the hospital. We all share a bond. It's a bond that we should, perhaps, remember to carry with us beyond the doors of the hospital. No matter what happens in between, we are all bound to birth and death. Hospitals remind us of this humanness and the emotions I have encountered have run the gamut of human capacity- from the frazzled woman I witnessed yelling about the "incompetence" of the hospital to Carl, who along with the nurses and doctors make up the most amazingly patient and helpful people on the Earth. With this, I am filled with a renewed desire to experience life to its fullest. And also to never smoke a cigarette again in my life...

Views From Views

2007-10-29T15:38:00.000-06:00

The world of experimental film has become a very interesting place for me lately. More words on that later. First, I wanted to post some pictures that I took at my screening, which took place on October 7th.

The setting: The Walter Reade Theater. This is where the Views from the Avant-Garde portion of the New York film festival plays. Before the programs start, we all gather in the gallery. I was very pleased to see that the program in which my film was playing was sold out:

I recognized a few faces, but as I said, I feel that I have become estranged from this world. A group in which I once felt so at home and seemed so welcoming to me seems at once elitist and alienating to me now. So I did what any normal person would do. I went to the bathroom with my iPhone to do some quick e-mails and take photos of my fish purse:

What? Wouldn't you do that?

After bonding with my fish, I decided the two of us needed to get to the theatre before the films started:

So yeah. Then the films started and I stopped taking photos and playing with my toys. Great program. Great films, all around, actually. I've exhausted all of my past strength to write detailed critiques about avant-garde films, though. I might write about a couple yet... It just always took a great deal of effort to write about these works and I kind of felt that the energy was lost. Again, more on that later.

I was kind of surprised by how many of these works were digital this year. Much of the experimental film world has been fairly "anti-video" for a while. With the exception of the occasional hiss at the video projector (yes, someone actually hissed), it seems like this "rule" might be beginning to bend (this is the avant-garde, after all- we're supposed to be all about bending the rules). Though I have been doing a lot of video work lately, my film was shown on 16mm. Unfortunately, the 16mm projector bulb was having "issues" which resulted in my already dark film being projected MUCH too dim. I've grown out of my "artist throwing a fit" stage and have accepted the uncertainties of working in the medium I have chosen. Besides finding it somewhat unfortunate, I simply let it go.

Besides, there was a director's party to get to and wine to be had:

Lots and lots and lots of wine!!

I really didn't drink all that much wine. I just liked the way my phone's camera handles reflected light in low-light situations. Now, for stars (the movie kind that don't emit their own light making them actually uninteresting subjects for my camera phone):

Jason Schwartzman!

Not really. I thought it was him, but I'm really bad at the whole "identifying people" thing. But I swear this is Wes Anderson:

Huh? Huh?! Forget it. I have no real pictures in this category. They actually kicked us out rather early, but this being New York, we just moved to a new bar.

Most of these folks are filmmakers whose films were in the Avant-Garde program, but I will spare them from being identified by my text here (that makes it Googleable and, let's face it, some people don't want a fuzzy strangely-lit picture of themselves popping up on the Internet when stalkers Google their name).

Finally, I snapped a couple of photos of graffiti outside of the restaraunt. A friend of mine asked me to snap a couple of shots because she thought it was beautiful. I agreed:

These Little Town Blues... and Nicole Kidman!

2007-10-20T10:42:00.000-06:00

I love New York. I wish I could live there again, but I know better. Living in that city really took its toll on me. I might live there if I didn't have to make a living there, but as it stands right now, that's not happening.

A friend of mine had put the movie "Ghostbusters" in my head, so I was taking pictures of the various places in the film:

Ray: "Symmetrical book stacking. Just like the Philadelphia mass turbulence of 1947."
Venkman: "You're right, no... human being... would stack books like this."

Gozer? Who's Gozer? And what's he doing in MY ice box?!"

"Ray, when someone asks you if you're a god, you say 'YES'!!!"

I arrived at the festival office to collect my credentials, hoping to see a film or two (because, you know, film festival). It turned out that I wouldn't be able to see most of the feature films. The films that were playing over the weekend we were there were the so-called "popular" films, with stars like Nicole Kidman:
Oh, wait. What? Was that actually Nicole Kidman? Gee, I don't know, let's get a closer look:

Why, I think that was, in fact, her. Better look again, just to make sure.
Okay, these pictures kind of suck. I mean, I think the bluriness is kind of cool, but not when you're trying to prove someone's identity. That was Nicole, just take my word for it (yeah, we're on a first-name basis now because she walked in front of me). Yes, she is beautiful in real life. Also, she smells like roses. No, not like rose perfume, but like a bouquet of roses. It was a little surreal.

Earlier, I had to squeeze by John Turturro on my way out the door (who does not smell like roses). We had not reached the level of fame required to stay in the press room for the photo ops. I said, "screw that" and made our own little photo op:

Courtney Hoskins, director of "Snowbird" and "Gossamer Conglomerate" at the 2007 New York Film Festival for the premiere of her latest film "The Counter Girl Trilogy."

Carl Fuerman, director of "The Box" and "Oft Not" in attendance at the 2007 New York Film Festival.

And then we were really kicked out.

The press conference was for Noah Baumbach's new film "Margot at the Wedding," starring, obviously, Nicole Kidman and John Turturro, but also Jack Black (who wasn't there, but I've already "met" him, so whatever), Flora Cross (of "Bee Season," which was an excellent movie based on an even excellenter* book), and Jennifer Jason Leigh. There are others, I'm sure, but I didn't see the film, so I don't know much about it other than what was posted there. I'm sorry I missed it at the festival, but I'm looking forward to it.

Incidentally, Jennifer Jason Leigh and I must have similar-looking hair. Perhaps we even look a bit alike. When I exited the building, there was a brief moment of excitement resulting in a couple of pictures, but that passed as soon as it was determined that I was no one. And I KNOW they didn't think that I was Nicole Kidman- the only other famous female at the conference.

In all, quite a first day in the City!

*new, real, legitimate word

Air travel joys

2007-10-18T15:47:00.000-06:00

I had a nice hotel room with a big, fluffy bed in Chicago, so I was a bit sad to leave it, knowing I would be crashing at a friend's apartment soon, imposing myself on their lives like any good former New Yorker would.

Sigh. I quickly got over it, though. I was, after all, heading to New York- a city dear to my heart and always full of excitement. I was also heading there to attend the New York Film Festival, where my latest film was going to be screened. I could get over the loss of a fluffy bed and pool.

Nothing, however, could ever make me happy about Chicago O'Hare (well, except for the UFO sighting (a video here), but that's neither here nor there- oh yes, puns intended).

Traffic to the airport was awful. For some reason, the cab driver seemed to believe that if you alternately slam your foot on the brake and gas pedals, the car would either fly over the offending vehicles, vaporize them, or somehow alter the spacetime continuum, making it possible to get to where you were going on time. Needless to say, none of those things happened. I got to the airport only an hour before my flight, though they "recommend" two.

I quickly learned that in the world of overbooking, "recommend" translates to "require." I was too late to check in and was bumped to a later flight, flying standby. Still, I flew out, eventually, and the trip out of the city was at least visually interesting.

Arriving at Newark airport turned out to be a mistake, however. $85 to get to Brooklyn? Ouch...

The Rest of Chicago

2007-10-16T10:11:00.000-06:00

After three days of the Adobe MAX conference, I started craving art for art's sake, rather than art that is design which is supposed to maximize profits and provide a better, faster, and slicker "user experience." I didn't have time to go to the Art Institute of Chicago, which is unfortunate. I've been there once and wanted to return to the Joseph Cornell collection. I did get a picture of it from the outside, however:

I also got to walk around the city a little bit. Alone with my iPhone full of great music and its little camera, I was inspired by many city scenes:

I fell in love with that mirrored sculpture. I love photographing reflections:

This is a really cool water sculpture. The face towers are actually video images (that's my one complaint with my iPhone- no video) lit by little LEDs within glass or plastic bricks of some sort (see the bottom photo):

I really like Chicago. I think it's a beautiful city. I wish I'd been able to see more of it on my trip (as well as visit some of the folks I know who live out there)!

The User Experience

2007-10-15T16:10:00.000-06:00

The title of this blog is one of many phrases I got sick of hearing while attending the Adobe MAX conference in Chicago earlier this month. Others included "integration" (mixed with a variety of other words), "client-side," "runtime," and "Adobe is the king of the world."

Okay, I didn't actually hear that last one, but that was the general point of the conference, so I "sensed" it enough. In fact, many of the workshops and lectures I attended seemed to offer more of that sentiment than actual "information," but some of them offered some new tricks and tips that I have been able to use in my job and my creative life.

One of several Adobe pep rallies- this one was the unveiling of new products to the crowd of eager geeks (of which I was one- when I learned that Flash may start "integrating" inverse kinematics tools in their product, the animation nerd in me got all choked up).

I got so bored in one of my morning workshops that I encrypted my notes to keep from dozing off:

Indeed, I am a geek among geeks.

I also got a little sick of filling out surveys every half hour (that is NOT an exaggeration) and eating potatoes. The potato thing got so bad that one of the parties featured potatoes in a martini glass. Them's fancy taters!

To be fair, I won a great book on Flash video and learned how to shave time off of some of my projects. Mostly, though, I just received confirmation that I do things right. Oh, and I also got to attend an over-the-top party, the theme of which, from what I could gather, was "80's pop/geek culture and stuff that makes you go, 'oh yeah, I remember that!'"

BMX bikers and skateboarders show the crowd what can be done when you are not sitting in front of a computer all day:

A giant game of "Operation" (oh yeah, I remember that!):

Oh yeah! I had one of these:

And these (things are cooler when they are big):

Remember this movie (I was deemed too intoxicated to go back to the future)?

And the Fusion engine from the sequel (beer make car go fast):

This conference really was just kind of over-the-top for the most part. The conference center employees revealed to me that it cost half a million dollars just to unveil the new products to the crowd- I can't imagine how much the party cost. Shareholders take note. Ahem.

I had fun, though:

Arriving at the party.

Preparing for the Segway obstacle course

The band. I actually like these guys. They did a swing version of the Spongebob Squarepants theme song and "Smells Like Teen Spirit" by Nirvana.

Jell-O shots. Without alcohol. Still pretty, though.

This was a huge virtual graffiti wall connected to Wii remotes. You worked with another player to create your wall and then a picture of the wall was sent to flickr. But I took my own picture:

iPhone, iSlack

2007-10-01T09:02:00.000-06:00

I've been so neglectful of my blog lately.

I jumped the gun on the technology bandwagon and got myself an iPhone before I really had the time to learn how to use it to write blog entries. I figured out how to do it technologically, but the actual writing threw me off.

Don't get me wrong, the iPhone has an excellent keyboard. It's actually very easy to write. What it's not easy to do is edit! I've basically become addicted to cut and paste. It allows me to write fluidly and then go back and make edits after I've thought about how I want to communicate an idea. So far, I have not figured out how to do this with an iPhone, or any other mobile device.

Until then, I'll have to just play catch up when I have the chance to sit at a computer and type. Or, I'll have to learn how to hack the iPhone to get a text editing program on it. Or, I can figure out the best way to post photos directly from my iPhone because the thing takes gorgeous pictures!

(it's always important to test a cell phone camera with a self-portrait first)

(flowers)

(fungus)

(the soap on my windshield at the car wash)

I recently took my little phone with me on a trip to Chicago and then New York. I plan to post pictures and stories from those trips this week.

I do love my iPhone. I had my music on me at all times and could take a photo whenever I was inspired to do so. I was able to watch movies on the airplane and share my own films with interested parties. I could check my e-mail from the road. I could wander through the cities with my phone, search for a place, get directions or go to the website or call them directly... I'm not going into the details here. You can go to the apple web site to see all of the tricks it does. It really is a magical little device! I've never owned an iPod or anything "Mac." I'm very impressed!

Okay, I'm slacking

2007-09-27T15:15:00.000-06:00

So I've been working on this incredible independent film by Pericles Lewnes. I haven't been able to say much about it because it's all been top secret, but I'm really excited that I might not have to be quiet too much longer.

Pericles is the quintessential independent filmmaker. Whenever I start a job for someone, I always get a little nervous when it comes time to actually watch the movie. I hope for the best, but I'm often... a bit let down when it comes to "quality." People often overrate their abilities as filmmakers (or underrate the difficulty of the jobs people on productions have) and try to act, write, direct, edit, sing, fly... on their own, usually ending up exploiting me or whoever else they have suckered into working on their production. However, this was not the case with "LOOP." I was blown away by the quality of the production, the acting, the...

I still can't go into details here, but I wanted to give a little shout out. Pericles has been a great person to work with. I met him participating in the "On the Lot" competition. "LOOP" is premiering at FAIF on October 31st at 7:30 PM at the AMC Downtown Disney 12 Theaters in Los Angeles. I highly recommend anyone who is going to be there to go see this film. At least check it out online at:

http://faif2007.bside.com/?_view=_filmdetails&filmId=32395578

Additionally, if you want to hear a little true independent spirit, he was on blogtalkradio, interviewed by Jon Moody for "The Independent Corner." I had wanted to get this blog up before his live interview last night, but the wireless in my house was acting up and I haven't mastered my new iPhone quite yet (more on that later). Click on "The Pericles Lewnes Show:"

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/JonathanMoody

The poster below will take you to the the site for the film.

The Counter Girl Trilogy at The New York Film Festival

2007-09-21T10:03:00.000-06:00

I'm proud to announce that my short film series "The Counter Girl Trilogy" is being included in this year's official selection at the New York Film Festival. This is its U.S. debut (it's world debut was in London a little over a year ago).

It will be included in the "Views from the Avant-Garde" series in a program called "Bits and Pieces (Make up to Break Up)." The screening is at 6:15 pm on Sunday, October 7th at the Lincoln Center (Walter Reade Theatre) and I couldn't be happier with the company in which it will be shown! Some links are below:

The Bits and Pieces Program

The Entire Views from the Avant-Garde Series

The New York Film Festival Home Page

I've had the honor of seeing my films on this enormous screen before, so I'm really looking forward to being there. Also, due to the fact that Kodachrome has been discontinued, this might be one of my last Kodachrome prints!

Living with a Star

2007-09-19T11:06:00.000-06:00

This could be a shocking expose about life with a celebrity.

It's not.

It's actually the name of a group that studies the interactions between the sun and life on Earth, or space weather. Furthermore, it's a cool way for me to show you something... cool. Well, cool relative to the rest of its surroundings, anyway. It's actually pretty hot! The below movie clip is footage of a sunspot captured by the Japanese-launched Hinode (Sunrise) international spacecraft.

Sunspots are areas of relatively cool temperature on the surface of the sun. This is caused by intense magnetic activity, which inhibits convection (that up and down swirliness that you see in soup and coffee- among other things, I'm just kind of hungry right now). The exact details of how and why they happen is still an area of intense research in Physics.

Some have said that the footage looks like trilobites. Others have said it looks like cells. According to the article (if you click on the title to this blog, it will take you there- all of the titles of my blog entries are links, incidentally): "This movie is a magnetogram— a dynamic map tracing the sunspot's intense magnetism," Physicist Lika Guhathakurta explains. "Black represents negative (S) polarity, and white represents positive (N)."

I just think it's pretty cool! Enjoy!

To eat or not to eat...

2007-08-31T16:36:00.000-06:00

So, I've had a few people comment on/ask about my eating habits recently. Eating is one of those strange rituals we have as humans. It's an act that is necessary to our survival, yet we seem to take it to another level- it's social, it's a statement, and sometimes, it's even art. As Remy the rat (above) says in "Ratatouille," humans "don't just survive, they discover, they create...I mean, just look at what they do with food!"*

The first food question I get asked quite a bit is "you're vegetarian?" I'm often taken aback by how this surprises or bothers some people, but first, I shall italicize the inflections, because this can actually be three different questions:

"You're a vegetarian?" The "v" word. To many people, this is a bad thing. As if I am putting my life at risk by not eating the corpse of a rotting animal three times a day. Indeed, I am probably putting the lives of others at risk and keeping the entire American economy teetering because beef is not what's for dinner. Furthermore, I'm probably vocally political and annoying. Most likely, I will lecture you about the evils of Nike, scold you for having a goldfish bowl, or make you feel bad for liking "Transformers," rather than delighting in an obscure, heavily depressing documentary about how bad you should feel every day of your life for even existing.

In other words:

"You're a vegetarian?" As if I should "know better" or I just generally have a "meat eating" look about me.

In other words:

"You are a vegetarian?" Which brings me more to my point. This is asked by people who swear they have seen me eat meat at some point in time. Didn't I, that one time, eat a piece of steak? And didn't I, that other time, enjoy a bowl of steamed mussels with saffron sauce?

In other words:

Why yes, I did. In fact, when asked if I'm a vegetarian (which usually comes up only because I've ordered something with tofu or have asked someone to leave the ubiquitous "chicken" off of whatever dish), my answer is usually: no. I don't typically eat meat, but I "can." For the most part, I don't like it. It just doesn't appeal to me. It's not a black and white "decision" or a "statement." I also don’t care for cooked green bell peppers, but this doesn’t bother people as much as my distaste for pork.

(And for the record, while I do find that there are better shoe brands to choose from and do occasionally enjoy the obscure, depressing documentary, I loved "Trasformers" and have two fish bowls.)

This all began for me while I was living in Paris. I'd often see "beef" on the menu. Just like that- in quotes. "Steak" frites, for example. When I asked why this was the case in the less expensive restaurants, I was told that "beef" or "steak" usually meant "horse." I had a horse. I adored him. I also had a rabbit, which someone tried to force feed me at a fancy Parisian restaurant. Once, when my rabbit was cornered by my dog, it screamed. Yes, rabbits scream, and I remember it vividly. To me, eating horse or rabbit is the equivalent of eating my cats. Now, eating cat is generally thought to be taboo, but all of this made me wonder, why?

