Day 193 - Stairway

Thought of the day: I ran into some photos of bento box lunches prepared by a Japanese woman for her son to bring to preschool day to day.  I was thoroughly impressed.  The lunches were meticulously and thoughtfully prepared.  They were aesthetically pleasing to the eyes and, judging from the statement that her son devoured every bite of them, they must be pleasing to the taste buds as well.  She demonstrated that with enough love and intention, a daily chore can be turned into a creation of art.  That's probably true for many other things as well.  Indeed, life itself can be an art if you decide to live it as one.

Photo of the day:

There's art to be seen pretty much anywhere in the Stanley Hotel.  Old historic hotels may give you a cozy living space with very little luxury in the room, but who cares if it's interesting wherever you set your eyes on.

Day 190 - Tackle

Thought of the day: Our neighborhood has now a photo club!  It's nice to be able to hop on the bike or walk to a photo club meeting in a neighbor's home.  In the meeting tonight, we showed some of our recent photos to each other and then spent the rest of the evening talking about some random things.  For those of us who do photography as a hobby, or maybe even as a profession, you know that it's a labor of love.  But unlike a "normal" group activity where you get constant feedback from each other,  it can be a lonesome pursuit.  You can be taking photos for years without knowing whether you are really making progress or not.  You can be sending albums to friends and family for years and getting little feedback other than an occasional "This is great!" which, unfortunately, doesn't tell you much or help you much.  I wonder if the feeling of loneliness is shared by individuals laboring in different areas of arts, for example, painting, writing, composing.  Other than the occasional recognitions you may receive when you are really good or get really lucky, you mostly labor in the dark driven by nothing more than the love of doing what you're doing.  In fact, it's probably true in any field that requires you to work on your own for a long stretch of time - astronomy, biology, basic science research, you name it.  The feeling of loneliness is pretty much inevitable and it may even be a necessity for us to develop into who we are.  However, we are primarily social beings and we need support from each other to break the monotony, and that's when something like a photo club comes into play.

Photo of the day:

Little kids tackling a soccer ball.  It's certainly more fun for kids to play with others than playing a ball on their own!

Day 168 - Lights

Thought of the day: The annual Conference on World Affairs is taking place at CU this week.  CWA started in 1948 and had attracted a wide variety of experts in different fields to talk freely about pretty much anything under the sun.  This morning I attended a discussion called "Artists and Scientists in Pursuit of Light" with two artist friends.  The panel included Danielle Feinberg who is a director of photography at Pixar and did the light-up of Wall-E.  She talked about the lighting for a few Pixar movies which made me want to watch them all over again as her talk gave me a new perspective in animations and a new appreciation for the making of them.  Another panelist was Jeff Lieberman who is the host of Time Warp on Discovery Channel.  His talk began with the origin of the universe and ended with the future of human consciousness.  So as you can imagine, his talk jumped all over the place from science to human emotions to mythology.  It was unusual and yet he made it all seem coherent.  I could tell that the audience was quite captivated by him and his topics as most of the followup questions were directed to him.  The third panelist was a physicist and science writer. He made some interesting observations on how science eventually brought many sci-fi dreams into reality.  And the fourth panelist was a storyteller.  Her sense of humor and keen observations of human nature added a nice touch to an otherwise quite serious discussion.  All in all, I found the whole session to be scintillating and mind-opening.  To say the least, any discussion that would make me go online afterwards and research for a dozen of new books to read is definitely not a waste of time.

Photo of the day:

Lights on Pearl St.  Danielle said that one of the joys of photography is to make the most mundane objects look special.  How true! Similarly, I think one of the joys of life is to make the most routine days feel special.  To make an object special, the key is in the light.  And to make a day special, the key is in the mind.  Stimulating thoughts can enlighten a day just like dancing lights can bring an object to life.

Day 150 - Fridge Door

Thought of the day: Today I took some videos for a family.  It was an interesting experience as I had not taken many videos before.  I learned a number of things for sure.  For example, I found out, to my surprise, that the real life could go through some subtle transformations when they were transported onto the screen.  The same scene or dialogue could appear more or less beautiful, more or less poignant, depending on how you record it.  By changing the lighting, the composition, and the surroundings, you could change the mood of the video.  Editing could make a difference too, by using different background music, cutting out different footage, and doing sequencing differently.  So taking videos is pretty similar to taking photos, in the sense that you can make the recording reflect your view of the reality.  Just like what a photographer can do with photos, a videographer can record beyond what the naked eyes can see.  He can cut through the surface and record the essence of reality as seen by the eyes of the heart and mind.  That definitely makes video taking interesting for me.

Photo of the day:

Friend's fridge door - random but precious snapshots of everyday life.