I bet y'all didn't know I'm a pretty decent calligrapher! I actually really love calligraphy in general since I was introduced to it when I took Design in my senior year of high school (a class that overindulged my OCD-like tendencies for detail craftmanship). I got to learn proper Chinese Calligraphy (or 书法) while I spent a good 3 months on the college language program in Qingdao, China and came back with a full set of Chinese calligraphy brushes, a mat, authentic Chinese rice paper, a traditional inkbowl, and a traditional Chinese seal with my...
Friday, December 24, 2010
Wednesday, December 22, 2010
So it is that time of the year again. As as per tradition at my parents' house, massive amounts of cookie-baking is currently underway. You see, everyone close to the family usually gets a bag with an assortment of homemade cookies. My mom usually makes like12 kinds. Because she's been stuck with an unusual amount of work lately, I've been the one doing the baking (because, you know, I have no job). I've made Sugar Cookies and Chocolate Chip cookies...
Sunday, December 12, 2010
So I thought it might be interesting to share a bit of my creative process with you guys! Anyways, whenever I do a project, I'll create a playlist for that project that will sort of mimic the emotional arc that the story is meant to follow. I'm currently working on a new playlist for a new project I'm starting to write soon (it is a 3-part science fiction fantasy that I've been working on to develop since I was 15) so that playlist currently involves a lot of Daft Punk's new stuff for the soon-t0-be-released film Tron: Legacy. Daft Punk is pretty...
M kindly sent me the link to a really interesting and incredible article in the New York Times about half an hour ago. It is about young entrepreneurs, who like myself, gave the economic depression the finger and started their own companies. My own personal LLC for films is still sort of just a bunch of business cards on my desk, a website, and a registered company in New Mexico. We have yet to actually get a Tax ID number (should get on that soon actually) or really actually hire anyone else other than myself. Or transact business. We're on our...
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Saturday, December 4, 2010
Thursday, December 2, 2010
I finally finished the first draft of my screenplay! I must say, I'm proud of myself. I wrote 94 of its 144 pages in the past two and a half days. Guess I can really get things done when I'm motivated. I'm actually really proud of it. I mean, it needs tons of work, but the main idea is there and solid and the characters and the dialogue are good. I'm extremely self-critical of my own writing, so for me to thing it is actually a good solid base is a good sign. I think.This is the fourth full-length screenplay I've written, and also the longest....
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
The title pretty much sums it up. I had to get up at some ungodly hour this morning (6:15 am) after going to bed at 3 am (without finishing my screenplay) to go to the first Chinese class I've attended since I tearfully (and I do mean tearfully, the damn exam reduced me to tears of desperation) handed in my final exam for Advanced Readings in Chinese and gleefully completed my Chinese major. I got up today in hopes of maybe refreshing my language skills to be able to successfully conduct business in Mandarin Chinese when I go to Hong Kong in March...
Monday, November 29, 2010
So, it's been a long time coming. Here's playlist three. It is mostly stuff I have on the playlist for my script and that I'm hoping I can incorporate into the soundtrack (long shot, but whatever).(1) Boy with a Coin (Iron & Wine): Has a slightly different feel than most of Iron & Wine's songs. I'm a big Iron & Wine fan, but I like Boy with a Coin because it has this sense of traveling somewhere, leaving something behind, and being nostalgic about it.(2) Nature Boy (Nat King Cole): Love, love, love the lyrics. Also, love Nat King Cole.(3)...
So I decided that I really need to make something of myself so I'm strapping myself down and making myself finish writing my screenplay by Dec. 1. You see, there's a grant I want to apply to. It is a pretty sweet grant so I really can't miss the opportunity. My own deadline is Dec. 1 so that my editor (N from Everything Will Be Okay) can go through it, butcher it, and return it to me in time to make adjustments and send it off. Today, I've written 10 pages so far but I still need to write another 30 at least I think. It kind of feels like forcing...