Why is it okay for us to abuse and cruelly slaughter one kind of animal and not another? When we hear about someone kicking a cat or beating a dog, most of us are horrified- indeed there are laws against it. The kind of cruelty animals raised for meat endure is unimaginable. They are usually malnourished or force-fed and many of them never even see the light of day. Chickens have their beaks broken off so that they don't fight in their close quarters, employees of slaughterhouses have been caught many times "playing" with the animals before boiling (to de-feather) and skinning them alive. Some of them aren’t even well enough to stand by the time they are brought to the slaughter house. If the image of a skinned, sick or crippled cow covered in blood and writhing in pain is not enough to make you think twice about that hamburger...

And that's all I ever ask anyone to do: think. If you're fine with all of that, so be it. As long as you have a reason other than "the commercials/news/my dad told me," I respect it whether I agree or not. We learn to tune so much out simply because it makes us uncomfortable. We in turn numb ourselves by overindulging in what we think makes us happy or getting angry at others for shattering our illusions. Our culture has a special place reserved on every plate for chicken, beef, or pork, but I don't think it always needs to be that way. I think the "fake" chicken nuggets taste just as good, if not better, than the dead ones. If everyone replaced that meat spot on their plate with a substitute just once a week, it would have a major impact on the environment and their health.

On that note, the other question I get asked is “how do you stay so thin?” Usually, this question is asked of me because I am eating French fries or chocolate cake.

That’s a far simpler answer than the vegetarian thing: I never diet. That being said, I also don't eat those things all the time. I think the best way to set yourself up for failure is to tell yourself you can’t do something. It turns that thing into something else... something "tempting" and "forbidden." Once it becomes that forbidden thing, it’s hard to get out of the habit of seeing food as a part of a battle. Then when we "give in," we give in good! We go way too far, eat way too much, and do it while feeling guilty or convincing ourselves that it’s what we really, really want or need to be happy. But what’s the point of eating, then, if it’s either mindless or torture? Just like with the vegetarian thing, I "can" eat French fries every day, but I find that I don’t actually want to. In the words of Anton Ego (yes, I’m quoting this film a lot- I adored it and it's about food, so back off!!!!) I stay thin because:

"I don’t like food, I love it. If I don’t love it, I don’t swallow!"

I simply try to make consuming food something I enjoy and savor rather than something that is easy, fast, indulgent, or can occupy my hands while I’m watching television or working. Last night, I ate a huge salad consisting of things that were grown right in my yard- fresh leaves of lettuce, green beans, bok choi, fresh herbs. It was more than food, it was an experience! It took me back to planting the seeds months ago and watching them sprout and grow.

(Peaches from a friend's peach tree)

When it comes to the food that I put in my body, I don't like just gulping something down mindlessly. I love to cook, I love flavor and ritual. To quote Remy again: "If you are what you eat, then I only want to eat the good stuff! " Whether that includes meat or French fries or not...

*If you have not seen this film, you are not allowed to read my blog until you do.

Brad Pitt's Secret Life

2007-08-14T08:35:00.000-06:00

Oh boy! Juicy Hollywood gossip! There's been talk lately about tensions arising between Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt. Much speculation exists over why this might be happening to this couple we know absolutely nothing about but who look cool and get their pictures taken wherever they go. Some of the theories are as follows: they fight over which democratic candidates they should support, which charity to donate money to, which horrific disease one of them has, who is cheating on whom, etc. (no, I didn't make any of those up.)

I'd like to propose a new theory. I have discovered that Brad Pitt has secretly been directing my favorite films:

When I first read this and saw the photo, I thought, "wow, that Brad Pitt is a pretty smart guy when it comes to animation!" Of course, everything made sense when I saw that it was not Brad PITT who said this, but Brad BIRD (who looks like this):

(Also known as "the one who won the Oscar," no offense, Mr. Pitt.)

I also feel that I should point out that Brad Bird neither directed nor wrote "Finding Nemo." That honor goes to Andrew Stanton. I got to "meet" both of these heroes of mine in L.A. last year when I drove out for the Screenwriter's Expo.

"Ratatouille" is quite easily the best film of the year, so far. That's my humble opinion and that only includes films that I have seen, but I have seen a lot, so... take that! Incidentally, if you are wondering what the worst is, in my opinion, I would have to give that award to "The Number 23."

Brad Bird has a habit of directing films that I love (damn him). He directed "The Iron Giant," which I've seen about a million times, and "The Incredibles" (see previous comment). He also worked on "The Simpsons" and created "Family Dog." Does anyone remember seeing "Family Dog?" If you do (and have fond memories of doing so), we should get ice cream. I loved that show.

I should start writing about films again. Ratatouille deserves more than just a blanket "it's awesome" review. Plus, I like coercing people into seeing movies that I love without resorting to "go rent 'The Iron Giant' or the bunny gets it!"

American Quilt Part 9- A Richley Woven Tapestry

2007-07-16T16:06:00.000-06:00

I concluded my story with a contemplative trip to the ghost town of St. Elmo. The drive there offered spectacular views of the collegiate peaks. I'm not sure which one was Mt. Princeton, but I imagine that one of them had to have been!

The ghost town itself had that essence of Americana that I actually enjoy, and I was glad to have visited.

This little town actually reminded me of Lars von Trier's film "Dogville." Luckily, there were no gangsters or crooked townsfolk (though the place is reportedly haunted by a crazy woman nicknamed "Dirty Annie"). Also, all of the buildings were real, not just chalk drawings on the floor. Incidentally, that was an excellent film. I was able to imagine the setting despite the film's lack of an actual set. It was an emotionally difficult film to watch, but brilliant (with a most satisfying ending).

I was amazed that people actually survived here in 1878. The place made me reflect upon the richness of the history of this country. I'm not talking about Abraham Lincoln and George Washington and other more obvious "patriotic" choices, but this seemed like the kind of spot Jack London would write about. This led my mind to weaving literary threads of Mark Twain, Herman Melville, Zora Neale Hurston, J.D. Salinger, Gertrude Stein (this list could go on for a while and I'd never be satisfied with it). I let my mind wander into the visual realms of American painters and filmmakers, photographers and sculptors... This is MY American history, the part of the culture that fascinates and fuels me. Unfortunately, it is the part that, without commercial zest, sports appeal, or military might, is marginalized by society.

I thought back on my adventures at the springs. I wondered if any of my subjects were aware that the strange, quiet girl sitting in the corner with her meatless meal and oddly-titled book was finding art, poetry, and comedy in their colorful vacation world.

American Quilt Part 8- Lloyd's Place

2007-07-06T15:32:00.000-06:00

I write this conclusion shortly after the July 4th festivities of this country. Traditionally, we gather in groups to celebrate our "freedom" by eating potato salad and hot dogs cooked over an open flame, drinking carbonated malt beverages, and then lighting explosives while inebriated.

For some reason, I wasn't in a festive mood. Perhaps it was the recent commutation of Scooter Libby's "unfair" punishment of a couple of years in prison (why did we freak out when Paris Hilton was allowed to serve the remainder of her sentence from home, resulting in her being thrown back in the slammer, yet this is somehow excusable- driving on a revoked driver's license is, I suppose, somehow more punishable than outing a CIA agent). Or maybe it was a friend's recent experience of having his Internet access at work censored, despite the fact that he is a web developer and needs access to such risqué sites as CNN and Google.

My point is that I can sometimes get irritated at the goings-on in this country that I call home. I get upset when "I'm an American" begins conjuring images of people behaving badly and loudly in restaurants and foreign countries, certain that only here can we drink beer and coke, buy a car and/or gun, vote, drag our country's flag behind our trucks, and not give a damn about any other place in the world that might not like these things. This results in the criticizing from behind a curtain of "patriotism" any citizen who finds this behavior appalling. "If you don't like it, leave," I've heard, as if disagreeing with the government is now unpatriotic, rather than the backbone of the Bill of Rights, or as if your home is akin to a football team that either kicks ass or loses and if you don't like they way they play you should uproot your entire way of life so that you don't spoil the fun of the game. This was the feeling I got from Mt. Princeton Hot Springs.

There are, however, times when "I'm an American" can actually mean something to me beyond what I say to the customs agent when traveling abroad. Arriving at Lloyd's Bed and Breakfast was one of those times.

My initial feelings about the place were mixed. I was looking forward to quiet. It seemed very small and peaceful. However, it came across as an odd mix of "military compound" and "vacation spot." The property was surrounded by a tall, unflattering chain-link fence and contained a man-made pond upon which sat a large plastic paddleboat shaped like a swan. A spotlight illuminated an American flag at the front entrance (reassuring me that I hadn't driven to Mexico or Peru- I was, in fact, still Stateside).

Despite the odd outside decor, I knew I was at least going to get some sleep. I parked my car and beeped the alarm, securing my chips and soda. To my surprise, I was immediately greeted by a smiling man in his slippers. He was soon joined by a woman in her bathrobe. Both of them welcomed me with open arms and offered to take my bags.

I was led through the entryway. It became clear that I was to be given the customary tour so that I could offer my approval of the place before accepting the room. This amused me. Quite frankly, a cot would have satisfied me at this point. I was, however, happy for the tour.

The hallway was decorated with oil paintings of Native Americans, black and white photos of trains, mining towns, and post offices, and various rusted tools that, unlike the random bits of junk that decorated the walls of the Mt. Princeton Resort Restaurant, seemed infused with history and importance. Of course, there were still dead animals on the wall, but they had a sternness to them. There was no faux happiness on their faces and their presence seemed purposefully haunting. These animals were hunted by the person who owned the place, not purchased at a flea market to fill an empty space on a wall.

I was led through the common room where the family sharing the bed and breakfast with me was playing a board game by the fireplace. I was introduced to my fellow vacationers who welcomed me and greeted me warmly.

"She says there were too many spring breakers down the street," the woman explained. My new housemates shook their heads. "Oh, that's too bad! What a way to ruin a vacation. We promise to be quiet, though."

I was led into my room. It was decorated with old furniture and smelled of fabric softener. I had two large widows, one with a view of the swan pond military compound, and the other with a breathtaking view of the collegiate peaks, which I was sure would light up as if they were on fire at sunrise. Most importantly, it had a large, clean, soft bed.

"Well? What do you think? I can give you the same rate as the place down the street if you want it for the night."

"For the night? I'll take it for the next three days!"

American Quilt Part 7- The Parting

2007-06-18T08:40:00.000-06:00

We now return to our regularly scheduled program:

I do not like being mean to people, but I will be, if necessary. Several times in my life, this has resulted in my being taken advantage of until I have had enough and scream at someone. This comes as such a shock to the people taking advantage that I am immediately labeled as a "bitch." As in, "man, I thought she was nice. Then she yelled at me for repeatedly hitting her in the head, even though that was fine last week. What a bitch, that bitch." And so forth.

Unfortunately, the one woman capable of giving me a refund was the only person who had been kind to me at all: Unfinished Sentences Woman. I tried to hold back my true feelings, knowing full well that she was not the one to blame, and having sobered up entirely from my earlier pint of wine. Still, I was very unhappy. When I approached the front desk, she was all smiles.

"Oh..." she happily began, clearly expecting me to praise the springs.
"Yeah, hi," I curtly replied. "Um... what are the chances of my checking out now and getting a refund?"
"Oh... are... um... oh...."
"This just isn't what I expected."
"Oh... I'm sorry... I... oh..."
"I was just expecting something a little more relaxing. It's like Mardi Gras down there."
"Oh... yes... it is spring break."
"Oh? I wasn't aware that this was a popular spring break destination."
"Oh... I... sure... I'm very sorry. Yes... we can give you a refund."

The fretting on her part continued, replacing my irritation at the situation with stomach turning guilt. Although I assured her that I would be fine to travel back to Boulder, she insisted on setting me up somewhere else in the vicinity. I just wanted to leave Mount Princeton as far behind me as possible, despite the fact that heading back to Boulder would involve my driving through the night. However, sleep did sound tempting and I could tell that it meant a lot to her to try to right the situation, so I let her.

She called Lloyd's Bed and Breakfast down the street. They just happened to have one open room, which they agreed to give me at a discount. After much apologizing, "umming" and "ohing," I parted ways with Unfinished Sentences woman and headed to Lloyd's. Well, I headed about two miles in the wrong direction. Then I headed to Lloyd's.

As I passed Mt. Princeton Hot Springs resort, I had to slow down and swerve around an object in the middle of the road. As my headlights illuminated the dark shape, I recognized it as a pair of swimming trunks. Somewhere on Mount Princeton, a naked teenager was streaking through the forest.

Why Haven't You Blogged?

2007-06-05T15:57:00.000-06:00

I'm asked. It's not that I don't want to. It's not that I don't care. I do. I think about blogging. I've just been working day and night on a new video project. More details later.

While I enjoy working on my films and videos, you know you have a problem when the last time you remember bathing, it was for a shot you needed:

Good thing blogs are scentless (though I did have the good scents (sic) to bathe recently).

And now, a series of behind-the-scenes candids shot by my talented neighbor, Geneva (who is working on a story with NPR about a time capsule car that she helped bury in 1957- it will be unearthed on the 15th of June):

Setting up the blue screen.

My partner, Carl Fuermann graciously filming me instead of working on his own video. Thanks, Twigs!

Everybody was Kung-Fu fighting! Okay, only me.

Then everybody was Kung-Fu stepping-on-a-rock-and-injuring-their-foot (soon to be a popular song)

So everybody was Kung-Fu dancing (because that doesn't involve pointy objects)!

I'm clearly Kung-Fu worried about something here, but I have no clue what that could be. Oh yeah:

"I shall fight this Pteradactyl flying down at me!" (or, "crap, the cat is in the tree again!")

Gratuitous action shot. Please note that none of this has anything to do with "real" Kung-Fu, which would be an embarrassment to the entire art form! I was just looking for "shapes" in front of the blue screen.

I do apologize that all of this came up in the middle of an epic tale- there are more hot springs antics to share...

In the meantime, here is a great blog to read:

The Heliocentric Pantheon: An Interview with Walter Murch

(Many thanks to Sam for sending this link to me.)

An American Quilt, Part 6- The Springs

2007-05-18T11:10:00.000-06:00

For those of you who might not be familiar with what a hot springs pool is, let me elucidate:

A spring is basically water that flows from the ground. Well a hot spring is just a spring that is produced by the emergence of geothermally-heated groundwater from the earth's crust. And a hot springs pool is just a collection of said water. Thank you, wikipedia.

What's the big deal? First of all, they are warm. It's kind of neat to sit outside in hot water when it's snowing. Secondly, they are thought to have healing powers. Because they are warm, they can hold a variety of dissolved minerals and elements, from lithium (mmm... mind bending) to sulfur (mmm... smelly). There's quite a bit of evidence to suggest that soaking in this mineral water can help with a variety of ailments, from stress (my ailment) to arthritis.

Even a monkey knows that!

To be fair, they can also hold a variety of bad things, such as the naegleria fowleri amoeba, which lives in warm waters and soils worldwide and can be a cause of meningitis. Several deaths have been attributed to this amoeba, which enters the brain through the nasal passages. Thanks again, wikipedia.

While the above is an extreme example, hot springs do kind of contain their own ecosystems. Time almost seems to stand still around them. Not only do the seasons not matter- I once watched a snake sunbathe in the dead of winter- but neither, it seems, does evolution. Ants the size of nickels march around the edges of the pools and dragonflies as big as grapefruits flit from palm frond to palm frond (and palms don't grow in Colorado). I digress.

I've had some great experiences with hot springs. Several times, I've visited the Orvis hot springs in Ridgeway, Colorado (a good ten hour drive). This is a "clothing-optional" facility (read: "nudy") where the water is perfectly warm and does not smell sulfurous and is chock-full of calming, soothing lithium. Massages are given in yurts and health is the word of the day.

And then there is Mount Princeton.

I was told that there were two options for hot springs soaking. The first option was the man-made pool, which I could see was crowded with children. The second option was to actually sit in the creek that ran alongside the resort. This was the option that appealed to me. There was something romantic about the idea of sitting in a warm river at the foot of the mountain. Plus, there was enough light for me to continue reading "Naked." Plus, I was still kind of drunk and was romanticizing just about everything.

I think "hillbilly" describes the situation more than "romantic." It suddenly dawned on me that I was essentially sitting in a warm, dirty puddle. This epiphany came about the same time that I realized that this place was apparently a hot spot (pun intended) for spring breakers (boy, this is just full of double entendres). I found this somewhat ironic, since it was also spring break at the university where I worked and the last thing I wanted to do was actually follow the students to a place where they felt they could be even louder than they are on campus.

Sex-crazed college students chased each other through the water (splashing, of course, my book). A group of guys was having a contest to see how far they could throw large boulders into the creek (splashing, of course, my book).

I decided to head to the man-made pool.

Let me take a moment to say here that I love kids. I adore them. But when a twelve year old does a belly flop five inches from my face and then emerges from the water to say "holy shit, ma! Did you see that belly flop I did?" To which "ma" replies, "yes, honey." I begin to find them less endearing.

The kids were on crack! They were kicking strangers, running around the pool, cannonballing everyone in the water, and ma did nothing while pa just rolled his eyes. I'm guessing that "yes, honey" might be a common response for ma.

"Ma! I have head lice."
"Yes, honey."

"Ma! Can I light the baby's diaper bag on fire?"
"Yes, honey."

Sitting in warm water in a pool full of kids makes one cringe a little. My idealism began sobering up. I decided to head back to the room and attempt to sleep. On my way back, I stopped by the front desk to ask if there is any chlorine in the water, wondering if it mattered one way or another. I stood by the desk and waited to ask my question. I waited. And I waited. You see, the towel boy was busy making out with his girlfriend.

I could empathize with my fellow travelers, sure. Yes, we like to party in America. We like to eat steak and drink beer and sit in restaurants with fake and/or dead versions of things stapled to the wall. We like to drive SUVs, RVs, wear stupid hats, have things our way and...

You know, I live here too! It was time for me to join in. I decided to exercise my right as an American to demand a refund...

