What's that smell?

Today I met by buddy Jake at the Subway on Alabama St. for lunch. His original idea was to meet at "The Lounge" on Penn.

"No, I don't have that much time...." I said - but I was also thinking about the smoke in the place. Anytime you go there, you walk out smelling like you've just smoked a pack of cigarettes, and then dumped the ashes in your pockets. It's a lingering smell that you just can't shake.

So Subway on Alabama was were we went. Lunch was delicious, a veggie delight with loads of vinegar and oregano. Mmmm.

When I got back to my office I discovered the smell. It was as if someone was baking bread in the room next door. I went to the bathroom and washed my face, hoping that would get rid of it. Nothing. If anything, it just energized it.

Sitting at my desk, soaked in the aroma of wheat, white, etc.... I began to wonder if it was just me. So I IM'd Jake. He smelled like bread too, and even tried to convince a coworker to "sniff his clothes", but they declined.

In the long run we both agreed that we would much rather smell like smoke than bread. (Jake said the smell reminded him of "barf") I think it was more like the smell of the stuff they put on barf, but what's the point in debate. It's not good.

So next time....I'm voting for "The Lounge", where at least when you get back to the office you have an explanation for why you smell funky...

In Search of Nostalgia

I've been thinking a lot lately about nostalgia - or old things from times gone by that people don't really use anymore, or that have been replaced by some new form or gadget. I think the curiosity has been peaked lately from watching National Treasure, a movie where treasure hunters (Nicholas Cage) are in search of a treasure buried somewhere by Freemasons 200 or more years ago. The movie is full of nostalgia - most of it centered around the founding of our country and all of the history in Philidephia.

And then there is the camera problem I have. My working collection as of now satisfies me, and I haven't purchased anything new for quite a long time, but more than half of it is 20 or more years old. I have a full sized Canon EOS 1N that I use for anything I'm asked to do that is very important that every shot be usable - because with autofocus and program mode I can point it in any direction and with three button pushes I can have a perfect photo 99 percent of the time. But what's the fun in that? That's why I have an older Canon that I shoot anything artsy with. Not every shot is perfect. Most of the time only half are usable, but that's getting better the more I practice. The other cameras are just toys. A big medium format Swedish camera that I bought more as a project than to actually use, although it makes a really nice black and white picture. There's an ancient rangefinder from the 50's that I was lucky enough to get from my grandfather - who turned out to also be a camera guy, although I never really got the chance to know him well. And a few others that I don't think I can find film for anymore. But they are all there, for the sake of nostalgia; the really old ones perched above my desk at work. Every once in a while someone will come by and ask about them, and they are taken down and demonstrated, their inner workings pointed out and marveled at - and I usually say "They don't make them like this anymore....it's all electronic now...." But for that 3 minutes the camera springs back to life, just as it did 40 years ago when taking pictures of my father, or some nice scene from a field that's probably a shopping center now.

And then there is a fairly recent thing of coolness I've discovered, although I haven't been able to get one. Fountain pens. Do a little good search on old fountain pens and see what you find. Chances are you'll find some clubs and dealers who specialize in selling and buying old fountain pens. How cool is that? Just like cameras, technology almost wiped the fountain pen as people once knew it off the face of the planet. Bic plastic rollerball pens took over the market, and away went the fountain pen. Now, if you want a fountain pen you have to go to a special shop to find one. Office depot doesn't carry a good selection at all. I wanted one, just for kicks, but found that most of them would cost me 60 or more dollars, so my search was put off for some other time.

But what is it about this stuff that intrigues me? Well, a number of things. First is probably quality. You know that if something is still around after all that time it is a quality product. Second is the thought of where something came from. What have my cameras seen in their life? If they could write on this blog, what could they write about? It would probably amaze us, even if it was the most mundane thing.

