Hip Hop Is Where the Heart Is.. Open Source 4 Life: Firefox Download Day!.. FILE 4K Symposium now Scheduled.. It''s Bigger Than Hip Hop..
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Hip Hop Is Where the Heart Is
Throughout the past few weeks of planning for my trip to Sao Paulo for FILE 2008, I have been repeatedly blown away by the sheer size of the international Hip Hop community. Planet Rock has officially arrived! CALIT2 was recently visited by the National Geographic Society in order to see the work of Maurizio Seracini. I was approached by one of their project managers after a screening of Beatbox360. She apparently just returned from Rio de Janiero where a couple of National Geographic Explorers were shooting a piece called 4REAL, by Sol Guy and Josh Thome, on "Hip Hop for Social Change," featuring MV Bill, a prominent Brazilian MC. National Geographic is covering Hip Hop? I never imagined that Hip Hop could be so pervasive!It turns out that Sao Paulo, Brazil is one of the fastest growing epicenters of Hip Hop culture in the world! I am planning some side trips into the heart of the city during my stay in order to get a glimpse of this cultural phenomenon. I have also been checking out K'Naan's album, "The Dusty Foot Philospher," which is probably one of the realest Hip Hop albums out. K'Naan is originally from Mogadisho, Somalia, before he fled to Kenya as a refugee. He was also featured in 4REAL. Early next year I will also travel through Hong Kong and Thailand in the search for Asian Hip Hop. These encounters have spawned a new photo series, entitled "Hip Hop Is Where the Heart Is." Each version is an homage to the various Hip Hop communities from around the globe, featuring the outline of a specific country containing its most prominent Hip Hop city. So far the series includes the United States (South Bronx, New York), Brazil (Sao Paulo), and South Korea (Seoul). I'm planning to expand the series to Africa, Japan, and Iran. Check it out in our photography section.
Open Source 4 Life: Firefox Download Day!
Hey web. Mozilla released Firefox 3 today and is attempting to achieve a Guinness World Record for most software downloads in a single day. Jettison High fully supports Firefox, as it is the only internet browser that faithfully translates all of the freakin' code that I write. Therefore, I encourage all of you to go out in the next 24 hours and download Firefox 3! Peace.
FILE 4K Symposium now Scheduled
Well, hello internet. Come here often? Here are some new updates about the FILE show in Brazil: In addition to the opening 4K show on Monday, August 4th, there is going to be a 4K Symposium on the following Friday, August 8th. This will include talks and presentations by Sheldon Brown, Todd Margolis, Peter Otto and myself. We will all be giving a 30 minute talk (translated to Portuguese in real time) followed by our 4K artwork. In order to establish some context, I will talk briefly about the technology and the process involved in creating Beatbox360. More importantly, though, I would like to discuss the piece from a Hip Hop standpoint, including the elements of the DJ, the MC, the graffiti artist and the break dancer (B-boy/B-girl). I'll post some of my thoughts on these topics in the next few weeks leading up to the show. Keep it real. Peace.
It's Bigger Than Hip Hop CALIT2 and the University of California, San Diego are both featuring a news article about Beatbox360, a Hip Hop-based 4K Super High-Definition artwork of mine. The article, written by CALIT2 senior writer, Tiffany Fox, was mainly written for a "tech" audience, but rebelliously dwells on the topics of Hip Hop and remix theory. These aspects of the artwork, while being the basis for its artistic expression, have usually been undercut by the 4K and HD technology used to portray them.
The full article is published on CALIT2's website, while a shortened version is featured at This Week @ UCSD. Unfortunately, the published version of the article lacks an opening epigraph by KRS-One that I had added. So, I'm going to stick it to the man by putting it here:
Hip means to know It's a form of intelligence To be hip is to be up-date and relevant Hop is a form of movement You can't just observe a hop You got to hop up and do it Hip and Hop is more than music Hip is the knowledge Hop is the movement Hip and Hop is intelligent movement
Special thanks goes out to Tiffany for a fantastic article and also to Pinar Istek for her supreme photographic skills! I feel extremely lucky to be able to work with such great people. Check out the Beatbox360 website to see the entire photo shoot and to download the HD version! Peace out, internet.
