Mike (bass) and Dave (groupie) and Tony (drums)

Mike Murray (far left) lost his 35 year long battle with MS. Another good man leaves this Earth. Mike was a husband and father, a band mate in High School and most of all a good man and a friend. God’s Speed my friend. Now you are at peace.

In keeping with the season.

Using a wonder of invention, the iPad to hunt and peck my way along. Just as I’ve been dwelling on the destructive nature of these devices. Cell phones, texts, email, Facebook. What little good is there in any of this. Keeping a journal is fine. Thinking the rest of us care is narcissistic. Does anyone care your at the dry cleaners? Really now is it so important that I’m at my grand kids soccer game to post it along with photos on Facebook followed by a tweet?

I think not. Once there was a time we reserved our efforts for those true masters. e. e. Cummings wrote,

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

How could I say this any better? Tweet I’m at Tommy with my wife of 35 years?

I suggest we create a day devoted to no use of communications thecnology. No cell, text, computers; nothing that requires more than a pen and paper or face to face communications. Yes. Freedom. What peace there would be on that day.

I don’t talk a lot about how I work so I thought I’d take you through one of the images I did last year. “Wings.” What I really do is when I see something that stirs my artistic curiosity I stop and look at it and if I really see what I’m looking for I take some shots. What I see is not what others driving by see. I try to peel back the layers of metaphors and get to what the object or what ever really is. In this case I saw an abandoned gas station with those wing type lights on the pump islands. The pumps were long gone but these lights were still standing but in wacky ways. I hoped out of my car and shot the light from a few angles and varying exposures and left. Very quick operation.

Original photo of the light.

Now this original was over exposed but I really liked the texture and deep blues so this is where I started. I often begin with a less than perfect shot if it is closer to what I “see.” So from here I usual spend time in Lightroom doing development adjustments. I messed with the exposure, color mix and cropping. Once it is looking pretty good I will have an image that looks like this.

Intermediate image

Now into Photoshop to remove the light pole and make sure the image is clean. I did color fine tuning here with effects to produce the final image.

Wing (finished piece)

I know I didn’t explain which knobs I turned but I don’t really remember. I do it by feel not formula. Once I finish the piece I take back into Lightroom. I work from DNG files through the entire process. I don’t do jpegs unless I have to. There are times I have to export a DNG file into a JPEG for some external processing but I always re-import the image as a DNG.

Well that’s it for now. I finished writing the book about Robin Randle and I’m editing so I can create readers copies. That’s kept me off the streets so I’m itching to get shooting again.

N

Three Trees

I usually don’t talk about the “how” I get this writing done and I find a lot of people don’t want to know. It spooks them out. They ought to be me for a day. Screen plays are methodical. Novels are organic. I’m really hooked. It’s a lot harder to write prose but it takes you to such fun places it is well worth the ride.

Research for this book:

The Soul After Death by Fr. Seraphim Rose
Solomonic Archangels and Demon Prince by Stephen Skinner & David Rankine
Grimoires by Owen Davies
The Kabbalah Peach Hagaddah by The Rv Berg Sheltie
The Holy Bible by God
Magik of the Ancient Gods by Ford
Biblical Fragments from Mt. Sinai by J. Rendel Harris.

And many more. I will list all books, websites etc when I get finished up. It’s so funny, people think you just sit down and make things up but beyond these books I’ve used all kinds of maps and references for local areas. It never seems to end.

Personally I find this part to be really fun. I’m curious and love to learn.

I ask for a bit more indulgence. Those who have offered to read the initial draft, it is very close. I do know how this part ends but there is a lot of pieces I forgot along the way and I keep plugging then in.

I could still use a few more readers. You will get a rough copy of the bock bound, signed and numbered by me. Read it and MARK IT UP. No grammar or spelling corrections just content. Once I have all remarks coded I will return to you for your enjoyment.

Being a filmmaker I love being trashed so I can think more clearly. No ego here.

Then a first official revision will be made and used with a book proposal so I can find a publisher. I’d love to do a special edition through someone like http://www.subterraneanpress.com/ if possible then located a larger publisher for a wider distribution.

I’ve done all this with films and have been release by, LIONSGATE, Imagination, The Lifetime Channel and on and on. So I’m not arrogant just motivated.

Any help (advice) would be great. Have a great Labor Day.