F.lux and Ommwriter are two desktop apps that have been around for a few years but I just downloaded a few days ago. Both have worked wonders to prevent longer-than-usual hours behind a monitor from giving me zombie eyes.
F.lux I was working with Joanna this week, and all of a sudden I saw her screen turn this peculiar shade of yellow. I mildly freaked out, thinking that her computer was short-circuiting, and she introduced me to F.lux. From their website:
During the day, computer screens look good—they're designed to look like the sun. But, at 9PM, 10PM, or 3AM, you probably shouldn't be looking at the sun. F.lux fixes this: it makes the color of your computer's display adapt to the time of day, warm at night and like sunlight during the day.
If you put in your zipcode, it will know when the sun sets in your neighborhood, and adjust the tinting of your screen to be less straining on the eyes – your usual bright, blueish white in the daytime, and more of a tungsten shade at night. Looking at the two shades together is pretty extreme, but I have mine set to change over the course of an hour and don't even notice the difference.
Ommwriter Lauren wrote about this one almost exactly a year ago, and I remember her freaking out about how beautiful it was. Ommwriter is an experiential writing application that takes over your entire screen with soft colors and ambient music. It's a really pleasurable writing experience that allows for little distraction. My personal favorite are the typing tones you can choose from – it brings back fond memories of the ICQ typewriter sounds from the mid-90s. I burned the midnight oil and wrote three stories for Laura's upcoming zine, NY _____.* using Ommwriter this week, and it was so pleasantly different from using Word or Pages.
What are some of your favorite tools to help make endless nights more productive?
* Please help fund, there are only a few days left to help make this (awesome) idea a reality!
I noticed a movie playing at a restaurant a few months ago, and liked the camera shots so much that I wrote down the name of it. I finally watched Drama/Mex this week, and still can't stop thinking of it. It's a short movie that takes place over the course of one day and one night. It is set in Acapulco; lots of the shots reminded me of growing up in Puerto Rico, mostly in an urban design/terrain kind of way. Anyway, I loved it. There is very little about it online, and most of the reviews are cool, at best. I loved, loved, loved it. And after some digging I found out that it's executive produced by (among others) Gael García Bernal and Diego Luna. Perfect.
Drama/Mex is about a handful of people who are semi-intertwined and either start the movie being in a crisis, or end the movie being in a crisis. I found myself becoming invested in every one of the characters. They are strange, sexy, imperfect and intense. Also: Similar to when I watched Diva, I didn't notice how grainy the film quality was until loaded it onto my computer to take screenshots.
So, there you go. I'd like to buy a copy. I wouldn't recommend Drama/Mex to you unless I knew what kind of you movies you were typically into (similar to how I feel about Somewhere, which I'll also write about soon). Just maybe don't watch it with your parents if you do decide to give it a shot - there are a couple of pretty intense bits. The song above is the main theme song of the movie; I can already tell it's going to be my favorite song this summer...
I watched An Education yesterday, which had been on my Instant Queue for quite a while. It was pretty great, and every time something like this happens, I marvel at the fact that I had been sitting on such a delight for so long without knowing it.
As you can probably tell, the movie is about a school girl in the 1960s who is cynical about what a traditional education all means - she'd rather learn about life by living than by reading textbooks. I won't get into details on the rest; just see it. The story is heartfelt, exciting, and shot beautifully – I took a million screenshots and couldn't prioritize or stop, really. They triggered all kinds of different memories and associations in my head. How I imagine English, 1960s style, Marisa (who writes the fantastic The Significant Other), and current Swedish girl blogger culture (see this, this, and this for examples), mostly. This might crash your browser (unless... does that happen anymore?).
Neal is on an aesthetics roll lately; he recently sent me this video for Shark Ridden Waters by Gruff Rhys* --
It sounds like a boppy version of Iron and Wine, with a hint of 70s. Similar to Joanna, I'm mostly taken by the video itself - it's shot beautifully and features this French actress Roxane Mesquida, whom I embarrassingly know nothing about. She is pretty captivating, and reminds me a little of Parker Posey (at least in this video). The whole thing blends the absurd, pretty and wistful seamlessly, which doesn't seem like an easy thing to do. Well done.
The inspiration for this album (Hotel Shampoo) is really interesting; in this bit he talks about it while setting up a domino-style layout of hotel products he'd collected from 15 years of touring. Cool stuff.
* Gruff Rhys was once the frontman of Super Furry Animals, which Neal also introduced me to years ago.
I am going to show you a music video that my friend Neal sent over. It's the debut single of a new band called Little Comets, and it's called Joanna. Already off to a good start, right? ^_^
Isn't that one of the most magical things you've ever seen? The colors and lights and scenarios remind me of what I see in my head when I read The Elephant Vanishes or After Dark. It reminds me a lot of how I used to feel in 2007, which is interesting because the album was mixed by the same dude who worked with MGMT.
There's not a lot out there about Little Comets yet, but I loved this line from their Wikipedia page: They are described to play 'kitchen sink indie' music, citing Debussy, Roald Dahl, Ella Fitzgerald and Paul Simon as influences. That might make some people's eyes roll out of their heads and out the door, but I was in a good mood.
Kinda Vampire Weekendish, no? Which also makes sense given the Paul Simon influence, I guess. Take a listen; what do you think?
