It's Spring Break!
Ahh! A break from classes.
Now I can update this thing!
I just saw Watchmen and it blew me away. Based on a graphic novel, this movie has apparently been going through a long and controversial struggle to get produced since the 80's, and the rights were still being fought over by studios earlier this year making it seem as if it were not going to be released. Thankfully it finally made it.
I went to see it not knowing any background of the story and loved it! I wouldn't recommend it for everyone though, since it has a lot of graphic violence and a sex scene that was completely unnecessary. Being 2 hours and 40 minute I was surprised when after 2 hours I hadn't seen nudity, then disappointingly they seemed to get bored with implying things and threw it in. Still a great movie. It had a very deep and insightful storyline involving fallen heroes, society falling apart and on the verge of destroying the world through nuclear war, and the few heroes left with any sense of morality trying to prevent ultimate destruction. All of which revolved around an
amazing soundtrack, featuring the title of my post. One of my favorite songs.
What's going on in my studio?
Well, here is one of my newer prints.
I have several more of these slightly larger prints, but I have yet to photograph them. I moved from working on 8.5" x 11" card stock to 11"x14" bristol board. Hopefully soon I will have originals in the shop. They smell delightfully minty because of the wintergreen oil. I collaged my own photographs of the bird and Chicago to create the entire composition digitally so I transferred it all at once rather than collaging each thing separately. I want to keep working on the bad movie posters, but I also have some more portraits.
The lines are art of my experiment of how to make the pictures seem like more than just a computer print out.
And now of course, the shopping update. Many of you must have the impression by now that I am a shopaholic, but I like to consider myself more to be a bargain hunter. I would say about 90% of the things I buy are not the original or list price. My way of thinking is, if I am going to want it later I ought to buy it while it is cheap and I have the money. Most recently I found a treasure trove of bargains at Office Max of all places. I went in with two ink cartridges because I knew that they used to be redeemable for $3 off your purchase AND they were doing one of those "15% off everything you fit in this paper bag!" sales. I wanted to get some of those clear plastic sleeves for three ring binders and ended up in clearance heaven.
Except for the file folders, everything in the picture was marked down to $1 or less, minus the 15% and the $6 of ink I redeemed. Altogether, I about the same as I would have on the regular priced package of 50 plastic sleeves. In order to redeem the ink cartidges Office Max now requires you to get one of their membership cards. It is one of those free ones that comes with a key chain card also and you get points and coupons and such. I'm always up for a free thing that can potentially save me money. I can't take a photo that would capture this, but the graphic design of the packet my membership card came in was unbelievable. They really went all out to put together a nice, high quality packet, especially considering it is free.
Chris works in the campus post office, and they always end up with magazines that can no longer be forwarded to the subscriber. A few weeks ago I picked up a copy of The Nest and found this great idea for framing things.
It may be a bit hard to see in the small picture, but they are framed cork boards with an individual image pinned in the center of each one. Like each one has its own bulletin board. That was my motivation for buying the thumbtacks and paper clips above.
I have plenty more to update on, but I don't want this post to be too big. I will save some for later.
(Simon and Garfunkel)
