Chaos Love: love, life, design and more.

Last Sunday night, Colin Lake and Wellbottom played their first gig at one of Portland's main music venues, the Crystal Ballroom, as a support act to the Bodeans.

What made this show different from the usual old Colin gig was that he asked Christine to bring our video camera along to see if we could get some footage for a demo reel. Colin had been in contact with some people who are trying to organise bands for the 2010 World Expo – in Shanghai! Needless to say, Colin jumped at the opportunity to apply, but it meant that he had to get a press kit – complete with a live performance DVD – together in less than a week! And while he could rely on me for all his graphic design needs, he was getting a little desperate regarding the video. Christine had done a great job just the other week with an impromptu video for Kevin's benefit shows, so Colin turned to her in his hour of need.

We turned up at the show early and got some footage at the soundcheck, then hung out in the green room with the band - playing at being groupies - until it was time for the band to go on stage. It was Kevin's first gig back with the band after his recent illness and everyone was raring to go. Christine spent the entire show getting footage from every angle, climbing all over the stage, yet aiming to be unobtrusive for the appreciative crowd. Because, quite unusually, the crowd responded very warmly to the mere support act and gave them their full attention. I tried to help out by shooting some video on Christine's new little Olympus camera, but the format ended up being tiny and pretty much useless.

Christine worked hard in tandem with Colin over the next couple of days to produce the demo DVD, or - in essence - a music video for one of their songs. The audio captured by our little camera was pretty sketchy, so Christine ended up having to meld audio from a live track recorded on Wellbottom's Spring tour with the video from the show, and she did a pretty good job of matching elements up to give the illusion that they came from the one and same event.

In the end, Colin met his deadline and everyone loved the finished product - I think it's amazing, especially considering the timeframe it was produced in. I'm in awe of Christine's ability to work with time, something that this little print designer still has trouble wrapping his head around. So without further ado, I present Colin Lake and Wellbottom, through the lens of Christine:

Posted in: chaosboy, music, portland on August 21, 2008 at at 8:39:00 PM 2 comments    

Adobe has just released version 2 of Lightroom, their photography management/development application, and all I can say is that it is amazing. There are so many enhancements and upgrades that it's hard to know where to start. It's probably best to say that unless I actually want to do a whole heap of tricky retouching, I'm hardly going to fire up Photoshop at all anymore.

It's not perfect, however: a rather nasty bug in v2.0 stops all your old keywords from v1.4 from exporting with your photos, although a very simple SQL command (so simple, even I could do it!) fixes that problem. There have also been reports of Lightroom being everything from somewhat sluggish to completely glacial in performance, although my Mac Pro makes light work of just about anything, so I can't really comment on this!

Of all the tools, the selective adjustment brush was the most touted. With it, you can now mask areas and apply exposure, sharpness, colour, clariry (and more!) edits to specific areas of your photos without having to hand the image over to Photoshop. All your edits are non-destructive - just as in the previous version of Lightroom, all your edits are simply saved as instructions that are applied in real time to your image. The interface takes a little getting used to, especially for us Photoshop mavens, but once you've got the hang of it, it really is intuitive and extremely powerful.

However, my favourite tool is the adjustment brush's poorer, less glitzy cousin, the graduated filter. As its name suggests, this tool emulates the coloured or neutral density filters that you can physically place in front of your camera lens to achieve certain effects. My use for this tool so far is extremely prosaic - I use it to fix overexposed areas of sky.

We've all taken photos like this. While the foreground is fairly well exposed and detailed, the sky is completely blown out. If I had shot this picture in JPG, that would be pretty much the end of things - an 8-bit image simply wouldn't contain enough information for me to be able to regain all that lost detail in the sky. White is white, and would always remain so.

