new year, same me.

January 3, 2016

a post in which i share some photographs taken on january 1st, 2016 and briefly talk about how i don't care about anything.

on turning 21

April 10, 2015

i am 21. i am legal all over the world. i am an adult. i am 21.

to me, being 21 just means those two things but it's birthdays that get to me.

i'm not good with dates but i never forget a birthday. i dont know why.

ok. so x amount of years ago, you were born. its not really that big of a deal but i personally believe birthdays should be recognized. celebrate yourself. you made it.

i think i hate the traditions surrounding january first. it's the beginning of a new year but it comes smack dab in the middle of winter, the school year, and the peak of my seasonal affective disorder. so. im not generally interested.

i especially hate new years resolutions. i dont get why people are setting themselves up to fail. you're not going to go to the gym and you're probably not going to quit smoking. stop giving yourself false hope. stop it. this isn't the beginning of a new you.

despite that cynical rant, i like to make goals around my birthday for the coming year. i guess they are sort of like my own personal new year's resolution but let's not call it that. i think goals are important. i think goals are smart. here are some of my new goals for this year.

take more photos.

i need to get specific. i have a camera on me 80% of the time but don't use it as often as i'd like (its like the only accessory i wear lol (that was a shitty joke (its okay, you laughed.)))

some photo specific goals:

shoot more couples!!!!!!!
shoot more series!!!!!!! and shoot more cinematically!!!!!!!
shoot things that aren't babes!!!!!
host a photog workshop!!!!!!!!! (i swear i'll do this by the end of may.)

write more.

being stuck between things is a shitty place to be in. i want to make this blog more personal and i want to write more in it but i don't even enjoy looking at blogs with lots of writing so why would you? hopefully you feel like i have something worth saying so you read it and i hope i can come up with shit that just as interesting to read. maybe interesting is the wrong word. captivating? enthralling? definitely not. but you know what i mean, right?

this one is kind of tough because i want to write more for myself but i'm stuck in a spot where i want to share things but what's worse than throwing a premature thing into the cesspool that is the internet? (nothing.) and honestly, nowadays it feels like 'are you really doing it if it's not out there being shown to the world?' this is a terrible mindset that i want to rid myself of. anyway.

some writing specific goals:

start on that damn book!!!!! (not because i think i have a novels worth of words, but it'll teach me discipline.)
blog here more regularly!!!!! (whatever that means)
commit to a piece!!!! (edit and rewrite and refine)

do more for me.

now this is not to say that im a completely selfless being that disregards myself entirely to put other people first. i am selfish as heck and i have no problem with admitting that, but i don't take care of myself. i don't eat well or often enough and i've got bad habits. when i was younger i honestly didnt think i'd make it past 18 but here we are so i guess this living shit is going to last a lot longer than i though so maybe i should take are of myself to see how long i can ride this out. a few things this resolution entails: exercise. learn to cook. mental health. don't fricking overwork yourself.

the last one is something that i struggle with the most. my problem lies in time management. i feel like y'all might be able to relate with this. i function like there are 40 hours in a day. i tell myself i have time to fuck around for the first bit of a day because i'll be able to do more things later. shit goes south when it's 8 pm and im tired and ill i want to do is binge on social media till i pass out and wake up with some weird internet hangover.

so i guess the solution is to plan things out better. because one thing i want to do for myself is build this blog. i want to buy more books and spend time reading those books. i want to buy that shirt that i tried on, liked, and put away because it was a little more than i wanted to spend but fuck it. im going to buy it and i'm going to wear it and i'm going to feel good because treat yoself am i right?

one more thing this entails is focusing more on school. i'm taking the summer off to really get my shit together so i can really do what i need to do to finish this shit because honestly taking things slow is cool but man. i just want to be done. that being said, this summer i get to exercise my first goal and keep my camera going so i'm stoked re: that.

ANYWAY.

i turned 21 on Good Friday. last year on my birthday i took a photo of myself in a bathtub loaded with donuts. this year i decided i wanted to take on of me holding a cake. the night before i thought it would be a good idea to make the cake. so i tried. turns out i'm really bad at making cake. this is what it looked like.

i honestly have no idea where i went wrong. anyway. my friends came over and helped me fix it.

