A Year in the Making

Nearly one year ago I was asked by a Korean Hiphop/Dance group to make a "teaser" music video for them. We spent an evening by the Han River filming, I made a rough edit and showed them, they liked it, but then I didn't really hear from them again until TWO WEEKS AGO. Thankfully I still had the editing files and the footage stored on my harddrive, so I went to work to get them the Final. 

The cool thing is that now, having improved a bit in my filmmaking skills since that time, I don't really like the old version, so I did a REVAMP and cooked up something fresh and (in my opinion) a bit more interesting than the first version. So, we'll see if the group thinks the same as me, or if they demand that I make it like the original one again...crossing my fingers. There's only so much you can do with footage that you shot nearly a year ago...

Below are two stills I pulled from the editing platform. It's a pretty dark video (not in content, but in the overall look). I'll post the final up here within the next week for all to see. So stay tuned!

60 years of wisdom

   My father-in-law has been alive on this earth for 60 years now! He was born during a very difficult time in Korea's history. And he's had a pretty difficult life with generally not the greatest luck. But despite the tough times, he's a very happy man; he loves his wife, both of his children are married, and he's got a granddaughter (it's not me and Jinny's haha, it's Jinny's brother's).

   Jinny and I took a trip down south to one of the lower provinces in Korea to visit and join in on her dad's 60th birthday celebration. We had a nice fancy meal. Dad was sitting across from me at the table and I specifically remember one moment when we just looked at each other...we couldn't say anything because he doesn't know English and my Korean is aweful...but we just couldn't help but smile at each other, so much so that we both blushed and cracked up, looking away. 

   After the meal I got a chance to ask him to share some wisdom. He told me (thanks to Jinny's translation): 

  "Before you make any decision in life or say any word, take three seconds to think about it. Three seconds won't hurt you any, and it could really save you from making a poor decision or saying something you will later regret." 

   He also told me: 

   "Go have fun! Spend your money on traveling, on adventures. If you receive 100 dollars each month, save 10 dollars of it, and in just a little time you will have enough to take a trip. Don't wait until you are old, like me, to travel, because traveling at this age is not easy."

   Thanks for the wise words, Dad. Happy birthday!

  After the birthday dinner/party Jinny, Mom, Dad, and I went to see a movie at the theater; Dad really loves a good action movie. Exiting the elevator to buy our movie tickets he grabbed my hand and we walked together, hand-in-hand (Korean manly style), through the lobby, a picturesque father/son moment. Good times with my Korean family.

Jinny, Mom, Dad, Sihyun (niece), and Me on a polaroid

bouncy chairs

I realized I was slouching too much at work. And when you think about it...I was slouching for about 8 hours straight as I stared at my computer screen. So, I came up with a solution: a bouncy aerobic ball chair. They force you to use your lower back muscles (which I don't have much of) to hold yourself upright, so it's actually constant exercise!). Today was my first day with the contraption, I'm a tad bit sore after the day's work, but I think my back muscles will become stronger over the next few weeks and it won't be a problem for me. It also is good for just bouncing when I start spacing out or whatever.

Wandering 48 Hours

This past week I wandered around about scouting for filming locations. Found these cool abandoned waterways and tunnels. Had a bit of fun exploring them. Would be a cool place to film a "Post-apocalyptic" film. They say the Mayan Calendar is expecting SOMETHING to happen on December 21st of this year...end of the world? Well, if my faith means anything to me then I know I'll only believe it if it happens according to the Word. So, honestly, you've gotta always be ready for anything...Jesus was a surprise to about 99.9 percent of the Jews 2,000 years ago, right? And they were the "Chosen" people...

This past weekend I participated with some of my co-workers and another team as a camera man for the 48 hour film festival. So we spent our day shooting in a cool cafe/dinner place called "Big Bread." The owner was super nice, offered us complementary coffees, pastries, and dinner. It was a fun refresher working with a team of fairly experienced filmmakers. Most of my stuff in Korea the past two years has been fully independent with people not really experienced helping me out (and I truly appreciated their help, just it was nice to talk the filmmaking lingo again). We turned in the film on time, finished the Korean translation for general audiences, and we'll see how we do.