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
Monday, November 22, 2010
Today I miss college. Not the work. I don't miss the work at all. But I miss being able to stroll about the beautiful campus when I needed some alone time or just some time to appreciate the beauty of the place. I miss curling up with a cup of tea on our blue couch in my senior house, watching the gray sky outside, waiting for the casserole I'd made for dinner to finish cooking. I miss riding my white and blue bike around campus with big red (my cello) strapped firmly to my back going to orchestra rehearsal. I miss orchestra. I miss coming home...
Sunday, November 21, 2010
So, for anyone out there living or going to LA and concerned about where to get some good, not too expensive food, here's some good suggestions:(1) Neptune's Net (42505 Pacific Coast Highway, Malibu, CA 90265)What to Order: Fish Tacos N recommended this restaurant to me. Apparently he and J both ate here a few years ago when they traveled across the country by train. It is pretty out there in the middle of nowhere a little past Malibu in the Aventura county border. About a 45-min drive from Santa Monica. I'll tell you this much - their fish tacos...
So I'm actually back in Quito right now. Have been for about 5 days (wow, time flies). And now that my altitude sickness is gone again (but I am still stupidly jetlagged) I thought I'd write up a nice post about my brief visit to LA.Let me say that I really love California. I mean, my heart is definitely back east in New York.I miss the autumn leaves, the bitter cold wind, the snow, the beautiful New England Brick buildings...(YES N, I KNOW NY IS NOT NEW ENGLAND). But California is a different kind of exciting. The weather is super nice (not too...
Monday, November 8, 2010
Sunday, October 31, 2010
I feel it coming. The next great shift. My friends are all moving again, uprooting from those temporal places they found to transition from college into the beginning of adulthood. J left Poughkeepsie yesterday (or was it two days ago?) and D is also talking about going out on the open road. N passed his driver's test and has a license and will soon have a car. S will soon join J on the long road to California.California...it is weird. I feel like there's a mass exodus of most of my friends going that way. I too am going soon. For 11 days at least....
Thursday, October 28, 2010
Antiperigalacticon: the point in a star's orbit where the star is the furthest away from the center of the the galaxy.I came across this particularly lovely word when doing some research for a screenplay I'm working on. A screenplay that recently is out of the running from the Sundance Alfred P. Sloan Commissioning Grant. Hearing that news last night was a bit of a bummer I will admit, but I have other places and other grants I can apply for. My next upcoming deadline is Nov. 8 so I'm typing furiously any time I get the chance. You see, the thing...
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Making a real film really is a rollercoaster. It is exhausting, tiring, you come to points where you want to quit, you come to points where you think it'll actually work. It is an experience. We're a day away from filming and things are starting to sail smoothly again after a very hectic crazy day today. The director and I had a bit of a shouting match this afternoon and I went into a meeting at 6:30 meaning to quit and to ask for my investment back. I even called up my lawyer. That's how serious I was. Luckily I didn't. My mood lifted considerably...
Saturday, October 16, 2010
Scary, huh? I mean, thrilling, exciting beyond belief, but right now mostly nerve-racking and stressful. By all means, I shouldn't be as worried as I am. We're doing so much better than we should be doing by this point, but a lot is still sort of up in the air and there is only one more week to solve that. One. More. Week. That's insane!I am thrilled though. I really am.We're shooting a sort of teaser trailer thingy for our feature-length that we want to shoot in May-June. A sort of calling card for possible investors.You see, we're going to the...
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Everyone makes lists of "Best Movies of All Time" and I thought that it was only appropriate that I make one too. Mind you, my list is about my favorite films...the ones I think go above and beyond anything else. And while it does include some classics, not all of them are considered cinematic masterpieces by most. Okay. So here goes:1. Star Wars: A New Hope (George Lucas)2. Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back (Irvin Kershner) 3. Seven Samurai (Akira Kurosawa) 4. Garden State (Zach Braff) 5. Hero / 英雄 (Zhang Yimou)6. Inception (Christopher Nolan)7....
Monday, October 4, 2010
So. I'm back in Ecuador.Yeah. I was here for that whole crazy scandal last Thursday.Yes. I am ok. No, I things aren't crazy here. It is business as usual. The political stuff - well...it's the political stuff. Don't get me wrong, it isn't that I don't care...but it's politics. I hate talking about politics.Besides that big scare, I think things have been crazy hectic with me sort of getting things in order. We're filming a teaser trailer on Oct 22-24. That's not very far off and we're sort of piecing it together. Well...it is already pieced together....
