living off the grid

One thing that continues to appall me is the lack of things for children to do in a city. It seems that things either have to cost money which they will get from heir parents. Or they are accused of loitering. I've mentioned this before but it is funny that since the economic down turn there seems to be more kids paying out side. This is a good thing. Maybe we can counter obesity through poverty. Or something like that.

Joe's last question today really made me think. I love the idea of living off of the grid. Not that you are mooching but that you are enjoying life as a process not a product. What if we all made our own clothes instead of spending hours shopping? We would no longer have people in ambercrombie shirts that say dumb things and cost $80 but we would have the pride of making our own clothes. Yeah it would still cost a little money but more of it would be time.

At times I think we have let ideas like comparative advantage take over our lives and convince us that things are worth what they are priced at not their value.

irony

irony for me was simple today.

On sunday I made a phone call asking our music director what instrument I was playing for the service that morning. She instead told me the set list. Oe of the songs was entitled "nothing compares" I immediately thought of the Shane o'connor song and started singing it since I haven't heard it forever I couldn't remember the worlds just the verse " I went to the doctor and lalallalaal" We had a good laugh.

So I got home that night and looked up the song on pandora radio and ofcource it played a bunch of other stuff as well . And one of the songs was "Isn't Ironic" Again I hadn't heard this forever so I've been on the 80's retro thing for a few days. And today we heard that song again.

Kabakov

LET IT SNOW please

NO snow is bad bad bad on so many levels. I know there isn't anything that we can do about it accept blame China for releasing so many green house gasses into the atmosphere. But if our mountains don't start building up some snow here soon those problems are going to compound. Let me explain how this stretches beyond the realm on skier and snowboarders.

If we have no snow like we did I believe years ago we are going to have to buy electricity from other states that produce it using coal or other sources. indeed our great renewable resource may not be renewed this year. The reality is that there is no quick solution. But what makes me even sadder is that the media seems not to care. In fact most people are unaware that this is really an issue most people would rather the winer be mild. Shame on you!!!

On an economic level Washington state sells a lot of our clean power (although it isn't "clean" under the new laws) to other states if we have none o sell our debt will grow even further.

So today please do a snow dance for all of us.


just for fun

yoko uno

Snow Piece One

Watch the snow fill the mountains in the fall
Return the following spring
Watch it all melt.

Count the flakes as they melt.

Autumn 2008


Water Project

Drink water from every source
Evaluate them for cleanliness
Report unclean water to the government

Demand they drink it if it is not cleaned up

Fall 2008

sounds

here is what I want to hear... Inside


what nature sounds like from William Knudsvig on Vimeo.


-Willko

the video for all who are interested.

the final from William Knudsvig on Vimeo.

Safety first.

Bet they didn't know we watched them break protocol.

I'm much more concerned with their safety.


we all know what these say. Don't stand on or above this step.

But this government paid college worker can't read a label.


please note the foot position on the ladder. 


Maybe they couldn't read the "Off" sign either.

Best luck to other groups it seems we encounter incompetence even here. :(

A short Video tutorial

I just wanted to show every one that how simple final cut really is. The 1:40 video that I made for our presentation only took about 40 min to make. That is fairly fast considering a normal ratio is about hour per 1 min of edited material. so 1/60.

Any way here are a few screen shots.
here is the time line


if we zoom in you can see that all I used was a change in the opacity to allow the video to fade into the text. There is a way to do this with filters but i wanted it to be all random.


then for the flicker effect of the text I simply used the blink filter and changed the opacity on that as well. The same things was done using motion filter to cause the text to zoom in and out


here is the link if you have any questions on a particular part please ask.


the intro from William Knudsvig on Vimeo.

3 lines take 1

Woman wants to grieve alone
away from her lawyers
and the crazy man who killed her loved ones.

Tax payer money will keep a killer on life support
so he can serve his six life sentences
for killing children.

here is a thought

Spotted

There is a water mark or something on the ceiling of the arboretum it is bothering me.

Look right by the smoke detector. It surrounds it. The picture is only ok at showing this.

Charity

So it was 15 cents

I left it because I got paid today and figured someone else needed it more.

free writing take one

You are a bird on the shore of the shore of the beach with out a plan or with out ideals. Are you cold. Are you sleeping are you tried are you alone some say yes and some are no. I was all of those at a time still some of them are the same as tonight before the ideals of a man who came or a woman to nurture me came what would I be. More like you a self less selfish flock of on who live in common with out a trace of speech or an idea to follow the rumor of the truth around inside of my head. For a while now silence but before that there was a dark night and after all of that there will be silence again so you see only a glimpse. Of the world that you are inside of. Her belly it is wet with thirst for our life is not a life with our a plan they say . to drive me to behave into a the silence of the night that I may leave more for their children then I leave for my own and they themselves will we announcing my death with a megaphone and a radio tha ti was the greatest of nothing that will ever be with out an idea that was with out a name. We are to talk about ourselves as if we have never though about the fact that we are not who wwe think we are instead we are just a reflection of what we hear. Have you ever seen yourself. No no with out a mirror with out a painter perhaps a painter is a better way to see ones self then with out a mirror but all the same I soul d have to say no, no, no never have I seen my nose except for a glimpse out of one corner of my eye when the sun hits it just right. And my lips and y mouth my dentist is more acquainted with then I. So we judge not by truth of an ye but by the mirror and what it says that we are to be. Perhaps it has been ling to us all of our life’s and when we escape we will see that who we are I snot who is to see.