We interrupt this story...

2007-05-18T10:46:00.001-06:00

...to bring you some sweet springtime images. The geese who live next to my office had babies recently. There's a family of four little goslings and one of an only child. These photos were all taken with the high end camera we just got (click on the images for the full-sized versions):

Ain't they just the cutest?
And a macro image of a flower, for good measure:

American Quilt, Part 5- Fine Dining

2007-05-14T11:23:00.000-06:00

A bad sign: "Do Not Play the Piano!"

I've hated this sign all my life- hated the fact that it is usually hanging on a piano. What else is a piano for, if not to play? They ought to stick a different sign on it: "Reduced to Furniture." This was the first thing I saw upon entering the restaurant.

The second thing I saw was a series of grotesque, stuffed animal carcasses, all of which were posed to look tame and smiling. I stood by the brass "Please Wait to be Seated" plaque and waited, staring at their vacant expressions. And I waited to be seated. And waited...

I finally grabbed my own menu and sat myself at the bar. Most menu items contained one or more forms of beef and cost $15 or more a plate, so I settled on a wine dinner. I asked for a wine list. Of course, there was no wine list. The waitress pointed at the bottles on the bar.

Now, I'm fine with cheap wine. Some cheap wines are very good. I try not to be a snob about such things, but when the fanciest wine on the menu is Kendall Jackson, you know you will not be drinking anything spectacular (and the dinner prices had given me false hopes). I pointed at "red" and she poured me a glass. And I mean a "glass." Think of a glass of water. Take the water out. Replace it with wine. It was a good 16 ounces of cheap, red wine! I'd never had a pint of wine before (though I can no longer say that). I happily lapped it up in an attempt to calm myself. I cracked open my new book and began reading.

David Sedaris is an amazing writer. He has a way of turning any awkward situation into a humorous, thoughtful, and touching story. Like I said- a perfect traveling companion for a vacation like this. My mind was in tune with his long before I opened the book. Opening the book helped, though. As did the wine.

Suddenly, I found my situation... charming. The smiling mountain lion on the mantle, propped (quite unnaturally) next to a fake fern was... sweet. The elk head, turned in a gaping smile, tongue wagging was... quaint. Why, even the curling iron plugged in by the cash register behind the bar made a quirky sort of sense! "Of course," I thought, "what better place to curl one's hair?"

My fellow diners with their screaming children suddenly endeared themselves to me. These people probably worked very hard for their vacation. We all work hard here in the U.S. of A. After we work hard and earn our vacations, we just want to go someplace where we can eat a fancy steak, let our kids run wild, and sit under the gazing eyes of a murdered animal. Not exactly my idea of "vacation," but I was happy for my fellow travelers. They seemed very satisfied (though to be fair, they probably weren't staying in one of the six remaining so-called poolside rooms). The family in front of me found it somehow... cultured to pass around the plastic toothpick dispenser after their meal. Their children crawled on the floor, moving from table to table in search of... something.

"Up, Mitchell! Up!" the mother commanded brightly, as if Mitchell was a pup in training.

High on wine and compassion, I walked out to the lobby where I would simply inform the woman behind the desk that my phone didn't work. She began every sentence by trailing off as if she'd hoped they would finish themselves.

"Oh! Oh... I'm... oh... so sorry... um..."
"Not a problem! I was just calling to complain about the dog next door..."
"Oh...oh..."
"No, no. It's okay, but I also wanted to book a massage. Can I do that from here?"
"Oh, yes! Yes, by all means. Oh..."

She offered me the phone. I smiled and took it from her, feeling guilty that I had mentioned the dog (she was clearly concerned), and called down to book my massage. The woman on the other line asked me if I wanted Carol or Sue. I said that I knew neither, but I'm sure that they were both just fine.

"But which one do you want?" she insisted. "I have to put you down for one or the other!"
"But all I know about them is their names," I replied, defensively.
"Fine. Nine A.M. with Carol."

And with that, she hung up. Just another odd employee, I'd guessed. In the back of my mind, I was somewhat fearful of what a massage was, if "customer service" was such a foreign concept. But I couldn't be bothered by that now. I was heading out to do what I came here for: soak in the hot springs! Surely that would melt away all of the day's headaches...

American Quilt, Part 4- The Arrival

2007-05-11T10:00:00.000-06:00

Tired and sore, I turned onto the winding road leading to the hot springs resort, eager for a nice, hot soak. My first view of the place took my breath away. Not because it was awe-inspiringly beautiful, but because I almost passed it, thinking it was a construction site. Actually, it kind of was.

A bit hesitant (I am NOT up to date on my tetanus shots), I exited my red Chevy... car thing, pushed the remote control buttons to announce to everyone that my car was LOCKED, so don't even think about stealing my snack foods, and approached the check-in desk.

The woman at the desk was very friendly and animated:

"Oh! Hi there. Checking in? How exciting! Oh! Let's see. Hmm. Oh. So, I see... you are upgrading to our cliff side room on Sunday? Oh. Um. Oh. Okay. That will be nice. The pool side rooms haven't... really ... been upgraded yet. It's too bad you can't stay in our cliff side room all weekend. The pool side rooms really aren't as nice. You will love it, though! Oh, and check out time is eleven o'clock, but you won't be able to check back in until three, but I'm sure you can find something to do for that time. So. Okay!"

I signed some papers, followed her finger across the map (ice machine, pools, rooms, restaurant...), and collected my room key. I returned to my car and drove to my room.

I wouldn't exactly place this getaway spot in the "spa resort" category. I would place it more in the "motel" category. In a further sub-category, I would identify it as "the kind where bad things happen to people." I've been to spas. You get to walk around in a bathrobe and slippers all day and breathe in the scents of eucalyptus and chamomile. I've also been to crappy motels. You sleep fully clothed and hold your breath when walking past certain "stained" parts of the room so as not to breathe in the toxic mold spores. This was clearly the latter.

Although I had requested a non-smoking room, I could tell that "no smoking" was a fairly recent rule, enforced, perhaps, sometime in the eighties. I determined this from the scent and color of the 1950's wallpaper that was peeling off of the wall. "You're here for the hot springs," I reminded myself, "not the room."

I'm a pretty happy-go-lucky gal, so I let it go. I began unpacking my bags and said hello to my neighbors who were on their way out. I actually found the motel to be somewhat charming- one of those old "Americana" type places sprung straight from the pages of "Lolita" or the frames of "Psycho." You know, a family place? My neighbors even had an old hound dog in their room...

...who immediately began baying when its owners drove off.

"Okay, okay," I thought. "This is not a problem. You brought your entire MP3 collection with in-the-ear headphones and foam ear plugs for sleeping." My getaway had suddenly degraded from "relaxing at a hot springs spa resort getaway" to "hiding in a dirty motel room with crap stuffed in my ears." I tried watching the television (the only nice thing in the room) to drown out the noise. Despite the fact that I was watching one of the loudest scenes from "Zathura" (very good movie), I could still hear the dog. I turned the television off.

"I'll schedule a massage," I thought. "And while I'm at it, I will inform the front desk of the dog." I picked up the phone and dialed the front desk. Nothing. I hung up. Picked it up again. No dial tone. I did the "trick" (which never seems to work) of rapidly pushing the little button that hangs the phone up. Nothing. No phone.

Okay. Fine. I will just drive back down to the main desk. I was eager to begin a new book ("Naked" by David Sedaris, which turned out to be perfect for this trip) and have a glass of wine, so I figured I would just grab dinner while I was down there. I opened the door to leave my room, and for the first time, really took in my surroundings:

Kids ran wildly around the campground, music blasted from most of the rooms, construction workers yelled on cell phones (very spotty service up there at 12,000 feet), and the water slide that the happy young lad surfed down on the web site was in pieces, all of which were strewn about in a field in front of my room. The pool (which my room was apparently "aside") was just a concrete hole. I held out hope that the cliff side room would be better.

"You're here for the hot springs... You're here for the hot springs..."

American Quilt, Part 3- Pit Stop in South Park

2007-05-10T09:56:00.000-06:00

I drove through South Park to get to the hot springs. This is neither as cool nor as funny as one might imagine. There is nothing particularly exciting about the real-life town aside from its name, and most of its inhabitants (from what I could tell) weren't very geometrical or funny and didn't speak in strange voices.

In fact, I took a photo, but was driving through rather quickly, so I didn't get a chance to focus on anything. Still, I've looked at it and I see nothing strange, funny, or copyright infringing about it (click to enlarge):

American Quilt, Part 2- Getting There

2007-05-09T11:37:00.000-06:00

(in stupid blog style- part one is beneath this post, so scroll down if you haven't read it)

Because I am a member of Mensa, I get a significant discount on car rentals. I'm not sure exactly how this relationship works, but I'll take it. Mount Princeton is a good two and a half hour drive from Boulder and I didn't want to leave my significant other without a car for the weekend.

I arrived at the Millennium Harvest House Hotel, eager to pick up my car. There is something exhilarating about renting a car. It is one small way a person like myself, who would spend $20,000 on film stock before buying a new car, can participate in the excitement of American consumerism. For a mere $40, I get an entire weekend of "owning" a new car, with all of its smells and none of its monthly payments. To boot, they even gave me an American car! A red one with a remote control to lock the doors, beep the horn and flash the lights!

But before I got my car, I got a little sidetracked at the hotel. The signage for the car rental company led me to a dead end. I had to make my way back to the front lobby. I suddenly found myself at the annual regional sewage conference (ahem, I mean water and wastewater plant operations conference). As if this wasn't funny enough in and of itself, it just so happened that I had helped design their web site just a month prior. While it was tempting to sit in on "Why Chlorine?" "Biosolids," "Advanced Activated Sludge," and the other tantalizing classes I had fantasized about while updating their web content, I had a date with a swanky hot spring resort and didn't want to sully it with memories of sewage (for those who have never been to a hot spring, most of them smell like sulfur).

I eventually found the car rental booth, and before I could say "limited liability," I was on the road. I made a brief stop at a local Target to buy an adapter for my MP3 player (the radio doesn't work very well in the mountains), fully intending to exchange it for a set of knives upon my return. "It didn't work," I'd lie, "but I do need a new set of kitchen knives."

About 15 minutes into my trip, I sadly realized that I would not have to lie. It didn't work. It worked better than the radio, but it wasn't the experience I had been hoping for. Without the music to drown out my voice, it became painfully obvious to me that I knew very few of the lyrics to Beck's new album. "When the in-for-mation comes you'll know from the bacon!" is most likely not what he's singing.

This was not the road trip of my dreams. It wasn't even as pleasant as the road trips of my past. My bag of chips exploded due to the change in altitude, causing me to scream and swerve before realizing that I had neither a flat tire nor a gunman in the back seat (but pathetically, this almost ALWAYS happens to me on road trips- someday I will learn to open all of the bags before ascending). Despite the slick sexiness of my brand new car, I never seemed to be going fast enough to satisfy the other drivers on the road. Junk food and cans of Red Bull were flying through my car with every dangerous mountain turn, but my fellow drivers were still passing me left and right. There must be some unknown law of Physics that I do not grasp. Or maybe they were just using cup holders.

One thing was certain: they all had big cars. Vacationers like myself stuck out like a sore thumb here in rancher country. We were all driving cars, minivans or VW buses. The locals had SUVs and trucks. "Heavy duty" and "super duty" were two silver decals I saw passing me on many occasions. Saying "super duty" out loud always makes me giggle and consider proposing a new course for the wastewater conference. But I'd never tell them that...

American Quilt, Part 1- Reservations

2007-05-08T08:44:00.000-06:00

So a few weeks ago, I decided to take a four-day weekend and spend some quiet time in the mountains. I eventually got my wish (more or less), but the path leading up to it was pretty damn funny, so I thought I would share it here:

Like many adventures of our time, it all started with a web search. A search for "hot spring resort colorado" yielded several results. After sorting through the reviews, clicking on web site images, and comparing prices and distances, I chose "Mt. Princeton Hot Springs Resort." Their web site featured pictures of a happy lad of nine or ten, joyfully slipping down a hot springs water slide, glistening bare backs of pronate women receiving luxurious massage services, clean, well-lit bedrooms overlooking the mountains, and happy couples enjoying brunch on a wood deck. Perfect.

One day before my departure, I received a phone call from Mt. Princeton resort. The woman on the line informed me that there was a slight problem with my reservation. "You chose the poolside room for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday nights," she questioningly scolded, "but the room is scheduled to be remodeled on Sunday."

I apologized and informed her that I didn't consciously pick a "poolside room" and would be happy to change my selection. I simply took what the web site offered. She responded by informing me that there were no more rooms in my price range and suggested that I either cut my vacation short by one day or pay to upgrade my room to one of the "cliffside rooms."

Annoyed, I told her that I appreciated her suggestions, but the option that seemed best to me was that the hotel give me an upgraded room, free of charge, or shove it (though not quite using those words). After all, they were the ones who both chose my room and scheduled it for remodeling. After much sighing, she told me that she would "get back to me" after she spoke with her manager to see what they could do.

Two hours later (I guess it was a tough decision), the woman called me back and told me that I would need to switch rooms in the middle of the weekend because they were overbooked and couldn't find a room that would be available for the duration of my stay. While the prospect of packing and unpacking four times in as many days did not seem appealing to me, I reminded myself that my real reason for going was the hot springs, not the room, and accepted her offer.

I should have taken this as an indication of things to come, but at the time, it seemed like a small snag. Perhaps the woman who called me was just a little... untrained in customer service techniques? How was I to have known that my resort getaway was secretly planned out by John Hughes?

Yet another competition

2007-05-02T10:36:00.000-06:00

But this one is really cool! This is one that I actually hope I win and have no reservations about entering. Bjork's new album, Volta, comes out next week. I'm excited for a variety of reasons. The first reason is that I always look forward to a new Bjork album. She is one of my favorite musicians. The second reason is that I have front row, center tickets to her concert at Red Rocks. The third reason is that she is hosting a music video contest for one of her songs: Innocence!

Apparently, she will hand pick the winner. If I had to imagine a musical counterpart to my visual rhythms, Bjork would be at the top of my list! Here's hoping she might feel the same way...

Oh, to hear the song, you can visit my MySpace page. Or Bjork's.

Sexy Back

2007-04-30T09:21:00.000-06:00

I just downloaded "Sexy Back" by Justin Timberlake.

Does that make me a bad person?

Polymer

2007-04-26T17:07:00.000-06:00

Polymer was a sort of chain mail/penpal film. Carl Fuermann and I began sending a high-resolution image back and forth, each one modifying it before returning it to the other. We then used each image as a frame of film and recorded it out to 16mm film. It's only 30 seconds long, so make sure you are paying attention! When it played at the New York Film Festival, the lights hadn't even dimmed fully before the film was over!

If you'd rather see the film in flash video format, go to Polymer on blip.tv

Sweet Intuition - Part 2

2007-04-12T20:04:00.000-06:00

This second part consists of about 7200 16mm frames of the film "Amelie" (a more "professional" romantic fairytale view of Paris, but a parallel one).

Each frame was cut out, stacked in order, placed in bundles of 24, labeled and then individually re-pasted (in order) on strips of 35mm film that had been flashed with colored lights and scratched. These strips hung in my lab for two days while the glue dried, then they were spliced together to form the complete five minute film below.

This film celebrated an anniversary of sorts this last Saturday. I participated, in my way, in my friend's annual all-night meditation. I stayed up until 5:00 AM cutting my 16mm frames in my own quasi-meditation.

Click on the above image to see the quicktime movie or go to Sweet Intuition on blip.tv for the flash video version.

Sweet Intuition- Part I

2007-04-11T16:10:00.000-06:00

This was a labor of love. I say that for many reasons- romantic, obsessive, blind, sentimental- but I will leave out the personal reasons and focus on the technical for now! I split this film into two parts and I'm sharing them one at a time. It would be too long, otherwise.

Part One (below) consists of Super-8mm footage I shot in Paris. Part Two will eventually be above this one. I'm not fond of this method of blogging organization, by the way. It gets quite annoying when one wants to continue a thought at a later time and can't do so fluidly without directing readers to the post just below it. It's almost like starting a book with the last chapter and asking the reader to skip to the end and read from the back. I digress.

The film is a reflection on romance. The setting is Paris (bien sûr). This first part is a fairytale daydream view of the City of Lights- complete with Eifel Tower and carousel! The second will come tomorrow...

Click the image above to watch in Quicktime, or you can see the film in flash video by going to Sweet Intuition at blip.tv To be continued...

Guest Vlogger- Jason Bortz and "Taxi Ride"

2007-04-05T12:42:00.000-06:00

Blog, meet Jason, Jason, blog.

Jason Bortz is a guest filmmaker here today. Like me, he entered one of his films in the On the Lot competition (and like me, got nuthin'). I've decided to post one of his videos here today because, well, I just like it!

I'm a huge Tori Amos fan (we share a birthday and a love of pianos, among other things). Below is Jason's submission to a competition Tori (well, officially Sony) was hosting for filmmakers to make a video for her song "Taxi Ride." Jason's video made it to the top nine!

Click the image below to watch the film and the link on the side (or above) to see his other works:

Yang T'ai Chi

2007-03-28T16:54:00.000-06:00

A sketch I did in my all day class. The instructor told many colorful stories while we sat and listened.

My day... (an ellipses kind of day)

2007-03-26T15:13:00.000-06:00

It's an ellipses kind of day. You know, it's not a good day. It's not a bad day. It's just...

An emotion undefined by words. It can only be summed up with three little dots...

So much can fit into those little dots...

It's not that I'm sad. I'm just...

I'm not overly happy, either- just kind of...

Hmm...

More films are coming...

The Galilean Satellites- Callisto!

2007-03-21T14:50:00.000-06:00

Finally! I feel so neglectful of poor little Callisto. I got my firewire cable in the mail on Monday and re-rendered Callisto last night.

Callisto is the final film in The Galilean Satellites series. She is silent. This film was complete magic toward the end. I had not quite expected the results that I got, but I was awed by them.

