Book Signing: Scott Schuman aka The Sartorialist @ Paul Smith [Oct. 21]

This is probably the longest I've waited in line to get a book signed--3.5 hours!!! While I can't believe I waited from 7:15pm until 11:30pm, to finally meet Scott Schuman was quite worth it since I see his blog almost everyday. I just didn't know he'd be so popular here. And I knew I was in the right line when all the people lining up looked as if they were from the blog pages of The Sartorialist! Hipsters left and right but hey, everyone wants to dress to impress.

Paul Smith in SF (50 Geary St.). I waited in line around the corner on Kearny and stayed around the blog for almost 2 hours!

Being so close yet so damn far!

Finally seeing the inside of the store: Great! Seeing that there's still a line all the way back to the store: not so great.

I've personally haven't heard much of Paul Smith [=/ Don't bash on me!] but wow, the items in this store are flying off my money to spend scale.

There were cuff links for guys at $150. Toothbrushes for $12 (yes designer toothbrushes). Jeans for $350. Etc!

My copy of The Sartorialist purchased at--you guessed it--Amazon.com

And finally here I am with Scott Schuman who kindly shook my hand while taking the picture.

Everytime I go to a book signing, there's a pocket of time to ask a question or spark a short conversation while the author signs my copy. My question for The Sartorialist: "Will you ever shoot around here in San Francisco?" He kindly responded "I would love to! I just need to make time!"

For his widely popular blog, visit it at http://www.thesartorialist.blogspot.com/

Sony Carl Zeiss 24-70mm Sample Images

For my birthday [Oct. 19], my girlfriend Cher surprised with me a photography-themed day. We headed to SF MOMA's Richard Avedon exhibition [which is great btw! A must-see exhibit if you have time!] and before that, surprised me with I have on top of my list when I get a job: a Sony Carlo Zeiss 24-70mm 2.8 lens. =)

This lens is just superb. Yes, it is a 2 POUND 1 OZ lens but the build quality is second to none. I'm not going to run a full test on this lens because there are other reviews out there [Google it!] but from what I know it's a lens that is definitely worth its value for the serious minded photographer.

So first off, thank you Cher for the really nice gift!

So here's some quick shots I did early early in the morning. None of the pics are enhanced except white balance was fixed a bit.

My favorite quick shot. Just look at the out of focus quality aka bokeh! The shots here are all lit with a table overhead fluorescent lamp so this 2.8 lens does its magic great.

My Vornado Flippi fan and if the background was lit more, the separation of the subject and background is awesome.

Mighty mouse.

All shots were also focused manually since the focus points using the lens wide open is really small. Take notice of the keyboard's focus focal plane--from keys f to k.

My Grados SR-80 headphones. If you're looking for new open headphones by the way, I recommend these all the way. Yes, they're not sound isolating but if you're just looking for the quality of the sound, I personally love these. If I had money, I'd upgrade to the SR-120's or the higher models.

Lastly, my Sony Cybershot W120--my pocket camera I have with me 99% of the time. I bought a black silicone skin for it on eBay so it brings that sexy black professional profile to it.

Do expect more shots with this lens as I'm leaving this baby on my Sony A700 99% of the time.

So I never drank before a movie...

...but I think this movie calls for it. Give me beer and a bunch of my friends around and this will be good. Guaranteed.




The Expendables directed by Sylvester Stallone; starring Stalone, Jason Stathem, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren [Remember Rocky IV? "I must break you"--yes him], Eric Roberts, Randy Couture, Steve Austin, Terry Crews, and Mickey Rourke. And oh, cameos of Bruce Willis and our governor Arnold Schwarzenegger!

August 20, 2010

Abbot and East Moltke: "Chair" & "Elliptical

Abbot and East Moltke is an on-going project documenting the various items left by households at the corner of where I live. Different items have been left already and some of which I've already unfortunately missed. This photo series will continue for an unknown period of time and is planned to be [self] published once body of work is completed.

Review: [New] Moleskine Project Planner 2010

Borders gave me a bonus $5 Borders Rewards dollars so I felt inclined to use it towards something useful. Because I get 90% of my books on Amazon, I felt that I should this on something besides books and after awhile not being able to find anything, I result to my default product that I stock up on--Moleskines. I remember seeing this on Moleskine's blog and behold they had about 3 of these brand new Moleskine Project Planner 2010! They were so new infact that Borders didn't have a price tag sticker on them!

Without knowing the price before going to the register, I was wide-eyed when the lady rung it up and it was $12.95! Even she was surprised for such a small thing. Then again, these things are always priced high among the pocket notebooks world.