But when you shoot RAW, there is a ridiculous amount of information contained in the file (4,096 levels as opposed to JPG's 256 levels). And the important thing to realise is that most of this information is in the lighter areas of any image. As explained in this excellent article at Luminous Landscape, exactly half of the 4,096 levels of information are contained in the brightest fifth of the image, while there's a mere 128 levels of information in the darkest areas, the shadows.

What this means is that it's very possible to restore missing detail from overexposed areas when you shoot RAW. However, this was kind of a painful process before the new tools in Lightroom. To retain the properly exposed foreground but also get the corrected sky, I would have to export two versions of the file to Photoshop (one exposed for the foreground, the other for the backgroun) and then use layer masks to blend the two versions together. It's not something I'd do except for a photo I really thought was worth it.

With the new graduated filter tool, all I have to do is specify my exposure adjustment for the sky (around -2.0 to -3.0 stops, depending on how blown out things are) and drag out my gradient from top to bottom. The gradient is fully adjustable to taste after it's been applied, both in location and intensity. The results are nearly instantaneous and it's ridiculously easy to apply. Here's a before and after of the shot above, just so you can see how much detail can be regained using this technique.

This is an extreme example, requiring a full -3.0 stops to regain the detail in the clouds - probably about the absolute limit of this technique. But just think - there is that amount of information and detail just hiding in that brightest part of your image, and you have to shoot RAW if you want to be able to release it.

Posted in: adobe lightroom, chaosboy, photography on August 8, 2008 at at 9:42:00 AM 0 comments    

Last weekend, Portland played host to one of the craziest days of entertainment that I have ever witnessed - the Red Bull Flugtag. Flugtag means "flight day" in German (Red Bull being an Austrian company), and it certainly lived up to its name.

A crowd that has been estimated at being in the vicinity of 80,000 people crammed into Tom McCall Riverside Park, the Hawthorne Bridge's entire southern sidewalk and one east-bound lane, and even the Eastbank Esplanade on the other side of the Willamette River (which was jam-packed with boats both big and small) for this event, which is interesting in itself.

You see, ol' PDX generally prides itself on being staunchly anti-corporation, looking somewhat down its nose at coffee and fast food chains because we're better than that here in Portland, don't you know? Except when afore-said corporation is promising a day chock full of idiots throwing themselves and their home-made magnificent flying machines off a 30-foot high runway into the drink. Then we'll drop everything and turn out in droves.

And we did. I've never seen the riverfront so full, not for the Blues Festival, the Brew Fest, Barack Obama or anything. I arrived a little late and tried to force my way through the seething masses to take some pictures from down the front - it was impossible. I eventually found a few good locations on the periphery of the park, but things were hectic the whole time.

As for the flugtag itself, it was all about showmanship and spectacular crashes and the crowd loved it. We had a giant plane made out of "Lego", complete with "Lego Men" pilots, the Winnebago from Spaceballs (crowd favourite), pots of gold, sporting mascots, hot dogs and more. Some of the "planes" didn't even have wings! The winner flew some 60-odd feet, but no one really cared. Distance was irrelevant; the crowd only cheered for suicidal death plunges into the murky water below and everyone went home happy.

Posted in: chaosboy, photography, portland, sport, weirdness on August 6, 2008 at at 8:49:00 PM 0 comments    

Well, we've actually got a few seconds to spare and can finally post an article about our big Late Wedding/First Anniversary bash that we recently held in Boston, MA. Certain persons have been clamouring for a review of events, and we just love to share, so here we are!

Ever since our humble little space wedding atop Rocky Butte just over a year ago, we had wanted to throw a bigger and better party for all our extended families (Booth, Moore and Garcia!) to attend. As things turned out (mainly because of my parents' travel itinerary), Boston presented itself as the perfect venue and plans were set in motion. Our spies in the area (Ann Elise) searched high and low for the ideal party spot, accommodations were found, airline tickets were booked and we soon found ourselves on the Atlantic side of the USA (via Minneapolis and New York airports!).

