thelabmonkey

This is a pretty radical departure from my usual style. I like how it turned out.

This was part of the shoot I did sneaking around the Westin St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco with two models. Luckily we did not get kicked out...

My latest guilty pleasure is reading thisisindexed.com/ and graphjam.com/ I mention this by way of explanation for this monstrosity of a Venn diagram...

This is an extensive, though probably not exhaustive, representation of the technical junk that goes into a photo exposure.

FYI, the color, or size of the bubble and amount of overlap are not strictly... anything. Really, it's just the fact that they overlap at all that shows an influence.

I was up in San Francisco this weekend to go do a guerrilla shoot running around in hotel hallways.

Lunch was sushi, and I had to make Mina wait patiently while I photographed it. Once that was done, though, we decimated it... even its cute little antennae could not protect it.

There's this game called Scribblenaughts which was announced at E3 this year and it is insanely cool... and just plain insane. The idea is that you play a guy named Maxwell (bonus points!) who can create anything in the world just by writing it... like "lumberjack" or "salad". You then use these things to solve puzzles.

This weekend was fraught with birthdays. Friday was a friend's daughter's 1st birthday, then Saturday was Jessi's up in San Francisco, and then back down to San Jose for our neighbor's daughter's 2nd birthday. I'm all birthday'd out now, kthxbai.


Sunday I went to the community garden with Kristin to help, you know, garden... things. You can tell, I'm totally up on my farm culture. Tractor, pitch fork, hay bail, barn, tornado. Yep, got it covered. Thanks first ten minutes of Wizard of Oz!

Since I have no concept of really how to make things grow, Kristin put me to work destroying them. Oh, I can do that... I'm good at that. There was a 12 foot tall row of fast growth tree cover that was pushing past the fence and blocking sun to the back of the plot. I was told to "go nuts".

Wielding giant pruning shears, a hand saw, and what I can only describe as a mechanical pole-arm designed for fighting trees, I pruned like a man possessed. In years to come, bards will sing tales of Max "Shade Bane" Johnson, and his fearsome foliage purges of 2009.

Seriously, that pole-arm tool was something else... On the tip, it featured a jagged, curved saw blade that looked as if it had fallen out of a pre-historic predator's mouth. Just below that was a pulley-powered hook/blade assembly from which dangled a 10+ foot cord. By hooking a branch and pulling the cord, I could slice through wood a half inch thick as if it were a licorice stick. I'm sure to use if effectively you have to take some kind of exotic weapon feat.

I must say that the best part about a vegetable garden is that you can eat it. I loves me some organic snap peas and lettuce.

My first night in Rome, Kristin and I shared a bottle of wine and got a bit tipsy. After dinner, Kristin hung out in the room and I took the camera (sans heavy backpack, woo!) and wandered the streets of Rome. I got myself a crepe, took some night photos, and made silly faces behind the backs of people who were trying to take pictures of their spouse/son/daughter in front of the Trevi Fountains.

While I was hanging out, this guy in a suit with a bouquet tapped a woman on the shoulder. When she turned around, he grabbed her and started kissing her! The woman was surprised, but then seemed to recognize him. I got the impression she didn't expect to see him in Rome at all. It was very cinematic. I managed to snap a few surreptitious photos as I walked past.

This was made even better by the addition of what tasted like ludicrously expensive balsamic vinegar. You can see it in the background there, exuding tastiness...

While in Amalfi, we got some candied, chocolate dipped lemon and orange peel slices that were awesome!

The Southern Italian coast is just lousy with citrus trees.

I posted the last leg of our trip into a compiled travel log on a web page for friends and family... I was too lazy to reformat it for LJ, so... linkie:

The Great And Terrible Records Of Italy, As Retold By Max Johnson (with photos)

Day 13 we decided to take a day trip to the Amalfi coast. We had heard it was one of the most beautiful drives in all of Italy. We also heard from some lady that Amalfi and Positano were dirty and crowded... but luckily she was either blind or insane. Before we could see any of this alleged beauty, however, we had to pass "The Test". The test being that we had to successfully find and board a bus to Positano. Having had luck with the bus system in Siena, we did not think it would be hard. After waiting for an hour and a half at a stop we had been assured by multiple people was the correct one for a bi-hourly bus, we took the train to the main bus stop in Sorrento. I guess they just didn't feel like leaving, or took an alternate route. Once there we boarded the correct bus and were on our way a mere two hours later after we should have.