All My Bags Are Packed, I'm Ready to Go Beats, Rhymes and Art. Beatbox360, a 4K visual beat of XBOX360 footage, was recently selected to be a feature presentation at FILE: a digital arts festival at the SESI Cultural Centre in the city of Sao Paulo, Brazil. The annual Electronic Language International Festival (FILE), occurring from August 5th to the 31st, attracts over 40,000 attendees and a vast amount of international media coverage. And, for the first time, 4K digital cinema. 4K comes to Brazil. Thanks to the work of Todd Margolis (CRCA), Sony and Zaxel Systems will be donating a 4K SXRD projector and Zaxel 4K playback computers, respectively, for the festival. Other works being shown, in addition to Beatbox360, include Scalable City by Sheldon Brown, and Julia 4D by Dan Sandin. Beatbox360 will be closing out the show in full 4K, 8 channel surround sound glory.Leaving on a Jet. I will be flying to Sao Paulo, all expenses paid, to check out the festival, represent Jettison High, and give a hell of a good show! If I'm not there, then check the beaches of Rio de Janeiro. I am really excited about this trip and I will keep you posted, webbers.
So the Tiger is crouching, and the Dragon hides?
Hello, internet. Here's a new photo series, called Stalking Tiger. It's a digital composition of high-res scanned images of real objects, ranging from microphones to circuit boards. The tiger, for example, was created from scanning a small pool of Windex (the shape of the tiger was a complete coincidence). The subtle grain of the plastic that held the pool of liquid also contributed to the overall texture of the background. The total size of the composition is 3000 x 4200 pixels, or 10 x 14 inches. All of the images within it were used at their native resolution, as well, to achieve the highest possible quality. Check it out at photography.jettisonhigh.com to see Stalking Tiger along with certain sections of the composition at their full resolution. To see the piece in full resolution, click on [website] on the photography page, or just click here.
Good News for Stalkers
Dear WWW, We now have a new "About Us" section at JettisonHigh.com, for all of those who want to know a bit more about our individual focuses (foci?). You can also grab our contact info while you're there, unless you're already outside in the bushes. Hope everyone had a great weekend; lord knows I did. I found out how many sake bombs are too many sake bombs (five), why bowling is only considered an ESPN2 sport (they serve beer to players and spectators), and what a healing arts festival is (eating free samples while listening to local reggae bands). Love, HTTP://
Here in Our Biosphere
As promised, here are the Los Altos photos fresh out of Photoshop.
I'm not really into nature photography to be honest. With all due respect to Ansel Adams, large, far off landscape images are just not my thing. The one way I've been able to make nature photography work for me is by having one central focus. This ends up resulting in mostly macro photography, although sometimes I can work with the rule of thirds to do more of a focused landscape.
In this series I worked with different lighting. A lot of my images tend to be dark and ominous so I went with really bright, vivid colors on this, making it look almost surreal in some of the photos (Almond Orchard). I also was interested by how the sunlight looked through the greenery (Green Stars), or how nature could imitate man-made products (Reaching Wire). I did a little play on pattern work as well in the photo "Foxtails". All in all I was pleased with what I came home with.
(To view image titles, click the comment button on the pop-up navigation bar.)
New Look for Video Page
Hello, internet. I've designed a new video page over the weekend (yes, work can be done over 4/20) and it is in action right now. Check it out and I'll keep fine-tuning it as time goes on.
Hope everyone had a great weekend. Peace.
Beatbox360 Machinima Presentation at UC San Diego
A few days ago I gave a talk and a 4K showing of Beatbox360 to two undergraduate ICAM classes, and other faculty and staff, in the Main Auditorium of CALIT2 at UCSD. Having been in the same position as most of the students present, I thought it would be great to share with them all of the great technology and various resources that are available at CALIT2. My talk is mainly focused around my work with Machinima (the art of making movies with video games) through the Beatendo visual beat series. Check out the taped version, filmed by Alex Matthews, below.
