Dread of night. Dread of non-night.

Albert Camus

2011-08-17T22:42:00.000-07:00

What is more real … in our universe than the life of a man, and how could one hope to revive it better than in a realistic film? But under what conditions would such a film be possible? Purely imaginary ones. One would actually have to posit an ideal camera that is fixed, night and day, on this man and ceaselessly records his slightest movement. The result would be a film, the screening of which would last a lifetime and that could be seen only by viewers resigned to losing their life in the exclusive interest of the details of someone else’s. Even then, this unimaginable film wouldn’t be realistic—for the simple reason that the reality of a man’s life isn’t found only where he is. It’s also found in the other lives that shape his—first of all, the lives of those he loves, who would, in turn, have to be filmed; but also the lives of unknown others—powerful or downtrodden—fellow citizens, policemen, professors, invisible companions in mines and factories, diplomats and dictators, religious reformers, artists who create myths that govern our behavior—all told, humble representatives of the sovereign accidents that reign over even the most orderly existence. Thus there’s only one realistic film possible, the one that is endlessly projected for us by an invisible apparatus on the screen of the world. The only realistic artist would be God, if he exists. Other artists are, of necessity, unfaithful to the real.

Abbas

2011-08-01T16:36:00.001-07:00

"My photography is a reflection, which comes to life in action and leads to meditation. Spontaneity - the suspended moment - intervenes during action, in the viewfinder."

Mr.Koolhaas' CCTV building

2011-07-12T10:03:00.001-07:00

The garden turns out to be a blown-up version of Piranesi’s 18th-century map of an imaginary Rome from his engraving series “Il Campo Marzio dell’Antica Roma.” The map represents an urban ideal, one in which the greatness of cities is seen to arise from a clash of architectural visions built up over centuries, and where each of these visions is given equal weight.

Len Lye

2011-03-04T23:54:00.001-08:00

the colour film "should have nothing to do with straight realism. If a theme is convincingly presented, it is reality enough to the mind of an audience."

Josef Koudelka

2011-03-03T21:44:00.001-08:00

"I try to be a photographer. I cannot talk. I am not interested in talking. If I have anything to say, it may be found in my images. I am not interested in talking about things, explaining about the whys and the hows. I do not mind showing my images, but not so much my contact sheets. I mainly work from small test prints. I often look at them, sometimes for a long time. I pin them to the wall, I compare them to make up my mind, be sure of my choices. I let others tell me what they mean. [To Robert Delpire] My photographs, you know them. You have published them, you have exhibited them, then you can tell whether they mean something or not."

Gorillaz - The Fall

2011-02-04T13:55:00.000-08:00

Gorillaz - The Fall

2011-01-31T21:53:00.000-08:00

Disappearance scares me. It scares me even more when I cannot stop one from disappearing. Please, don't go away. Don't let me have a hole in my heart filled with the frigid wind.

Photos: 2011 movie preview - latimes.com

2011-01-16T13:09:00.000-08:00

Photos: 2011 movie preview - latimes.com

happy new year

2011-01-03T21:05:00.000-08:00

The spirit of the new year.

2011-01-01T03:34:00.000-08:00

I was sober at the moment the year changed. I am drunk now and happy.
I keep saying that it's going to be a good year for me and I mean it.
I got out of the black hole - no more hatred, regrets, anger, and negativity.
It's going to be a FINE days, uh-huh.
Happy new year, everyone.

Kodachrome

2010-12-31T10:38:00.000-08:00

NY Times article

Things I admire are becoming a history.
Soon, I won't be able to smell the film stocks and feel my heart pounding.
I wouldn't be flipping a newspaper and complaining that my hands are so black.
What would happen when we lose all the electricity ?

RIP: Dodge Morgan

2010-12-23T15:21:00.000-08:00

His competing desires for affection and solitude.

My love of the windows

2010-11-24T21:23:00.000-08:00

The New York Times Article about the casement windows.

Gorillaz - "Doncamatic" Feat. Daley (BBC Radio 1 - Live Lounge)

2010-11-24T15:08:00.000-08:00

Gorillaz - "Crystalised" (The xx Cover) (BBC Radio 1 - Live Lounge)

2010-11-24T15:05:00.000-08:00

Chicken business

2010-11-17T11:36:00.000-08:00

There are some pretty chickens in Guatemala. This particular chicken has a cute butt.

