Save Me

But I've learned my lesson.

I'm the only one who can save myself. I'm my own hero in disguise. I'm Clark Kent, Lois Lane, and Superman, all in one.

True Love Will Find You In The End

I wish more people believed in Karma.
Now, religion is a tricky subject (and yes, I'm counting Buddhism as a religion, even though a lot of people don't. But it is, and it's a little offensive to practicing Buddhists to have their religion discredited from theological debates). And ideas similar to Karma come up a lot in different religions. But the true, pure idea of karma is something I live by, and it makes me really content, and I wish I could share that glimmer of inner peace with others.
Basically, to those who don't know, Karma is the idea that whatever you put out into the universe you get back. This comes up a lot in Wiccan practice (every spell cast comes back three fold or ten fold, I forget which). Any negative thoughts come back to you, and any positive thoughts come back to you.
This is how I live my life, always wishing the best for everyone, even if I don't know them. Even if I have every right to hate them. I can't make myself hate them, because I don't want to be hated. I can't wish ill on anyone, because I don't wish ill on myself. I think that this forces me to try to see others perspectives, try to truly understand their actions before jumping to conclusions and making myself a victim, which is really important to me.

Just...a useless rant, I guess. I don't know. Eh.

Daydreaming

There are two types of people, I believe: people who hardly ever daydream and people who never stop.
Unfortunately, I am one of those people who never stops daydreaming. It's great for my artwork, but not great for real life.
It means I'm an absolutely terrible listener; since I was a child, it's been really hard for me to comprehend audibly. They made me get my hearing tested in 6th grade because I was tested on learning capabilities through various forms and my audible comprehension was so low they figured I wasn't hearing the instructions properly. No, I just don't know how to make myself listen. I'm much better at visual comprehension.
It means that if I'm not looking at you speak I probably have no idea what you're saying. Not because I can't hear you but because I can't get my mind to focus on what you're saying unless I'm looking at you.
It means that I can NEVER pay attention in class. Ever. It's why I take such meticulous notes, so that I can go back later and re teach myself everything I was already supposed to have learned.

While I was taking anti-anxiety medication, I found that this was never a problem. Which I guess means that my incessant daydreaming is a byproduct of my severe anxiety. It's how I cope with being around people in the real world. Don't get me wrong, I'm not anthropophobic, but leaving my house gives me severe anxiety. And I just daydream to disconnect myself from feeling anxious about being around people. But it has detrimental side effects, I believe. Not severe, but just enough to be upsetting to me. Because I want to feel good about leaving my house and going outside, and I want to be more extroverted.

Digital Final

Time And Narrative

I am not sure how I feel about this particular series. While I am normally all about creating narratives, I struggled with expressing my idea properly. I wanted it to not be a direct narrative, but more implied, more spaced out, more about feeling than plot. My main topic, I suppose, was an extension of whatever existential crisis I have been having as of late. I wanted to express that weird loneliness; that surreal, irrational feeling that we are the only people who feel the way we do, who go through these emotional stages. This is not so, however, though we often forget it. I wanted to convey that struggle to constantly remind one's self that we are not alone, even when we feel our loneliest.
Technically, these images have been very satisfying for me. I've got a good grasp on the focus in these images, and the contrast is strong in each one. I think the zone system is working very well, I can see that it is improving my technique quite a bit. I also really enjoyed, once again, working with Fiver paper with these prints. The tones just seem richer to me, though they are more muted than matte RC paper, but i find I prefer that with my style of work. I enjoy contrast, but not too much. I don't need the image to be flashy, merely realistic in lighting and contrast.

Sunday

This is all I want in life. It is the cutest fucking thing I have ever seen. It's the worlds smallest deer, it's called a Pudu. Just look at it! Don't you just want to cuddle with it!?!?!! It's absolutely amazing. It's the cutest fucking thing. It's so silly looking, and I want to spend all my days with it.
Literally, this is all I want in life.