After settling in at our comfy hotel, we ventured out into Boston in search of a restaurant to celebrate Christine's birthday. With the help of her swanky new iPhone, we located a wonderful restaurant in the North End, just off the main drag, Hanover Street. The difference this 100 feet or so made was incredible: every trattoria, ristorante and cafe on Hanover Street was spilling out onto the sidewalk, while our restaurant was only about two-thirds full and quite relaxed and romantic. The food was exceptional, and the wait staff knowledgeable and friendly. Here's a pic of us about to enjoy some delicious desserts:

Early the next day, Keener picked us up at our hotel and whizzed us off to catch the ferry from Wood's Hole to Martha's Vineyard, a small and somewhat exclusive island just off the coast of southern Massachusetts (next to Nantucket, if that helps any). Christine's Aunt Alison and Uncle Peter were to be our hosts for the this day and the next, and they made sure to show us all the sights of their island. Peter took us out on his boat and we took full advantage:

After enjoying the warm sun and water for a while, we tried our hands at waterskiing. Keener, as you can see, is obviously a salty seadog and had no problems whatsoever.

... while the less said about my attempts the better. Needless to say, I never actually stood up. All too soon, it was time to return to Boston, where we met up with my friend John who had flown in all the way from Sydney via Yosemite and San Fran for the party. As my "guest of honour", we spent as much time as we could with him and even managed to walk the entire length of Boston's famed Freedom Trail... on a day where the temperatures climbed into the 90s!

Finally, the night of the party rolled around and all our hard work and planning finally came to fruition. After some early doubts about the size and suitability of the area that he hotel had set aside for us, everything turned out perfectly and a fantastic time was has by all. In honour of our first anniversary, the theme was paper and everyone turned up wearing paper hats of all shapes and size. Some people even commissioned artists to make a hat for them! Here's a rogues' gallery for posterity's sake:

The happy couple: me in my Aussie cork hat and Christine in her amazing papier mache chicken creation.

The two mothers. Karen and Keener made hats for my parents, as they probably wouldn't have had time to do it themselves, having just flown in from France.

King Nick. Or is it a court jester? He seems to have a mischievous grin either way...

And finally, here's Peter proving that a hat doesn't have to be an enormous production number to be a winner... the happiest dang pirate I ever did see!

We finally rolled out of the hotel at around 12:30am, quite a bit later than our original booking was for! Quite a few people had been incredibly sensible and had booked rooms in the same hotel the party was in, smart thinking! The party was an incredible success and it was wonderful to see so many members of our extended family. A big thank you to all who attended and to all those who couldn't make it but passed on their best wishes - it means a lot!

Posted in: boston, chaosboy, party time, travel on August 5, 2008 at at 8:49:00 PM 2 comments    

It's true! The work front has been good recently and has just got a whole lot better.

I've been working at a fantastic design studio called Downstream for the last few weeks and it's been a lot of fun. They mainly do large scale environmental design for universities and financial institutions, which is something I haven't done a lot of to this point in my career. I came in to help out on one specific job, a series of big informational screens for an enormous financial advisor. The screens show a ridiculous amount of stock exchange, commodities and currency information, all in real time and I had to take the general design and apply it across every screen, while still making sure that it was technically possible to produce! I spent the entire first full day researching actual stock market data to use in the mock ups to present to the client... my brain still hurts three weeks later.

While I was working there, 52 Ltd let me know that Wacom were interested in getting me back for a couple of weeks, but that there was also a long-term contract job designing and producing a huge Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for a multi-national infrastructure development company downtown. This is the first time I've actually had to choose between two jobs since I've been in the US. While I loved working at Wacom the first time around, the lure of long term employment meant I had to at least enquire about it.

