Futurballa Blog

Busman's Holiday

I'll be taking a short hiatus next week for a bit of well deserved vacation. Promise to come back with a refreshed perspective, a sunny attitude and lots of pictures. In the interim, may I direct you to the blogrolls on my right, where you can find the best in culture and politics that the blogosphere has to offer.

Be seeing you!

posted by Rick @ 7:24 AM 0 comments

Breakfast of Champions

Writing in In These Times, the iconic author, Kurt Vonnegut shares 81 years worth of wisdom in a wide ranging essay on the state of America and the world. In his curmudgeonly voice Vonnegut talks the kind of sense that is all too often lacking in political discourse.

Read Cold Turkey.

posted by Rick @ 7:48 AM 0 comments

All Your Digital Photography Needs

Why do you come to Futurballa?

The answer for that is usually I searched for something totally unrelated to Futurballa Blog and stumbled on to this pointless blog. I was checking my referrer logs and this guy linked to me. Or, I went to college with Rick and feel obligated to look in once a day.

But, if you are the one who stops in here for my perceptive takes on photography, to see my photo blog postings, to link through to my other site, or to find out what is hot and new in the world of digital photography. Have I got the links for you.

These are the stops I make every week to get the latest news, learn about techniques, read the forums, and generally waste some valuable time.

Digital Photography Review - DPReview is the best site to keep up on news and reviews if you are looking for gear.

Steve's Digicams - Steve is the next stop after DPReview. Also a great resource.

Rob Galbraith - Rob's site is a great place for more in depth info and analysis.

The Luminous Landscape - A fantastic stop for techniques.

Norman Koren - Norman has the best tutorials around on scanning and color management.

That should keep you busy for a while.

posted by Rick @ 7:19 AM 0 comments

Political Animal

Kevin Drum has a few very good posts on Bush and on Abu Ghraib and links to some interesting commentary.

One of the writers he links to is Senator Lindsey Graham. I saw Graham on yesterday's Meet the Press, and was a bit of surprised. You may remember that Graham, while still a congressman, was a major player in the impeachment hearings and was a hard line Clinton antagonist. While still doing his best to be a good Republican soldier, Graham obviously hackled at Cheney's assertion that people should "get off of Rumsfeld's back", and seemed sincerely disturbed by the treatment of Iraqi prisoners.

All I could think watching this was, if Bush is losing the full support of this guy, things are going south really fast.

posted by Rick @ 7:59 AM 0 comments

Coincidence, I think not...

Crooked Timber's Chris also saw Wender's Wings of Desire for the first time recently. His one word review, splendid. He doesn't want to give too much away in terms of the story, but he sums up the movie's theme with a wonderful quote from Dennis Potter.

I can celebrate life. Below my window there's an apple tree in blossom. It's white. And looking at it - instead of saying, 'Oh, that's a nice blossom' - now, looking at it through the window, I see the whitest, frothiest, blossomest blossom that there ever could be. The nowness of everything is absolutely wondrous. If you see the present tense - boy, do you see it. And boy, do you celebrate it.

My original post can be found here.

posted by Rick @ 7:42 AM 0 comments

The Cathode Ray Mission

posted by Rick @ 7:29 AM 0 comments

A New Look at Copyright

I spent a part of the morning today listening to a presentation by Stanford Law Professor and blogger, Lawrence Lessig. Mr. Lessig was promoting his Creative Commons Project, which is a new way to look at copyright and licensing of artistic product. Of course, as someone involved in both software used by creative professionals and as a photographer, I was very interested in what he had to say.

If I may attempt to summarize his thesis, and I hope do it a bit of justice... Lessig makes the point that copyright law derives from 18th century technology, and as written, causes a lot of problems with 21st century technology. Since the 1980s it has been assumed that copyright is granted upon time of creation. I.e., hit SAVE and it is your property. The onus is on the person seeking to use your material to seek permission from the artist. But what if the artist would like to share their works, but set reasonable limits. Copyright law does not provide for a method for the artist to do that up front.

That is where Creative Commons comes in. The artist simply goes to CreativeCommons.org and makes some choices on a web form. Such as, does he want attribution, is he sharing for non-commercial purposes only, are derivative works to be bound by the same contract? And voila, 3 documents are generated. A human readable license agreement, one in legalese, and a machine readable document.