Callisto is also one of the most heavily cratered bodies in the solar system. Jupiter's gravity attracts comets, meteoroids, and other objects and Callisto, being far away and tectonically inactive, bears thousands of years worth of battle scars. She also has the lowest density of the Galilean Satellites and it is thought that there might be an ocean beneath her rocky crust.

The imagery consists of liquid crystal paints and rubbing alcohol (like I said, magic). Enjoy:

Click on the above image to watch the film in Quicktime or go to Callisto on blip.tv to see the film in flash video format. Click on the title of this post if you would like to know more about the film.

You would think a thing would be easy...

2007-03-15T11:24:00.000-06:00

...until you find that you have no cables that work with any of the equipment that you have (despite the fact that you have a lot of cables).

In the meantime, you can check out my famous neighbor's pictures that made it onto the local news! That's our house behind the deer!

If you can't be a famous artist, become the muse of a famous artist. Or at least the neighbor.

Poor little Callisto...

2007-02-22T15:07:00.000-07:00

...experiencing technical difficulties. Where did Callisto go? My original file is gone! :(

(Non video types, skip to the end of this paragraph) I'm trying to get the digital recording from the betacam back online. I copied it to a digital 8mm tape, but got rid of that camera, so I can't recapture the video. I ordered a digital 8 camera from ebay but wound up with... a camera that records to DVDs? Not at all what I need. There, nerd talk over.

I FINALLY have the camera now and plan to get that and other neglected videos back online (including one that didn't even make it onto the DVD). In the meantime, I will shamelessly plug myself here:

Come vote for Snowbird on "The Lot!" http://films.thelot.com/films/28908

"Wait," you ask, "didn't I already vote for this film once?"

Well, how would I know? Who are you? And how in the world did you just type that above?

Yes, this film is up on the IFC, and yes, I begged my blog viewership to go and vote for it there (that's right, all ten of you- according to feedburner statistics, anyway). BUT this time, I might win $1 million development from Steven Spielberg to make my first feature AND I would be on the equivalent of American Idol for filmmakers. Just think about it, you could be watching TV and saying, "wow! I actually know that very sad, sad person!!"

Plus, there is now a 45 second introduction before the film that includes drawings and a moving, talking me (unlike the stationary me in the upper right who just produces text).

Okay, you have been sufficiently coerced. End transmission...

The Galilean Satellites- Ganymede

2007-02-13T10:27:00.000-07:00

If Europa could be considered the "audience favorite" of my films, Ganymede would have to be her cute little brother.

This is the third film in The Galilean Satellites series. It is quite a bit shorter than the previous two, but was easily the hardest of the series to make (easily the hardest- bad English, I know, but funny enough for me to leave it there).

The imagery is both digital and film in origin. The opening sequence of photographs consists of digital images taken by the Galileo probe that visited Jupiter recently. The film imagery is clear 16mm film leader that has been scratched, pitted, twisted and bent to refract the polarized light.

The soundtrack consists of radio signals received from the moon's ionosphere. Unlike the previous two films, however, I have not manipulated this sound in any way. In fact, you can hear Ganymede's voice on the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's page.

This film tries to capture the essence of Ganymede, who, like his sisters, is pulled and pushed by the tidal forces of Jupiter and the other moons (sibling rivalry...even the planets and Greek deities suffer from it).

Click on the above image to watch the film in Quicktime or go to Ganymede on blip.tv to see the film in flash video format. Click on the title of this post if you would like to know more about the film.

The Galilean Satellites- Io

2007-02-07T16:57:00.000-07:00

This is the second film in The Galilean Satellites series. It is an artistic study of the wrenching and twisting of Jupiter's volcanic moon, Io.

This film is quite a bit longer than the others. It is also what I feel to be the "scariest" film I've ever made. The soundtrack consists of stretched and manipulated radio emissions from Io's ionosphere, while the image consists of various objects that I'm twisting and pulling in polarized light.

Io is constantly pulled and pushed upon by her sister moons and the immense gravity of Jupiter. This film probes into the beauty of turmoil. Io is the most volcanically active body in the solar system, and is actually the hottest body in the solar system, outside of the sun (which reminds me of that Groucho Marx quote: "Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog, it's too dark to read").

Again, imagine this quite a bit bigger than it actually is. Much of my work is meant to be seen on a very large scale. I have wanted to project this particular film around an entire room as an installation.

It was originally shot on 16mm film and is a sound piece:

Click on the above image to watch the quicktime, or go to Io on blip.tv to watch it in Flash video. Click on the title of this post to learn more about the film.

The Galilean Satellites: Europa

2007-02-03T21:57:00.000-07:00

This is the first in a four-part series of films dedicated to legendary filmmaker and friend, Stan Brakhage. It is also dedicated to a group of filmmakers with whom I shared orbit around the massive scope of Brakhage's work.

This has been the "audience favorite" of my works so far- at least, it has traveled around the world to all sorts of festivals and gotten great feedback (though the New York Times called it both one of the "most ambitious" films in its program as well as "relentlessly abstract." I'm not quite sure how to take the latter, but every artist knows that "ambitious" feels like a blow-off. I digress...)

As such, I am a bit reluctant to post it online, where it will be seen at 1/100th of its intended size, with resampled sound and dropped frames. Still, I'm reaching out into the volgosphere! It will be traveling around the country soon, so perhaps it might inspire a few souls to go see it when it comes to town (more details as they become available).

It is a 16mm sound film that imagines the icy hatched-marked world of Jupiter's moon, Europa. The soundtrack consists of recordings from several probes that visited the moon (specifically, the "sounds" are coming from the atmosphere of Jupiter), as well as whale songs- an imagining of the possible life beneath the icy surface. The imagery combines hand-painted liquid crystals and Super-8mm footage from a local aquarium (hooray for (now extinct) Kodachrome).

Click on the image above to watch the film (in quicktime or go to Europa on Blip.tv for the flash video- I am slowly working on adding other formats as well).

Ether Twist

2007-01-30T15:09:00.000-07:00

Back on track!

Now, for the next film in my one-woman show: "Ether Twist." This film has sound! It's strange and quiet, but it's there...

Sounds from very low frequency (VLF) radio emissions make up the soundtrack to this film. These sounds include aurorae, solar flares, lightning and other electromagnetic phenomena that affect the Earth's ionosphere. The imagery is composed of various pieces of transparent plastics (try to guess what some of them are- you might be surprised) whose colors are revealed through polarized light. Neither the sound nor the image would be detectable if it weren't for careful manipulation of electromagnetic waves.

Many thanks to Stephen P. McGreevy for recording the incredible VLF sounds and allowing me to use them. This is a rather large file- the film is about 10 minutes long.

(Click on the image to play the quicktime movie- with sound!)

Footnotes: Ether (or Aether) was once considered to be quintessence, or the "fifth element." It was thought the be the medium through which light waves (indeed, all energy) traveled. It has since been dropped from the world of scientific thought and is considered to be, well, more...ethereal (not sure if that can qualify as a pun, but it was intended). It is considered to be the unifying energy for all living spirits in Wicca and some other religions.

The film title owes its existance to lyrics in the Tori Amos song, "Suede:"

i'm sure that you've been briefed
my absorption lines
they are frayed
and i fear
my fear is greater than my faith
but i walk the missionary way
you always felt like suede
there are days i am your twin
peekaboo
hiding underneath your skin
jets
are revving yes revving from
an ether twist
call me 'evil'
call me 'tide is on your side'
anything you want

I connected with these lyrics instantly, but really keyed in on the phrase "ether twist." The liquid crystal materials I use do a sort of "ether twist." By twisting (refracting) the direction of the light waves at different wavelengths (colors), the bland, transparent plastics become vibrant, colored light sources.

Mid-winter Blues

2007-01-26T15:06:00.000-07:00

the days are getting longer and the days are getting longer
yet the hyacinth clouds of mid-winter still brush the mountain peaks
far too low, far too early for sleep, yet far too late for light

In other words, I haven't been able to find the time to get the rest of my films online! Veuillez patienter...

Snowbird

2007-01-23T17:04:00.000-07:00

This is a short film that I originally shot on 16mm. It is my first "narrative" film (well, apart from "Exploding Science Lab III" from my early days as a filmmaker). The film was shot in New York State at the end of 2003 and didn't get finished until just recently (though a rough copy of it played in the Short Film Corner at the Cannes Festival Market in 2004). The film stars Perry Daniel and was shot by Carl Fuermann (and hey, this one has sound!)

The above link takes you to the IFC Media Lab. If you like it, give me a vote. If not... well, maybe just make a graceful exit (don't "single-star" me- I'm beggin' ya! Think of the ducks!)

If you'd rather not deal with the stress (or you are a chronic "single-starrer"), but would still like to see the film, go on over to Snowbird on blip.tv where it plays just the same!

Special Features Section: Perry is sitting in front of the reservoir that supplies New York City with its drinking water. Needless to say, when the sun went down we were harassed by both the local Police and the Feds for our "suspicious" activities! On top of all of this, it turned out that the car we had borrowed from a friend was recorded as having been impounded but never released. Translation: as far as they were concerned, we were driving a stolen car and up to no good. Oh, and they also suspected that our bottle of water was actually a bottle of vodka (Absolut and Smart Water have similar bottle designs). We managed to clear everything up, though. The Police were actually very friendly and let us finish filming- with a stern warning that if we crossed over the guardrail, they would "turn us over" to the Feds!

In the House of Equal and Opposite Reaction

2007-01-22T16:51:00.000-07:00

My apologies- I slacked over the weekend!

The next film in my series is not an easy one to watch, I must warn you. It juxtaposes a moment of pure joy with one of horror. While there is no up-close imagery of violence or bloodshed, it captures one such moment from a distance- the burning of the World Trade Center towers before their collapse. I felt it necessary to warn any readers who might not want to relive the moment in images (I often fall into that category myself).

(Again, this film is silent. Originally shot on black & white super-8 film.)

Click the above image to watch the film. For more information on this particular piece, please visit the link in the title.

Munkphilm

2007-01-19T15:46:00.000-07:00

"Munphilm" came to me through a dream:

I had a great job working with the orcas at a monastery (yes, a monastery with killer whales- what?) I swam with them at night, which was quite frightening. I couldn't see them approaching me and suddenly, my body would lurch through the water. I would find myself tumbling through the air and plunging down to the bottom of the pool... luckily, we can do things like this in a dream and not drown!

One morning, a monk approached me. He handed me a toothbrush and told me to clean the orca pool, brush stroke by brush stroke. I took this duty and found that just as I had made a complete circle around the entirety of the pool, algae began appearing at my starting point. My day became an endless circle of the minutiae of whale care!

The monk in the dream was my friend Phil (hence the title). In this film, I try to explore yin and yang- depth, mystery and darkness interrupted by cuts of smooth, metallic vibrancy (note: you guessed it, this film is also silent - there will be sound in later films, but aren't you glad you don't have to turn the volume down at work?)

Snow Flukes

2007-01-18T16:07:00.000-07:00

Next up: "Snow Flukes"

I'm going a little bit out of sequence, but this was the next video that I felt like publishing. This is "Snow Flukes." I happened upon this 16mm silhouette footage several years ago. I was told that the artist who drew the cartoons was Otto Messmer (Felix the Cat) and that the skater is Dorothy Hamill, but I'm not sure. All of my searching has turned up very little on this little film.

I'm glad I have breathed some new life into it (and I always credit Otto and have never made a cent off of it- I'm really not sure if this footage ever fell into the public domain). The "psychedelic" background is shrink wrap and the skater is made of the same liquid crystal paint that went into "The Light Touch Dust Nebula" (ah, that's probably why I felt like following it with this video). I really love the fact that a paint activated by heat can be made to look like snow (note: this film is also silent):

Click the image to open the video. For more information about this film, click the title to this post.

Art in Science/Science in Art

2007-01-18T11:08:00.000-07:00

I briefly interrupt my film show to announce that tonight is the opening of the Art in Science | Science in Art show at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science (DMNS). Yours truly was lucky enough to have a piece chosen for this show (which will be traveling- I will announce venues when they become available) as well as two pieces for the online show.

I was interested in how many of the finalists also worked with polarized media. I can't wait to see some of these pieces "up close." I felt that the competition was somewhat slanted more toward "Art in Science" than "Science in Art" (I think I fall into the latter category), but there are some really amazing pieces (such as this one, below, by Marshall Dines).

In this piece, the artist injected "cells" of bubble wrap with paint.

The Light Touch Dust Nebula

2007-01-17T16:33:00.000-07:00

As you can tell, I have been playing with the look of my blog. Please don't hesitate to leave comments if you find that it doesn't perform well for you.

My second film, made as Gossamer Conglomerate's twin, is "The Light Touch Dust Nebula." Click on the image below to watch (note- this film is silent):

This film was made by applying thermotropic (changing with heat) paints to decayed film leader and filming the result before the heat of the projector lamp. The color of the paints changes from red to blue with heat. These are the same paints found in mood rings. For more information about this film, please click on the link in the title of this post.

Gossamer Conglomerate

2007-01-16T16:11:00.000-07:00

Now that I have my technical wires uncrossed, I plan to post one of my 16mm films here every day for the next few weeks. Although the compression looks much better than I thought it would, I do have to take a moment to say that this is not the preferred format for my films. They are best seen in their original 16mm format in a darkened theatre.

Well, not all of us live near an experimental film venue, nor do we have finances at our disposal to rent film prints from places like Canyon Cinema, The Film-maker's Coop, CFMDC (Canadian films) Light Cone, or Le Collectif Jeune Cinéma (though you can click on any of these if you do- they have many great films in their collections). I decided to make my films available online, too. You can also subscribe to my podcast (you'll need iTunes) or check out my blip.tv channel.

Okay, enough. Here is my first film, "Gossamer Conglomerate" (click the image to play- note: this film is silent):

This film was made by filming cuts of splicing tape placed upon decayed film through polarized filters. Click on the title of this post if you want to know more.

Chicken Little and the Notion of God

2007-01-11T16:31:00.000-07:00

Well, Colorado is in for another storm. Earlier this week, I awoke to winds so strong my ears were hurting from the change in pressure. Today, the temperature has plummeted 20 degrees (Fahrenheit) since this morning and is going to keep dropping as an Arctic front moves through the region this weekend.

Don't get me wrong. I love weather phenomena. I used to chase tornadoes when I was a teenager. In fact, one of my favorite cable channels was The Weather Channel. I am a weather geek, but boy, I'm getting sick of being indoors! I guess I prefer my storms to be a little faster...

(From my film "Petrichor." Click image or link to play Quicktime.)

There have been some interesting things falling from (or through or beyond) the sky lately, and I wanted to comment on some of them.

First of all, the weather has put me in a pensive mood. I recently recalled going through bouts of insomnia as a kid. I was absolutely terrified of aliens (if you read my posts below about my early fears, you will understand this). One year my brother and I both got cable television in our bedrooms as a Christmas gift (woo hoo- a kid's dream come true). I found that watching the Weather Channel was the only thing that helped me sleep. While I will acknowledge that the lack of action-packed story lines at 2:00AM might have contributed to this, I must also add that I felt an odd sense of security knowing that I wasn't the only one awake in the world. I think it also comforted me somehow to know that satellites were monitoring the Earth's atmosphere. I thought that if there were UFOs, surely the National Weather Service would see them and alert us all (or at least the person standing in front of the weather map, appearing to hover above us all from his Star Trek Enterprise-like view in the television studio). In a sense, it was almost like verifying God's existence on a physical level: I was being watched from above by wiser forces...

Of course, that was before I learned that the National Weather Service would likely do everything in its power to keep UFO information from us (and that those watching me from above are neither gods nor wiser humans)! Additionally, I'm not so sure how safe I feel anymore knowing that there is a bunch of bus-sized space junk floating around over our heads. This sense of unease was confirmed early this week as a "Russian rocket body" fell through the Colorado skies at 6:15 in the morning. I'm sorry I don't have a photo. Most of the images were taken by local news traffic helicopters, so they have a monopoly on the images. I HIGHLY encourage you to click on the link and watch this clip, though- it is incredible.

It is also an incredible example of media stupidity. Thankfully, the video above is silent. When the clip was first released, the news media were calling it a "meteor shower," saying that it was the Quadrantid meteor shower. They then went on to say that the shower is named after an "extinct" constellation. Well, I wrote my first angry "letter to the editor" (I think this is a sign of aging- the older we get the more letters we end up writing).

First of all, I wish meteor showers looked like this! This is clearly something bizarre. From my first viewing of it, I knew it was not a natural object- it was too scattered. It would be highly unlikely that a solid, dense meteor that large would break up in that way. Additionally, it looks a lot like the footage of space shuttle Columbia when it exploded in the atmosphere.

Secondly, there is no such thing as an "extinct" constellation. Yes, the Quadrans Muralis constellation is obsolete, but it didn't go extinct! With the exception of a handful of supernovae, the stars have remained pretty much fixed throughout recorded history! I digress...

Well, I got a response and the web site, at least, was updated. Turns out a Russian rocket body fell from the sky, Chicken Little. Strange how it took NORAD five hours to identify the object, yet they were quick to say that they knew it was coming all along and that we really shouldn't find such a thing remarkable. Huh...

In related...news...I was tickled to hear this NPR report on a UFO sighting at Chicago's O'Hare airport (here is the interviewee's report, as well). Their story pretty much sums it up. Strange!

Tonight I will be missing one of the brightest comets in 30 years: comet McNaught. I encourage anyone in the Northern Hemisphere with a clear view of the Western horizon to take a look right at sunset. I've heard it's spectacular! I've tried to see it several times now, but each attempt has been thwarted by either mountains, bad timing, or dense cloud cover. Damn! I even dreamt about it last night. I don't have a camera in my dreams (well, at least not one that will let me share images in this reality...yet), so I will close this lengthy post with another video clip from my storm chasing video "Petrichor." This one is silent:

Click the image to view the quicktime movie.

Okay! Enough snow, already!