The paper used in this planner is about the same thickness and feel as the other regular Moleskine notebooks.

I personally use a Moleskine Daily Planner and love it. I am able to write a lot since each page is dedicated for a day and makes as a makeshift diary. This on the other hand is a Project Planner and the special is that it's "pages" is really one long piece of paper so you can roll this thing out on a table and really look ahead.

You can flip through this as a regular book.

But because the end is not attached to the book's spine, you can literally roll this out to be more than 3 feet easily.

Just like the other Moleskine Planners, it has maps, unit conversions, and other handy information.

On the reverse side of the Project Planner pages are a weekly planner pages so you can have a bit more room to write something.

I am still gonna figure out how to write my projects on it since the space is a bit limited.

Overall, I am happy to purchase this because while I do have a Daily Planner that I plan on using every year, it is great to actually "see" your plans on a timeline rather it being one page and flipping to another page.

This will be great for writing down schedules for work [which I do hope I get a job next year as an RN] and portrait sessions.

It is a good at-a-glance project planner although I'd wish there's more room to write a lot of details on a certain project.

Here is my favorite accessory for my Moleskines: my custom Renaissance Art leather case.

Custom because I had it made to order to fit my two most used Moleskines: the pocket Squared Journal and the pocket Daily Journal.

Best part is that it will also fit my new Project Planner 2010!

Say hello to a more organized and planned 2010.

San Francissco 45th Annual Book Sale at Fort Mason Festival Pavillion

Arrived 2:30pm at Fort Mason's Festival Pavillion.

And then bam! 300,000+ books, movies, CDs, and all that good stuff. Best part? All books were priced $2-5. The Kicker? All books will be $1 on Sunday [09/27]

My girlfriend and I check out books. She got herself a Photoshop Tips and Tricks book for $3 and other books for friends.

Well what do you know?! My friend Apol aka Apollo Style was among the books!

There were far too many books but luckily they organize the place in easy to find categories. There was even a section on Math. Skip!

My treasured find among the lottery amount of books: Annie Leibovitz Photographs. Her first published book! $5 Woo hoo!

My other friends are all relating to art/photography as well:
- Andy Warhol: The Philosophy of Andy Warhol ($1)
- Pricing Photography by Michael Heron and David MacTavish ($3)
- Take Better Pictures by Kodak ($3) [This is for a gift]
- The Non-Designers Design Book ($2) by Robin Williams [Another gift]

Me and my loot!

I enter the Best of the Bay section where San Francisco Public Library people put their top and expensive books and low and behold: a 1st edition Annie Leibovitz Photographs 1970-1990 signed edition!

My girlfriend knows that I wanted this... so it looks like I'm coming back for it tomorrow. =)

Another sought-after book that is out of print: The Americans by Robert Frank.

Took a quick snap of this guy while we headed out.

Today was a good day.

And so will tomorrow be when I get my hands on that signed edition.

--
INFORMATION ON THE EVENT:

45th Annual Big Book Sale Sept. 24-27

@ Fort Mason Festival Pavillion

2009 Big Book Sale:

Wednesday, September 23— 4-8 PM (Member Preview Sale)
Thursday, September 24—10 AM-8 PM
Friday, September 25—10 AM-8 PM
Saturday, September 26—10 AM-8 PM
Sunday, September 27—10 AM to 6 PM (All Books $1 or less!)

jC Photography x DJ Zita: Behind the Scenes Montage [Produced by Apollo Styles]

Photographer JJ Casas and San Francisco based DJ Zita collaborate on a promotional photoshoot at Levende East in Oakland, CA. This is a video montage of the 1.5 hour photoshoot. Thanks again to everyone who made this happen:

DJ Zita (Talent)
Michele Kitagawa (Stylist)
Awny Rael (Make Up Artist)
Julian Aguas (Behind the Scenes Photographer/Videographer)
Jiro Bantay (1st Photographer's Assistant)
Apol Perea (Producer/2nd Photographer's Assistant)
Levende East (Restaurant/Lounge)

Special thanks to Apol who produced this video montage and Julian for shooting it.

Links:
http://www.jcasasphotography.com
http://www.djzita.com
http://www.awny.us
http://www.astellarproductions.com
http://www.apollostyle.blogspot.com
http://www.levendeeast.com

Enjoy!

Update: [Project] Abbot & East Moltke

So I've been lagging quite a bit on posting images for my next project entitled Abbot & East Moltke. I've been taking images and have also added a Project page on my website jcasasphotography.com

Here's the text copied and pasted from the Project page:

Abbot & East Moltke records what is left behind on this particular corner. Countless items have been abandoned overnight magically and disappear in the same fashion the next day.

