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Epic Road Trip ~ the Full Time Lapse

direct youtube link

music links:

Finally had a chance to pull this together. It’s pretty cool to see the whole thing – 3000 miles and four days of driving compressed into about 21 minutes. Any faster and everything becomes a blur. Any slower and it starts to feel like doing the drive all over again. If your web connection will support it, you’ll definitely want to watch it large in HD. Go to the Youtube Link if you have to.

It’s a big country, with much to see. The camera rig and software used to record the trip preserved each frame as a full resolution photo on the iPhone – over 21,000 of them. Many, many individually are simply stunning. Those will fly by like the others, flashing on the screen for 1/12 of a second.

It’s amazing how sensitive memory is to vision. Almost four months later all but the most generic late night road images still bring back immediate recall of that part of the trip. Played at speed in sequence, some significant events go by so fast they are all but invisible – the train wreck, for instance. Others – the ground blizzard in Wyoming, the dust storm in Oregon with tumbleweeds darting across the road – are more prolonged, but far more brief and beautiful than treacherous. The smooth animation belies hours of white knuckle driving endured in real time.

I confess to cheating a bit. To have mercy on less engaged viewers, the long, grey, monotonous drive through winter-dismal Missouri has been accelerated by 400%. Trust me, this is a good thing. Sorry, Missouri. Most of the night driving has been sped up, as well. Otherwise, it’s all here.

Enjoy.

 

 

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Speaking of Oregon & Boatbuilders

Emily is sorting what must go and what must stay. Much will stay. The process could take all night.

While the packing and planning ensues, there’s not much to do but come up with ideas for my own next project. A cabin in the woods, designed and constructed by a boatbuider, hmmmm . . . :

“Boatbulder Constucts Home in Oregon Woods for $11,000”

via MyModernMet

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Apparently, he started with a brass sink found at salvage, and imagined a whole house around it. The idea sort of took on a life of its own after that.

I can totally relate.

 

 

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a second a day of a year of a life

 direct video clip

 

One second of every day of one persons life for a year.

How compelling even the most mundane parts of life, when fleeting. Isn’t it all?

 

 

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Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

As someone inured and enamored with words, I have followed John Koenig’s blog Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows since it’s early days.

He just posted his first video “definition” and it’s really, really well done.

If you’re a word person, enjoy:

 

Sonder | The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows from John Koenig on Vimeo.

 

 

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Sound is Time Tangible

Justin Boyd: Sound and Time from Walley Films on Vimeo.

Justin Boyd, Department Chair of Sculpture and Integrated Media at Southwest School of Art, shares his connection with sound and how he uses it to create original works of art. Inspired by his sensitivity to sound at a very young age, Boyd has been recording and working with sound and music since the mid 90s. Boyd actively captures field recordings for integration of sound with found objects. This documentary was produced in association with Southwest School of Art. Learn more about their BFA program at http://www.swschool.org.

 

Sound seems one of the few ways to experience time. A semi-conscious, second tier sense, drifting along the margins – shadow, not light. The soundtrack to our film, as it were.

Like most semi-conscious senses, it’s tapped directly into memory. I remember the squeak and bang of the screen door of my grandmother’s house, always the same one-two rhythm.

I remember the sound of our mothers calling us home for dinner in the evenings, when I and my buddies were out fooling around in the twilight up in the mountains of the Carolinas. It was like a call to prayer at dusk. Each of us was tuned to a different call, but we knew them all.

I remember the metallic chimes of the ice cream truck, three blocks away.

Crows.

Whippoorwills. And Quail.

Fiddle music, long after dark.

 

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Cat’s Paws

Steve Earley in Spartina 

 

A long time ago, when I asked why puffs of wind coursing across the water were called “cat’s paws,” I was told it’s because the wind makes patterns on the surface shaped like a cat’s paw. Sounded reasonable.

Well, obviously, this is wrong. And clearly an explanation made up by someone who never set foot on a sailboat once their whole life.

Continue reading “Cat’s Paws”