2007-01-05T13:43:00.000-07:00

I haven't been able to do much of anything lately. One week after the first snow, Boulder was hit with THREE new blizzards that left over one foot of ADDITIONAL snow. Snow is piled up in parking lots in hills so large you could ski down them (this is NOT an exaggeration- people are actually skiing and snowboarding down them).

Now we are being hit with yet ANOTHER storm! This one is expected to dump an additional 12-18" on Boulder (that's on top of the foot that was already there from these last storms). The University has been either closed early or closed entirely an unprecedented FIVE times in three weeks. Needless to say, the new job I started three weeks ago has been the easiest I've ever had...

The thrill is gone (no more snowrkeling), and now it's time for some quiet contemplation. Many of these images look better in a larger size. You can download large pics from my flickr page.

First of all, some fractals of nature:

Icicles:

Falling Snow:

And in the darkness:

34 Inches in Boulder!!!

2006-12-22T16:09:00.000-07:00

For the first time in years, we actually got a snow day at the University of Colorado! The plains region was hit by a massive snow storm that dumped almost three feet of snow on Boulder in less than 24 hours!

My little cat wandered out, and although she had seen snow before, she was not prepared for the mounds that surrounded her:

I found that the snow put me in a variety of different moods.

Contemplative:

Artistic:

Um... "Other:"

The full story on that one can be found here:

"Snowrkeling"

How do people keep up?

2006-12-08T09:49:00.000-07:00

I've been so neglectful of my little blog! I sometimes wonder how people keep up. I've been through the hell of trying to find a new job lately, but my work has finally paid off: I just got a great new job as a web developer!
To get it, though, I had to put myself through computer programming boot camp- learning and "reminding" myself of all of the different languages out there.

I had a great line of defense, though. I figured that if anyone asked me a question to which I had no answer I would just grin sheepishly and state, "I'm in Mensa."
Luckily, I didn't have to resort to such tactics. It turned out that all I had to do was be myself. They were more interested in my creative side (especially the film work).

I pop open a bottle of champaigne and share it with my virtual blog-reading friends! To tenacity! To being yourself! To... oh, hell, I'll just say it... a huge-ass raise that will keep the film production gears turning!!!

(And to Sudafed for giving me the buzz to share all of this in under 15 seconds...)

Finally Current!

2006-10-30T16:00:00.000-07:00

Thanks, blog readers, for your patience! It was a struggle getting all of this up here. I had a rough time regaining my equilibrium (I traveled over three mountain ranges twice in a single week- going from sea level to 13,000 feet)! Then I had a job interview/test (yay). Then I had a "mid-term evaluation" at my current job (boo- I guess I don't file fast enough). Then Blogger crashed numerous times in the middle of all of my posting. But it's all here now, so enjoy! For those of you "just tuning in," start at "An Astronomer in Hollywood- Part I" and work your way to the top!

News and "back-posted" blogs

2006-10-25T08:46:00.000-06:00

Okay, I now have Internet access. Perahps even more than I would like!

I plan to "back-post" my trip. That means that I will change the dates on the post to reflect the actual date. Hopefully, this will not get too messy. I will give them each the title of the day of the vacation (i.e. "day one," "day two...") Stay tuned! There were some fun times!

I have finished (finally) putting together my DVDs! That means, if you have been on "the list" to receive one, fear not! Your disk is on its way! I plan to have them for sale on my site before too long. I really want to hit that Holiday season shopping frenzy (a DVD of hand painted films for Susan, a sountrack of buzzing sounds for Johnny)...

Road Trip Friends

2006-10-23T18:32:00.000-06:00

These two guys were my buddies on the road. They told me everything I needed to know:

Day Seven

2006-10-23T18:18:00.000-06:00

The Return. On my way out of Vegas this morning (I lost four dollars in the slots and $2.50 at Starbucks), I happened upon this song:

It's hard to hear. I posted the lyrics below. Except for being "New York City born and raised" (I was only there for four years), it's all pretty much true. I actually laughed when I heard the lyrics!

"L.A.'s fine, the sun shines most the time
And the feeling is 'lay back'
Palm trees grow, and rents are low
But you know I keep thinkin' about
Making my way back

Well I'm New York City born and raised
But nowadays, I'm lost between two shores
L.A.'s fine, but it ain't home
New York's home, but it ain't mine no more

"I am," I said
To no one there
An no one heard at all
Not even the chair
"I am," I cried
"I am," said I
And I am lost, and I can't even say why
Leavin' me lonely still"

So anyway, the drive back was awful and I was left with blocked and ringing ears accompanied by vertigo and an upset stomach (Pizza Hut salad bar in Utah= BAD IDEA). I also paid dearly for my In-N-Out beef fold-in. At a gas station in Grand Junction, I pulled over to grab some snacks. Suddenly, three double-decker cattle trucks pull up to the station. Not only was the smell awful (the cattle on top crap and piss all over the poor animals on the bottom), but the poor things were terrified and kept lowing. It was heart wrenching, knowing that they weren't going to a better place and knowing that I just played a part in it (not only that, but I actually ATE it). My stomach was a mess all the way home. The frequent stops meant that it took me about 13 hours, but I got there. Still, it was my journey back through Middle Earth, so I will end on the photos:

From here:

To here, in a matter of hours:

Quite a bit more exhausted. This was around mile 2,200- and the Pacific Ocean had taken my sunglasses:

But at least I learned the lyrics to all of my songs:

Day Six

2006-10-22T23:54:00.000-06:00

The Beach.

I don’t have photos. I was too introspective for that. I love the Pacific Ocean. When I first arrived here for the Expo, I drove to the shore at midnight, just to say "hi" to the Ocean. My hello was answered by sea lion barks. It was a very magical moment. On my way home, I saw a shooting star.

This day was wonderful. The water was cold, but swimable (for a Colorado kid, anyway). More In-N-Out fries. A lot of reflection. Water is good for that. I could live here as long as I could live close to the beach.

I thought back on my trip. In Utah, where the roads were wet, every car had this kind of mist accompanying it. It made it look as if everyone was driving on their own little cloud. I must have had my own little cloud, as well. Everything has been really great (except the plastic cup wine, but hey).

I also thought forward about my film. I’m just going to produce it myself. This trip has really given me confidence in my ability to do so. I’d be very happy to have representation from one of the agencies, but I don’t think I really need the production companies. Plus, I was pitching a script, but I really have no interest in being a "writer." Yes, I’ve had to write this and I wanted to learn how to do it well, but I didn’t pitch myself as a filmmaker to the producers, so I would doubt that they would let me direct the project. If I get that far and they let me and things work out, great. But I’m not waiting any longer for someone else to give me the green light. I’m giving it to myself.

My plan was to head out to Vegas at about noon and arrive at four or five in the evening to eat and see the strip. I stayed at the beach until 4:00 and just used Vegas as a place to sleep (I didn't get there until about 9:00). It’s a strange place for a solitary girl to just "hang" by herself anyway! So here are some pictures from the road- the sun setting on a journey of self-discovery:

(This was the line of cars for 100+ miles coming back to L.A. from Vegas)

Day Five

2006-10-21T23:58:00.000-06:00

The big day! I had all of my pitches today. Plus, some of the creative team from Pixar were there to talk to the Expo. They were amazing! I heard Andrew Stanton (director of "Finding Nemo"), Brad Bird and Mark Andrews (director and head of story, respectively, of "The Incredibles"). It was really inspiring. These are people who love film (particularly my early love- animation) and have managed to really fight the studio system to get their work made (though Andrew Stanton warned that he is not a good person to ask for industry advice because he doesn't work in Hollywood, he works in "Fairyland"). I totally agreed with Brad Bird (who also made "The Iron Giant-" a really incredible film) when he said, "I would do this job for free. What they actually pay me for is to deal with the bureaucracy." Amen to that!

Anyway, the pitches:

What a strange reality that was! All of these people were in their mid-to-late twenties. They were all junior executives and interns. It was a little surprising. It was also very eye-opening. We were on different sides of the same struggle: beginning a career in film. What they need is talent to represent or produce. What we need is representation and support! The edge disappeared and I was able to be myself. Essentially, I was meeting with peers. It was like mingling at a bar (especially since it was necessary to scream over all of the noise in the room). Suddenly, they were all just human. Out of six pitches, three producers and two agents want to see my work. I was floored! Really? The only one who turned me down was admittedly looking for television ideas.

Of course, I won't hold my breath or assume that this means anything, but at least I know that I can pitch a project and that the film I am working on at least sounds interesting! I saw plenty of disappointment and head shaking, so I didn't get that, at least. What floored me even more than acceptance was that one agency rep became interested in me when he learned that I knew Stan Brakhage. "No way! I love his work! My buddies and I were so bummed when he heard that he passed away two years ago." Huh? I would never have imagined driving to Hollywood and dropping Stan Brakhage's name to a junior exec at a talent agency! Suddenly, I was able to see that my two film lives didn't need to be so exclusive of one another.

Still, the experience was a bit surreal. At 15 minutes before your pitch, you are herded (with about 60 other people) into a room. At 10 minutes before your pitch, you are herded to the other side of that room. At 5 minutes before your pitch, you move to the "five minute zone" (a new room) and stare into the pitch pit (a bunch of long tables with numbers, pitchers and pitchees). When the referee announces that the current pitchers have one minute, you are told to file into the room, find your rep, and hover quietly over the person finishing up their pitch. When the bell rings, you count to ten and if the person sitting in your seat has not moved, move them. On my third pitch, I made the mistake of trying to move the rep rather than the pitcher. Oops! It turned out to be the most successful pitch, actually. I felt totally spent after the experience.

My day went from 8AM-11PM, so I am rewarding myself for a script well pitched and taking the final day off tomorrow to hit the beach. Oh, and my brilliant inter-species/racism scene (see day four) only got a score of 83. You needed a 90 to make it to the next round. No $5,000. Even better, I’m off the hook and can get a little sunshine on my ghostly skin!

Day Four

2006-10-20T22:18:00.000-06:00

No pictures today. Unfortunately, I couldn't find an unarmored place to pull over on Mulholland Drive to take a picture of the spectacular view of Los Angeles! I was surprised by how beautiful it was. California has an interesting topography. I got a little lost on the winding road, which concerned me. It didn't go well for the woman in the David Lynch movie, so I just hoped I'd be okay!

Obviously, I am. I did waste most of my Expo time being lost today while trying to "take in the sites". I nearly accidentally ran into the (former) set for "That 70's Show," though, so that was fun. When I wasn't lost, I was stuck in traffic. "If you are thinking about heading out right now," said the voice on the radio, "think again." "Sig" alerts everywhere. Traffic backed up on all of the highways (especially the 405, which was the one I needed). I tried to be "clever" and take alternate routes using the sun to navigate (an interesting note: being from Colorado, where "West" is determined by looking for the mountains, it is VERY confusing to be in California where the mountains are to the East). Alas, traffic was bad everywhere- every little neighborhood street and side street! Eventually, I managed to find Sepulveda Boulevard, which pretty much runs parallel to the 405 (but was moving much faster). I got back THREE HOURS later than I had planned!

As for the Expo, I started out with my million dollar cup of coffee and attended a panel about women in the film industry. While I admit that we have been underrepresented and undersupported, I'm getting kind of sick of dwelling on it. I really don't consider myself a "woman filmmaker." I try to just think of myself as a filmmaker, period. True, I haven't had a lot of role models that "look like me," but the second I think of myself as belonging to any sort of a minority group, it changes my thinking (see my post below about grandpa's comment). Sometimes it was a little rough being the only woman in the film lab. Once I established my expertise, though, I was just another lab technician (minus the sex jokes). Still, I do think that we need some support of the "encouragement" kind. It's true that I know many men who have been dragged through the film mud just as mercilessly as my women friends, but I think the biggest problem is that girls are never told that they have the option in the first place. Come on! We have every right to grow up and be equally brutally rejected and stabbed in the back!

Anyway, the other Expo activity that I participated in today was the "Screenwriters' Open." You have 1.5 hours to write a 6-minute scene. My parameters were: "your protagonist, their love interest and a third character of your choosing are stuck in a dark place. The protagonist is injured and loosing blood and one of them holds a secret that, if revealed, could save them all, but would put their relationship with the others at risk." Most of my time was spent thinking of these characters.

Finally, I chose to write about a Chihuahha and two sibling Siamese cats. The dog had convinced the other two that he was really a cat because he was in love with the sister. When the brother cat dares them all to jump in the trunk of a car, the Chihuahua can't quite make it (because White Dogs Can't Jump) and gets his tail caught in the door of the trunk (injured and losing blood). The brother picks up on this uncat-like behavior. The Chihuahua knows he can save the day because, as a dog, he can sniff the trail back home, but he doesn't want to offer this for fear of losing the sister cat's friendship. By the end of the scene, the brother cat forces him to reveal his secret. It had everything- racial tensions, cats and dogs, a car chase (kind of)! I'm sure to win the $5,000 prize!

Now to celebrate with a $5 cup of wine. That's right. A cup of wine. A plastic cup of wine. Hey, this joint is classy!

Day Three

2006-10-19T21:14:00.000-06:00

It feels a little strange and "fakey" to be posting all of this in "live" style, even though I did write all of this down as it was happening, but I guess that's movies for you! Actually, that's Hollywood for you. And this, as well-

This is Los Angeles summed up in two pictures:

(The expo is in two hotels near LAX)

For those of you who may not know, In-N-Out is famously good. Everything there is made fresh- the lettuce, tomatoes, onions, etc. are all cut right there, the buns are made of fresh, old-fashioned sponge dough (nothing frozen, no preservatives) and the cheese is real. The fries are cut from fresh potatoes and fried in vegetable oil right there in the store and the shakes are made from real ice cream (this sounds so simple, but in the fast food world, this is pretty miraculous). And the menu is: burger, cheeseburger, fries and shakes. That's it.

So as a former meat-eater and one who is really trying to get back on the full-time veggie bandwagon, this was a pretty big fold on my part. I will occasionally eat it if I feel that I "need" it somehow (sometimes are bodies just let us know), but this was pure, guilt-ridden craving cave-in! I indulged guiltlessly in the fries, though! They really are the best fries in the universe (at least this side of it).

On the screenwriting side of things, day three was pretty interesting. It was essentially a "how-to-pitch" day, with a panel of screenwriters and producers sharing their advice and stories. The most valuable piece of information that I got was that whether they end up being successful or not, everyone has their "first pitch."

One of the writers shared his story, which involved vomiting the night before the pitch meeting. Another's involved having to go to the bathroom so badly that he ended up using an Evian water bottle in his car and inadvertently "spilling" on himself minutes before the pitch. When he tried to explain it to the producers, they wouldn’t believe him (he’s a comedy writer)! It definitely took the edge off!

I also learned that what I will be doing is not a "real" pitch. This is a five minute stone throw that you hope makes ripples that might one day grow into a full 20-30 minute pitch. I’ve lost a lot of my nervousness about Saturday (six pitches in a row).

Another good thing to know is that producers tend to frown upon costumes and props! I guess a few people last year decided to pitch through puppets and wear funky costumes. Never really crossed my mind to use them, but if it ever does, I won’t!

I must add this note: this is an expo packed full of activities. In fact, there is very little time to run in and out of the hotel to get food and whatnot. There is a Starbucks in the hotel, but they charge $2.05 for a SMALL coffee!!! Way to blackmail the fatigued! This was also the case at the Stratosphere. There, it was $2.55 for a small. We’re not talking lattes here, either. Just plain, brewed coffee! I guess these are hotel franchises and don’t need to follow the corporate guidelines (which are still outrageously expensive)!

Wireless can get tangled too!

2006-10-19T18:47:00.000-06:00

My dreams of blogging on the road have been crushed by the corporate hotel giants! The hotel in Las Vegas and the hotel hosting the expo in Los Angeles want $10 PER DAY to access the Internet. I do need enough money to make it back home, so the "live" blogging will have to wait (with the exception of the Las Vegas ambient noise below- I can call my blog, I just can't figure out how to write to it)! The wonderful woman running the Kinkos here noticed that I was making my business cards out of 6"x4" index cards cut in quarters ($1.34 compared to $20-$40) and kindly let me have some internet time.

Anyway, despite the fact that I've been lugging my laptop around for no reason and killing my already tired neck (20+ hours on the road), things are great! Everyone is much more laid back than I thought. I haven't met any of those notorious "Hollywood types," wherever they might be. Maybe I'm deflecting them somehow. A few people have randomly asked my what my screenplay is about, which I wisely chose not to answer. Actually, I did answer, but I kept it vague: "It's about someone's life and something that happens to them between their birth and their death." They shake their heads, certain that I'm setting myself up for trouble with such a lame pitch and leave me alone about the details.

Do stay tuned. I have pictures, videos and all sorts of stories from the road. In-N-Out. Oh boy! Best fries on earth!!!

Day Two

2006-10-18T21:34:00.000-06:00

Traffic into Los Angeles was a nightmare!

I got stuck on I15 between Vegas and L.A. for about two hours. They decided that the middle of the day was the best time to close down a lane to repave the highway! So there I sat, in the middle of the Mojave desert with 1/8th of a tank of gas left, too much water in my bladder, and stuck in a nightmare of a traffic jam.

Traffic was smooth until I hit the city (though by this time, I was able to listen to my favorite public radio station- KCRW- and know that I was only a few miles from the station, so I was pacified). There was a major jam caused by a car accident. Not uncommon in Los Angeles, but the strange thing about this was that a car ran into an entire funeral procession! As if being in a funeral procession wasn't bad enough! I have yet to figure out what a "sig" alert is, but apparently, it means that you really, really want to avoid the area for which the sig alert was given!

Still, I managed to arrive just in time for the pre-expo party. I met some very down-to-earth people there. I was pleasantly surprised. Not a lot of food (and $3.50 for a bottle of water? You've got to be out of your f*&%in' mind), but good conversations. We'll see what the rest of the expo brings!

So, basically, The Day= Driving+Arriving+Driving+Partying+Sleeping.