BTW I did correct the spelling but nothing else.

The day breaks

this was my morning.

So I saw this and I liked it... A lot

well two things.  These LED throwies. The other was this light graffiti project. I guess this is a response to what Joe as talking about earlier in the class. 

Final Cut and DVD studio help

So I didn't post this earlier because I was busy studying for a mid term and I still have one left. That said if you have any questions regarding the software you can ask me as well as Joe. I'll try to put together a video tutorial or link you to one. 

There is a lot of tutorials on youtube. If you search say FCP (final cut pro) creating text you will get answers. Some are good, some are bad but there is usually a good one for this kind of basic stuff. 

You will discover the text tool in FCP is very weak if you want to make your words dance or something.  For that you want to play around with livetype or motion both have a learning curve. But live type is fairly simple. 

Here is an example of using live type

Here is something I did using illustrator as a text generator in Final Cut


two-step from Hey Marseilles on Vimeo.

The power is using illustrator is that you can then change the text files using the power of illustrator or photoshop and have them automatically update...

Any way that is getting fairly techie but if anyone is interested let me know....

e-mail is best

willjk@u.washington.edu

pray for snow

Willko

white people

This is a great example of the observations that we make in our everyday... Indeed it can make you money but you may still ride your bike everywhere. It was great to note Lander's comment about how people know when you are faking it. His success is from his blog stuff white people like something that to him was just for fun. Seems like that is how it happens.



Enjoi!

quote:

"Despite massive development of the means of communication the everyday escapes. This is its definition. Blanchot p 37 "Everyday"

When I read the first sentence I stopped and thought of Myspace and Facebook both so effective, but at what really? The vas amounts of information available has allowed us to find information on any topic. But if one is stuck on looking for one thing, big or small in a sea of other things one may miss the importance of the context clues one is seeing. We call it surfing the web. Maybe at first that it what we do. After a while one becomes an expert at navigating the web. You are no longer lost but only if you stay within your familiar area. Life is like this as well.

When you move to a new place or go on a vacation you will at first have to discover your way around the area. Once you find the few things that you need to live you will travel that same path for a long time picking up only the things that you need. 

Then I continued reading. And realized that is what the intention of the world that we created is. We designed the world, it is ours. I'm not talking about the earth itself or trying to debate creation/evolution I'm speaking of the streets and the houses. The stuff that we have placed in nature to be part of our lives. So all of the signs and the landmarks the placement of the streets and the branding of our toys, is VERY deliberate. So much so that we have faith in it enough to let it define us. 

Video Hunting

Well this was a fun one. I was in group eight and we managed only to piss off two women with strollers who refused to be filmed. Oh well. Here is my edited version for your enjoyment. I started with the speaking parts to get them out of the way so you could enjoy the wonderful music that some good friends of mine have made. They are Hey Marseilles from Seattle and will by playing at Neumos on Oct. 15th 21+ (just a shameless plug) I owe them one since Philip spoke Italian for us.



compare to Vimeo


Bis 303 hunt from William Knudsvig on Vimeo.

Game time

I often play pinochle if you are not familiar with the game it is quite hard to explain but a general dictionary definition will suffice. to me pinochle is a prefect reflection of everyday life. You are dealt cards and then you bet on what you think the best hand you and your partner can make with the cards in both hands. The catch is that you really have no clue as to what is in the others hand. If you win the bid you declare the trump suit and four cards will be passed to you by your partner, you then pass back the four least valuable cards in your hand.
That is what we all do everyday. We wake up think of what we have and what we need then bet that if we ask the right questions and do the right things that we will gain another part to our puzzle by the end of the day. Sometimes it works ad sometimes not. It never has to do with what you have by yourself but what you and your partner have together.
I don't want to make a blanket statement about all games but it seems that pinochle is used to pass the time and creates that fine balance that we all seem to live in between chance and our own direction. Games have to do this same thing. A good game is one where the winner must not get only lucky but to be able to get out of unlucky situations. Just like everyday. How do you use something negative to your advantage? If you break it down capitalism is a game because there are winners and losers. So I guess I would be curious to see what kind of games come out a a socialist country.To bad I don't get $200 for walking around the block in real life.

A slower world looks better

This is a video that I saw on vimeo.com it is shot at 120 frames per second, then slowed down to 30 fps when played back. the result full resolution video at 1/4 speed. PURE beauty. Taking the everyday and making it slow enough to observe. 


skate - shot on red #1347 - 120 fps from www.theglobules.com on Vimeo.

botHELL

I like to think that I live in a nice place I thought this was hell. I'm sorry if you get lost I did too.