You've Passed

I've taken back so much control in my life recently, and it's fucking great. I've never felt more in control of what's going on than now. It's incredibly scary and frightening, because now I know that whenever I fuck up it's my own damn fault, and no one elses. But, at the same time, this is exactly what I want. I want people to call me out on my bullshit and help push me forward, ya know?

I'm excited for this new direction in my life. Only good things can come from it, I can tell. Bring it one, life. I'm fucking ready.

All I Have To Give--Pt. 2

I listen to the Backstreet Boys more than any person really should. Especially by myself.

I don't know how this happened, but for once I feel like I'm a fully functioning person. I'm managing my time and staying busy and I've got everything under control. For once.

Except for I'm about to lose my job. I'm spending money too quickly. I'm so uncertain of the majority of my relationships it's not even funny.

But I'm not focusing on that. I'm focusing on getting my finals done and being happy with all of my friends and always listening to good music. That will keep me feeling sane for a little while longer.

Hymn

I thought about this while I was drunk at Stay Sweet Fest all weekend.

Music scenes are much like churches, especially punk. There is a leader (singer/preacher) that the audience responds to when prompted, the audience is supposed to be unquestioningly devoted to said leader, there's lots of erratic movements and blindly shouting along with the leader. And at the end of it all, an unexplainable sense of euphoria.

I think I've always felt this way. I often tell people this is why I listen to Girl Talk; whenever I hear a particularly clever section of a song, or the beat hits just right, I imagine it's what Church and talking to God is supposed to be like. Unexplainable euphoria and a feeling of invincibility.

Nature

So, the following is my proposal for my darkroom final:

For this final project, I thought about all the possible things I could photograph. I thought about shooting tableaux photography, especially since I really wanted to revisit the fabrication project. However, I found myself fantasizing about roaming around outside and photographing what I saw; getting lost in this new greenery and translating it into black and white. So, this is what I’m going to try and do. Find the natural places of Richmond and focus on photographing nature.

With this assignment, I want to focus more on aesthetic than concept. I felt I tried too hard with concept in the time and narrative project, and it didn’t translate very well. While I would definitely like to try to return to more conceptual work in the future to better perfect conveying a theme in imagery, I think that I need to take a step back and better perfect my sense of aesthetic style and see what comes from that.

I want to explore nature. Nature has not always been my friend; I have a very strange, very strong phobia of butterflies (I know), and because of this usually springtime is not my friend. However, having gone through the rough horrors of seasonal depression, I find that the only thing that makes me feel sane is spending the majority of my free time in the warm sun, fears be damned. With this new psychological compulsion to immerse myself in nature, I’m appreciating nature in springtime as I never really have before, and in a city whose natural side I am not yet familiar with. I want to photograph this exploration and explore the foliage I come across in my wanderings.

My main basis of this work is my previous work with abstraction: I found myself more drawn to the images I took of abstractions and patterns I found in nature rather than the images I found indoors, or the patterns I created myself. Working off this work, I want to keep examining nature in that same vein. I’d like this work to lean more towards abstraction and less towards recognizable landscapes.

7 Days To Change Your Life

I need to get stuff done this week.
I can't linger on the problems in my social life, or all those bills I have to pay, or just how fucking painful this sunburn is. I need to do work.
And, of course, I have to work tomorrow, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. Joy. I wish I could just not have a job during exams. But of course that would be counterproductive, because finals are expensive for art kids (especially for photo majors...$56 for 6 rolls of film. Ugh). I think I have to buy new fiber paper soon as well, because I'm pretty sure I spilled beer on my fiber paper this past weekend. I'm pretty sure I spilled beer on everything this weekend.
Well, hopefully I can get all my shooting for digital done today, then hopefully do some shooting for darkroom on Thursday if I don't have to work? Hopefully. I NEED to shoot for that final. I'll be doing that all weekend. Joy.
When is all this bullshit going to be over?