Day One

2006-10-17T22:09:00.000-06:00

Eagles on the highway
Swirling whisps of clouds on mountaintops
A control burn of a ski area
A car overturned in the snow
Sipping hot cocoa during a snowstorm in the desert
Seeing the lights of Vegas from 100 miles away
A communications antenna taller than the mountain it sat on
"Writing" seven scenes of my film in my head

These are some of the things I would have missed if I had chosen to fly rather than drive. It was a long haul, but I've done it before and I wasn't really alone. Ten years ago, I had The Beatles, Tori Amos and Sarah McLachlan to pull me through the Rocky Mountains. This time, I had some new friends: Imogen Heap, Cat Power, The New Pornographers and Massive Attack to name a few.

(me and Imogen Heap)

(me and Cat Power- I'm not really depressed, I'm just concentrating on driving in the snow while taking my own picture)

I experienced such dramatic changes in climate that I almost felt like I was traveling through Middle Earth! My "One Ring" was self doubt and fear and rather than lembas, I had ranch flavored soy crispettes, but it was still quite the journey.

I stopped in Vail to photograph a control burn and eat some peanut butter sandwiches. I also had to "control burn" some CDs on my laptop. I lost all radio by this point and the rental car did not have a tape deck for my mp3 player (I had one of those adapter things). Technology can be great!

It can also be a burden. Eager to blog, I plugged my laptop in the second I got to Vegas. Alas, the hotel charges $9.95/day for access.

Vegas is the strangest place. Never before in my life have I seen so much religion juxtaposed with so much vulgarity! People "prayed" for their gambling luck and a nearly naked woman was present for everything from a lap dance to a wakeup call to a children's magic show.

I stayed at the Stratosphere hotel, which is essentially a large penis. Everything in the hotel is shaped like this. These objects were even more phallic than the tower itself! They took the pointy tip off to make it child safe, which made it nice and rounded. I saw a child sipping from the tip of a large phallic drink container and my shampoo was even offered in little phallic representations of the tower.

There once was a roller coaster at the top of this structure. That was deemed unsafe and replaced by three "thrill rides" or, as they put it, "The Threesome." One spins you around in a circle over the edge of the building, another slides off the edge and dangles you 1100 feet above the ground. The third is the funniest of all: it is one of those rides where they strap you in, pull you up a tower and then drop you. Not so funny until you see it: The seats wrap around a bright, glowing red tower. Not only do the raise you and drop you once, but they do it repeatedly. From the ground, you see a black ring stroke the tower up and down as people scream orgasmically! This one is called "Big Shot." If you think I'm reading into this too much, the motto for the thrill ride threesome is "Get Down, Get Up, Get Off." You know, for the kids! I rest my case.

Vegas Ambience from the Casino Floor

2006-10-17T21:55:00.000-06:00

Not sure that this captured exactly what I was after, but...

An Astronomer in Hollywood- Part 3

2006-10-16T16:28:00.000-06:00

(Because everything is better when it's a trilogy)

So enter the world of the divorce where people freak out and do things that they normally would not, such as... oh, I don't know... drop their film career, move halfway across the country and go back to school for Astrophysics while working for a makeup counter in a mall? Not that any one of those things is bad, in and of itself, but when all you do at either place is think about how you can use what you are working with in a film (cosmetics)/movie(astrophysics), it's time to do some soul-searching!

So what the hell does any of this have to do with anything? Good question. If you find a blog anywhere that has the answer to that, I'd love to read it.

Just kidding.

With these two seemingly incompatible halves to my film personality, I am once again packing my bags and driving out to the West Coast alone. This time, I will be attending Screenwriting Expo 5 in Los Angeles where I will be pitching my narrative scripts to people with money, in the hopes that they might take a swing. All of this is making me laugh somewhat since the title of my first script is "Stealing First" (as in First Base in baseball- the one you can't actually steal). Hopefully, I won't need to resort to such rule-breaking behavior.

I hope to post to my blog from the road. With any luck, I will have some amusing, insightful but hopefully not tragic views on the world of screenwriting or just road trips in general. I hope to make my next post from the road!

An Astronomer in Hollywood- Part 2

2006-10-16T15:23:00.000-06:00

Part I was the first-year film student biography; the "follow your dreams" biography. It ended with me unable to afford CalArts and settling for an in-state film studies education under the guise of a degree in French to make the parents happy. Go ahead and ask how much I've been able to do with a degree in French...

The foundation biography picks up where that left off and goes something like this (trimmed slightly so as not to bore):

In 1998, I began working with legendary filmmaker Stan Brakhage as a student projectionist at the University of Colorado. I discovered that we shared many of the same foundations. Although my passion for film was firmly in place, Brakhage opened my eyes to the possibilities in the cinematic medium. We soon became close colleagues and I learned much about his hand-painted film techniques.

In 1999, I traveled with this newfound passion to Paris where I studied experimental films with filmmaker Pip Chodorov and began my first animation projects using a Super-8mm camera. I furthered my film studies by traveling to the Cannes Film Festival as an intern. I lived in France for six months while I wrote my thesis on the films of François Truffaut, for which I graduated cum laude (see above comment on "degree in French").

Upon returning to the States, I was eager to apply this knowledge to my own film work, but desired a distinct voice. Serendipitously (because this was a grant application and it is important to have at least one six-syllable word), I was called upon to aid a physics professor with a presentation involving crossed Polaroid filters on an overhead projector. Under normal conditions, this would block out most of the light and the result would be a black screen. However, the demonstration was to show the properties of birefringent (double-refracting) materials, such as liquid crystals. The result was a screen full of vibrant, changing colors, produced by the bending of nothing more than a plastic fork. I was presented with the final piece in my desire to find beauty in the mundane: polarized light.

My imagination was ignited by the possibilities within this newfound world. I realized that the technique used to project these materials onto a screen could be modified in order to film them. I acquainted myself with various birefringent materials readily available in the world around me: plastics, soaps, liquid crystalline paints and cosmetics. I experimented with different lighting and equipment setups. Bending, twisting and congealing became my new brushstrokes. I soon had complete control over the color spectrum. My medium became light itself.

I moved to New York where I gained access to an optical printer and made my first films. “Gossamer Conglomerate” (below) made use of cut pieces of birefringent polyester splicing tape, placed upon clear film leader destroyed by "vinegar syndrome." I shot the film through crossed Polaroid filters, which isolated the vibrant colors of the splicing tape. By applying these fresh film materials to the decayed leader, I made film that represented the life cycle of film and its rebirth as a new and personal work. It was suggestive of a butterfly’s flight from the darkness of the chrysalis.

In “The Light Touch Dust Nebula,” I painted upon this colorless film leader with thermotropic liquid crystal paint. Used in mood rings, this paint changes color with heat. As the film sat in front of the lamp of the printer, the paint changed color in each frame, giving the image the look of twinkling, luminescent dust. Finally, “Munkphilm” (below) employed plastic that I had melted onto the same clear film leader. It was a cinematic meditation on melted plastics in a plastic medium.

I gained employment as an optical technician and film and video artist at a film laboratory in New York. I was granted me access to film equipment and various emulsions. I collected objects that would ordinarily be thrown away in order to expose their beauty under polarized light. In this unique and ambitious recycling program, a discarded plastic wrapper or spool of unwanted film became a prism. To make my film “Ether Twist,” I used these bits of discarded materials along with recordings of very low frequency (VLF) transmissions from aurorae, thunderstorms and sun spots. I created “Snow Flukes” (below) by applying heat-sensitive liquid crystal paints to a 1920’s silhouette cartoon that had been abandoned in the film vaults. From strips of discarded lab tests, I created “Sweet Intuition,” meticulously cutting out thousands of 16mm frames, pasting them on 35mm film with birefringent glue, and filming them through crossed-polarizers.

I set out to complete my most ambitious project to date: “The Galilean Satellites,” a film series dedicated to Stan Brakhage. The films explored the possibilities of life on the four largest moons of Jupiter, discovered by Galileo. Just as his discovery changed the popular view that the Earth is not the center of the solar system, I hoped to offer the view that the amazing beauty seen on this planet is a common thread connecting the Universe. This series of four films incorporated several birefringent materials upon recycled film stock and original footage. The soundtrack consisted of radio transmissions from various space probes of the atmospheres of celestial bodies. In this way, I was not only exposing the unseen vibrancy in seemingly ordinary and colorless materials, but the unheard symphonies emitted from seemingly silent objects. I hoped that they would be, as Jonas Mekas would later comment upon seeing them, "The true music of the spheres."

An Astronomer in Hollywood- Part I

2006-10-12T16:09:00.000-06:00

I've just had to "introduce myself" as a filmmaker for a couple of different audiences. It's always an interesting exercise for one to try to define oneself. The first audience was a foundation from which I am seeking funds, the second was a class of beginning filmmakers. Needless to say, I had to tweak my story to fit each audience. I thought I might share a bit of that biography here and then explain the journey upon which I am about to embark:

I have wanted to be a filmmaker since the age of five. Why? I was terrified of E.T. Fear drove me to my desire!

I guess I should explain that. E.T. scared the living crap out of me. I'm always surprised when I meet people my age who weren't frightened by this long-necked, sickly-looking, Debra-Winger-backwards-talking creature, but I guess most people found him and his creepy smile to be "cute." Yikes. I was convinced that he lived in the downstairs bathroom- the creepy, cold, dark one down the hallway from the roaring washer and drier and in front of the garage (which was full of poisonous brown recluse spiders that bit my mother on the arm- and people think children have irrational fears). We only used that one when we came in from playing in the snow and had to go to the bathroom so badly that we could not hold it to make it upstairs to the "real" bathroom. I might add that my fear for this room was confirmed by an accident involving my father confusing "D" for "R" in the family truck and driving through the wall of the garage. I digress.

My mother noted my fear. It made her a little sad that a child should be terrified of such a touching story. She decided to show me the "behind-the-scenes" clip of the film. She showed me that not only was E.T. just a puppet, but that he was hatched from the creative mind of this guy named Steven Spielberg. While I still avoided the downstairs bathroom (what do parents know, anyway? After all, it looked like Drew Barrymore thought it was pretty real), I was fascinated that something someone had once imagined could become so real to someone like me; real enough to provoke this strong emotional response. I decided right there and then that I wanted to be a film director just like Steven Spielberg.

Another film that stood out in my mind was "Pete's Dragon" (made the year I was born, I saw it much later on television). The concept of "real from imagination" became even stronger when I learned that the dragon was nothing more than a series of drawings! How could this be? I became obsessed with the concept of animation. I made flip books out of my scary biology textbooks (yes, I had some strange fears as a child, but even E.T. didn't like frog dissections) and dreamed of the day I could play with a film camera and make my drawings come alive!

These dreams were quickly snatched from me. My grandfather decided to give his Super-8 camera away and I begged him for it. Even at the age of 10, I knew I could not animate with my father's video camera because it couldn't shoot single frames. He merely told me that I wouldn't know what to do with it and gave it to my cousin (who I'm sure threw it in a closet when he realized a video tape wouldn't fit into it). Besides, he added, it wasn't a toy for girls anyway.

Not a toy for girls? Why not?

This stuck in my mind. Indeed, I only knew of one female director, and that was Penny Marshall. At such a young age, I was not interested in the types of films she made. I was convinced that the only way I was going to be involved in films was to become an actress. As I took absolutely no interest in my appearance, I saw my chances of working in film become quite slim!

Still, I stubbornly held on to my dreams. You can't stop a child's imagination. On the Catholic school playground, I directed the other children in reenactments of Disney cartoons, using those Tinkerbelle read-along books as my script. My mother and father were called in for a parent-teacher conference. While I was doing very well, my teacher noticed some...strange things about me. My desk was a mess. The top was designed to open up to a metal storage tub. I was not using the tub to store my papers and books (which were piled under my desk). I was using the tub to... well...

She opened the desk and my mother recognized it immediately: it was the entire set of the show "Moonlighting," recreated in miniature and clearly labeled. It was a show we used to watch together. One episode stood out in my mind: the detective team is chasing the "bad guys" and suddenly, they wind through the film set (it was a comedy)! They run past gaffers, extras, and cameramen! My mind wanted to fill in the blanks and figure it out. What did that set look like? To my parents' credit, I was not scolded. I was, however, advised to clean my desk.

My brother and I began making movies with a borrowed video camera. I would "direct" and my brother and his friends would "star." The stories usually involved dinosaurs or space travel. I became famous among his friends for creating "dino-vision" and a science lab explosion in the basement (I did get in trouble for that). Of course, I became infamous for ruining their illusions when they took away my creative control! I did things like zoom in on their empty cereal bowls that were supposed to be full of food and exposing the fact that they were eating Air-on-a-Spoon.

Despite our creative differences, my brother and I were tight film partners. We'd watch the same films again and again, trying to memorize the lines of our favorite characters and noting all of the continuity errors. As brothers and sisters tend to do, we drifted apart a bit when he entered high school. My film interests matured slightly. While I still found Sci-Fi fascinating, I also started developing an appreciation for drama. My biggest revelation came when I saw "The Piano." Finally, a film I loved, directed by a woman! If Jane Campion could do it, maybe I could, too...

My obsession with film (particularly animation) continued. Although I was attending the University of Colorado (in state=cheap), I decided I wanted to go to film school. I weighed my options and chose CalArts, where both my interests in directing and animation could be cultivated. I drove out to Los Angeles alone at the age of eighteen...

Screening and Ranting

2006-09-07T08:30:00.000-06:00

It's been a while since I've posted. There's an exciting reason for that, and I plan to unveil it soon. In the meantime I just wanted to send out a little announcement that a couple of my films are going to be screened in the San Francisco Bay area as part of the MadCat Film festival:

MadCat Program

I must add a rant. While I had agreed that any of my silent films could be accompanied by live music, "Europa" is not at all silent. Its soundtrack actually incorporates Voyager recordings of the magnetosphere of Jupiter- pretty cool stuff. I'm kind of sad that it will be turned off and replaced with something else. I mentioned this twice to the festival director to no avail (with twelve programs, I'm sure she has plenty to worry about- I just let it drop). Still, it's listed as a "silent" film, which gives the wrong impression. It's like billing "Raging Bull" in a comedy program and replacing the dialogue with slide whistles. It's okay, though. I'm usually rejected from women's film programs because my films do not obviously deal with "issues," so I'm glad to be a part of this.

I mentioned this to a friend of mine, who joked and said it "served me right." I imagine he was referring to the fact that because I had agreed to let my silent films be shown with music and thus violated "my" artistic integrity, I had no right to complain. Fine. This is a fairly common view in the experimental film world (which at times- I will take this opportunity to note- can be more rigid than the "traditional" film world from which it claims freedom). Music video is often viewed as the lowest of the low, so musical accompaniment probably hovers just above death. Now, I love my friend and we see eye-to-eye on most things, but I also like music videos. Some of them are brilliant, in my opinion. I also admit that if I could actually compose music, I would probably be a musician, so I admire anyone who chooses music as their canvas. I can play a mean Bartok and sing all the Tori Amos songs I want, but most of my "original" compositions turn into "Mary Had a Little Lamb" after a few measures. I would love to direct a music video for any one of my favorite musicians.

To defend the experimental film world:

A. This isn't everyone's view. It's just a very vocal subset (and don't even mention George Lucas or Spike Jonze to any of them). For the most part, I love my imaginative and supportive experimental film community.

B. I understand their frustration. Many people would rather organize pocket lint than sit through a silent film. These people inevitably ask, "have you ever thought of, like, putting some techno music or something to that stuff?" As if techno will make anything bearable.

Still, I grow tired of hearing that I've sold out every time I find a penny on the sidewalk on my way to a screening. It's exhausting to sell out so frequently and never reap the benefits. At times, I wish I could just sell my screenplay and direct my narrative feature for a few million dollars. That way, when I'm accused of being a sell-out I can at the very least afford to drink a good wine while listening to the accusation! After a good sip of a Châteauneuf-du-Pape, I could just smile, nod, and drift off into my wildly landscaped dream world where I don't have to alphabetize nauseatingly colored file folders all day so that I can afford to paint on strips of film! As it stands now, someone accuses me of selling out because I have a fancy web site and all I can do about it is dig in the cracks of my car upholstery, looking for enough change to by a box of Mac and Cheese! Of course, things have gotten a much better since I've really sold out and taken a variety of jobs that have nothing to do with anything I am interested in. Now I can eat at Qdoba (sometimes).

Many people see the mind-numbing day job as necessary. "Yes, but we've all done that. None of us cares about spreadsheets." Fine. Then we're all sell-outs. Let me design my web site in peace.

Humor aside, this MadCat program looks like fun. The rest of the programs look great, too. I really have no problem having my work integrated into someone else's artistic vision (sound). I wish I could be there to see the results.

Time and the Aquarium

2006-08-16T14:14:00.000-06:00

I should probably preface this by saying that I am not high, nor is anyone painting, gluing or doing anything else with fumes in my vicinity. That being said...

The other night, I was thinking about time- a normal activity for an astro-filmmaker (especially one who just had to shove a whole story into a single minute of video). I think it's fascinating that we don't really know anything about time, yet it seems to have always been a part of our reality. It's so intangible, yet integral to science, philosophy, art, and life in general. How do you measure it, really? Every form of measurement is pretty arbitrary- every "standard" having been created by humans for convenience more than anything else.

Still, we know it exists. We feel it pass, sometimes painfully, sometimes fleetingly. It seems to be our measurement of reality (manipulation of time being a common way to imply altered states in film and music).

What the heck is it?

I was thinking about all of this while watching my aquatic roommates float in the current of their aquarium. Do they know that a mechanical pump is making this current? Do they even understand what a current is? For them, it is just something that happens- they know it innately from Nature.

I began thinking about fish in the sea. When the current is turbulent, do they understand that it is because there is a giant hurricane blowing over the water and changing the pressure? How could they? It would blow their little fishy minds to see that giant spinning cloud! ("And why," they might imagine, "does such a thing exist at all?") They don't even see that side of reality, except through a shimmering, blurry lens. All they know is the water.