This project is a reflection of how our personal objects become a problem or solution.

Each piece has a story to tell and unfortunately that story too is abandoned. Where it will go or what will happen next to it is undetermined as well.

This collection of photographs are not of the past or future but a temporary portrait.

Once completed, proceeds will be donated to an undecided charity benefiting the environment in order to progress towards a greener Earth.

As of now, I'm not sure when I will [self] publish this body of work because the amount of photographs are infinite right now. Who knows when people will stop dropping random items! I am though planning on going to local mom/pop galleries in San Francisco to inquire on hanging these images [maybe 11x14's?] on the walls.

Regarding the photos being published into a book, I will also ask my high school classmate Catherine Abalos to write an introduction as she did for my Nonage. I will also be choosing a charity organization just as I did with Nonage and St. Jude Children's Research Hospital to donate proceeds from the sales of the book.

I will continue to post images from this series on this blog as well as my website.

2 Bed Mattresses

Couch + Chair

Couch Number 3
Reclining Chair

Office Chair

TV

Cushion

Rolled Rug

White Couch

New Event: Independent Artist Week @ Yoshi's [San Francisco]

I just got listed as one of the Sponsors/Partners for this year's Independent Artist's Week 2009, which is kicking off tomorrow [Sunday, 3/6/09] at Yoshi's in San Francisco.

I'll be there tomorrow night taking portraits of other guests and artists at the event and will also be back at the Fillmore Center on Thursday [3/10/09] doing LIVE ART: I'll be taking "double exposures" using my Polaroid POGO printer and photographing the person again with their instant exposure.

One, I'm definitely excited to be visiting Yoshi's because I know it's a renowned spot for jazz music and all so I'm sure the venue is gonna be nice. Two, I've worked with Melonie before, one of the heads of Infin8sync in which I was able to put up my work on display at the Fillmore Center last year.

Officially September 8-12 is Independent Artists Week and it is declared by our mayor Gavin Newson.

So do come and support us all [including yourself!] I must say that it's a good way to network and enjoying a space with other indie artists is definitely a home setting.

See you all there!

School is Officially Rollin'

School has officially rolled in for me [despite it really beginning last Wednesday]. As I sit in my usual seat next to the window, I realize that I've been in this very same classroom at Cowell Hall [of University of San Francisco] more than a couple of times and see that time has really flown by. This is my last semester as a nursing student and it's been heck of a ride since freshman year. So many learning experiences and especially in nursing, so many lives I've bumped into [in the clinical setting].
I've learned so many things at this very point. Just to start: forgoing the backpack. This is what I now bring to class: My special edition faux-alligator and brown leather backgammon case from St. Vincent de Paul's [thrift store] containing my Moleskines [planner and notebook], a sandwich for the day + tangerine + granola bar, headphones for my iphone, pens, post its; my animated Nalgene bottle, and I guess sunglasses.

Besides easing the load, I've learned that this entire process of schooling in order to graduate also means finding yourself in this crazy mix. School is to help find your passion and when you do, fuels it with the classes, its workload of quizzes, tests, frustrations and deadlines. I'm just about to finish The Dip by Seth Godin, and it's at this point where you find frustrations as "the dip" and you find yourself asking "Should I quit... it's so hard." And when you finally start to pull yourself out of this dip you start to say to yourself "This is me. I can actually pull it off."

Yes, I do photography and I still believe that is a major part of me and my passion. Nursing at that same time surprisingly compliments my passion for photography. The same rules apply for both types of work: importance of communication, time management, and roles as a leader. I've found that my social skills has improved over the course of these years and it has helped a great deal in nursing and photography.

School is always going to be tough. We are entitled to sit down through lectures and that means chances of falling asleep, getting in trouble for texting [like how I did today] and being distracted. Yet when we are out of this classroom, we all still strive to be students of whatever of our passions are. If it's nursing, we find time to read the latest developments and always staying on top of technology and advancements. For photography, we continuously learn through other people and being inspired by other photographers.

I say School is Officially Rollin' and to my understanding, it will always will. I realize that once you stop learning, you stop reaping the potential of your capacity to move forward, advance, and/or change to make a difference and impact.

Surround yourself with material that is viable to you: magazines, literature, websites, anything that will help fuel your passion and ultimately your passion to continue learning. More importantly, surrounding yourself with people that share the same passion will ensure this on-going process of learning will continue and will never burn out.