The goal is that at some point using metadata that digital creations will be able to link back to the license, and creative persons will be able to see to what extent they can use or repurpose artwork created by other artists.

"All creativity is based on the past," says Lessig. And he hopes to remove the intermediary where no intermediary is necessary between creative individuals, and hopefully foster an explosion of creativity.

He doesn't seek to replace copyright, but instead to offer a method to "opt in" to a more open system. I'd be interested to hear from those of you who are creative types yourself, and from my creatively legal friends as well.

posted by Rick @ 10:59 AM 0 comments

Stuff an Nonsense

This is a very disturbing use of Flash. [via Lileks]

Hi, I'm Rick and I'm a noisaoholic. Pretty much the whole day in my office, either KFOG, Air America Radio, or iTunes is playing. In the car it's KFOG (again), a Giants game, NPR or I'll surf talk radio to get pissed off.

What I'm reading: Neil Gaimon's Stardust
A grownup fairy tale about a boy looking for a fallen star.

On the shelf: The Triplets of Belleville just arrived from Netflix and is slated for this weekend's viewing.

If you haven't been over to Futurballa Photography lately, be sure to check out the new look.

posted by Rick @ 7:33 AM 0 comments

Today's Suggested Viewing

The German film director Wim Wenders can be a pretty frustrating guy as an artist. Some of his work is borderline schlock, and he has had his flirtations with Hollywood fame, but at his best he is a visual poet. In his best films, Wenders has a slow, languid style of filmmaking. He concentrates on the visual, on the rhythms of the scene. Plot takes a back seat, but he manages not to be boring.

Arguably his finest work was 1987's Wings of Desire. This movie works on so many levels, a love story (That was unfortunately remade with Nick Cage), as an essay on Berlin before the fall of the wall, as a meditation on the secret lives of ordinary people, and as an allegorical tale about an Angel longing to touch and be touched.

Oh, and watch for Peter Falk. I often forget what a fine actor he is.

posted by Rick @ 7:19 AM 0 comments

Point Counterpoint

If you are looking for a remedy to RNC spinpoints and the So Called Liberal Media, former conservative hitman David Brock has started a site for just that purpose. You might call it "Fox in the henhouse watch".

Media Matters for America

posted by Rick @ 7:04 AM 0 comments

I'll be your mirror

There has been a major revamp of Futurballa Photography. It's a whole new look. Check it out.

Futurballa.com

posted by Rick @ 7:03 AM 0 comments

Barfly

I pass this place quite often on my way to lunch, but never go in. The Caravan sits conveniently next to the Greyhound station. It's downtown San Jose before the tech boom. An oasis for barflies and bums in a high tech desert.

There was a time that I would have ventured in and pulled up a barstool. But now I walk by and take a picture.


The Caravan

posted by Rick @ 11:07 AM 1 comments

Ulla, Dance

Nicole Kidman will be answering the phones, "Bialystock and Bloom" when she picks up the mantle (not to mention the blonde wig) of Ulla, in the film version of Mel Brooks' Broadway musical.

"Last night a star was born on Broadway - the lovely Miss Ulla
Inga Hansen Bensen Yonsen Tallen-Hallen Svaden-Svanson.
We predict that her name will soon be up in lights. If they can find enough bulbs."

Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick are slated to reprise their stage rolls and word is that Will Ferrell will be taking on the role of Franz Liebkind.

Here.

posted by Rick @ 12:19 PM 0 comments

God of Last Night

Aaron Haspel's satirical take on About Last Night is almost spot on. However his title was missing one necessary little touch, if you want to totally get that Teachout style he so aptly parodies.

It should have read AH: Administrivia.

Here is Terry Teachout's good natured response.

posted by Rick @ 8:28 AM 0 comments

Hot Enough For You?

It's been a few days of scorching weather this week in Northern California, but today is supposed to be cooler. These kids had the right idea.

posted by Rick @ 6:53 AM 0 comments

You Will Watch This Space

It seems to be a trend, but many of my favorite bloggers and friends are too busy with their dayjobs to post at the moment. Alas, I too must say stay tuned.

posted by Rick @ 2:29 PM 0 comments

Combustibles

Had a very entertaining DVD watching day yesterday including some worthy recommendations to pass on.

