Paper Dreams
Edit: this just in:
Polaroid stop motion of Dion and his polaroid obsession. Taken in Taiwan, four of us in the mirror, photos by me, gif by Dion. Check out his awesome portfolio Comma Comma.
What what? What is that? Closer, closer, colours make an entrance, forms are introduced, light emerges from the grey.
Our lantern floating quickly off into the clouds
Listening to: Avril Lavigne I Will Be
People ask, "how was Taiwan? How did you see anything with only three days there?"
But really trips are good not only because of the destination but the experiences are largely made up of the people.
It was not fun because the things we did, ate and saw were spectacular but it was the company that made it what it was.
We went to this one area called 'Shirfen" where they had these little stores that sold five feet tall paper lanterns. You choose a colour according to the meaning you wanted to convey(pink=friendship, love, orange=power, red=prosperity etc) and then you sit around a table to write and draw your dreams out. After they open it up, light the interior and together, you release it into the sky in hopes that the heavens will take note and answer your dreams.
-------------------------------------------
I saw 'Up' again in theaters in Hong Kong.
And I was amazed even more so the second time watching it than I was the first time round in New York exactly two months ago.
What impresses me, astonishes me and bedazzles me about Pixar is this: their ability, sensitivity to the world around them. Unlike filming a human-based movie, you cannot simply tell the character to jump, walk or run, nor can you tell the vegetation-based backdrops to stir at the sound of wind. Every single nuance has to be orchestrated. Hence Pixar animators have to be extremely aware of how things work, move and interact with one another.
They also have the ability to bring to awareness even the smallest detail of how we interact with one another. One small gesture can become so meaningful. When the character crosses his heart as a mark of a promise to his wife or readjusting the wooden bird on the mantle piece so that it is angled perfectly to how she would have liked it: all these small actions just make the characters even more real.
I have never seen another movie in which in a matter of an eight minute reel of a couple's life together, the audience is reduced to tears because they are already so attached to them.
That is power. And not only power but just a glimpse of the passion that the animators at Pixar have for their craft. You can see their heart in the growth of facial hair on the old man as time passes by. Dude if I was animating an old man, I would not remember to animate his stubble. Yes, it's just those small details which makes Pixar all the more real.
In watching 'Up' I have become more aware of how the elderly move, how they interact and you know what? I see it every day when I go to the market with my grandmother yet all these things pass me by. It takes something unreal to make me realize the real.
But yeah the one thing about Pixar I love is their passion for their craft. I was told every film takes four years to make and they do exhaustive experiments and tests in real life in order to study, imitate and animate. For 'Up', they actually floated a ton of balloons inside their studio and had to cover all the fire alarms on the ceiling in case they started going off.
To animate 'South America', a team was actually sent there to study the landscape and scenery over there.
You can't say "just look at photos, they're the same thing."
Which is why I find business people unbelievable. It's just not the same thing. If you only experience the 2D, you will get 2D animation.
If I could work for Pixar, I would. In a heartbeat I'd move to San Francisco or Vancouver. Their passion is infectious.
--------------------------------------------
The Drawing of Dreams
Sitting on the stool trying to figure out what dreams to express was the most, I guess, frustrating thing I had to do particularly as a graduate trying to find her ground.
Geez, Sam, you don't have to take it so seriously. It's all just for fun.
Yes I know that but it's the fact that I really don't know what direction I want to go towards that makes me concerned.
I can't draw my dream because first, I don't know if I ever received what I so wanted, if it'd be something I'd really want. Secondly, if I could draw my dream out on paper and make it into something tangible, well, it wouldn't be that marvelous would it? Plus my imagination is limited to what I think every person would want in life: car, money, boy, girl, house, job. But when does a person's dream ever revolve around serving other people? Hardly ever.
Yet if you ask me what my dream is as of now it would be
1) To find fulfillment and meaning in what I do. Sounds vague? Well it doesn't matter what the heck I do as long as that is there. But if you want to know what I find meaningful at the moment it would be:
2) To realize my thesis as a living, breathing, functioning system. I want to be the Pixar of fashion.
But that dream, I realized last night, may be something I have to let go. Not that I just gave up, but for now, I may have to backtrack and put that on hold. There's a scene in 'Up' where the old man has to make a decision of whether to save his house along with all his memories of his wife or to rescue his new companions.
In that split second I realized that sometimes you have to let go of these dreams to gain something better. At times we are so bent on pursuing one thing that in our disillusionment, do not realize how beautiful what is already in front of us.
I love this line from 1 Timothy 6:6-7:
But godliness with contentment is great gain. 7For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it.
---------------------------------------------------------
There is a chance right now, that I may not come back.
