A year in review

Time lapses are some of the most beautiful photography/videography out there. As with my other things in life, there’s a distinct beauty that comes from seeing what time can do to help evolve and change the world around us. An annual project by Eirik Solheim brings that concept to centre stage.

This isn’t the first year time lapse project from Eirik but it is the first true time lapse. He set up a camera system that took a photo every half an hour for an entire year outside of one of window frames. Not counting some technical glitches, he was left with roughly 16 000 photos at the year end to combine together and transform into art.

His first project was stitching the photos together to create an image of a year. Information on that endeavour alone is found here: A year in one image. It is a beautiful shot of Norway scenery where Eirik lives. Creating this photo included some technical script in order to take one line from each image to combine altogether. The photo makes a clear distinction between the seasons. It depicts fairly short spring and fall seasons, a relatively decent summer and a not too surprising long winter.

His second task was to create a true time lapse video, combining all of the photos together. The specific on its creation can be found on his website.

I’m sure Eirik has moved on to his 2011 project and I’ll be more than interested to see how that one turns out.

For the full story on the process for this project please visit: eirikso.com

Tales of Mere Existence

My sister introduced me to this YouTube series a while ago and was instantly hooked. Unfortunately due to other factors in life, I didn’t really get a chance to start watching them until recently. This animated series was created  by Lev Yilmaz. “Tales of Mere Existence” is a first-person narrative tour through the occasionally mundane, always hilarious, thoughts of a young man on the edge.

“Topics include: what makes him horny (those choker necklaces women wear), how he feels about his successful friends (great guys he loves and would like to drive off a cliff), what he has worried about in his life (“that I would never see that Barber of Seville Bugs Bunny cartoon again,” “that one day kids will find Aerosmith as boring as I always found Elvis,” “that I will one day be the old guy at the party.”)

Lev does everything — the writing, the production and the vocal narration. The latter is hard to believe when in Lev’s company and listening to his normal, maybe even a little sweet, speaking voice.

Lev’s alter ego sounds world-weary, and maybe little bitter, as his gravelly voice drones his narrative.” – credit

He has gone on to produce merchandise for his growing fan base which include DVDs, t-shirts, prints of his comics and books. His narrations and perceptions of his surroundings never fail to make me laugh and lift my mood when needed. Although the animations are short, the point comes off fairly clear and it is a continuing series. I highly recommend that you not only watch but that you subscribe as well if you have a YouTube account.

For those looking for more, check out his website Ingredient X Entertainment

Marcel The Shell

While talking to a friend about some random videos on YouTube, he suggested that I give this a watch. Needless to say, I totally loved it. So I wanted to share it with those who, like me, may have not seen it before. I love Marcel the shell! :)

Desk Design

“If a messy desk is a sign of a messy mind, then what is an empty desk a sign of?”

Does your desk look like this? Is your idea of a filing system a pile of papers in stacks everyone? Where wires seem to be growing out of every crevice of your space with no idea what they actually connect to or what they’re used for? Is your desk where sleep, eat, work and play crash together in one giant mess? I’m sure many people can relate to the chaos seen below.

How people organize their desks is very telling to their personalities. Some of the most creative and gifted minds have no time or care to keep their desk neat. For the creative folk, their desk is another canvas to work their magic on so that they create an inspiring and comforting environment. For those who spend a great deal at their desk, it may be all about comfort and ease while others advocate the world of simplicity.

I wish I had home offices that looked like this. I’d say that I probably fall somewhere in-between when it comes to cleanliness. Papers certainly find their way into stacked piles from time to time but I try to make a consistent effort to clean those up and put the papers where they need to go. My desk definitely screams ‘young student’ with the textbooks, notebooks, pens/pencils and notes laying on it or organized to the side.

I started thinking about all of this due to a video featuring people’s connections with their desk/workspace and it made me think of mine. I’d highly suggest you watch the video as it is interesting to see the variety. Click the link below.

Video: Desk – Music and Sound Design from Aaron Trinder Film:Motion:Music on Vimeo.

1920s rendition of 2010 hits

“Billboard Magazine first began covering the burgeoning industry of radio nearly 90 years ago, in the 1920s.

To celebrate this arbitrary milestone, I’m counting down the top hits of the week of September 4, 2010…1920′s style.

Here’s the countdown:

#10 Magic – B.o.B ft. Rivers Cuomo
#9 Just the Way You Are – Bruno Mars
#8 California Gurls – Katy Perry
#7 Cooler Than Me – Mike Posner
#6 Right Above It – Lil Wayne Ft. Drake
#5 Dj Got Us Fallin’ In Love – Usher ft. Pitbull
#4 I Like It – Enrique Iglesias ft. Pitbull
#3 Teenage Dream – Katy Perry
#2 Dynamite – Taio Cruz
#1 Love The Way You Lie – Eminem ft. Rihanna” – youtube description

I tweeted about this a while back because I was just too excited to share it with everyone then. I decided to write a blog post for it also because that’s just how much I adore this video. I love when super creative people take overplayed hits from the year (or past years) and turn it into something much more enjoyable. Take for instance this 20s rendition of popular hits from this year. At first it was a little hard for me to catch the actual tunes but if you listen carefully it’s definitely there. If the creativity isn’t enough to impress you, his technical skills must. Look at how crazy fast his hands are going. I’m a piano player so let me tell you, that kind of skill isn’t easy to come by. Love this video and I simply can’t stop sharing it.