So that's what I've been thinking about lately. I'm surrounded by technology everywhere I go. Wireless rays of electronic information pass through all of us every single second of our lives. I can't say I hate technology. I've had a computer since I was in the 4th grade. I've been surfing the web since 1991, when all you could get was the weather - and chat rooms were the most amazing thing ever. My profession, most of the time, is centered around pushing the limits of technology and what it can do - usually translating into dollars and cents, but sometimes something more meaningful. So I don't hate technology - only what it has done to the old way of doing things. I think that's why I write in a paper journal a lot. Why I use old cameras to take pictures for myself, and why I'd love to have a fountain pen. Because if we don't hold on to these things, they'll be gone. Our kids won't know anything of them, unless they stumble across a photo in a publication about "Life Before 2010" or something. And write some stuff down in a book somewhere. Technology will eventually make even this blog obsolete. It will disappear. It's only 0's and 1's held together by some code and an electronic device. It doesn't actually exist.

So I am in constant search of nostalgia....

IT'S ALIVE!

After a long long trip and a lot of late nights this week, the USA Diving site has gone live.

USA DIVING IS LIVE!

More of Maine - the black and whites

Oh yeah. Got the black and white negatives back last night, and while uploading files tonight for the monster website to launch tomorrow, I decided to play with a couple.



An old anchor. If you're coming to the Maine house (below) this is at the end of the road. It's really the only landmark out there, so when you see the old Anchor in Friendship, turn, and follow that road to the coast.

Here's what the old Maine house looks like from the dock, on the water.

Charity Work

I thought last week that I had done something very foolish. I received a call from the Make-A-Wish Foundation of Indiana, who I volunteer for as a "Wish Granter", and they were looking for a designer to put together some things for a promotion they were doing. I was told it would be a poster and a little 2 sided card. No problem, I though.

Then I got the details. The promotion is taking place at the 31 Applebee's locations around Indiana. They are going to be selling bracelets (like the Lance Armstrong yellow ones) to promote Make-A-Wish, and to raise money for wishes. Each location has agreed to sell the bands, and all of the money goes toward a child's wish, who the location is sponsoring. So, there is a poster (not shown) that gives those details and has a place to put the locations child information and a photo. Then, on each table in all of the restaurants there will be what is called a table-tent card - basically those cards that usually have the deserts or the drink of the month on them. Well, it's going to be my design for these cards and the poster. Hmmm, 31 locations - each with about 30 tables....plus the bar....damn! That's a lot of eyeballs on this stuff. To say the least, I got a little nervous about it. Plus, I was looking at a deadline for the stuff to be printed in less than a week....

But, late last night the breakthrough came. There was a problem. No photography of the bracelet. I'm not sure they've even been produced yet. So I had the idea of illustrating one. But they are pretty plain, so how could I dress it up? I thought maybe I could illustrate a person wearing one. But then, I'm no illustrator....or am I? I found a photo I liked, blew out the colors in photoshop and brought it to basic highlight areas and shadow areas. Then I just illustrated what I saw. I don't think it turned out too bad!





So look for this stuff to hit Applebee's locations in July, and please buy a bracelet to support the cause. It really is worth it.

Digital Sketches

I've been playing lately (for an upcoming project) with rendering sketches from my 3D software. I can output all kinds of styles, and hopefully incorporate them into an environment. Just thought it would be something interesting to look at, so is my favorite of the tests so far.

Check out this link: http://www.madflydesign.com/sketchflash.html for another example of an all vector based animation - the file below is 4 meg in size, the one on the link is 25k! A LOT smaller!



I'll keep you informed as more come around. I am super busy with work stuff, and personal stuff, and trying to cut out 100 covers for the reception invitations, and trying to design thank you cards....it's just a little hectic!

Maine Pictures

Ok, for all of you who have been anxiously waiting for photos of Maine, here you go. I don't have time to write a lot, this weekend I hope to catch up on some of that. But here are the images with breif descriptions.



-remember I said I was waking up to the ocean 30 feet away? This is the view! That's Cow Island right there that you see. On the other side, the Atlantic Ocean.


The other side of the arch. The path leads up and around to the chapel.


You have to climb these stairs to get up to the chapel.


Here is the inside of the chapel. It's a little dark, and I didn't know this lady at all, so I didn't spend much time there. She was eating lunch with her daughter. We will be married in about the spot she is standing there, overlooking the ocean to one side, and a bunch of really nice gardens on the other.