But, to say the least, all this filmmaking has gotten me pumped up. I'm jazzed to get filming on some of my own projects now.

Skateboards, Smokes, Reflections

And here's the rest of my film roll. More skateboarding. Some fellas enjoying a smoke and a beer by the river (I did a hip shot on that one so he wouldn't know I was taking it, haha). And some night shots at the biking/walking path near our new home (Jinny's reflection). The last one is a little area where our local homeless community lives. The last three were a bit tricky cuz my light-meter only goes as low as 1 second...and it was darker than 1 second. So I just set my camera to bulb setting and did a guesstimation on the time...about 15 seconds I believe; and there you have it.

  

Pizza and Pictures

Big news: tonight Jinny was off and away and I was alone at home and so I decided to ORDER A PIZZA! In Korea, the delivery is quite speedy because they zoom around on little scooter bikes breaking all the traffic laws to get their pizzas delivered on time. So, I found the Dominoes Pizza website, located the Dominoes closest to my house, and then called the provided number. I broke out all the korean I knew. First, as soon as the guy answered, I said (in Korean), "I am a foreigner, I don't speak korean well." And he said, "네." which means yes or okay. And then I proceeded to order in korean...asking him for a medium size, telling him the kind of crust I wanted, asking for a Cola, asking for extra garlic-cheese dipping sauce, and then the most difficult thing was giving him my address. But after only about 3 minutes I had told him all he needed to know and a delicious pizza was delivered to my door 15 minutes later. Fantastic! You can't beat that service!

A few more pictures from my most recent roll of developed film. I'm milking it for all she's worth. You can see the REST of my roll in a few days.

a day at the Han

This past weekend a group of us hung out at the Han River Park for the day. There was a huge fireworks show over the river in the evening, so thousands of people started to arrive to the Han River Park (actually the newspapers the next day said that 1,000,000 people had been at the event).

It was a good chance to walk around and take photos with my Minolta film camera. And I brought my skateboard along too, so we skated a bit. Jinny worked on her skating skills as you can see in the  first two pictures below. She's actually pretty legit. The third picture down a new friend tried out my board; the sun was just going down, so her red hair was glowing like it was on fire. Ryan (my brother) was there too, brought his Aerobi with him...but it acted as more of a necklace than a frisbee. Most of the main streets in the area were closed and it was a sight to behold...thousands of people walking in mass down the middle of the roads toward the Han River Park. And of course, there was lots of food being sold there.

A great day spent at the Han.

small thing

Here's a small thing I made in preparation for a bigger project I'm developing at work. I've been brushing up on my AfterEffects skills for motion graphics content. Fun stuff. 

It's actually not really up my alley because with motion graphics and animation stuff you have to be really nit-picky, and I'm just not a nit-picky person with details and such...I don't like spending 2 hours on 1 frame of film...so, often my motion graphics work suffers for it.

Maybe hard to believe, but this short little 9 second clip took nearly 40 minutes to put together. It's not good enough to be a finished product, but it'll do for experimental purposes.

Chuseok Holiday 2012

This past weekend Jinny and I spent three days visiting her parents (my parents-in-law) and other family for the Korean holiday Chuseok ("chew-sock"). Chuseok is basically equivelant to American's Thanksgiving. You meet family, eat delicious food, watch Korean Dramas (as opposed to football), and just enjoy each other's company. I brought my camera along and tried to snap a bit of video throughout the trip to show you how it was. Enjoy!

ps- I met Jinny's parent's for the first time 2 years ago during the Chuseok of 2010^^

before and after

Buffalo wings. Before and After. Quite tasty indeed!

 

new watermark

I've never really had a personal watermark for my photos...but, tonight I decided to make my own. I opened up photoshop and away I went. Here's what I came up with: simple and neat. What do you think?

 

new home

Sorry I haven't updated for a few days! Been busy with moving to a new apartment! Yay! Our old place had nice high ceilings and a big window looking out over the city from the 14th floor. BUT, it was like living in a shoe box.

Our new place is on the second floor, has a bedroom, living room, office room, window/porch area, spacious kitchen (as opposed to our kitchen-bathroom combo in the last place), a bathroom of course, AND, a new addition: we have a huge loft area; so we actually have  a place to store our stuff! Hurray!