A birthday

2010-11-15T11:52:00.000-08:00

My thirtieth birthday with the strangers, or semi-strangers.
They had planned for somewhat long time - since the beginning of the trip - and surprised me.
Lots of laughter, patting and hugging - thank you, everyone.

Older and wiser, I should be. Come true! My birthday wishes.

Blue Valentine (HD Trailer)

2010-11-05T22:12:00.000-07:00

I can't resist Ryan Gosling.

A concert in Hollywood Bowl

2010-07-06T23:26:00.000-07:00

In the beginning, a woman introduced the director of LA philharmonic who recently passed away. She said there will be a fireworks and he would have liked it, and he might be watching it above. And then they started with Haydn's Te Deum, Hob. XXIIIc:2. I guess the scores in the movies like this: the music with the story.

And then the fireworks with Hallelujah!
My favorite was Gloria though. Thanks Hanna.

Raoul Coutard on Onfilm

2010-07-04T10:59:00.000-07:00

"Making a film is a love story. You must be happy to make the film with the director, the actors, and the team. You must learn to communicate and delegate, and to promote cohesion. Cinematography is not the technique, but the eye. It's a way of looking at things. A frame is like a photograph, a moment, but with cinema that moment has a before and an after. The time of viewing is limited, imposed by the director. A succession of these moments gives birth to emotion for the spectator. No one wants to see a film for the beauty of the photography only. For a film to be an artistic success, the vision must be a whole. A good film is when you come out of the theater totally stunned. You have no idea what hit you. You don't remember if you had dinner or where you parked your car. You want to be alone to think about it."

Full interview

2010-07-04T10:57:00.001-07:00

2010-06-30T14:49:00.001-07:00

Watch more free documentaries

Sesame Street - I Don't Want To Live On The Moon

2010-06-15T21:01:00.000-07:00

A masterpiece.

Exciting!

2010-06-10T16:06:00.000-07:00

These posters are great fun.

ESPN World Cup posters by country

Infinite Jest

2010-06-09T23:01:00.000-07:00

Home with the team, no matter how high the AC or how thin the sheet, Orin wakes with his own impression sweated darkly into the bed beneath him, slowly drying all day to a white salty outline just slightly off from the week's other faint dried outlines, so his fetal-shaped fossilized image is fanned out across his side of the bed like a deck of cards, just overlapping, like an acid trail or timed exposure.

Empty, but not empty

2010-06-06T17:13:00.000-07:00

In Gran Torino, the blackness that swallows up much of the room where Walt (Eastwood) sits brooding after the attack on Sue (Ahney Her) suggests the inaccessibility that has swallowed much of Walt's own fragmented being.

Two sides

2010-06-05T20:01:00.000-07:00

I admire writers. When they describe things in a way that I would precisely picture, I would taste and how I would feel, yet I cannot express in words.
But the words hurt. the shapes of them, the sound of them, the violence and inhumanity of them - I fear.

June, I like the sound of it

2010-06-01T00:27:00.000-07:00

World Cup, NBA championship, Baseball, Wimbledon, and Infinite Jest.

2010-05-31T02:10:00.000-07:00

If I get to shoot a movie like Lawrence of Arabia, that would be the pinnacle of my career.

That '70s look

2010-05-27T12:35:00.000-07:00

Many films today, good or bad, high or low budget, feel hermetically sealed, unfolding in sterile and controlled worlds that seem removed from, well, reality. The most evocative movies of the 1970s feel like they were made by crews who took cameras out into the streets, and shot in real locations, using gradations of light as their key special effect.

Agreed.

Read the article

Uncle Boonmee who can recall his past lives

2010-05-26T11:33:00.001-07:00

The picture made me gasp.

The article

What is Philosopher?

2010-05-17T22:20:00.000-07:00

What is Philosopher?

Wow

2010-04-30T16:20:00.000-07:00

http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2010/04/29/world/20100430_EXPO.html

Life in prison without parole for barber who set homeless man on fire

2010-04-29T14:07:00.001-07:00

Life in prison without parole for barber who set homeless man on fire

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Suspect held in man's fiery death - latimes.com

2010-04-29T14:06:00.001-07:00

Suspect held in man's fiery death - latimes.com

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China kindergarten attack, copycat knife attack in China on children at kindergarten - latimes.com

2010-04-29T14:05:00.001-07:00

China kindergarten attack, copycat knife attack in China on children at kindergarten - latimes.com

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I missed it!