An old bell. Not sure what it was for...


Here's a side shot of the chapel itself. It's surrounded by trees, so this is the only angle I could get it all.


Some of the lush garden areas around the chapel.

Sometimes you just have to laugh.

I interviewed 3 people today for a job at work....

with my fly down.


Sometimes, you just have to laugh.

Culture Shock

- my feet, sitting on a bench in Camden, ME. I was drinking coffee at the moment. Exciting!

Well, I've made it back to Indy for a while. I won't be leaving again until the end of July.

I have so many things to write about, it will probably take all week, maybe even two weeks, to get it all out there. I have notes about it all so I won't forget.

And pictures....oh do I have pictures. I FILLED my two memory cards with pictures from Maine and I have 3 rolls of black and white that I took as well. I CAN'T WAIT to get those up here.

I'm swamped at work now, though, so I'll have to try to make some time in the evenings to put some stuff up. Maybe I can sneak a break in here and there to write some. Like now, I am compressing audio files for a project, that takes about 3 mins each, so I can get this up...but it helps to be able to spill it all out there at once, not bits at a time.

To say the least, I'm a bit shocked mentally and physically to be back after the last week of adventure. The first part of the week saw me on my way to Connecticut to make a sales pitch for some new business, and to see some sights along the way. Everything went very well on that trip, in case you were wondering, and the work is already flowing in - part of the reason for my current busy state.


- a little sneak peak of the chapel! Lauren proudly standing in front of the arch leading up the stairs to the little chapel. I don't have any good pictures of the inside because there were a few people inside it trying to have a quiet lunch, so I didn't stay up there long. It's going to be so cool though....

But waking up this morning, to look out the window at a rain soaked corn field, was a little bit of a shock to me. After four days of waking up to the ocean 30 feet from your head, a corn field just didn't have the same effect. I'm not complaining, though. It was still tons better than waking up with 10th street 30 feet from your head! That's something I won't soon miss.


- inside a little diner. Lauren was paying for something, and my ADD kicked in. I was snapping photos and getting weird looks from the girl behind the counter, a favorite activity of mine.

I just wanted to get this up there, to warn you that there are a ton of photos on their way, and a lot of stories to tell - stories about the travel, the sights, and the crazy people we met along the way that are going to be involved in our wedding. Oh, it's going to be a trip, that's for sure...

Golden Palace

I'm back from possibly the most nerve racking business trip in my life. I had technology problems that you would not believe. Scheduled to present to a room full of people at 2:30PM with my laptop and a projector. On the way, in the car, I was running through my routine with my laptop and BLINK! It quits working. It quit working and wouldn't restart for the remainder of the trip.

Luckily, having done this once before with similar results, I put everything on a backup hard drive that I could use as a "Plan B". After hijacking a computer and putting the work on a network to wirelessly play back on a borrowed laptop, I was able to present, and no one even noticed my sweating profusely, cursing under my breath, and asking myself what the heck I was doing. I'm a designer, not a salesman!

So that's the nerve racking bit. The next part was really quite nice. We were put up in the Mohegan Sun Casino and Resort in Connecticut. I would highly recommend this place if you are a high roller and tired of Vegas. I've never been to Vegas, and I don't even know how to play the slot machines, so I would fit into neither of those categories. BUT, I did enjoy myself for the remainder of the trip - and I didn't gamble one red cent.

I would definitely call this place something out of Oz, or a movie not yet created. It's "the biggest casino in the world" and it lives up to it's reputation. I can't even describe it, you just have to be there to see the scale of everything. It's like Disney land for gamblers, and people like me who just like to wonder around and touch shiny things.

So, here are some pictures with an explanation of what each is, just to kind of get a feel for it:


This is the LOBBY of the hotel, the first thing you see. These are all sculptures of trees, and the "leaves" are hand strung glass beads. So, the green stuff you see in this photo and the one below are little beads - sort of like a beaded fabric, but strings of them.