School of Rock... Jack Black doing a pretty good Angus Young impersonation in this Sister Act for heavy metal fans. Light weight fare, certainly no This is Spinal Tap, but good innocent fun.

The Searchers... Following my comments earlier on John Ford and Terry Teachout's appreciation of Ford's "painter's eye", I had to return to the greatest western every made. This is a multilayered film about racism and obsession. There are all sorts of unanswered questions that take on meaning with each repeated viewing. Like the tension in the early parts of the film between John Wayne, his brother, and his brother's wife. Could Natalie Wood's character be the biological daughter of Wayne? Had never thought of that possibility before, but it struck me last night that might be the case. Would certainly add another layer to the fact that Wayne is ready to kill the girl after she has become the wife of the Indian war chief, Scar.

Finally, I ended my triple feature with Robert Aldrich's, Kiss Me Deadly... The Mickey Spillane classic starring Ralph Meeker in the role of Mike Hammer, with a very young Cloris Leachman (Blucher... neigh) as the blonde who sets the story in motion when Hammer picks her up on the road. The film contains the infamous suitcase full of ?????(could we say, combustibles?) that has been paid homage to in Alex Cox's Repo Man and Tarantino's Pulp Fiction.

Next up... Evil Dead II

posted by Rick @ 10:37 AM 0 comments

Fashion! Turn to the left

Slate is sharing a small slideshow and essay on the NYMoMa's exhibit of fashion photography.

The article is titled, Striking Poses: Is fashion photography art?. I am familiar with two of the artist's featured (Cindy Sherman and Nan Goldin) in the slideshow and neither of them made their names as fashion photographers, but instead are best know in the fine arts world.

Based on this small sampling, it would seem that the exhibit is more about, is art photography fashion?, instead of vice versa.

posted by Rick @ 7:16 AM 0 comments

John Ford and Antonioni

Terry Teachout is watching John Ford in today's consumables, and praising Ford's "painter's eye". I concur. Ford was a master of composing a frame.

My own consumables at the moment include, Robert B. Parker's earlier Spenser novels. Michael Moore's last book, Dude, Where's My Country. Listening to the Zabriskie Point soundtrack. Most recently watched was David Cronenburg's first feature, Shivers. And next up on my movies to watch, Harry Shearer's Teddy Bears' Picnic.

Was searching Netflix to no avail for the Zabriskie Point DVD, and after searching Amazon, discovered that it has never been released on DVD. Criterion, what are you waiting for?

posted by Rick @ 10:31 AM 0 comments

A Nod and a Wink

As Carrie Fisher said in When Harry met Sally, "Everyone thinks they have good taste and a sense of humor, but they can't possibly all have good taste." Not to say that people who don't get Quentin Tarantino have either no sense of humor or bad taste, perhaps the opposite. But I do think that a taste for Tarantino requires that you are in on the joke and share his tastes to some extent.

This, by way of saying, I saw Kill Bill Vol. 2 last night and predictably enjoyed it. Liking Tarantino is similar to having a taste for Kevin Smith, who also seems not to be everyone's cup of tea. It is often one big "in joke", and either you are in on it or not. Kill Bill Vol. 2 is pretty much that. Where Kill Bill Vol. 1 was mostly a tongue in cheek homage to a certain brand of Hong Kong action pictures, Vol. 2 is a pastiche of styles, from Noir to Spaghetti Western, to other types of Kung Fu movies, with nods to TV shows of the seventies and before.

David Carradine shines as Kwai Chang Caine's evil twin and Uma Thurman takes a beating that might catch Mel Gibson's attention. The dialog is typical Tarantino. Nobody actually talks like that in real life, but there is nothing in this movie that would or could lead you to think that this is real life.

