Too Much Fun on Blip.fm!

Just been going a little online DJ crazy as of lately. Martin Wong over at Giant Robot turned me onto this new DJ social network site called Blip.fm. You as well as everyone you know can now become a virtual DJ on the web. Which is totally okay and rad because so many people are self proclaimed DJ's anyway. Don't get me wrong, there are some great DJ's out there. But they hard to come by and just like a good live band, you either know about them or you don't. Well you can have some fun too and create your own playlist's online with what seems like a large database of material to pull from. I really like this site for a lot of the live tracks that I've found as well as just putting up some of my favorite songs. I've also linked it to my twitter account which is linked to my facebook account. So every time I list a song on my playlist it updates the other 2 sites as well. This may annoy your twitter and facebook friends. But I haven't heard any negative comments yet, but if your annoyed with my posts. Sorry twitter and facebook friends! Join in the fun and create your own playlist, I think a playlist of songs says a lot about someones personality and mood. So its definitely cool to see what kind of a playlist you may come up with. I'm just having fun with it and hopefully it doesn't get me to addicted, although I guess I could be addicted to something much worse. Anyway, its a fun way to listen to music and listen to your friends taste in music. http://blip.fm/BenClark

Extra juice with the iPhone mophie case!

Not sure how often the rest of you run out of battery power on your iphone. But this happens to me all the time. Especially if your running applications, watching movies or surfing the internet. Well I recently purchased one of these battery life extender cases made by Mophie. Not only will it double your iPhone's battery life, but its not that bulky and still contours to the iPhone's sleek design. The case acts like a separate battery that you turn on when your iPhone is down to about 20%. Then the mophie will act as a charger and charge your phone back up. You can still charge your phone through the mophie usb wire also. It'll run you about $80.00 which isn't a big investment if you depend on your phone a lot. I'm constantly being surprised at how high tech gadgets are changing the way we live. Apple and its accessory companies are constantly turning us all into high tech humanoids.

Regans Birthday Party at Wurstkuche!

Had a great time at Sol Tech, Emerica, Altamont buddy Justin Regan's Birthday last weekend. This was my 3rd visit to Wurstkuche within 2.5 weeks and was stoked to go back. The last 2 times I got the Austin Blues, but this time I had to try the Rattlesnake, Rabbit and Jalapeno Sausage. It was a bit gamey but with some sweet peppers, sauerkraut, and spicy peppers, I was good to go. Also the fries with the Chipotle Aioli sauce is something that shouldn't be missed. The night was a fun evening seeing lots of old friends and eating some great food!

Fellow Photographer and Goat band member Atiba Jefferson.

From the right me, Steve Robert and Steve's lovely date that I forgot the name of. Sorry Steve, send a comment if you read this and I'll correct it!

Vice Magazine Editor Chris Cechin and Chris's Steady/BabyCakes owner Erin McKenna.

Justin is loved by many.

A certificate from the Skate Industry!

A sweet pair of Emerica's that are appropriately named.

Justin and Beautiful wife Beth.

Ako Jefferson with one super cool t-shirt!

Baker Pro Skateboarder Kevin 'Spanky' Long giving me the double thumbs up.

Donny Miller careful where your peeing in public. I just read this about the state of CA http://www.yelp.com/topic/san-jose-peeing-in-public-register-as-a-sex-offender

Donny's Beautiful wife Angie and a very sleepy little Indy.

iPad, iPad, iPad, you know you want one!