If you have any other questions involving either Beatendo or Beatbox360, feel free to leave your thoughts/questions in the comments section. Thanks!
Santa Cruz
Here is a set of photos from the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk. Can't say that they're brand spanking new, but fresh material will be along soon enough. I spent some time up in the Los Altos hills this last weekend taking a few photos, so those will be the next coming attraction.
Beatbox360 discussed at CineGrid 2007 CineGrid, a community that strives to enable industry and academics to stream high-bandwidth digital media across fiber-optic networks, holds an annual workshop at CALIT2 at the University of California, San Diego. At this workshop, there are presentations from scientists, Hollywood producers, filmmakers, camera developers and artists alike. Beatbox360 debuted at the 2007 workshop on December 4th. The following day, a "CineGrid for the Arts" panel was held. Below is a clip of Eduardo Navas' commentary on Beatbox360.
Eduardo studies Remix Theory and is pursuing his Ph.D at UCSD, in addition to holding a Curator position at Gallery@CALIT2. You can watch the entire video here (at the bottom), which contains presentations by each panelist and the entire panel discussion.
Men At Work
Lots of cool stuff is coming online this week, folks. As Jon mentioned, music.jettisonhigh.com is in full effect with an all new .mp3 player so you can listen to the latest Jettison High beats. As always, check back often because much more will be added very soon. Also coming to life this week is video.jettisonhigh.com, your destination for film, video and animation. A more comprehensive list of material is on the way, with more works, such as Winter Quarter.
New Songs on Music Page
Yo, ayo! It gives me great pleasure (yes that kind of pleasure) to announce that the Music page at JettisonHigh.com now has a fully operational MP3 player so you can listen to all the Jettison High goodness you can handle. Actually, right now there are only two songs ("Just a Lazy Day" & "Instrumental") with another ("Devolver") on the way.
These three songs will make up "Devolver", the first demo CD from Jon Engquist for Jettison High Productions. More info to come.
You can also check out JH's MySpace Music page here, if you want to download the songs or leave me some lovin'.
Peace!
Nerdgasm!
What up, rockers. I just finished compiling a technical explanation of Beatbox360. You can download the .pdf here at the Beatbox360 website. It includes a walk through of the computer that I built especially for the project, the video signal flow, and the 4K editing and playback process. The more interesting conceptual explanation will be posted quite soon. Thanks!
Hip-Hop, Video Games, and High-Def
Simba, it is time! The HD version of Beatbox360 is finally online for your viewing pleasure. For the ill-informed, Beatbox360 is the third installment of the Beatendo visual beat series. It is a musical Hip-Hop beat composed solely from high-definition video clips from the XBOX 360 gaming system. Below is the YouTube-encoded version. For the true HD experience, download the HDWMV here. The file is only 110Mb (compressed from over 21Gb)!
This particular beat surpasses its predecessors in every aspect. Its source clips are of the highest definition possible from a console gaming system. Its beats contain more samples and are mixed better than ever over eight channels of surround sound. Its total frame size is four times the resolution of HD. Yes, that is correct. Beatbox360 is one of the first artworks produced in the digital cinema standard of 4K, getting its name from the fact that it contains 4096 horizontal pixels. In simpler terms, think of 4K as four quadrants of HD video stitched together. The basis of this project was built around this notion, as I could use 2 megapixel HD video clips to populate a canvas of 8 megapixels. If you are interested in this project, please visit the official Beatbox360 website. There you will find an in-depth explanation of both the technical and conceptual ideas behind this project. Enjoy!
Site Launch Y'all
What up, web? JettisonHigh.com now has sections for photography, music and video for your browsing pleasure. Be sure to check out the new photography gallery here at photography.jettisonhigh.com, featuring the visual stylings of Roxy. If you like what you see, give her some love in the comments section and remember to check back often for new photos!