Tenzin took the photos above for the most part and the ones below.

after the cake was semi-decent, we took it over to a plain wall and shot! here are some of my faves.

i like how things turned out.

thank you coco for helping me fix the cake, belle, for the emotional support and taking pix on the instax, and tenzin for taking the photos above and all of y'all for the friendship.

and you! thank you all for your birthday wishes. the past week of being 21 has been pretty cool i guess.

stay messy, guys. till next time,

the process of a self portrait

March 21, 2015

i started out in photography by taking photographs of myself. i didn't have any models when i was 15 nor did i know what i was doing, so it was the best practice someone in my shoes could get. all i needed was a tripod and a camera, two things that i had.

i have never been too keen on how i looked but this isn't the time or place to talk about that. one thing i can say is that after years of photographing myself and seeing myself in every unprepared angle my cameras have captured, i very much feel like my face is something that belongs to me, and not that i belong to it. i digress.

about a month ago, i started thinking about a new profile picture. i posted the one i currently had on new years day of something that i took the past december. i figured it was time for change. and like with everything i do, i started panicking and consulting my friends. many of them did have photographs for me to use but i decided that i wanted to take a new one.

now this is the part where i tell you that this is not easy. i often have people tell me that i'm so good in front of a camera and that i'm so incredibly photogenic ect based just on my self portraits and that is the furthest from the truth. if you've ever seen a group photo i'm in, you'll see that i'm horrible in front of any camera that isn't my own (and maybe daniels' but that's because he's too good at what he does.)

taking self portraits like i do that you'll like is hard because it's not usually just a straight ahead shot in front of anything. i like movement. i like utilizing space. so it takes time and it takes patience. it never turns out how you envision it but if you keep at it, you'll get something you're happy with. i initially thought i wanted to take a photo in my room with my mirror but the lighting didn't really work out and i figured i had way too many photos here so i took a few, hated them, and changed scenery. here's one failed selfie.

it was a sunny afternoon and my family was in mexico so i decided i wanted to take a photo in my driveway. that sounds boring, especially in front of a suburban home like mine, but the sun was shining and i like shades of blue and lines so i said fuck it, put on my favorite shirt, and did it.

i took my tripod, my camera, and my remote out with me and got ready to shoot.

here are a few things i think about when i'm starting out:

where can i stand that'll make sense compositionally*
is there room for me to move around
(this one is silly) what poses can i do that are flattering and cool looking
how is what i'm wearing going to work with my surroundings

* you don't want to over think this. for me in the photos in this post, i was thinking about having most of me generally centred in the photo but it wasn't the most important thing. also you don't want to over think any of these because nothing matters and we're all going to die anyway.

the next few things i think about are camera settings, arranging my camera, moving things around in the frame, and test shots. usually take a few test shots to make sure i kind of know where to stand when i get at 'er.

disclaimer: my test shot never really looks this good but here it is.

things i like about this:

it's a full body shot which is what i wanted
the contrast between my dark clothing and the light background is perf
the ass end of my dads truck is covering the ugly part of my yard
yooo my legs look long #dope

so i played around with this framing. i moved my camera around a little bit from time to time for a little variation. if you're taking a lot it's nice to have little differences.

i took 112 photos. there was about 10 that i actually liked. not all selfies work out. here are some failed ones.

i've got like 90 more of those if you want.

some did work out though. i've taken the liberty of editing them. here are some of my favorites.

and sometimes things get weird. i was taking photos and the people that live across from me came up and started talking to me about alkaline water. here's a photo of floyd, me, and harriet. they're pretty cool. also this definitely isn't the first time something like this has occurred where an old person in my neighbourhood has caught me taking selfies and has joined me for one but that's a story for another time.

anyway. after it all you finally get the shot you want and all is well and you have a new profile picture. when you take the one, you'll know. i knew right when i saw it.

so that's it! that's how i take selfies! the trick is to take a lot i guess. change it around. don't be scared to take a bad one because if you're like me you'll have a 9:1 shitty photo to good one ratio.

also all i've been listening to for the past week is kendrick lamars latest, to pimp a butterfly. if you haven't heard it, get outta here.

till next time,

southern california

February 19, 2015

a blog post in which i show you excessive photos of foliage and american flags i took in southern california.

whytecliff with jack

February 2, 2015

i went to whytecliff park with my friend jack over the weekend. it was nice and i wish i could paint you guys a picture of how this place makes me feel but i couldn't ever do it justice. you're just going to have to go and experience it for yourself. it's about a 25 minute drive out of downtown vancouver into west van and i would highly recommend it.

also, i'm pretty bad at taking photos of nature type things and i always feel like a photo is better with a person in it so you're going to get glimpses of my favorite place but mostly pictures of jack.

enjoy.

you can see some of jacks photos of the trip here, on his blog. jack and i went to lighthouse park as well but it wasn't that great also we were hungry as heck, so we went to lucy's (pictured above.) jack didn't like his face in this picture but i fixed it.

anyway, the gorillaz are back and i'm beyond stoked. listen to rhinestone eyes, kids with guns, and phoner to arizona.

happy monday and wishes of a prosperous week ahead for y'all.

-r

new year, no new friends

January 1, 2015

ok ok. so if your friends told you on new years eve that they'd be picking you up at 630am on new years day to watch the sun rise from stanley park, you'd take it as a bad joke and carry on with your night, right? i'm glad i didn't.

here are some pix from our first sunrise of 2015 at stanley park with tenzin and coco.