It was all the same.
The same color.
The same green.
The same brown.
The same flags.
The same roof.
The same view.


They had to number them to tell them apart.
It was scary.

No Children to be seen.
No life to be had.

I wanted to leave the land of the zombies.


I really waned to know what happened inside these "houses" so i looked on youtube.com As you will see I think they are using their uniformity to hide the truth.




If this is "the dream" I'd hate to live it.
Besides there was no SNOW

iminlikewithyou

so iminlikewithyou.com is probably the most fun i've had in a while. That is sad I know. But you should check it out. Just another way to pass the boredom

off topic but wow

I like this lady

spacecraft

I think this would go along with the lecture today. Although we are going into the pop world here a little it is something that I'm sure you are all going to start seeing if you haven already. This is also known as gorilla marketing. However I've met some of these people and they are more about fun and creativity then $$$. Here is the link

PRO=Instructor=NOb

Observing people that come in to a Ski shop has been my job for a while. Every year we run a sale for those who give back to the sport though instruction. I've never met such a group of anal nikt picky people ever. Most are engineers from Boeing so I guess I should be glad they are so anal when I'm on my next trip flying. 

Techie tech tech is all they seem to ever want to talk about. It is a totally different slant on life then I've ever taken.

It is like this

Say I want to go to New York I'd probably drive my car so I can see everything along the way. These people would drive their car because they are fascinated by the car itself. Most of us ride to be on the mountain while others ride to ... Well I don't know what the other purpose would be. 

Anyway just observing the differences.

What are we drinking

I was given a Red Bull my a rep who dropped my my work today.  I said thanks BSed a bit and went back to work. About 15 min later I cracked the can and drank a few sips. Then I thought about the whole case of FREE wired that we stock in the store. All of the different flavors etc. Then I looked inside my can it is a beerish color like most things in the class of energy drinks. But I then thought of all the things that I drink and how I just trust the bottling company to put the right thing in the bottle. 

I then stared to think about the different bottles that things come in. Wine in tinted bottles to keep the UV out. Hard Alcohol usually in clear glass or tinted glass. BUT we drink both out of a clear glass. 

At what point did we stop caring to see what we were drinking? Would it be odd to put water in cans? what about a  clear beer bottle? Would Red Bull be as appealing if you saw that it looked like urine as you drank it? Probably not. 

It seems that somethings we want to see and some we do not. I guess the truth is scary. 

NOThINg

So I decided to wait and see if subconsciously I'd built a nothing time in to my day. When I woke up his morning and laid in bed for an hour I realized that I had. I thought about nothing and kind of dozed off and woke up but nothing was intentional. It really wasn't that exciting. I have an alarm clock but it usually is only needed if I'm up really late or if I need to get up really early. So the sunlight wakes me up, it really is the best way. For those of whom this is not an option I suggest this I had a teacher who swore by it. He had to get up at 5 Am every day for a car pool and said that be never got the morning doldrums. My solution is cheeper: take late classes and get a job that never starts before 10 Am. 

More interesting was that after I decided to "getup" I logged on to you tube. This is not usual for me usually I go straight to bathroom then food. Ironically I first watched this rubric's cube rap 

then a video on the rising food costs in Kenya.


Then I read the comments they are disturbing I won't repost them you can go read them here and here. Lets just say that the Rubric's Cube Rap was more accepted then the problems facing Kenya. It seems we are full of apathy. No wonder we are often so empty. 

RIDE

So I sat though a clinic on all of the new RIDE snowboarding gear this year. The most impressive things was the contra-band binding  One strap and your in, very cool. Also if you have the cash and want a killer light set up and Concept UL is worth it I rode it for several days last year stiff and light... but still charges through the crud.

Pray for Snow

Willko

waiting for...?

My friend posted this. I thought it was appropriate.

Is it a sign?

Plagiarism

When the subject arose in class today regarding plagiarism a word that is as taboo to college students as Beer is to a southern Baptist. I thought of my final project last quarter. We made a video that was a compilation of videos from YT. But we took the videos and put them in a sequence that was not only entertaining but formed some kind of an argument. Please note that in the final version there was a bib at the end of the short (just in case). 

 A long time ago probably when I had to write my first research paper in HS we got this massive lecture on the evil P word. I remember being so scared that I would write a sentence that was similar to something that was written somewhere. I had writers block for the entire assignment and failed the paper. I felt that nothing I could do was going to be original. 

Now I think of it like legos. No, I didn't make the legos but I can make them do anything I want. Or think of GMO's and cloning we are not creating only rearranging and then placing them in a habitat that is conducive for growth. 

So it dosen't really matter what you read or observe because they are the same. You didn't make the book nor did you make the world. 

However you can influence the world and books can influence us...

In the snow-sports industry we refer to this as the R&D dept. (research and duplicate).Meanign that a product has only a one year life. It is capitalism at its finest every year you have to have something new because your new idea will be everyone else's.   Interesting to note that the snow industry dosen't have any monopoly lawsuits or any history of them. Unlike internet companies.  

Pray for Snow

Willko