Gorgeous

Thank God for springtime. The sunshine makes everything better.

Jezebel

All these finals sprang up on me. Fuck.

And the thing is, I passionately care about all of them. But I feel like I'm not going to be able to put my all into all three of them. Because, you know, I have a job. And as selfish as it is, I would like to hold on to what remains of my social life. If I don't have non-stressful social interaction at least a few times a week, I feel like I'm going insane. I don't know, maybe that's what I need to do for the next three weeks?

But like, Shane's final is just fucking ridiculous. I think he thinks his class is the only one I care about, which isn't true. Then there is Laurens final, which I can't even shoot for until I get money from my dad to buy film. So, I'll be waiting for something that may or may not happen. Good. Then there is my digital final, which I don't think is gonna be too bad, I just need to find the time to go downtown and get everything shot. And then work on it. Get some good HDR shots.

Stress, get outta here.

Fame

What is wrong with me?

I wish I weren't such a weirdo around people. It makes me mad. I want to be normal. Just once, it would be nice to actually feel like a normal person.

Oh well. Maybe someone someday will appreciate me. Until then, I'll be patient.

Dear Shane:

Fuck you.

Fuck you. Fuck you. Fuck you.

Oh, and by the way, please go fuck yourself.

I know that you are trying to push us. I know that you think that eventually we will respect you and realize the error of our naive, bratty ways and see that we are all better people because of how you made us work.

This is what you thought last semester, too, and surprisingly it didn't work on me. I felt like you didn't let me explore my own process, instead you forced your presumptions on me and I eventually did what you told me to do not because I felt a connection to it, but because I needed you to stop making me feel like a piece of shit.

You didn't even try to let me explain my process or how I wanted it to go. I picked self image and physicality because you told me I should work off the fear project. And everything else I did solely because I thought it would get you off my back. I feel terrible even claiming that work as mine; it is completely you. There is nothing of me in that work.

I want this work with Jamie to be different. I really like the relationship and friendship that Jamie and I have, and I have a great feeling about us working together and designing our own shoot. But the way you sprang those due dates on us in class was not fair. What you should of done is told us the due dates and let us work around them in planning, not let us plan and then try to tell us that 'oh just kidding, this is what you should be doing'. Jamie and I had already begun planning our time around our schedules how we saw fit and how we worked, and all of a sudden you want to override that just because you can? That's not fair at all. Once again, you're forcing yourself into our work arbitrarily to make sure we're going about the process the 'right way', when this is not how we naturally work. So now, we have to pretend we're doing it the way you want us to when really we're just going to do it our way anyway so what difference does all of this make?

I was seconds away from telling you to go fuck yourself in class today. Thank God you gave us time to leave. If you had tried to speak to me anymore, I would've said it. I'm usually the one sticking up for you and saying that your intent is what makes your actions okay, but right now all you're coming across as is an uncaring douche bag who is exercising power because he can, not because he cares. And that's not okay with me. I will not let you walk all over me and make me jump through hoops because you have authority.

People As Places As People

Getting ideas going, definitely beginning to feel inspired.

I've figured out what I'm doing for my digital final! I was going to do some complicated portraits and blah blah blah people and nature, highly stylized, but I might just save that for a summer project, because I'm just unsure of time for all this. Instead I'm focusing on industrialization as form. Lots of modernism and underlying Freudian complexes. Should be exciting. Now I just need beautiful weather and a completely free afternoon...

Sigh.

Have some rough ideas for what I'm doing in studio with Jamie. Definitely some cool ass portraiture. I got a few rough ideas for costuming/make up/character... just gotta figure it all out

I have no idea what I'm doing for my darkroom final. But I have lots (too many) ideas. So that's a start.

Dark Night Of The Soul

I want to feel inspired. Instead I just feel sad. I hate this so much.

Fire & Rain

I need to get out of town. I hate this feeling, like I'm trapped here. This is the worst about not having any money: I have a car, but cannot afford to leave town for a weekend.