Okay, so there's a whole bunch of people out there already talking about the iPad. I'm sure there's a million blogs out there about the product as I'm writing this. But I just wanna say, Apple has pretty much done it again in creating another computerized mobile devise that we all want. Think of the future generations of the iPad, will it take over, and will it evolve the personal computer and laptop as we know it. I do think that we are just beginning to see the potential of what may come ahead in the future. Just remind yourself that this is a 1st generation of this apple product and to me, it looks pretty damn awesome for the first of its kind. Kinda like Led Zeppelin I, what a doozy of a first record. I don't think another band or musician has topped that record for a 1st record. Lets just put it this way, as a photographer I'm seeing several uses already. One that could save the print magazine world, if that world is open to it. Lets face it, I love checking out the magazine stands and printed material is always nice. But the future of the media is changing and so are a lot of things. We are now in a part of our culture that says keep up or fall behind and fade off into obscurity. Which is fine if you like being obscure. I just think that if someone can develop the app or program to make magazines online. It would even cut print costs for the magazine's out there. Just imagine getting a folder emailed to you with a file that is an issue of a magazine. You would still have either a subscription or there would be some online mag store to purchase these files. You then have a virtual magazine that can be viewed by your iPad. Now I know its only 9", but like I said this the 1st generation and apple can decide later if it will create larger or even mid and smaller versions of the iPad. Magazine's could still charge for advertising depending on their circulation and popularity. They could still even release a printed product if they like. If the content is good I would still buy a magazine. Or even if a magazine just created an annual printed edition at the end of the year. The online material could be something that could create a tangible book edition at the end of the year and could be sold as a collectible. This could be pretty thick and they could probably charge more for it than a news stand cover price. I'm just throwing this out there because I see the potential in the future. I've heard that apple has already made a deal with college textbook companies that will probably increase the number of sales of the iPad and eTextbooks to that age group. Now that sounds like a vision of the future out of some Sci Fi movie. A bunch of college students walking around or sitting at table's on campus with their iPad. You now just need Marty McFly to cruise by with his hover board. And thats supposed to be 2015 I think, which is 5 years away. All I'm saying is that the potential is just scratching the surface and it will be up to new generations of Entrepreneurs to lead the way. And Apple is definitely one of those Entrepreneurs in the now.

Yo Gabba Gabba Art Party!

Well it seems that post production has come to an end for Season 3 over at Yo Gabba Gabba. And to celebrate the post production dept. threw an Art Party. Which was a fun party that invited all who worked on the show, either during production or post production, to hang some art up. It was a fun party and a great way to see everyone who worked on the show again.

DP Jay Lafayette, Show Creator/Director Christian Jacobs, and Makeup Artist Marissa Deleon.

Motion Graphics FX and part time DJ for the Party Jordan Kim.

Show Creator/Director Scott Schultz.

Production Assistant Evan Sinclair.

Artwork by Erin Pierce A.KA. Brobee and the voice of Toodee.

Motion Graphics FX and amazing time lapse artist Joel Fox and girlfriend Michelle.

Animation Art Director Parker Jacobs.

Artwork by Parker, you might recognize some of the character design from the show.

Camera Operator Langdon Taguiped showing me his bounty for the evening.

Great external storage system if your on a budget!

If your a photographer or anyone who needs lots of storage space on your computers hard drive. Then you understand how costly it can be and how easy all those hard drives add up and take up space. Well someone over at Newertechnology has a rad solution. The Voyager SATA I/II hard drive docking station. It kinda reminds me of ATARI 2600 from back in the day but for hard drives. The dock is a pretty simple design and is pretty much what it sounds like, a plastic docking station. The nice thing is the initial cost of buying the dock will only run you about $88.00 for Firewire 800/400, USB 2.0+eSATA or about $30.00 for USB 2.0+eSATA. You then have to purchase the 2.5 or 3.5 SATA drives to plug into the dock. Its pretty raw looking to see a SATA drive just sticking out like a video game cartridge. But if your someone who can shoot 50 to 100 gigs every time you do a photo shoot or you record music and video which I assume takes up massive amounts of hard drive space also. Then this might be a great inexpensive solution for you. I'm using mine as an off site back up storage system. I also use a drobo at home which is another great storage devise. Best place to purchase the dock is at the OWC(Other World Computing) Site. Probably the best place to get non dedicated accessories for your mac or pc. They also sell rad DIY kits if you want to build your own external drives as well as their own brand of external drives. Here is a link to the shops site http://eshop.macsales.com/ I've been a customer of OWC for about a year and haven't been disappointed yet.

GR Bienalle Art Show Closing Party!

Last night was a fun evening at the Japanese American National Museum in downtown LA for the closing party to this years Giant Robot Bienalle Art Exhibition. I actually had 10 photo's up in the show as part of the photo retrospective for 15 years of Giant Robot. I was honored and stoked to be in such good company with so many respected artists and creative people. It was great seeing friends and GR collaborators, there was also the rock band "The Binges" to end the evening with some loud guitar wailing sounds.

David Choe

Stella Lai

Jeff Soto

James Jean

Deth P. Sun

The Binges.

GR friends Ayako Fujitani, Bill Poon, and Publisher Eric Nakamura

My good friends Carlos and Angelyn De la Garza.

My good friends from Vienna and Motmot design, Anna and Steve.

Steve also does a rad comic called Cheetahs Never Win! If your in Vienna check out their store or you can check out their stuff online at http://www.motmotdesign.com/