I interviewed for the position on Tuesday and was accepted by Thursday. The job will see me gainfully employed all the way through until January, although the hours will vary quite dramatically from month to month as the EIS goes through approval and revision cycles. During August, I'll probably be working 50-60 hour weeks, while September may drop down to less than 20 hours a week. We'll see! I just love getting my teeth stuck into large projects; I see them as huge puzzles that have to be solved... and they don't come much bigger than this! Multiple authors, huge rounds of internal and client changes, diagrams, charts, maps... and I have to make it look attractive and easy to read! I start July 21st – wish me luck!

Posted in: chaosboy, employment, portland on July 11, 2008 at at 10:53:00 PM 0 comments    

Today was day that embedded itself into history. July 11th marks the worldwide day known as the release of the new iPhone just in case you didn't notice. Crazy geeks and hipsters gathered at Apple stores and AT&T outlets in order to claim the ultimate prize: a phone.

But wait, you say, who took all these pictures? Uh, that was me of course; in line to get my phone, because I am neither above or below everyone else. I am a whore to new shiny gadgets. It is all Sam's fault really. He is my capitalist consultant. It was Sam who got me to sit in front of Toys R Us to get a Wii at 3am in order to buy my $299 Wii in order to sell it on Craigslist before Christmas for $500 and now it is Sam who convinced me to sell my old iPhone for $400 and buy the new one for $199. Sam is going places in life.

Anyway, back to the Opening! Sam and I arrived at the Apple store at 6:30 in the morning. The line was pretty timid. Maybe 75 people back after some of these folks had been CAMPING outside the mall since midnight. Their determination makes them much more worthy than us to receive the coveted iPhone. Sam and I had to work sometime that morning but we were pretty confident that the line would scoot along pretty speedily. I began to feel like we were in an airport after awhile wainting to check into our flight as stood between our rope barriers. But the Apple staff were very genial and passed out bottles of water and even cups of coffee as people piled up behind us. We half expected a breakfast cart to come out next stacked with hotcakes.

We did find a fellow coworker at the beginning of the line - excuse me, not the beginning but NUMBER ONE in the line. He had been there since 12:30am. The store opened at 8. Sam and I waited another 1.5 hours before we got in the store. We were so relieved to get out of the halls of the mall as it has become very claustrophobic.
Getting in the store was a breath of fresh air. The staff was overly friendly and helpful and my iPhone was purchased, activated, and in the bag in under 10 minutes. We met up with our coworker who had nothing but trouble buying his iPhone as activating it with AT&T is mandatory and the network kept failing. So although he waited nearly 10 hours for his phone we ended up walking out around the same time. Poor Sam on the other hand was not granted the miracle of the phone as he was not the sole account holder for his AT&T account. He took it well enough, although I'm sure he would have killed someone given the chance. He had to go to and AT&T store to get his iPhone. But by the time he got there, the phones had sold out.

This whole AT&T shenanigans is the whole reason why Cam could not participate in the good times of waiting in line to pay money.

Afterwards, Sam and I went back to work 2 hours late and had to apologize to customers that although we were an Apple Reseller, we didn't have iPhones to sell them . *insert evil laugh here*

If you are wondering what is so great about an iPhone but don't want me to write 5 more pages of blogginess then you can check it out here!

Posted in: apple, chaosgurl on at at 9:42:00 PM 0 comments    

I really wanted Cam to do this post. But since I am the one home today and HE is at WORK, well I guess we know who's in who's place!

Last weekend we went to the Ditch! which should always be spelled with an exclamation point on the end. A friend through Kim whose family owns a large plot of land in Idaho, has a tradition of throwing a party on their property every year which is dubbed "Water in the Ditch" due to the ditch in the back of the house which has water in it. This tradition has been celebrated for 25 years and the generations that have attended keep coming back and bring their next generation with them. I would love to go into great depth of the great times we had but first.. here are some pictures so you can get the main idea :)

First of all, Kevin shaved his beard off which no one, including Kim, had ever witnessed before. He sported instead a giant walrus mustache.
Some people arrived days ahead of us to set up and when we arrived Friday night after midnight, lawn real estate was hard to come by. It was a very cozy community with plenty of utilities and easy to meet your neighbors.