Well, not to make it sound like it's set in stone, there is a chance I my calling is in Asia for now. But nothing is set and the cards are still being dealt.
I told God, "just like Isaiah, here I am, send me. Like him, I want to see and experience Your glory."
Yet when it comes down to following this, I'm actually afraid.
I'm afraid, after having finally made a solid group of friends in New York, I have to start from scratch again. I know what God has done for me and I remember the past four years in which He has provided for me yet I can't help but look at what I have in Manhattan and asking "again? It's been four years and am I to move again?"
I have come to love my church and now having to leave that is really difficult. It was at this church that I have come to know God in a deeper way, it was where I met other people who were passionate about pursuing God and finding a fellowship of people who I could lean on.
I'm also afraid of the people in Hong Kong.
Two days ago, I had dinner with someone I had not seen in ten years.
He told me, "I thought you'd study something else. I remember, you were smart. I thought you'd be a lawyer or a doctor.. not in design."
To him, as a business major, design is fine arts. Design is strictly painting or colours. To me, design is brand imaging, design is systems-planning, design is animated films, design is creating an image to be positioned in the mind of the consumer. Design infiltrates everything we see, touch, use and interact with. Yet it goes unnoticed when it is well executed.
Design, in many ways, is more difficult than say medicine, law or business. Because we have to imagine what if rather than what is. You can understand the body by reading the textbook and attending lab sessions at hospitals yet though you may study design in architecture, books, clothes, you still may not be creative enough to actually design.
To people in Hong Kong, design does not make money. Design is not business and business is not design. But having designed a business for my thesis, I can say they are inextricably one.
If I choose to stay here, I know the battle against the business-driven mindset is going to be frustrating. On one hand, I want to return to New York where design is regarded with importance yet I am reminded that in some ways, I should stay here because I am different. I have something to offer: I can make people realize the importance of art and design, not only for its commercial potential.
Hong Kongers are always in awe of the Japanese, and I've noticed it is because there is a lack of design and innovation here in Hong Kong to begin with. ANYTHING seems better than what is here.
God, I'm so lost.
Polaroiding in Taiwan. We did a series of shots that captured the colour development of a single Polaroid shot. Hopefully my friend will make a GIF out of it so I can post it here.
Quote from Up:
Russell- Sometimes, it's the boring stuff I remember the most.
How true. All my favourite memories are of those where we do nothing.
Polaroid stop motion of Dion and his polaroid obsession. Taken in Taiwan, four of us in the mirror, photos by me, gif by Dion. Check out his awesome portfolio Comma Comma.
What what? What is that? Closer, closer, colours make an entrance, forms are introduced, light emerges from the grey.
Our lantern floating quickly off into the clouds
Listening to: Avril Lavigne I Will Be
People ask, "how was Taiwan? How did you see anything with only three days there?"
But really trips are good not only because of the destination but the experiences are largely made up of the people.
It was not fun because the things we did, ate and saw were spectacular but it was the company that made it what it was.
We went to this one area called 'Shirfen" where they had these little stores that sold five feet tall paper lanterns. You choose a colour according to the meaning you wanted to convey(pink=friendship, love, orange=power, red=prosperity etc) and then you sit around a table to write and draw your dreams out. After they open it up, light the interior and together, you release it into the sky in hopes that the heavens will take note and answer your dreams.
-------------------------------------------
I saw 'Up' again in theaters in Hong Kong.
And I was amazed even more so the second time watching it than I was the first time round in New York exactly two months ago.
What impresses me, astonishes me and bedazzles me about Pixar is this: their ability, sensitivity to the world around them. Unlike filming a human-based movie, you cannot simply tell the character to jump, walk or run, nor can you tell the vegetation-based backdrops to stir at the sound of wind. Every single nuance has to be orchestrated. Hence Pixar animators have to be extremely aware of how things work, move and interact with one another.
They also have the ability to bring to awareness even the smallest detail of how we interact with one another. One small gesture can become so meaningful. When the character crosses his heart as a mark of a promise to his wife or readjusting the wooden bird on the mantle piece so that it is angled perfectly to how she would have liked it: all these small actions just make the characters even more real.
I have never seen another movie in which in a matter of an eight minute reel of a couple's life together, the audience is reduced to tears because they are already so attached to them.
That is power. And not only power but just a glimpse of the passion that the animators at Pixar have for their craft. You can see their heart in the growth of facial hair on the old man as time passes by. Dude if I was animating an old man, I would not remember to animate his stubble. Yes, it's just those small details which makes Pixar all the more real.
In watching 'Up' I have become more aware of how the elderly move, how they interact and you know what? I see it every day when I go to the market with my grandmother yet all these things pass me by. It takes something unreal to make me realize the real.