Monday, September 20, 2010
I'm back in NYC for the moment, and it is 8:47 am. I don't have much time before I have to go into the shower and then fix myself up to look professional before heading off for my shift. Yeah. It is my first official day of real work of sorts. Oh, I didn't get a job per se...I'm volunteering at a film festival/market here in New York City and there's a bunch of industry people around so we were carefully instructed to look professional and act professionally. I didn't give it much thought until this morning that it actually feels like a real job...
Monday, September 13, 2010
I found it.It is in San Francisco!I went there the other day and did the sightseeing tour (the downtown loop and the loop that goes through the Golden Gate bridge and to Sausalito). It was quite cool. I was underdressed though. Nobody told me that San Francisco temperature in September is the equivalent of temperature in the Hudson Valley around thanksgiving. A thin cardigan from Zara did NOT cut it. Especially on the Golden Gate bridge. I became an icicle with all the wind on that open-air bus. Every other tourist, however, had the sense to wear...
Monday, September 6, 2010
Thursday, September 2, 2010
So I've been milling about several airports today (read: I spent an awful 6 hours killing time at Miami-Dade International Airport...my favorite airport in the world! NOT.) and so I spent a lot of time browsing magazines and deciding whether or not getting candy was a good idea. This made me come across with some candy flavors that aren't real fruits at all.Can someone explain to me what the hell a melon berry is and what it is doing in the Skittles Very Berry pack? Oh nevermind. I googled it. It turns out it is a kind of Mullberry. However, the...
Monday, August 30, 2010
So its been another of those roller-coaster ride few days. For one, I had to move up my trip to San Francisco for Wednesday (which is a lot sooner than I expected to travel!) and for another I find myself once again wondering what I'm going to do come November and I'm done shooting the documentary. Edit it, I suppose. But I think I also need to get a job then. Where? Who knows. Some things are falling apart in some ways right now...which is stressful.I have a headache.I suppose I haven't slept very well recently because of all the stuff I've had...
Saturday, August 28, 2010
Friday, August 27, 2010
Well, as I posted about a week ago, one of my best friends from college, M, came down to visit. She left on Thursday early in the morning on the 2nd American Airlines flight out of Quito. I was pretty sad to see her go. It was nice having M around here and taking a bit of time off of work. I must say that I definitely needed it...especially with the decision to delay one of our productions. I was feeling sort of lost as to what I could do between January and April before we started it up again. However, things are slowly working out again I think....
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
So the past week has been somewhat tough. Things were at an all-time high on Monday. I managed to score producing another film project, but then yesterday, in true film post-grad fashion, I got sent to the dumps again. It looks like we might have to postpone our principal project, which means I can't do the other project and also makes me unemployed for 4 months between January and April to boot. On top of that, my student doc got rejected from yet another festival and my friends were away somewhere so they couldn't pick up the phone. It all feels...
Saturday, August 14, 2010
Here it is! Playlist Two!(1) Airplanes (B.o.B. Feat. Hayley Williams of Paramore) - Hey. It's on a lot on the radio! And very catchy. I found myself singing along to it whenever it came on the radio so I got it. I must say I'm enjyoing it!(2) SexyBack (Justin Timberlake Feat. Timbaland) - I got tired of Bad Romance as an alarm clock and heard this on the radio the other day. And I was like...Oh yeah! That was a good song! It is good to jam along to in the morning. Just my two cents!(3) Secrets (OneRepublic) - Kind of embodies my feelings about...
Monday, August 9, 2010
Phew. A lot has been going on lately, leaving me with next to no time for blogging. In the past week or so, I've managed to learn film finance, write two business plans, pick up a third project, secure local distribution, and get my film production company certified by New Mexico. I co-own a film production company. That's pretty crazy. If you would have asked me if I would be the owner of my own business 3 months ago, I would have maybe thought that you got the wrong person. But there it is.Incredible, no?Anyhoo, the food hasn't been particularly...
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