Yay for sunshine! We had a lot of it!
Overlooking the fire pit to the stage.
Among just camping, we tried many new fun things... like acupuncture! Beth Hazzard, a girl I met through Kim, has been studying Chinese medicine for the last 5 years or so. She is skilled in the philosophy of Chinese medicine as well as the science of the practices in the Western world. She had brought on the trip a few needles which she then proceeded to poke into me in stragic places in my legs, wrists and my head! I had told her that I had told her I had specific pains in my back and my dreams had been been very vivid lately. This was enough for her to find the exact spots on me to plant her pins. I can't say I'm completely sold on the idea of acupuncture although I'm sure it can be helpful in certain circumstances. Being pinned down in a chair listening to loud rock right next to me from the stage certainly had a certain calming effect on me.
Looking a bit ramshackle, Kim and I both get visions of grandeur of owning something just like it someday.

The band list for the evening. I regret not being able to get a picture of its creation. Damon created the type with nothing but a magnifying glass in which he burned the titles in.. even in cursive!!
Cam succumbing to the joys of the pool. I had sadly forgotten my suit.
The main house and everyone clear of the area in order not to get too sunburned!

Saturday afternoon brought hot clear blue skies and then suddenly with his Aussie sixth sense, Cam sensed a storm coming in and in an hour and half the sky was gone. Dust rose over the horizon and wind pumped up to a near 40mph. Everyone ran to rescue their poor tents which the wind picking up fron the ground. The bands continued to rock out on the stage and everyone was in a frenzied chaotic state. Cam took a cute picture of me protecting my eyes with my bonnet from the flying dust. I for the most part went and laid in the tent and watched the tent violently shake and shift. It was so soothing to me I was able to take a sound nap.
The storm evaporated as quickly as it had formed about 2 hours later and everything was back to normal.






Nothing like a weekend of crazy people, crazy rock, crazy wind out in the middle of nowhere to regain your senses!!

Posted in: chaosgurl, party time, photography on June 25, 2008 at at 2:13:00 PM 0 comments    

A couple of weeks back I got serious about this Australian immigration thing. Now that Cam is affixed here in the USA, now I want to be able to get back to Oz. At that point we would have free reign to go wherever we liked with the freedom of birds. Up till now, I assumed marrying Cam was my ticket to get back in and override the ban that was put on my VISA almost two years ago now saying I could not come back for a total of 3 years.

So, I called the embassy.

I talked to a nice woman, whom I was thrilled had an Aussie accent, and told her about my situation, and the reasoning that I had been granted this ban when my Uni was handling my VISA extension in my behalf so I wouldn't have to go to the immigration department and wait in line all day. Had I have been told to go there, instead of just sending Sydney Uni a piece of paper, I would have done so. The Immigration building was only right down the street!

So the nice woman laid her cards on the table. I would have to fill out an application online stating my case and applying for Visa 676 which would essentially override my current ban. Having married an Australian citizen had no merit in this process. Once the application was submitted and approved I would still have to contact an immigration officer for final approval for admittance.

A few days ago, I received my reply. Australia said no. They still needed a bit more from me and if it was the country's best interest to let me back in. If I could not prove my worth I was labeled simply as a RISK. As much as I would love to pursue this issue, I would not win by saying that I was just misinformed or that the Uni messed up. And, obviously I have no other reason to go to Oz other than getting my tan back, therefore my argument is already been brushed off the table.

The 75$ fee isn't all that much to have gone to waste but I sure could have used it on something a bit more worth while if I was going to be told off so quickly. I was hoping Cam and I could get somewhere warm in the cold month of November but I guess we will have to go somewhere else!

Posted in: australia, chaosgurl, immigration on at at 12:50:00 PM 0 comments    

Many of you may have seen this video on YouTube (it's rather popular, apparently!). As a designer, I find it absolutely hilarious - mainly because it's absolutely true!