But yeah the one thing about Pixar I love is their passion for their craft. I was told every film takes four years to make and they do exhaustive experiments and tests in real life in order to study, imitate and animate. For 'Up', they actually floated a ton of balloons inside their studio and had to cover all the fire alarms on the ceiling in case they started going off.
To animate 'South America', a team was actually sent there to study the landscape and scenery over there.
You can't say "just look at photos, they're the same thing."
Which is why I find business people unbelievable. It's just not the same thing. If you only experience the 2D, you will get 2D animation.
If I could work for Pixar, I would. In a heartbeat I'd move to San Francisco or Vancouver. Their passion is infectious.
--------------------------------------------
The Drawing of Dreams
Sitting on the stool trying to figure out what dreams to express was the most, I guess, frustrating thing I had to do particularly as a graduate trying to find her ground.
Geez, Sam, you don't have to take it so seriously. It's all just for fun.
Yes I know that but it's the fact that I really don't know what direction I want to go towards that makes me concerned.
I can't draw my dream because first, I don't know if I ever received what I so wanted, if it'd be something I'd really want. Secondly, if I could draw my dream out on paper and make it into something tangible, well, it wouldn't be that marvelous would it? Plus my imagination is limited to what I think every person would want in life: car, money, boy, girl, house, job. But when does a person's dream ever revolve around serving other people? Hardly ever.
Yet if you ask me what my dream is as of now it would be
1) To find fulfillment and meaning in what I do. Sounds vague? Well it doesn't matter what the heck I do as long as that is there. But if you want to know what I find meaningful at the moment it would be:
2) To realize my thesis as a living, breathing, functioning system. I want to be the Pixar of fashion.
But that dream, I realized last night, may be something I have to let go. Not that I just gave up, but for now, I may have to backtrack and put that on hold. There's a scene in 'Up' where the old man has to make a decision of whether to save his house along with all his memories of his wife or to rescue his new companions.
In that split second I realized that sometimes you have to let go of these dreams to gain something better. At times we are so bent on pursuing one thing that in our disillusionment, do not realize how beautiful what is already in front of us.
I love this line from 1 Timothy 6:6-7:
But godliness with contentment is great gain. 7For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it.
---------------------------------------------------------
There is a chance right now, that I may not come back.
Well, not to make it sound like it's set in stone, there is a chance I my calling is in Asia for now. But nothing is set and the cards are still being dealt.
I told God, "just like Isaiah, here I am, send me. Like him, I want to see and experience Your glory."
Yet when it comes down to following this, I'm actually afraid.
I'm afraid, after having finally made a solid group of friends in New York, I have to start from scratch again. I know what God has done for me and I remember the past four years in which He has provided for me yet I can't help but look at what I have in Manhattan and asking "again? It's been four years and am I to move again?"
I have come to love my church and now having to leave that is really difficult. It was at this church that I have come to know God in a deeper way, it was where I met other people who were passionate about pursuing God and finding a fellowship of people who I could lean on.
I'm also afraid of the people in Hong Kong.
Two days ago, I had dinner with someone I had not seen in ten years.
He told me, "I thought you'd study something else. I remember, you were smart. I thought you'd be a lawyer or a doctor.. not in design."
To him, as a business major, design is fine arts. Design is strictly painting or colours. To me, design is brand imaging, design is systems-planning, design is animated films, design is creating an image to be positioned in the mind of the consumer. Design infiltrates everything we see, touch, use and interact with. Yet it goes unnoticed when it is well executed.
Design, in many ways, is more difficult than say medicine, law or business. Because we have to imagine what if rather than what is. You can understand the body by reading the textbook and attending lab sessions at hospitals yet though you may study design in architecture, books, clothes, you still may not be creative enough to actually design.
To people in Hong Kong, design does not make money. Design is not business and business is not design. But having designed a business for my thesis, I can say they are inextricably one.
If I choose to stay here, I know the battle against the business-driven mindset is going to be frustrating. On one hand, I want to return to New York where design is regarded with importance yet I am reminded that in some ways, I should stay here because I am different. I have something to offer: I can make people realize the importance of art and design, not only for its commercial potential.
Hong Kongers are always in awe of the Japanese, and I've noticed it is because there is a lack of design and innovation here in Hong Kong to begin with. ANYTHING seems better than what is here.
God, I'm so lost.
Polaroiding in Taiwan. We did a series of shots that captured the colour development of a single Polaroid shot. Hopefully my friend will make a GIF out of it so I can post it here.
Quote from Up:
Russell- Sometimes, it's the boring stuff I remember the most.
How true. All my favourite memories are of those where we do nothing.
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