100 Strangers project, started! [Stranger #1: Rick]

Stranger #1: Rick, a photo by Bekah Stargazing on Flickr.

So, I've not been doing my amplified observations... and I'm sorry.

But anyway, here's my cheap way out of writing directly here:

...Go look at the photo page of my first photo for the 100 Strangers project! I wrote a very long description on Flickr, which shares what happened today.

Okay, so this may or may not count... (Drawings)

I haven't been posting very often, and I know this. I apologize.


Getting out of my own way to deal with photos and upload them and then write about them and post them is harder than I thought it would be. (Duh!)


But anyway, here is what I'd like to post for today...


There's this blog I found via one of the websites I frequent.
It's this: Draw! Sketch! Doodle!
It consists of weekly drawing prompts.


These drawings are my response to this week's prompt, which was to draw coffee mugs.

This one I have done in Inktense water-soluble pencils and plain graphite on 2.5" x 3.5" (standard Artist Trading Card--or "ATC"--size) watercolor paper.


I realize how "off" it looks on the table. I focused more on the coffee mug itself, giving little attention to the background.


PLEASE DISREGARD THE BACKGROUND. Urrgh. That is all.

This image has something of a story to go along with it. It is also done on a standard ATC-sized paper. Done in Inktense pencils and ink.


I worked on it first, just with my Inktense pencils, and then I started using what pigment I had put on the paper as kind of a palette. I would take some water on my brush and mess up all these colors I had already laid down on this paper. What started out as a watercolor pencil sketch turned out to be a mess of neutral and cool colors.


Transferring the pigment on the brush over to the other piece of paper, I finished the painting shown above.


After I was done with the first painting, I took a pen and went over the smudged, muddy watercolor pencils in this painting.


I think I am more satisfied with this drawing than the first; I like how simple it is, and how it was, for the most part, a fluke.


My scanner didn't like these light colors and the real life version of this piece is much brighter.


Both of these I may decide to work on later on, but I'm leaving them as-is for now. I'm not going to bother to upload them onto the gallery for the ATC website I frequent because of their unfinished nature, but if anybody would like me to finish them/add to them or trade them as-is, please leave me a comment or drop me an e-mail! (My e-mail address is rekaso@gmail.com.)

laundry day (the first one in a while)

...and when I say "a while," I mean, like a month. I spent at LEAST two and a half hours there this afternoon. But hey, now I get to have clean underwear!

Played on my DSi that Charlie got me as an early present for my birthday (holyshit, I turn 20 on Thursday), and I crocheted a bit.

I've never actually finished a crocheting project... I mean, I'm working on something from a year ago now.

I will probably edit this post later, as I am blogging from a Wendy's bathroom. Time to wipe (sorry for the TMI).

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last night @ the Middle East

Let me start this post off by saying this: Math the Band is one of the most insane two-person bands ever (of course, Insane Clown Posse will always be THE most insane).


I saw them last night for the umpteenth time with Charlie. We drove into Central Square, and Charlie actually ended up seeing an old friend of his who lives in rather close proximity of the Middle East.


But, anyway--MATH the BAND:
Kevin Steinhauser.
Justine Mainville.
I'm sure they're one of the quirkiest couples out there, even for living in Providence (which is, as far as I can tell, quirky capital of RI).


Their musical performances always consist of:

• an iPod (they used to lug around a MacBook) on a very loud setting, hooked up to an amplifier, with all of their backup electronic music on it;
• screaming into microphones (on which they always stick foam "spit-covers"--or, at least, that's what I get out of those foam things on the mics);
• keyboard--loud;
• a floor tom and a crash cymbal being beaten up--louder;
• a guitar, very loud--and occasionally, very out of tune;
• Kevin playing jump-rope with his guitar and strap by walking through the loop they make together;
• Justine doing the Macarena dance to a song that is not the Macarena;
• sweat--and lots of it;
• great photo opportunities.

I try to go to concerts of theirs whenever I can, and one good reason to attend them is that each concert always turns out to be a good work-out. Like, basically as good as ska shows, because everybody jumps, dances, skanks, and in some cases (last night there was a college kid doing this) moshes or thrashes... even if it ends up being with nobody in particular.


But anyway, last night they were playing at the Middle East, which is pretty close by, in the great scheme of things, so Charlie and I dropped by. It was pretty cool.


Side note: I always thought their name could've been could have been even more obnoxiously awesome if they were just called "Arithmetic the Musical Group."

what's up this evening

"Yeah, I'm pumped. I'm going to follow through on this project! Now, all I have to do is figure out what to upload today..." That's what was going through my mind as I picked up Charlie's little Canon point-and-shoot. I started to play around with it, reverting it from the old settings I was using when I shot pictures at that Say Anything/Motion City Soundtrack/Saves the Day concert in Boston that Charlie and I went to a couple weeks ago.


I didn't quite know what I was going to post up here, so I just pointed... and shot.


After I took the photo, I looked down at the screen on back of the camera and something looked interesting. Something looked different from what I would usually expect to see.


The couch. It was brown.


Charlie has had this couch for a while now, and when I looked at the display on the camera, I was slightly shocked. This whole time I was under the impression that it was black. I was hardly even able to say "Holy crap, Charlie! Look at this." I was just amazed that I had never noticed the sofa to be that color.


The reason I didn't notice before makes sense, though. The lighting in the living room of Charlie's condo is kind of dim. There's one lamp (which is finally hooked up to the right outlet so it is controlled by the switch on the wall). It's pretty small. There is also some light that comes from the kitchen adjacent and from beyond the glass sliding door to the deck, but it doesn't seem to be at a great angle to show true colors of items in the room.


The flash did the trick, though. Now I know: the couch in the living room.... is brown.

intended purpose of "amplified observation"

I often have ideas for projects. Projects that I think it will be a piece of cake to commit to and follow through with. It hardly ever turns out that I actually do these things... For example, I've started countless projects on Flickr and given up on them partway through.

This project, which I'm calling amplified observation, is something that will get built over time, but the general idea is this: I take a picture, draw, or expand upon an existing photo of mine--create some type of visual documentation of something I encounter or feel--every time I make a post. I then write a short piece based on that picture. It may document exactly what I was thinking or doing that day, or it may just be a creative piece of fiction based on the image. (To distinguish what it is, I will write my intention somewhere in each post--most likely the title. The words I'll use to describe the posts will probably look something like this: "my current situation: at a glance," "what's up today," "goings-on," or "I experienced this," vs. "fictional piece," "poem," "free writing," or something similar.)

I love creative prompts upon which I can expand. This project is something that I hope to do consistently, at least for a little while. (My psychiatrist actually was the one who told me that starting a blog like this would be a good idea, just to add structure to my daily routine.)

I am calling this blog amplified observation because I'm basically taking little observations in my daily life and amplifying them. I'll expand upon the experience or the message of the image I post by writing about it.