Another shot of the lobby, from the other angle. There is a waterfall behind me in this shot, with a huge glass statue by some famous artist...I should have written down the name, but I didn't have a pen. The water flows from the center of the lobby, down this "river" down one waterfall, under the floor, and over to another waterfall.


Here you can kind of get a sense for the detail of the little beaded forest.


This is the glass sculpture (hand blown - each piece looking like a tube of glass in a strange shape) and the second waterfall. The sound in the lobby is like standing next to a huge waterfall because of the two of them going all the time. There is a bar in front of this one that we all met at after our meeting and had a beer.


This is directly to the right of that last shot. It's looking down a long hallway of retail shops in the middle of the two huge casino rooms in the place. Everything from Godiva chocolate to Yankee Candle shops in here. Only the best...and the prices reflected it. I didn't buy anything.


Another huge beaded ceiling above the retail area. There were probably 20 of these arches, about 30 feet wide by 30 feet long, and about 20 fee above the ground floor.


This was a huge structure next to the escalator. You can get a sense of it's size if you look at that sign to the left of it. It is about 14 feet high. I'd say the ceiling height in this area had to be 50 feet or more.


This was as close as I could get to the casino part of the place with a camera. Even at 6:00 this morning, with no one around, there was still someone there to tell me no. The wolf you see here is one of about 6 robotic wolves that "watch" over the casino. 4 or 5 of them are on top of slot machine games, and when someone wins on a machine one will start to howl, the others will "hear" it, and start howling again. I didn't hear this, but our tour guide said it get's pretty intense.


Another shot down that retail hallway from the ground level. HUGE! And every one of those arches in the ceiling has beaded parts to it, as described above.


This was a picture from the side of the big waterfall by the bar and "Tuscany" a neat little Italian restaurant where we had dinner.

I'll write more about the trip later, but I've been up way too long, traveled a lot in the last two days, and now it's time to go relax!

Busy Summer!

Well, it's here. The first leg of a series of travels in preparation for my wedding in July.

tomorrow I leave on a plane to Connecticut for business, return to Indy on Tuesday afternoon, work all day Wednesday, then get on a plane for Maine for a 4 day weekend in Maine - where we will be making final arrangements with the reception hall, the florist, the photographer, and the officient. That all has to happen on Thursday and Friday, then on Saturday we are planning to just relax at Lauren's family's house for the day, hopefully not leaving the house for anything! I just hope we get half way decent weather while we are there.

So, with all of that said, the blog might go stagnate until I get back from Maine. I'll write after my trip to Connecticut - hopefully with some travel pictures from the hotel, at least. I may be working the entire time we are there, but should be able to snap a few photos.

-and away we go!

Life's too short not to...

Almost everyday I hear someone say "You know, life's too short not to _BLANK_."

"Life's too short not to eat that cake."

"Life's too short not to take that trip."

"Life's too short not to enjoy every waking moment of your life."

I agree, believe me, but I am a realist and I realize that certain things must be done in order to enjoy those "life's too short" moments. One of those things being work, the very thing that usually threatens ruin every single waking moment of one's life. It is a necessity, though, in order to enjoy life to the fullest, you have to buckle down and earn a living, so every now and then you can have a whole clump of "Life's too short" indulgences - eat the cake, take the trip, sleep till noon, bungee jump...whatever.

My philosophy - "Life's too short not to be happy...but life's WAY to long to live poor."

Now, I know money isn't everything. I would love to sit here and tell you that I don't need money for anything, that everything I enjoy is free. Unfortunately because of the time and the country we live in, this isn't true, or in my opinion - even possible. Money is the vehicle that drives our fun meters, it would seem. You have to have money to go on trips, eat cake, and buy nice things. You have to have money to do just about everything that we consider "fun". And to get money, you have to work. (unless you win the lottery, rob banks, or inherit tons of cash form great uncle Monty, the famous real estate mogul)

So, in the spirit of looking forward to a few clumps of "Life's too short" moments in the next couple of months (read: vacation, wedding, and honeymoon), I need to get back to WORK!

Enjoy your day - and if you are working - even if on your own, take a few minutes and think about all of the fun you'll have on the weekends and on vacation because of the honest living you are making!