Nearly two years ago, Noah introduced me to Pam, saying that he thought we'd get along. Well, we did and have been friends ever since. She has a blog called Phantasmaphile, which I've linked to before and read regularly. It has a very specific aesthetic, and I find myself describing it differently each time... I tend to use words like surreal, fantastical, magic, alchemy, dreamy, gothic and gossamer. Pam is the one who turned me onto Valerie and her Week of Wonders, if that helps any.
Last spring/summer, Pam told me about something she wanted to try doing: curate an art show. She told me about contacting all of her favorite artists and trying to sell the idea to a gallery. Well, nearly a year of not hearing much news later, I was delighted to get an email from Pam announcing the show! I was overjoyed at the news that everything had worked out and couldn't wait to see it.
I went to the Fata Morgana opening last weekend with my friend Laura, and it was spectacular. There were tons of people at Dabora Gallery – a venue that could not be more perfect for Pam's show – and it made me so happy to see it that packed. The gallery was dripping with chandeliers, dark red plushiness and a perfectly-matching Absinthe La Fee open bar.
I barely got to speak to Pam that night, because she was being pulled in a million directions by all sorts of people. I didn't mind and was thrilled to see so much interest in the show. Check it out; it's up until 12 April. Read some more information about the it and the gallery, and get a taste of some of the art.
Nearly a year ago, my friend Pam wrote about a 1970 Czech film called Valerie and her Week of Wonders. I had forgotten all about it until I was going through my shared items in Google Reader, and her post about it showed up.
I watched it last night, and Pam's description pretty much sums it up:
It is a bizarre coming-of-age reverie, consisting of a young girl who lives with her mysterious grandmother, lusty old vampires, magical earrings, burgeoning sexuality, ripe romance, hundreds of dripping candles, lacey dresses, oppressive religious figures, sick chickens, sun-dappled fields, dusty piles of books, and the list goes on.
The plot is a bit confusing (maybe in part due to the translation?), though I got the general idea. And it doesn't even really matter in this case, since I realized not too long ago that my favorite movies are the type I could easily watch on mute and still enjoy.
And boy, was this one beautiful. The lighting, costuming, and even the creepy characters were nice to look at (I like that a lot better than the current Hollywood torture gore trend that just won't go away). It's not a shiny movie, either: if you check out a larger version of a still, you'll see that it's pretty grainy and faded, which just adds to the entire movie's mood (whether intentional or not).
Check it out if you're into that kind of thing (Netflix has it); you can also watch the whole thing (in parts) on YouTube if you want to just poke around.
I don't know if it's a coincidence or planned serendipity, but I have been surrounded by French (or French-inspired) sugary aesthetics lately, one after the other.
Macarons It all started in September, as I searched for Veuve Clicquot images to put in a deck I was writing for a luxury client. I came across this picture and for the next several days was on a furious quest to find out what those cookies were called, and what they tasted like. Just nine days later, Amber from CODE FOR SOMETHING wrote about macarons. I have yet to try them, but I will by the end of the year.
Marie Antoinette I got into the mood to watch Marie Antoinette two or three weeks ago. After seeing it, I started noticing drapes, watercolors, pearls and chandeliers everywhere. I was very taken with this scene in particular:
Senses play a huge part in this: the touch of the fabrics, the taste of the pastries, the sound of the gambling chips and splashes of champagne; I don't even have to mention the visuals. Maybe that's why I enjoyed it so much; my roommate calls me a sensate, since I get so excited by sensory elements blending together to create a scene (in real and daydreamed state schemas, for example).
[click on the above photo for my thoughts on the Chucks]
Paris Breakfasts I revisited the Veuve Clicquot image to see what else was in the photo stream. To my pleasant surprise, it turned out that the entire stream follows this mood.
The photos belong to a woman named Carol who lives in NY but seems to be in Paris all the time, in and out of pastry and chocolate shops. Her photography is beautiful, and she also paints watercolors which are out of this world. She seems to have a collection of tiny Paris-related things that are arranged into little scenes as well, which is probably the cutest thing I've ever seen.
Hime Gyaru My friend and pen pal Julie sent me this WSJ article yesterday. It's about a huge street trend among women in Japan called hime gyaru (means "princess girl") in which girls "aim to look like sugarcoated, 21st-century versions of old-style European royalty."
Marie Antoinette and Paris Hilton are their heroes, and they deck their apartments out in rococo furniture. It's thought to be a conscious departure from the ripped /layered clothes trend of the 1990s. Here is how extreme it can get: there are specialized boutiques that sell these types of frilly, saccharine clothes, and one of the biggest stores – called Jesus Diamante – sells around $95,000 worth of clothing a month! Some women spend anywhere from $1,000 to $3,000 on just one outfit. The trend extends into accessories as well, which I think I saw a glimpse of when I was in Japan (taken from a sign outside a nail place):
I am not sure what my point is with all of this. As I wrote it, though, I realized that it wasn't all a coincidence. That quote in the beginning about my younger self is half true. Until this recent kick of mine, I for some reason had an aversion to everything having to do with this aesthetic, especially rococo. I itched at the thought of toile, I remembered zero dates & names during my Art History AP class when we got to this era of art. The golden cherubs and wigs drove me nuts as I daydreamed about a completely opposite aesthetic. Someone in the hime gyaru article said that maybe women are dressing in this cute, fantastical way to lighten the spirit surrounding our world's current economic state. I don't exactly think I've been doing the same, but I have always liked novelty and every now and then soaked up everything that's different from what I'm used to. I guess it came at as good a time as any.
[Special thanks to Carol for being gracious enough to let me take screen captures of her photos!]