I do disagree on one point, though: Trajan hasn't totally overrun the entire movie industry quite yet. There is one segment that resists the classical charms of this font, that being comedy movies. Don't worry, though, they have their own lazy designers who more often than not, resort to this:

BIG FAT SANS SERIF FONTS.

Almost always Gill Sans Bold (possibly one of the ugliest sans serif fonts ever, and an embarrassment to the Gill Sans family) or Futura Extra Heavy. If you can squish the kerning up to join all the letterforms together, then you're well on the way to the perfect comedy movie title.

So why does this repetition happen? Laziness, for sure. Why think of a new font/logotype for each new movie when you know that something that was done previously will work just as well. In a way, these typeface choices act as a kind of visual shorthand for the viewing public: Trajan = Epic. Distressed Trajan = Horror. Big Fat Sans Serif = Wacky Comedy. Adam Sandler. Jim Carrey. Straight away, you have some kind of idea about the movie. That's a plus on a crowded video store shelf, where you've only got a few seconds to attract a potential viewer. Not that I'm condoning this kind of design at all... I can't stand lazy, no thought typography. I was always taught to pay close attention to the appropriateness of type, and I think it's a great thing to remember.

Let me give you an example. At a previous agency, a client asked us to design a logo and brochure that evoked a stylish, 1930's kind of feel. I briefed the job into a junior designer and went away to do my own work. A couple of hours later, I checked in with the junior and was horrified to find that they had typeset the whole thing in Helvetica.

"Why did you do that?" I asked.

The junior simply replied, "Because it's a nice font".

And it can be, if set well. There are agencies out there who only use Helvetica Neue in every job they do, and it looks fantastic. But in this case, Helvetica was not an appropriate font to use. Helvetica was not invented until the 1950's and shares none of the aesthetics of the 1930's period we were trying to evoke. I explained this to the junior, who just looked at me a little blankly and asked which font I would use.

The short answer was "Futura" (because we were on a deadline), but there's more to consider than just the obvious answer. Take a look at this:

Here we have four fonts, all set at the same point size. Firstly, we can see that Helvetica displays none of the characteristics of a 1930's style font: it's what's known as a grotesque font (so called because purists thought this type of type was hideous when first introduced in the late 19th Century), while the others all display elements of the humanist style of sans serif fonts.

The next font, Futura, is appropriate to the task at hand because it's from the 1930s. You can't get more authentic than the real thing. Gill Sans is another font from around the same time period, making it another possible choice.

The last two fonts shown, Neutra and Nevis, are modern, computer generated fonts. But they have the look and feel - the elegance - of a 1930's font and are therefore appropriate. Neutra's extremely small x-height is particularly redolent of 30's style, while Nevis is very heavily based on Johnston Sans, another Eric Gill typeface that is famous for its use on the London Undergound.

A good typographic designer has an innate sense for this kind of stuff - a knowledge of the history of type and the ability to find new fonts that fulfill old roles in design. There's always an obvious choice for a typeface, but sometimes further investigation makes a good design great. For my part, I wish I'sd told the junior designer to use Neutra for that brochure, because it's a lovely, lovely typeface.

Posted in: chaosboy, design on June 19, 2008 at at 1:13:00 PM 0 comments    

The big news here in the US lately has been how the national average price for gas has reached $US4 per US gallon (oddly, not the same as an Imperial gallon). Apparently it spells the end of the world as we know it or something. So I did some quick sums based on a recent Sydney Morning Herald article that stated that petrol prices had reached 171.9 cents a litre in Sydney.

Works out Sydneysiders are paying the equivalent of $US6.13 a gallon for petrol or thereabouts. Ouch. There's always someone worse off than you. Makes me glad I ride a bike, that's for sure!

Posted in: australia, chaosboy, general musings, united states on June 18, 2008 at at 3:20:00 PM 1 comments