I heard Ebert and Roeper on Sunday singing the praises of KB2, and one of them even mentioned the "O" word in terms of Uma Thurman's performance. That will happen about the time monkeys fly out of my butt. This is low art and not the sort of thing the Academy is ever going to honor. But it is high entertainment, full of wit and action, and can be oddly touching. But you need to share some of Tarantino's vocabulary. I lack Tarantino's fanboy passions for Kung Fu movies, but I've seen enough of them to get the archetype character of the white haired teacher. I get the joke when the master says something like, "Your Kung fu is pathetic... Let us see if your Crane style kung fu can defeat my Tiger style." And I had to laugh when the Bride walks out of the chapel and there sits David Carradine playing a bamboo flute.

Also, as usual, kudos to Tarantino for a great soundtrack. Especially the Malcolm McLaren, oh so slow version of The Zombies She's Not There (titled About Her on the soundtrack). There is also a wonderful Johnny Cash rendition of A Satisfied Man.

If you want to get in touch with your inner teenager KB2 is a lot of fun. Is it better than KB1, as many critics are claiming? Yes, as a piece of filmmaking, but KB1 had it's charms. KB2 is slower and more about dialog and character. It took me a bit longer to warm to KB2, but it hooked me in and I had a good time. And what's so bad about a good time?

posted by Rick @ 7:27 AM 0 comments

And Speaking of....

The self same Brian Mickelthwait has some thoughts on The Godfather today. He seems to like the more structured, linear, and operatic Godfather over the sequel, Godfather Part II. He has yet to get to Godfather 3.

The second one had a really strong "deleted scenes from the real movie" feeling about it. I don't share the widespread opinion that Godfather 2 is the greatest movie in general and sequel in particular ever made. I thought half of it was those deleted scenes, and the other half was a rather slight anti-capitalist Americans Being Evil in Central America movie, that every star seemed to want to do one of in those days, usually starring a journalist or a photojournalist. The Godfather is, in short, one movie, not three. There is The Movie. There are the extra bits. There is the Al Pacino versus the Jewish Guy bit, which is as small and mundane and stitched on as the Real Movie is big and remarkable and of itself. And there is 3, which everyone says is nonsense, and which I'll let you know about when I've sat through it.

Yes, G2 is less linear, yes it is focused on the parts of the book that got left out of G1, but the great Lee Strasberg as Hyman Roth, Fredo in the boat, De Niro at his best as the young Vito Corleone. There is so much good stuff in G2. The film has a more sprawling, Sergio Leone or Bertolucci style to it. It is less opera and more family epic history.

The Godfather (Part I) may in fact, in some ways, be the better movie. But to dismiss Part II as a collection of deleted scenes is to miss the point. Where I agree with Brian is that these movies are best seen together. He mentions the TV version (known in America as "The Godfather Saga"), which re-edits the two films chronologically. I would love to see this version on DVD (without the cleaned up language that Coppola did for American TV).

Read the whole thing here.

posted by Rick @ 8:46 AM 0 comments

Going All Mickelthwait on Your A**

Yes I'm promoting a new word, in honor of culture blogger Brian Micklethwait.

What is going Micklethwait, you ask?

Answer: Excessive photo blogging, containing bridges, birds (in the British sense), and buildings. Let's make it a meme.

And all of this is merely by way of introduction to a few pictures I took of a covered bridge in Felton, California last Saturday.











[Update: I've corrected the spelling of Messr. Micklethwait's name. I seem to have inverted an ee and an el.]

posted by Rick @ 7:15 AM 0 comments

Baseblog Phlog

Wasn't a good weekend for the Giants, but it was a great weekend for Barry. If you care about this sort of thing, there is a very good piece at SFGate (here).

Here are some images I shot from my seat, high above SBC park.


Say Hey!


Bonds tied Mays


Cruising by the park


Barry takes his hacks

The night we attended, Barry knocked number 662 out of the park, and there was an awards presentation for number 660 at which Willie Mays said a few well chosen words. Worth the price of admission right there. Mr. Mays is, and always has been, a class act.

posted by Rick @ 9:21 AM 0 comments

Quick Note on an Ongoing Controversy

Aaron Hapel summarizes the plot of Kill Bill Vol. 2, and manages to get in some entertaining jabs. Aaron and I went back and forth a tiny bit on KB1 and agreed to disagree. I will withhold comment until I've actually seen KB2, which I plan to do this week.

Stay Tuned

Read Aaron's comments here, [Beware: one or two minor spoilers]

posted by Rick @ 7:31 AM 0 comments