I feel that we live in a similar reality when it comes to time. Time drives our "currents" (oh yes, pun entirely intended), creating pockets of turbulence and calm. What if we are like fish- unaware of enormous vortices of time that drive us while we swim in our sea of "reality." Almost everyone has experienced deja-vu or even "missing time-" phenomena that challenge the "linear time" reality that we know best.

And are there the "dolphins" of our world who can exist in both worlds (albeit temporarily)? Dolphins use the "mysteries of the world above the water" to ensnare their prey. They blow circles of "bubble nets" around schools of fish. The fish, afraid to pass through the strange shiny bubbles, school together while the clever dolphins take turns picking them off.
(Actually, dolphins love playing with "air reality" in water. For more info, see this article from Scientific American. They seem to be very good at manipulating it!)

I think there are dolphins amogst us. Many people throughout history have claimed to have manipulated time in some way or another. There was also Einstein, who presented the concept of time dilation in his relativity theories (time dilation was later proven). Some of the brightest minds have imagined (and even proven mathematically) some strange time realities- like those involving black holes and wormholes.

And then there are us filmmakers. Some of us just like playing with time. I've never met an experimental filmmaker who hasn't liked playing with slow motion, high-speed, or reversed action!
For the dolphin in all of us- keep blowing those bubbles!

One Big Happy Family

2006-08-14T14:24:00.000-06:00

Just a quick update:

My neighbor told us that the baby deer were down the street, so we went on a walk to see how they were doing. Not only are they fine (one is quite a bit bigger than the other now), but their mother was there too! Although I am still sad for the deer that was hit, I am relieved that it wasn't her. I was so happy to see her there, nuzzling the necks of the little ones!

Touching the Stars (Without Leaving My Seat)

2006-08-04T09:49:00.000-06:00

I have been researching the Harvard Computers for a while now.

Never heard of them?

I'm not talking about Dell or Mac, I'm talking about Fleming, Maury, Leavitt, Cannon (and that's Annie Jump Cannon, not the imaging company), and later, Payne-Gaposchkin. I'm talking about people. Women, to be precise:

The notion that women "suck at Math" is relatively new. Around the turn of the 20th Century, women were sought out by the director of the Harvard observatory for their mathematical abilities, their attention to detail, and, of course, their relative exploitability. They didn't seem to mind the tediousness of their work, and most of them had no aspirations to do their own research- a job in astronomy was glory enough. Interestingly, though, many of them still managed to make some extremely profound discoveries.

Henrietta Leavitt, for example, tracked variable stars (specifically, Cepheid variables) in the Magellanic Clouds. She discovered a curious pattern- the period of the variable star was related to its brightness. Brighter variables had longer periods and vice versa. She published her findings in the Annals of the Astronomical Observatory of Harvard College. She continued to study this phenomenon until it could be confirmed that there was, in fact, a direct relationship between the two. This discovery became one of the most important "yardsticks" in astronomy. If you can monitor the period of a star, and based on this relationship, determine its true magnitude, you can calculate (based on how bright it appears here on Earth), its distance. These findings were used to prove that the Magellanic clouds and Andromeda, then thought to be nebulae, were actually distant galaxies and not part of the Milky Way!

Cecila Payne-Gaposchkin was the first person to earn a Ph.D. in astronomy from Harvard (that's right: first person, not just woman, to get a Ph.D. in astronomy, though she would later go on to become the first female professor there). Her work as a computer was a little more comparable to the kind of work the average graduate student would do (and she had to fight for that). She studied stellar spectra. She was able to (accurately) apply ionization theory to the spectra of stars and relate their spectral classes to their actual temperatures- effectively establishing that Hydrogen was the most abundant element in all stars (before this, it was thought that different spectral classes indicated a presence of different elements- a bit too much to explain here).

If I went on to list all of the important achievements and discoveries made by these women, this post would be too long!

I find it interesting that while I am studying these women, I have become a "computer" myself! Right now, I am using a virtual microscope to search for interstellar dust grains that might be hidden in 40 to 100 out of 1.6 million movies! The project is called Stardust@home. It involves the sharing of millions of images with the general public to help scientists find interstellar dust particles- the largest of which may only be a few microns across. These are the remains of distant stars that have traveled across the expanse of space to our solar system.

The Stardust spacecraft flew through the tail of a comet and then through a stream of interstellar dust particles, collecting bits of comet dust and star dust in tennis racquet-shaped aerogel collectors. Aerogel is some pretty cool stuff. Below, a sample weighing a little over two grams suspends a five pound brick (from wikipedia and NASA):

This is an image of the collector from the Stardust@home web site (note the hand on the left of the image for size comparison):

It's not for everyone. There is a test that you must take and you are frequently presented with "test movies" to keep you on your toes. I've gone through hundreds already, but there are a few folks who have already gone through thousands! Like I said, there will be only 40 to 100 grains in the 1.6 million "slices" of aerogel.

Who better than a filmmaker to determine whether an imperfection is a scratch on the surface of the aerogel, regular "Earth dust" on the surface or something embedded a little...deeper. Furthermore, a woman with a tedious receptionist "day" job (ahem) is all too happy to give some of her time to stardust hunting! Without the help of thousands of people like us, it would take them about twenty years to go through the whole thing! I'm not sure if they are still accepting volunteers at this point, but if you have a keen eye for detail, they need you! Click on the link above to learn more.

So far, I have detected about a dozen candidates, though we won't find out for a while if they are dust particles or not.

(Avant-Garde Blog-A-Thon) Liquid Crystal Films

2006-08-01T19:34:00.000-06:00

I debated over what I was going to write about for this blog-a-thon (organized by girish). A friend of mine told me that she thought some people might want to know the science behind my liquid crystal films, so here we go:

My work is made using a technique known as cross-polarization. This technique utilizes two Polaroid filters which are placed at right angles to one another. Under normal conditions, this blocks out most light.

How?

Most light waves, seen head on, propagate in all directions; up and down, side to side, etc. Polaroid filters work as "prison bars," blocking out all light except that which is propagating in the direction of the alignment of the "bars." This is called polarization. Incidentally, this happens when light is reflected, as well (this is why your polarizing sunglasses block out "road glare" which is reflected, polarized light).

By placing a horizontally aligned Polaroid filter in front of a filter that is vertically aligned, one can create a sort of "light prison" trapping all light between the two filters. To visualize this, see the diagrams below:

When both "jail bars" are aligned vertically, a vertically vibrating light wave can make it through both sets of "bars," while all other vibrations are blocked.

When a horizontally aligned set of "jail bars" are placed in front of vertically aligned "jail bars," the vertically vibrating light wave that makes it through the first set of "bars" will be blocked by the second set, preventing the light from "escaping" from its prison!

Artists are often required to bend the rules. I bend the light waves, liberating them from their polarized prisons!

How?

By using liquid crystals, of course! Liquid crystals and some other materials display a property called birefringence (double-refracting or light-bending) Liquid crystals are materials that are not quite solid and not quite liquid (despite what we are taught in school, there are more than three phases of matter).

Using these "double refracting" materials, I can selectively bend the vertically aligned light waves that make it through the first set of "bars" so that they are vibrating in a horizontal direction and can pass through the horizontal "bars!" Through experimentation and study, I can choose my pallet by choosing the materials I use, the severity of a bend, the harshness of a twist, or the depth of a scratch. In effect, instead of painting with different colors of pigment, I'm painting with different wavelengths (colors) of light waves.

"Enough, chatter, egghead! Show us the results!"

Fair enough:

Stills from "The Light Touch Dust Nebula" and "Callisto"

From "The Light Touch Dust Nebula"

From "Callisto"

In these films, I used temperature sensitive (thermotropic) liquid crystal paints (available through Edmund Scientific at a reasonable price). This is the stuff that makes mood rings and those rainbow thermometers work. To obtain different colors in "Light Touch," I blew on the paints (and nearly passed out). For "Callisto" I decided to use an air blower and the evaporative effects of rubbing alcohol (much better).

Stills from "Europa"

This made a HUGE mess! The liquid crystal at play here is soap, which doesn't like to stay in one place for too long! Soap is a lyotropic liquid crystal (changes based on its concentration)

Stills from "The Counter Girl Trilogy"

I unveil my newest films!

From "Snake Oil"

From "Anti-Rides"

From "GWP (Gift With Purchase)"

This is a very special little trilogy for me. This film features three different shades of lip gloss that I got from my job as a makeup counter attendant. This particualr liquid crystal...(drum roll)...cholesterol! Can you imagine using that as a selling point? "Ooh! You'll love our new lip gloss! It contains green tea extract, Vitamin-C and a suspension of thermotropic cholesterol in its chiral nematic phase!" Which, I guess, quite a few of the cosmetics companies employ (click here)!

I have worn it, and yes, it does taste "greasy." Here is its "before" picture (this was the shade I used in "Anti-Rides"):

You can see how nicely it refracts the light...

The images in "GWP" show what this liquid crystalline material looks like when simply lit from above. In "Snake Oil" and "Anti-Rides" the material is cross-polarized to even further isolate and exploit the colors.

If you would like to see more examples, please click on this link to my site (or click on the film image to the right).

Little MissMatched Socks

2006-08-01T19:08:00.000-06:00

Begin shameless self promotion...

So, I found this quirky little company that was holding a film competition:

LittleMissMatched Socks

The deal is: make a video one minute or less in length and use two of their mis-matched socks at some point in the video. If your video gets the most votes between August 2nd-16th, you win their first place prize: $1,000!

That happens to be just about enough to cover the costs of getting prints of my films made and putting them in distribution, so I figured I would go for it (plus, it seems like a good enough company)...

Now today is August 2nd, so I'm trying to get the word out. Check their web site out and watch the movies. I am hoping that you might like mine best ("I Was Left (You may be right)" is the title and my real name is Courtney Hoskins) and give me a vote, but vote for someone, at least (there's something in it for you, too)! My bestest buddy Carl Fuermann has a film ("Sockadoo") there too. I'd be thrilled if he won, as well!

End shameless self promotion...

Baby Deer

2006-07-28T08:37:00.000-06:00

I thought I should give an update on the little ones. I've been out of the Internet loop for a while. Unfortunately, it does seem like it was the mother in the story below. I haven't seen her around (but deer can be shy, so there is still a chance). On the bright side, however, the babies are doing great! I think they were right at the weaning age. They are grazing and seem to be doing fine (though our flowers aren't). I've been keeping a close eye on them.

Animals amaze me, by the way! A human child would be so helpless at four months- even if you translate their age from "deer years" to "human years!" It's impressive.

A Goodbye

2006-07-18T21:45:00.000-06:00

I just heard the gun shot.

I was making my obligatory rounds to gather my cat. I mistook one of the baby deer twins for my cat. We both frightened each other, but we were okay. I fed two strange cats the treats that were meant for mine and then continued on my way to find Lyra. I rounded the corner of Mapleton and Folsom. I heard a sound. A dog was running around in the street. My heart jumped right as Lyra jumped from a bush behind me. My emotions were confused. I was relieved that my cat was unharmed, but afraid of what was. I scooped her up and threw her in the house. I ran frantically to the street. Carl ran after me. A mature doe had been hit by a car- two dogs had chased her into the street. The drivers called someone, dragged her off the road and then took off. She was still alive (and I want those drivers to know that to leave a life kicking and panting like that is irresponsible and cruel). A bike rider approached us. She stopped and knelt with us. We waved off traffic and spoke soothingly as the deer struggled with her last breaths. Finally, a police officer arrived. She told us that another officer would arrive shortly and that there would be a gun shot- that we probably shouldn't watch. I came back and wanted to reach out to the virtual world with shaking hands. I hope she is no longer scared and in pain.

I will be looking out for those fawns. If I notice that their mother is not here within a day, I will call the Park Services to help.

E.T. Phone Home (to your blog)

2006-07-10T13:31:00.000-06:00

Oh yes. Is this the future or what?

Inane? Yes. Someday, though, I might see a shooting star (or even the kind that walk around; e.g. Ms. Jolie) and feel the urge to call my blog!

Unusual Weather

2006-07-07T09:42:00.000-06:00

This post is a little late, but I wanted to include some amazing photos taken by our neighbor:

That was about two weeks ago (June 24th). This was actually mild compared to other areas in Boulder.

The interesting thing is that I got to experience the development of this storm. I was in Lyons (West of Boulder, in the mountains) with friends. We got caught in an electrical storm. The electricity soon turned into a downpour! Luckily, we were able to get indoors.

About five minutes after the storm passed us, our friend got a call from another friend of ours who was in Boulder (East of us). I could overhear her on the phone saying that she had pulled over in her car because it was so bad. While I agreed that the rain was heavy, I didn't really think it was that bad. That is, until we started driving home!

It looked like it had snowed! It was incredible. The hail ripped up our trees and our garden. All of Boulder was a mess for a few days.

What is interesting about this storm is that we were able to witness what happens when you force a saturated air mass over mountains! All of that downpour (just rain) that fell on us in Lyons had to be forced over the mountains to make it into Boulder. The rain droplets got pushed up higher in the atmosphere (where it's colder) and froze! Once it got over the mountains and fell on Boulder, everything that was rain in Lyons was hail in Boulder!

Thanks to Geneva for the loverly photos! She said it sounded awful in her house as the hail beat down on her roof...

The Angelina Jolie Incident

2006-06-28T08:59:00.000-06:00

Okay, this is by far our most popular "celebrity" story from the Cannes film festival:

So we had spent several days trying to plug a film that we were working on, spreading the word about the films we were showing there, and trying to see as many movies as we could in the space between. We were ready for a low-key film industry-free day on the beach. We packed our beach bags and headed out.

There are several "beaches" with piers owned by the different hotels in Cannes. You have to maneuver around them if you just want to walk along the shore. During the festival, many of them are closed for private parties and whatnot. We tried to just casually ignore these obstacles and walk over the fences as if they were nothing. Suddenly, we came upon a security guard and his Rotweiller (with muzzle removed). He approached us. I casually explained (in my best French) that we were just trying to walk along the beach and how frustrating it was that all of these tourists were here ruining that, etc. He nodded and said we could pass through AS LONG AS we continued to pass through. No stopping.

Well, you can't say that and not expect a person to be curious as to why they can't stop. So we stopped. We soon realized that we were in the middle of a paparazzi feast! I gathered bits and pieces of what was going on. I heard Angelina Jolie was coming. I thought it was odd that all of these photographers were here just to see her "arrive." I was under the impression that she was out on a yacht somewhere and was just arriving at the festival. Still, Angelina Jolie? Sure, we'll stay for that! So now, here we are.

We decide to pull out our festival badges and turn them around backwards so that we would at least look official. Suddenly, an American woman approaches us. She asks if she can share our "spot." Fine by us! We weren't even supposed to have a "spot." She then tells us that she had reserved a space further up the pier, but that some French photographer had come and sneakily placed his camera bag on top of hers, thereby claiming the space as his (I don't know, I don't speak paparazzo, but I guess that's how it works. Aspiring paparazzi- don't leave home without a very large camera bag). We sympathize. She's grateful. Now we have a "buddy" to hang out with. We are looking more and more official! She tells us some alarming things about the life of a paparazza (which she insists that she is not- she is a professional photo-journalist and the company that she works for just sent her here). She informs us that you can get a cool million for a "first kiss" photo or (as we have recently learned from the subject of this blog post) a first baby photo. It's somewhat eye-opening. No wonder they are so crazy. All you need is one good photo per year (or even your whole life) and have it made in the shade!

A Canadian videographer pops up out of nowhere. He works with the woman. He tells her that he got the whole conflict on tape and that they will use it to prove what a jerk he was. He then introduces himself to us. He is covering the film festival for AMC. He wants us to do a "spot" for the non-existent (yet) film that we have been pushing. Okay. I'm not wearing any makeup, I didn't bother to do my hair, I'm wearing half a bathing suit under some dirty shirt (hey, this was supposed to be a beach day) and here I am, talking to AMC about a film we haven't even made yet! Still, I'm being interviewed. That seals it. No security guard is going to bug us now!

The excitement starts. The energy shifts. We follow the examples of everyone around us and raise our little "point and click" camera up amongst the giant Nikon cameras with telephoto lenses! They say that size doesn't matter, but in this situation, I would have to argue with that!

There she is! Ah ha! It turns out that she is NOT just coming in for the festival, but that she is doing a promo for "Shark Tale!" She was there with her little boy who watched gleefully as she put on a life vest and then...sat on an inflatable shark attached to a speedboat! Can you imagine having this on your schedule for your work day?

A buff, handsome man in sunglasses gets on in front of her. The circumference of his arms makes me think, "ah ha! Bodyguard." A kind of large, disheveled man gets on behind her. The circumference of his belly makes me think, "um, press agent?" The boat starts up and the three of them begin slowly circling in the water for the cameras! It was somewhat surreal and funny as hell (all three of the shark riders were laughing, too):

But wait a second! Why is the bodyguard waving and making peace signs? And why is the press agent hamming it up, humping the shark and singing "Shaaark Taaaaaale!" I look at the poster for the film. Hold on! That's no bodyguard- it's Will Smith! And the guy on the back is not a press agent, it's Jack Black! The press show continues with screaming photographers.

Jack Black, the former press agent, jumps off the shark. The French police come to fish him out (you can't have an American movie star die in French waters- it just looks bad)!

The shark docks and its passengers disembark. The energy falls. The photographers are abuzz- chatting about the incredible shot they got, etc. We begin to leave. This has been an energetic and fun diversion, but we want to relax! On the way out, Carl grabs my camera. He tells me that he has a feeling that they are going to walk down the pier and stop to pose. I give him my camera. He strategically places himself. Sure enough, they stop. Well, Will Smith and Angelina Jolie stop. Jack Black is still swimming around in the water:

Here comes Jack:

It doesn't take the paparazzi long to realize that Carl has snatched the best spot. He is soon beaten over the head. Okay. We've had enough. This is fun, but it's not worth bleeding for!