( The cat in the picture is the stray cat who kept the lizard population in check around our bunker... I mean "bungalow" near Sorrento. I named him "Sir Wheezicat" because of the accordion-like sound he made when breathing.)


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After even MORE walking, we got around to the western side of the island of Capri and took photos. There was a sign pointing down that said "Natural Arches 300 meters", but we did not fancy going down a third of a kilometer and then back up.

This is from the central square in Capri at the top of the hill. We walked a bojillion miles up this winding path/stairway to get here.

A meeting place of some kind in Pomei... or a screen shot from the video game Elderscrolls: Oblivion. Take your pick.

Sorrento, as seen from a place not in Sorrento...

Our second day in Southern Italy we decided to go to Pompei. Pompei was humbling and terrible and beautiful. Words and photos are not sufficient to describe Pompei. The most succinct way to put it would be:

Pompei was.

When I've seen ruins before, it has always been a large monument or maybe some architecture which has been built over top of. Pompei was just... there. All of it. Or as much as survived a tidal wave of hot ash.

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Day 7 brings us to Lamolle, a small town about a half hour drive from Siena, deep in the heart of Tuscany.  The previous night at dinner, two of the other guests, John and Kendall, had invited us to go on a walk with them in Lamolle. They are a really wonderful couple from just outside London, and we all thought it a smashing idea. Kristin and I were so excited that I forgot I had hurt my foot the day before, running to catch a bus. It wasn't the running so much as the tripping and falling part. It was rather spectacular, since I managed to do a crazy ninja roll saving both myself and my backpack filled with camera gear. Onlookers were duly impressed, if somewhat concerned. But back to Lamolle...

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Continuing from the previous update, we begin on day four, the day trip to Firenze (Florence). I'd like to say that we spent all day studying famous works and museum hopping, but that just sounded so tiring. Kristin and I both agreed that we'd walk the town and see what we saw, but taking tours or waiting in line for tickets was just not happening. We spent an hour or two sketching and painting, we saw went to the plaza which has Michaelangelo's David and a slew of other amazing sculptures, we saw the Santa Croce (big building with lots of sculptures and gargoyles), and sundry other historical things. My favorite sculpture I dubbed "Dude Knows How To Party". I'm not sure what it really was about, but dude had two nekkid ladies and some wine. Word. Also, Poseidon and his peeps were chillin' in a big fountain (see first pic).

The other thing we did in Firenze was shop for leather goods. They've got leather coat stores coming out the ears and we both got two new leather jackets each for less combined than one new would have been at home.



Day 5 was Wednesday, and on Wednesdays there is a street market in Siena! Kristin was on a mission to buy some stylish Italian shoes and who doesn't love a street market? We wandered the stall-maze and I took some photos. Aside from that, it was a very chill day. The only other really noteworthy thing that happened that day was my awesome sea-monster salad. It was called an insalata de mare, but really it was various ocean going critters chopped up, cooked, and sprinkled with olive oil for my consumption/amusement. Tentacles are delicious.


The next day we walked into Siena to catch the bus out to San Gimignano (about an hour away). San Gimignano is a fairly large hamlet set atop a huge hill. It has a couple churches and a fort up at the top that were fun to visit. It is also famous for being home to the worldwide gelato (Italian ice cream) champion. We sampled some of their offerings and it was quite delicious. Though there is not much to remark on specifically, San Gimignano was remarkable as a whole, and a wonderful day trip. We were rewarded on our return with another of Agriturismo Marciano's incredible dinners, and a bit too much wine. :)

Next time on "Max and Kristin in Italy": New friends, long hikes, and Lamolle

Kristin has been planning the trip to Italy for a year or so now and we are finally here. Travel from San Francisco to Siena was at least a full day. We took a flight from SFO to New York, and a second flight to Rome. Then we got on a transfer train to the main depot in Rome where we had a 5 hour layover, then the real train to Siena. Finally, we caught a cab to the bed and breakfast, Agriturismo Marciano. We left our house at 7 AM on the 7th and got to our room at 9PM (Italy time) on the 8th. Whew!

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San Gimignano, Italy, as seen from the road at sunset.

This was a hip-shot taken at the street market in Florence (Firenze), Italy.

It's a little depressing that one of the best photos I took all day was one that I snapped holding the camera at belly-level without looking.