My sister is coming up next weekend, so hopefully that'll help me feel better. I feel like distance may give me some perspective. I hate feeling stuck geographically.

Fabrication

New work. I love using matte fiber paper. It looks so good!!

Vega-Tables Reprise

On April 21, there is a meteor shower.

Anyone want to watch with me? I'm going to try my hand at some long exposure stuff. We can drive out to the country side and enjoy the warm weather and have fun!

Yeah?

Good Times Roll (Part 2)

I need to find a proper place to vent my frustrations and petty anxieties.

Many people would say 'oh, that's why you're an artist, just go take some pictures'. And I wish that's how it worked for me. But I find when I make art out of anger and terrible emotions, it doesn't translate well. Only when I feel truly INSPIRED!! can I make good art.

I don't know if I can even explain that inspired feeling. It's that voice in the back of your head that gets overly excited. It starts as a whisper and builds into a booming voice that just constantly yells DEAR GOD PLEASE MAKE THIS HAPPEN OR YOU WILL EXPLODE. That's the kind of art I like making the most.

Lately, that voice has been talking to me about collaborations and fringe culture. Let's see where this leads.

All I Have To Give

I feel so unaccomplished, but I also feel like I try so hard. Like, how much more do I have to do? Am I even capable of doing anymore? I know that I am, but I feel like I'm not.

I'm gonna start saving money to apply to another show. I doubt I'll have saved $40 by May 30, but I'm going to try. (That's just pathetic, that I don't think I'll be able to scrounge up $40 by then).

The thing is, I keep really wanting to put more of myself into my artwork, put myself out there, try harder. But with my current financial situation, there are so many other things I need to take care of before I can get to the art stuff.

I know that I have no right to complain about my financial situation, though, because so many people have it so much worse than me. And honestly, I chose this for myself. I could've had everything paid for if I had transferred to UNCA. They have a pretty good photography program. It's geared more towards photojournalism, but I could've managed. I would've been in the mountains, close to home, living with one of my best friends in the whole entire world, and having the majority of my expenses paid for by my father (if I had transferred to UNCC, he would've paid for everything) (seriously, how little my father cares about me as his own flesh and blood seems almost comical if it weren't such an endangerment). Instead, I acknowledged that it would be much harder for myself to do what I wanted, and did it anyway. I'm notoriously stubborn, I will not compromise what I want just to make my life easier.

That's why, yesterday in Seminar when everyone was talking about what they've done to accomplish their goals, I just wanted to stand up and scream 'I'M STILL A STUDENT AT VCU! I STILL HAVE A ROOF OVER MY HEAD AND I EAT AT LEAST ONCE A DAY! I'M STILL ALIVE AND TRYING SO HARD TO GET THIS DEGREE! THAT'S WHAT I'M DOING!'. I think a lot of people take this education and this university for granted, and it always stings for people like me who are $25,000 + in debt after one year of education. That someone else came across this so easily, while I've been saving and scrimping and starving for so long just to get to the same place.

So, Shane, if you ever read/browse these blogs, that's what I'm doing. I'm working a low-paying job at the mall and paying my rent late and trying to keep up my credit score up so I can actually get approved for a new apartment come June. I'm driving my car for days with the gas light on and I'm buying $.60 mac&cheese for dinner, I'm doing my laundry only once a month to afford film and I'm trying trying trying to make a name for myself as an entertainment and wedding photographer. I'm writing my debts on my bedroom mirror so I never forget what I owe, even though my sense of self-entitlement is screaming out in protest.

Underneath It All

So, relating back to an old post, does anyone who reads this blog have pets or know people with pets that I could photograph?

I keep thinking about trying my hand at animal photography, and though it can be cliche, I am excited to try it.

The Mariners Revenge Song

Another medium to conquer: glass

Now that sounds hard as shit. But I would love to not only master photographing glass, but making it. One day...