We walk up the stairs to leave the press fiasco. We are surrounded by curious and eager people. There were literally hundreds of people watching excitedly, trying to get where we happened to be. We felt like movie stars ourselves!

And yes, Will Smith really is hot. Yes, Jack Black really is goofy and funny. And no, Angelina Jolie is not as pretty in real life as she is in the movies. She's actually more beautiful!

Cannes 2004

2006-06-23T15:36:00.000-06:00

Well, this blog is called "An Astronomer in Hollywood." So far, I've written a lot about Astronomy and a lot about my particular kind of filmmaking, but I seem to be lacking...Hollywood!

So due to popular demand, I have decided to post some photos from a trip to Cannes that I took two years ago with my best friend/partner in crime Carl.

So, here we are at the red carpet. No, seriously! See, you can totally tell: that blue blur is Uma Thurman, the black blur to her left is Quentin Terantino, and to her right, well (if I have to tell you), that's obviously Daryl Hannah. This was for Kill Bill Volume...whatever it was that came out in 2004...

Okay, I guess that wasn't very exciting. That was just the video projection of what was going on on the other side of the crowd that we were stuck behind. What was exciting was being on the red carpet:

No, seriously. It was a red carpet:

That was for Yimou Zhang's film "House of Flying Daggers." It was beautiful on the big big screen! It's fun to go to the red carpet screenings at Cannes. They screen the films several times throughout the day for the press. It's often easier to get into those screenings, but it's fun to do the red carpet at least once while you are there! The paparazzi snap your photos pretty viciously! Even if you are not a person People magazine would pay money to have on their pages, they can play off your vanity later and sell you the photo of yourself. I will expand on the cushy living a good paparazzo can make in my next blog.

If that wasn't glamorous enough for you, how's this:

Now for some serious film business shots. You've got to have the right 'tude if you're going to pass yourself off as a film producer:

I was showing one of my short films ("Snowbird") at the Short Film Corner in the Cannes Market. That wasn't the primary reason for attending the festival, but I wanted it to have a good screening. I wrote my posters and flyers out by hand. Tip: this works really well in the time of slick multi-colored glossy postcards. People could not resist picking them up! And yes, both cups of coffee and the pack of cigarettes are mine! I think we slept about 3-4 hours per night there:

By the way, I highly recommend this! There are no requirements for entering the Short Film Corner. Your films are not "judged" and "selected." You simply pay the entry fee and, voilà! You're in the festival. Not only that, but the entry fee is quite reasonable (70 Euros at the time) and you get festival acreditation which allows you to enter the market and attend film screenings. The Short Film Corner is available all day to producers and distributors who watch the films in little private booths. You also get a "theatrical" (video) screening with several other films. I was very pleased with the turnout for my film. In fact, it got to go to Paramount Classics (where they informed me that they don't "do" short films but to contact them as soon as I have feature work)!

Carl transformed his hair to match the carpet. It's unfortunate that we don't have a shot of him in his green satin scarf on the red carpet. Alas, it was hard enough to stop and take one photo when they are urging you up the stairs! Amusingly, the French have one very strict requirement for walking up the red carpet: Men MUST be wearing a black bowtie. No tie, no movie. Carl's was hidden under his scarf, so of course he got stopped (in the same manner as someone who has just set off the metal detector at the airport). He had to peel away his scarf and show his tie. The security guard nodded. Carl re-covered his tie and made his way to the carpet. I guess one doesn't need to be able to see the tie, you just have to have one...???

Anyway, Carl before:

And after:

And now we both have only one degree of separation:

The American Pavilion (where he was speaking with Nicole Kassell, Kyra Sedgwick and Benjamin Bratt about Kassell's film "The Woodsman") was cooking breakfast before he came in. It was kind of amusing when Carl and I looked at each other and said, "do you smell...bacon?" Seconds later, Kevin Bacon walked in the door.

I have to put some "real" photographs in here! We took a break from the festival to go visit l'île Saint Honorat. This is a small island run by monks. It was a nice break from the noise:

It's Twins!

2006-06-22T16:00:00.000-06:00

Every year, the deer come to our neighborhood to give birth. This year, she happened to choose our yard. This was the scene when I came home for my lunch:

Twin #1:

Twin #2:

This was just moments after their birth. Now, they return to our yard every day to either take a nap, eat our roses and pansies, or spend the night (one of them is under our bench every morning):

For jmac

2006-06-13T20:28:00.000-06:00

Thought this might cheer you up!

And no, everyone, it is NOT cruel! Despite the way she looks, she actually loves having her day at the spa (drug-free) and being better able to tolerate 100 degree (no exaggeration- that's how hot it was today) heat. By the way, I did NOT put the bow on her head and it was promptly removed after these shots:

I hope your kitty gets better. Your "get better soon" wishes helped my kitty get better.

Peonies

2006-06-08T09:08:00.000-06:00

From my garden:

Light Years Before Dreaming

2006-05-31T14:36:00.000-06:00

Each night when I lay down to sleep, I disturb the air with my bedding. I inadvertently send lint and dust particles flying through the air. I know this because I see them against the dark background of my wall in the intense beam of light that descends from my halogen ceiling lamp. These particles float and mingle in the air currents. Sometimes I watch them. They shine like stars. They are multiple colors. Some of them blink like pulsars; others only exist as a momentary flash- a micronova.

Perhaps our universe exists as the result of a cosmic settling down of sorts. Perhaps we are the last thought before dreaming. If we were to view ourselves from afar, we might look exactly like this micro-universe I am observing.

My curiosity gets the best of me. I reach out to try to touch one of these shimmering particles. Though I reach slowly, the particles react violently. They swirl around in this new air current. My gentle reach contains all the violence of a black hole. Of course, I cannot touch the particle I originally targeted. It has changed its course. I have lost it in this dust galaxy.

Something else happens. Suddenly, I can no longer see my stars. The reflection of the light’s beam off my hand is too intense. This bright light on such a large surface prevents me from seeing the complex galaxy that I just disturbed.

I realize that as humans, we do this all the time. We reach out with our curiosity and our egos as we constantly reflect upon ourselves. How beautiful would the universe appear if we could see it without blinding ourselves with our own existence?

The Other Cat

2006-05-22T16:55:00.000-06:00

I posted a story about my "big cat," Morgan (who is feeling much better). My "little cat," Lyra is the one causing me heartache now. Despite my attempts at keeping her indoors, she's been running out almost every day. Several times, she has returned with various "gifts." I got her a bell, but that doesn't seem to help. Here's one reason why:

(she got up there by crawling up the wall and then THROUGH the house!)

I have buried several creatures, all of whom I've named: Rosy Bird, Teddy Bear, Sunshine, Gift...On a positive note, there have been a few survivors. I display them here for the ones who didn't survive:

Pheonix was an amazing case. A Yellow-Rumped Warbler who played dead and then flew from the ashes:

(free as a bird- animated by my neighbor, Nageva)

Shoelaces:

(again, animated by Nageva)

Phun with Photos

2006-05-02T10:27:00.000-06:00

Do brothers and sisters ever grow up?

My brother, spinning with the slow shutter on:

Me, doing the same thing:

More slow shutter fun- Headless siblings:

Only sisters can see the demon sides of their little brothers:

Uh, touchee!

Been a while

2006-04-24T11:12:00.000-06:00

It's been a while since my last blog, but for good reason. I mentioned before that I had submitted a screenplay to the Slamdance Screenplay Competition. That has kept me on pins and needles for a while. As if it isn't hard enough to wait to hear from a competition like this, something went wrong with my account and I wasn't receiving the info that I needed! After weeks of calling, e-mailing and "vibing" the people in charge of the festival, I discovered that I have made it past the first round of readings with high scores and am now a semi-finalist contender!

While that turned out to be good news, the not so good news is that my cat, Morgan, had to go to the kitty hospital for a bladder/kidney infection. She is eleven, which means that this may now be a chronic problem for her. She is on antibiotics and subcutaneous fluids. English: we were instructed on how to give an I.V. in her neck so that we can administer fluids beneath her skin. Not only is it hard to stick your own cat with a needle, but it is next to impossible to get her to put up with it. I just wanted to collect some good kitty vibes for her here:

(you can see from this blurry photo not only how cute she is, but how hard it is to get her to sit still!)

Tank Mates

2006-03-23T16:47:00.000-07:00

Just thought I would share some pictures of my "more interesting-looking" roommates!

First, my newest friend:

He's a Dwarf Lionfish. His spines are poisonous. The poison won't hurt you or kill you, but someone who was once stung told me they needed two morphine shots to deal with the pain. That puts an end to my swimming laps in my fish tank!

My first "friend" (he was uninvited- I think he traveled for miles in the bag of sand that I put in the bottom of the tank):

He's a...something.

Another new "friend:"

Not sure what this thing is either, but I first saw it a couple of days ago.
There are also sea stars that pop out from time to time and a Hawaiian fireworm that makes a rare appearance. Sometimes, I wonder what else could be lurking in my aquarium...

Fires of Creation?

2006-03-16T13:10:00.000-07:00

The Spitzer Space telescope recently took this amazing picture:

This object is being called "The Double Helix Nebula" due to its DNA strand shape. The shape is thought to be caused by the magnetic field near our galaxy's center.

This nebula is about 300 light years from the black hole at the center of the Milky Way (to put that into perspective, we are over 25,000 light years away from it). It joins the "Strangely Shaped Nebulae Club," consisting of such members as the red rectangle and, of course, the smiley binary system highlighted below!

This is a false-color image. Spitzer is an infrared telescope. Since we can't see infrared, the images are assigned colors so that we can see them.

Photo credit: NASA/JPL, Caltech/UCLA

An Optimist's Confirmation

2006-03-03T16:36:00.000-07:00

I just received my beautiful e-postcard from the Spitzer Space Telescope:

What you are looking at is Stephan's Quintet. Four of the five galaxies in this image are colliding. The green arc in the center of the image is actually one of the largest shock waves ever seen- it's a shock wave bigger than our own galaxy! It is being produced by one galaxy falling toward another at over a million miles per hour.

Now what you might not see is actual scientific proof of a long-held belief! Now don't be hard on yourself if you don't initially see it, I am an astronomer and have been trained in image analysis. I know the proper equations to apply to this image to glean the truly necessary information. Using complex number wave functions and a little bit of scientific ingenuity I have come up with this:

God truly does have a sense of humor.

Vlog

2006-03-02T11:42:00.000-07:00

I now have a vlog set up (a video blog, that is)!

The Muybridge Connection

The first post there is my 10 minute narrative short film. It will take a long time to load, but I'm not planning on posting videos that large each time I post somthing, so never fear! The film was just long overdue and I wanted it to have a home somewhere. It was originally shot on 16mm film and looks best that way, but since I can't afford prints right now, this is the only life it can have:

The Written Word

2006-02-24T11:15:00.000-07:00

Words words words!

Today is the day.
I take a deep breath, run to Kinko's and print out 120 pages of screenplay. Then I drop it in a box, send it off to the Slamdance Screenplay Competition and wait. And wait. And wait...

On top of that, I finally have my ENTIRE thesis on the representation of children in the films of François Truffaut up and running!

On top of that, Jennifer MacMillan has just written about this blog on her blog: Invisible Cinema Now I'm writing about hers on mine. What a word whilrwind! It's been a long time since I've spent so much time with the written word. Tonight I will immerse myself here and surround myself with images.

A Snail's Trail in the Moonlight

2006-02-10T09:15:00.000-07:00

It was recently filmmaker (and friend) Stan Brakhage's birthday. Here is a belated gift to a man who said he wanted to "leave a snail's trail in the moonlight:"

These are the "teeth marks" of my saltwater snail friend, pictured below:

Many thanks to Gary the snail!

"Postartum" Depression?

2006-02-09T09:58:00.000-07:00

Words are returning in spades!

I've been trying to figure out why I've been so blue lately and realized something that might resonate with others:

I recently finished a screenplay that I had been working on for some time. I knew I had been working on it for at least two years (I started it when I was still living in New York) but a friend actually confirmed for me that I had sent him the first draft in September of 2002! So basically, It's been a project for about four years. In those four years, I abandoned it twice, hacked it pieces, pasted it back together, killed some of my characters and even brought a couple back to life. Needless to say, it’s been in my head for a long time!

Well, about a week ago, I actually typed "The End." Now my mind is reeling! Now what? Now what do I do with this? So I've finished the daunting task of writing 106 pages of story, now I'm faced with the even more daunting task of actually making the film (or worse yet, now people might actually read it, judge it, and the whole thing might not ever become a film)! Plus, there is a bit of…sadness. Now I have to move on and just let the screenplay part of it be what it is. This is much easier said than done.

Since that day, I’ve been moody, prone to crying for no particular reason, tired, argumentative, etc. Most interestingly, I had a very bizarre dream a couple of nights ago: I just had a baby. I kept finding the baby in precarious situations- climbing on scaffolding, swimming underwater, even jumping out of airplanes! I wasn’t sure I wanted anyone else to know that I'd had the baby and was extremely reluctant to nurse it.

All of this suddenly made sense to me- I was suffering from a kind of mild artistic postpartum depression (without all of the chemical changes that go on during childbirth, I admit- though it has been suggested to me several times that the "chemical" thing is there in me as well. My hellish experiences with prescription drug experimentation are fodder for another post!)

I’ve read about this happening with many artists- there’s a sort of mania involved in working on a large project and then a sort of depression when you send your creation out, defenseless in the world, to be scrutinized by curators, festival organizers, etc. Might be one of the reasons why much of my work has never left my house and why many of the talented people I know are "closet" artists! I do know that this has happened to me more than once.

Needless to say, this realization has been a powerful tool for me. It has forced me to start on another project- to have a new focus while people are reading the script and the "what ifs" are floating around my head. I think we all just have to keep plugging away…

Frigid 2

2006-02-09T09:34:00.000-07:00

From the outdoor landscape to the one covering my desk:

Each sheet must be placed in numerical order, sorted, photocopied and redistributed...
The Arctic tundra actually seems pretty inviting right now (ironically, I am working for a research goup that does Arcitc, Antarctic and alpine work)!

Still, beats pushing "gift with purchase" at the mall.

Frigid

2006-02-06T10:35:00.000-07:00

A photo tour of how I'm feeling this morning- both because the heat at work is broken and because today I feel completely alienated from everyone I've ever known or loved. I figure someone out there might share the same sentiments from time to time.

Mystery Artist Contest #1

2006-01-30T11:41:00.000-07:00

Okay, here's a little contest to mix things up. If you are one of the first three people to guess the artist correctly, I will send you a DVD of my films (how's that for prizes)! I recently discovered two of my favorite artists hiding in everyday household items. The first was found in a candle. The candle was actually in front of a poster of this person's work and I was really amazed to see the correlation (the colors were an exact match). Here's artist #1:

Who is it?

Lyra and the Amaryllis

2006-01-26T09:57:00.000-07:00

New Year Winter Wonderland

2006-01-04T09:50:00.000-07:00

Some photos from my recent New Year's trip to Ouray and Telluride. Arriving- San Juan Mountains:
The Ouray Ice Park near Box Canyon Falls (these are man-made "falls" designed for ice climbing):

At the base of the "natural" falls:

And from the top (as viewed 100's of feet above on a rickety bridge...crazy scary):

Holiday lights in Telluride:

Enceladus Is the New Hoth

2005-12-14T09:17:00.000-07:00

Image: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute

So the ice volcanoes continue to be intriguing! It seems that the general consensus is that Enceladus is, in fact, the source of Saturn's gossamer "E" ring. From the Cassini website:

"Saturn's remarkable E-ring is the largest planetary ring in our solar system, spanning all the way from Mimas' orbit to Titan's orbit, about 1 million kilometers (621,370 miles). It is by far the most extended ring around Saturn.

"Until recently scientists assumed that the dust at Enceladus was produced by a process similar to that observed at the Galilean moons of Jupiter: micrometeoroids striking the moon's surface blasting dust particles loose. However, the Cassini data show that the E ring is being replenished not only by dust particles from micrometeoroid hits on the surface of Enceladus but also from grains expelled from possible vents located in the south polar region. The possibility of vents is revealed by a higher surface temperature detected by Cassini's composite and infrared spectrometer, which detected temperature differences at the south pole."

Image: NASA/JPL

For years, we have heard about the moons of Jupiter, particularly the Galilean Satellites: Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. Io is a volcanic moon, Europa is an ice moon that may hold a salty sea beneath its surface (and some speculate that it is one of the most likely places in the solar system where we might find life). With Cassini's arrival at Saturn on July 1, 2004, we have heard plenty about its incredible satellites- Rhea, Dione, Hyperion Mimas, Iapetus... The Huygens probe has given us pictures of Titan that have stoked the imaginative fires. We have seen a landscape that looks like shorelines, cliffs, and rivers. People have speculated that it might be an active place full of volcanism, and (of course) life. Titan has brought up more questions than answers- are those features really shorelines? Is there really a methane sea that is replenished by "rain?"

Now Enceladus has given us an amazing picture: scientists expected to find ammonia in the ice volcanoes. Ammonia would help keep the water in a liquid or gas state at lower temperatures. So far, they have not found any! Additionally, this moon has the highest albedo (99%- the same value as fresh ice) of any body in the solar system. This means that of all the radiation to hit the surface, 99% of it is reflected. Enceladus, it turns out, is a bright, giant snowball, where it may even snow (hence the Hoth reference. For the Star Wars illiterate, Hoth is the ice planet that hosted the rebel Echo Base (and the AT-AT walker battle scene) in "The Empire Strikes Back")! And (the speculations fly), if an energy source beneath the surface is warm enough to melt the ice, perhaps it is warm enough to support life..? What a much more complex picture we have of our solar system! I remember my sixth grade science teacher telling us that scientists know for a fact that there is no life in the solar system outside of this planet. Now we don't seem to be so sure.

By the way, there is a really interesting video on how Saturn's moons interact with its rings here.