2010-02-02T10:01:00.000-08:00

Damn it, Kim Cogan came to LA last month. I could have made it. Upset.
I should save the dates for SF show in May.

The Berlin Stories, Christopher Isherwood

2010-02-02T01:17:00.000-08:00

In another moment, when I had drunk exactly the right amount of champagne, I should have a vision. I took a sip. And now, with extreme clarity, without passion or malice, I saw what Life really is. It had something, I remember, to do with the revolving sunshade. Yes, I murmured to myself, let them dance. They are dancing. I am glad.

She farted and created the world

2009-10-17T00:31:00.000-07:00

Watch how a dog creates the world.

ProVideo Coalition.com: Stunning Good Looks by Art Adams | Cinematography

2009-09-04T20:08:00.001-07:00

ProVideo Coalition.com: Stunning Good Looks by Art Adams | Cinematography

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I filmed two fish for a minute

2009-07-23T21:59:00.000-07:00

Loving Observation

2009-06-21T22:19:00.001-07:00

I had felt the emptiness that I always have after a project for the longest time.
Everyday was a challenge and the sleepless nights drove me insane.
I was very happy on the last day and slept as long as I wanted afterward, yet I am so ready to go back to work.

Blur : Midlife

2009-06-18T13:33:00.001-07:00

Kim Cogan

2009-06-15T17:53:00.000-07:00

I ran into the artist in the magazine I was skipping through at the party I wasn't enjoying.
He has been one of my favorite artists since then.
For a long time, I thought it always rains in his paintings. Later I realized I was wrong.

Alexandria Hotel

2009-05-21T20:54:00.001-07:00

Downtown, Los Angeles

the cat in Shea stadium

2009-04-15T12:09:00.001-07:00

Antoine d'Agata

2009-04-07T18:17:00.000-07:00

I try to distance myself from a certain type of documentary photography that often avails itself of symbols that are too easy to read and assimilate in order to present a complex reality in a balance that is endlessly discussed over and over between photography as an instrument of documentation and photography as being completely subjective. It isn’t the eye that photography poses on the world that interests me but its most intimate rapport with that world.

Merry Grinch Christmas

2008-12-23T20:40:00.000-08:00

My favorite movie of the year

2008-12-17T02:35:00.000-08:00

Absolutely Awesome.
It makes me want to wrestle.
Wrestling, Mickey Rourke, back to the ol' time all over again.

(pictures from "The Wrestler" by Niko Tavernese)

La Brea Tar Pits, Los Angeles, CA

2008-10-13T21:03:00.000-07:00

Alcatraz, San Francisco, CA

2008-10-13T00:18:00.000-07:00

Sausalito, CA

2008-10-10T23:38:00.001-07:00

Houses in San Francisco

2008-10-09T14:38:00.001-07:00

King Street, Honolulu, Hawai'i

2008-09-01T23:25:00.001-07:00

photographed by William Kwok

Radiohead at Hollywood Bowl

2008-08-31T19:11:00.000-07:00

The distortion of companionship

2008-08-31T12:16:00.000-07:00

I did not want to see things with anyone else's eyes. I knew this experience. If they point out something you have seen already you realize that your own perception was rather obvious; if they indicate something you missed, you feel cheated, and it is a greater cheat to offer it later as your own. In both cases, it is annoying.

The old Patagonian express, Paul Theroux

yearning

2008-07-17T09:14:00.001-07:00

It's not about the ocean.
There were many more behind it when I took this picture --- weather, wind, climbing and sweat, the Scottish with bagpipes, and Chris.
It was a very nice day.

Mets!

2008-06-01T15:00:00.000-07:00

On a nice Sunday afternoon, Mets beat Dodgers.
Everyone in my apartment rooted for them.

Clouds

2008-05-30T11:19:00.000-07:00

"You should stop and look up to the sky, especially when you are very busy."
That's what television hosts used to say when I was a little kid.
It is a nice break to stare at the unfathomable space.
I like the sky and everything in it --- clouds, the moon, the stars, the sun.
Wherever I can see the beautiful sky, I like it.

My new sweet home

2008-05-28T15:52:00.000-07:00

Welcome,
A cat at the window and a panda bear say.