We are very happy with the new place, although we're not fully moved in yet, there's still a lot of sorting to do and we're waiting for  some new furniture to come in.
I'll definitely be posting some pictures of it pretty soon...once it looks nice and cozy.

And, by the way, the reason for the move is because I got the new job working as a filmmaker for a very large publishing company here in Korea. I'm actually only the 6th foreigner they've ever hired, so there's gonna have to be a  bit of getting used to things. I'll share more about what I'm working on and what I get to do for my job once I get the go-ahead from the people upstairs :)  but let me assure you, it's really freaking rad!

b&w traditional wedding

This is a set of pictures I took quite a while ago with my minolta. I found them while sifting through my computer. An international couple got married in the ultra traditional Korean way and so I had the opportunity to take a few pictures. In the last picture she was actually inside a little booth carriage that 4 guys carried her around in, it was pretty nifty. 

International World Peace Festival

On Sunday September 16, Mannam took part, along with many other sponsors, in hosting the World Peace Festival, held in the Olympic Stadium in Seoul, Korea. The stadium's seating capacity is about 70,000. It was completely filled, even standing room, a few thousand people had to stand outside and watch all the happenings on a big screen because they couldn't fit in (an estimated 200,000 people came and went throughout the day's events).

Luckily, our team was participating in the basketball tournament on the day and so we had full athlete access. The tournament was a single-elimination match, so if you lose one game you're out. Our team ended up winning all FOUR of our games (4-0) and won the GOLD MEDAL! It was pretty awesome!

The crowds were so loud and so active that we couldn't hear a thing...and during our games many other competitions and performances were going on. In fact, at one point I was shooting free throws on a foul and fireworks were going off! It was pretty amazing! I'm glad Jinny was able to come along and photograph us playing and capture the memories. 

Definitely a great day full of amazing performances and fun times. I got to meet many people from various countries, cultures, and religions...and got to see first hand what it could be like if we could achieve world peace some day.

:)

Fighting for the rebound.

Intense defensive positions.

Making things happen.

Photographers getting in on our huddle. 

The Gold Medalists

Minolta Magic

Here're a few more pictures from my last film role. A delicious hamburger from Burgerholic (burger, fries, drink for 5,900 won (about $6)), a view outside a bus window, my watch (the longest I've ever kept a watch without losing/breaking it - 1.5 years!), escalator man, and two moving bus photos (day vs. night).

Goodbye Teaching

Yesterday was my last day of teaching English. I now move on to bigger and better things. Which, I  will hopefully be updating you on very soon^^ Below are some pictures I took with my Minolta in my final week. It was a nice way to end things.

Hanna, co-English teacher. 

 Morgan, co-English teacher.

It was time...

So, I gave in, and got another tattoo. I headed down to Tattoo Korea (probly the best/cleanest/most trustworthy tattoo shop in Korea) and I got it done. Of course when you get a tattoo you want to get something that means a lot to you. I had been thinking about this one for some time and I finally decided (with the approval of my wife) to get it done. One of the most influential and meaningful things I have come across in the Bible and in my walk of faith has been the Lord's Prayer from Matthew 6. Jesus says, "THIS then is how you should pray." Many people have it memorized because, well, they had to as a child, it was part of church, but how many people actually know what it MEANS? There's so much meaning in it! But instead of giving you a freebie and explaining it all out here, I recommend you take a look at it for yourself, go verse by verse, seeking understanding. This prayer is far shorter than any pastor in the world today prays, and it was spoken by Jesus Christ as THE example of how to pray and what to pray for.  Let's learn to pray for what is IMPORTANT, for things that actually MATTER to God.

*Jinny used my film camera and snapped these pictures.

Fall

Fall has FINNALY made its way here! Hurray! I can finally wear jeans! No more humidity! Here's a picture I took while waiting for the bus. The leaves are collecting in the gutters.

More from Minolta

It was only 8am in the morning, but the sun was SUPER bright and hot. Lydia on the second picture was barely able to keep her eyes open for me. You can see how the sun is making her shadow long and dark. But, it was better than rain!