Candle Light
Hello again. Here are a few more photos for your enjoyment. Nothing fancy, just some cool patterns and details I captured using my Macro setting.
Also, thanks to Mike and Picasa, we'll be putting in an embedded slideshow of the Jettison High photo album soon, so keep checking back!
Artists @ Work
Hello hello. I'm going to take this time to introduce a project I've been thinking about putting together called "artists @ work". The end result should be quite a large portfolio of artists from around the Bay Area (or elsewhere if I travel) working alone or collaborating in their preferred media of art. Here are a few sample shots I've already taken, and keep in mind this is in the most primary of stages at the moment.
This kind of gives you an idea of the wide range I'm going for here. The only thing is, I need more subjects for this to really take off. So if you're an artist, whether your forte be music or painting or performance art, please contact me at roxy@jettisonhigh.com if you're interested in being a part of this project. I'll even make you prints free of charge for helping me out.
I look forward to hearing from you!
New York State of Mind
My introduction to this community couldn't have come at a better time as I have just returned from visiting a friend of mine in New York. I am home and I come bearing gifts. Enjoy...
Yo, pass the mic!
So, this is officially my first post at the fabulous jettisonhigh.com blog. I'm looking forward to creating all sorts of things on this site. Hopefully we can be apart of something great. A forum where all forms of creative thought can co-exist and inspire each other.
At this time however, I would like to introduce another member of our Jettison High team. Roxana Horsch is an emerging photographer from San Jose, CA who incorporates intriguing and intelligent composition with an emotional and personal connection. While many of her photographs may seem candid, she is always able to capture the life and passion that drives every one of us. Her ability to see (and photograph) beauty in all things is something that we here at Jettison High are highly looking forward to.
Check back often for contributions from Roxy.
One Good Thing About Music
In addition to kicking off the debut of our music section at Jettison High, I would like to introduce to you not just a good friend, but an excellent musician and collaborator, Jon Engquist. Jon and I formed Jettison High Productions during our undergraduate years at UCSD while working at Student Run Television (SRTV). Some of our exploits include "The Moan and Groan Show," and "Winter Quarter," the first claymation to ever air on SRTV.
The views expressed in the above video are solely those of the characters involved and does not reflect the views of Jettison High Productions. And Jon is Mexican, so it's cool anyways... You can check out our music here at myspace.com.
Sign Spinning and Hip-Hop Culture
Ever since they first started popping up on downtown San Diego street corners, I have been extremely intrigued by "sign spinning." Started (at least in San Diego) by a local entrepreneur who created Arrow Advertising, sign spinning has become one of the fastest-growing advertising methods in urban environments. The idea is simple, really. A typical billboard-like advertisement is created as a lightweight, arrow-shaped sign, which a "sign spinner" twirls and spins in order to attract the attention of consumers. 'Nuff said.
This interest motivated me to create a (very) short documentary about a few San Diego sign spinners. Check it out below.
I believe that there is a fundamental connection between this new form of advertising, and the continuing growth of hip-hop culture. All good sign spinners possess a certain rhythm and time in their movements (listening to music while spinning is popular for this reason). In this fashion, the act of sign spinning becomes more than just shameless advertising, and begins to approach musical performance.
In addition, hip-hop culture encourages the notion of "free styling." While beginners usually stick to a routine of a handful of tricks, the majority of sign spinners showcase great spontaneity and a wide variety of spinning tricks.
I want to extrapolate this documentary further by interviewing more sign spinners and the creator of Arrow Advertising. More importantly, I think, would be to drop in and document one of their practices, to see the sign spinning community in action.
It all started when one of my striped SATA drives died, forcing me to frantically backup my data and switch to a safer RAID array setup. I knew that I would have to cope with losing some serious read/write speed, so I decided to switch from Vista back to XP in order to regain some system resources.
Unfortunately, and to my surprise, every attempted installation of XP on my system results in the above BSOD! Who would have thought that Vista would be more stable than XP? Not I, said the cat. Not I...
My talk is mainly focused around my work with 
