Digitally Photo

After using a film SLR for the past 6 years, I find digital photography incredibly overwhelming. In the world we have so much visual information, these days camera's can excessively document that information, and then there is so many ways to manipulate that information with the computer. Don't get me wrong I love my camera Ma' and I love to photo stuff its just hard not to get overwhelmed. Plus doesn't anyone miss the suspense of dropping off and developing film?

So with that said....

Have you ever tried to invert a light-trace photo in photoshop? I know this may sound really studious to some and cheesy to others, but I was fooling around with it the other day and found out that sometimes it looks pretty cool. I often don't like my light trace photo's because there is usually only two dominant colors (red from tail-lights and white from head-lights/streetlights) and a lot of murky colors from the reflected light.

Here is some comparisons. Some look like x-rays others look like paintings.






Yeah I cheated with the Hue (color) a bit on this one.

Minority Report

For the first time in my life I am living in a place where Caucasian's/Anglo-saxon/Westerners or simply white's aren't the prominent demographic.

In Korea, I am a minority.

I thought about this one day on the subway, while an older lady, was people watching and noticed me. I thought, what would I think if I saw that lady on the subway in New York? I would probably say to myself " hmm Asian... maybe Korean? definitely not Chinese"
You know, nothing special, just different.

Seoul is similar to New York in this manner. The lady who noticed me on the train wasn't surprised or scared for any reason but just saw me as someone other than her own. Korean's here are actually very used to seeing foreigners and American's, some get excited when we look lost and want to help us. And some like to hesitantly ask "Where are you from?" and then smile and say "Oh America..haha," after I respond. It's nice.
The average passer by is a lot more friendly than those in Finland. In Helsinki they stare, coldly. It's almost like they draw a line in the silence; I am Finnish you are foreign. Where to I try to non-verbally respond "what the hell are you staring at."

I haven't really received any discrimination being a minority so I can't relate to what racism may feel like. So I guess for now it's just something interesting to think about. When was the last time you were a minority?





I'll post more pictures as soon as I download them from my camera.
P.S. I really miss football. tear.

Hike

I know everyone thinks it's funny the way I say it, but it truly gets the point across here. Seoul is HUGE. Uuu-juh.

We went on a hike for our history class. And the trail was rather intense compared to a classroom. Ingwangsan is 338 meters up and our professor was trying to stick to a packed schedule so we went faster than I expected. Seoul is also very mountainous. Huge and Mountainous.

The views over "the city" were incredible. It's hard to see where it starts and where it stops. Unlike in the standard US city there seems to be several downtown's. And there is a very interesting similarity with the landscape and the built landscape they seem to mimic each other and ironically the lines pulled from the high-rises sometimes harmonize with the ridges of the hills.



Downtown #__



It looks funny if you squint


Yes I did it!!

Here is some other cool blogs of my co-hort's here in Seoul. Check them out.

http://helarchitecture.blogspot.com/
http://jedolci.wordpress.com/

Field Trip Week

Korea has been awesome! This is our 3rd week of class but so far It has been almost all field trips! We went to Paju Book City a small place for contemporary architects to build galleries and publishing works and houses, and that same day we went to Heyri Art Valley, which is a village for artists to build there modern homes and have there mini urban farms. It was kind of weird. TMA (too much architecture) for me.

Beautiful art gallery designed by Portuguese Architect and friend of Professor Kim, Alvaro Siza.


Very fine concrete and all natural lighting on the interior


Publishing office designed by our studio Professor Kim

The man and his building (and Jordy)


Building at Heyri Art Valley. Yeah even I was a bit confused.


Beard on Bike who saw 10 people crammed in a van suspiciously driving around Heyri Art Valley. Whose sketchier?

안녕 서울

bye bye USA.... hello South Korea

Greetings from one of the world's fastest developing cities. Seoul, where one of our Urban Issues professors described his job as somewhat of a patriotic duty saying "we simply cannot lose this market." Old and new claim to co-exist here, in a mess of high rises, markets and urban green development. I guess with a rugged landscape and so many people the only place to go, is up. I like it here. The city is vast and fast paced with a transit system perhaps bigger than any other in the world. But in this swooping development movement Korean's and I guess city planners never lose touch with their core, the mandoo (dumpling) stands, the kitschy convenient stores, and Soju/beer shacks are all integrated into these tower complexes.



Its been more than a week but Ill say its a week because those couple of days after spending 18 hours on planes was quite disorienting. I still don't know what happened. But since then I have had an amazing time. Its quite fun and suspenseful not knowing what areas will look like or what things will taste like. You gotta be bold and try everything, because it's quite gratifying when you find something you like. Stay tuned for more detailed findings.


Before class.... After class



Welcome dinner from our studio Professor Kim and his wife

SUMMER YO!!!

Folks I know you are anxiously excited to here about how things are going in KOREA!! But I cant go without acknowledging how fun summer was. I was quite busy, thank god for my Uncle Stephen for employing/putting up with me. I am very grateful for the experience.

I also went to a bunch of the best concerts ever and had an awesome summer finale with my family down in GA for my cousin Al's wedding. Here's some highlights.


Maggie + Al




Stabone Kat and Mikey. And I didn't have time yet to photoshop what looks like my toupe


Mombo


The touted "Guido Torpedo of Lido"










Drip Castles at Lido West. Pretty much why the world goes round for me.

CCB goes West

I hate to keep apologizing for my lack of contribution to this blog, but luckily I was a bit busy this summer. However there is going to be quite a change coming soon. For now I'm enjoying my last days here in New York and getting ready to head to Georgia for my cousins wedding which will be the finale for my summer.

Incase you haven't heard the news yet Chocolate Covered Bacon will be going abroad again! This time doing a 180 and going West, way West... to Seoul South Korea! I leave in about a week and am getting really excited. It is a completely different culture and urban experience than Helsinki. More to come!

Cheers,
-jm