NEW BLOG ADDRESS

Hi guys

If you're reading this then you're unaware that my blog has now moved to

www.limitlessxpression.wordpress.com

Please check it out and let me know what you think :)

The possibilities are limitless...

thxthxthx

http://thxthxthx.com/

Sometimes the random uni courses you do pay off with some gems. In this week's task we had to find our favourite blog and share it with the class. The one above is such a simple yet powerful blog that I thought I should share with you guys too.

I wonder at whether we would all be a little happier, a little less grumpy if we undertook the idea ourselves.

So what am I thankful about today? I'm looking forward to going to work in the harbour, having some time to think and write and get paid for it at the same time.

I'm thankful that I'll be shooting a wedding on Saturday and the weather looks awesome and it'll be a great way to spend some time with B.

Simple reminders that God is good :) Hope you guys have a good end to the week.

The possibilities are limitless...

Photos of Jordan

Here are a few photos taken on the spur of the moment at the Hen House of newborn, Jordan.  

I loved his massive yawns  and he left me a beautiful present when I held him.  Can't wait to take more photos when B and I actually prepared but hopefully you can see how cute he is. 

In other news, B has a 27inch iMac on the way- it's getting delivered to me so it'll be tempting to keep it here. I'm looking forward to testing it out and seeing how it goes with editing photos and just watching movies on the awesome screen. 

The possibilities are limitless...

Weekend Reflections [03]

Caleb and his dad

 It's been a busy weekend and I still feel like I'm catching up. On Saturday I spent the day fishing, driving a BBQ boat and just chilling up at Brooklyn celebrating Josh's final days as a free man. Besides a slight incident where I may or may not have run aground on protected seaweed it was a lot of fun and the weather was awesome. I wish there were more photos from the day but as it's always said- what happens on a bucks day stays there. I'm still recovering from the junk food, beer and Brazilian all-you-can-eat...

On Sunday Bianca and I had the privilege of taking some family photos for the Ku Family. Little Caleb is not so little any more and he was so much fun to shoot and play with. Can't wait to see the finished photos:)

View from the cockpit of the Manly ferry

In other news I have a new job at the ferries selling tickets and riding around in my free time. It's not every day you get to travel in the drivers' compartment of the big Manly ferry. It's been one of the better random jobs I've had in my time.

Gatsby wax has arrived! Now I can finally stop wearing a hat:) Hopefully this stash lasts me a little while.

 Finally, this piece of paper apparently signed by the PM herself arrived in the mail. I'm guessing this is for the Habitat for Humanity trip the boys and I went on a year ago. Good times...

Keep looking out for the finished photos of the Ku Family and the amazing 18th birthday party Matt, Bianca and I went to shoot last weekend. So much goodness to get through.


The possibilities are limitless...

Testing out the new lens

Recently I picked up a new 50mm f1.4 lens on the way to upgrading to a better camera. I'm supposed to be doing uni work at the moment but as usual I'm procrastinating- at least I think this is semi productive. 

Bianca let me take some trial shots with the new lens and the results are below:) I'm finding the new lens a lot faster, obviously a lot sharper and clearer- all round a lot more fun. 

I've still got a pile of photos to get through and hopefully after the 10th of October I'll have a lot more time on my hands. I'm helping out with an 18th debutante party tomorrow night (I have no idea what happens at a deb ball but it should be an interesting time). We're running a photobooth and just taking party pics. As it's my first paid photo gig I'm a bit nervous but it'll be a good learning experience. Much thanks to Bianca and Matt for letting me tag along and assist. 


Check out the pics below and hope you enjoy them:) Meanwhile I will go back to the uni life and then go work on the Quay tonight (come say hey if you're going off Wharf 4)


Cheers...

[Interview] with AJ

My friend AJ has always been the creative one of the group. Back in school he was the guy with the long hair, baggy clothes, beatboxing (his rapper tag is Truze) and sketching whatever crossed his mind at the time. He's always been into comics, anime, manga and the artwork behind it all. He'll often have long, complex and in depth conversations that turn into arguments regarding DC versus Marvel.


 I sat down with him and some of my friends over some bacon, eggs and coffee one Saturday morning to get to know more about where his inspiration lies and what draws him to the comic world. This was my first interview and I'm still trying to get on top of the processes so please bear with me. 

AJ has joined me as a Tshirt designer with his take on the Marvel character, Deadpool. Inspired by a plush toy and a limited edition statue (170USD) purchased from Japan, the sketch has been coloured on Photoshop and Illustrator. 

If you'd like to purchase or check out the Deadpool inspired design on a Tshirt go to www.limitlesstees.com. Fully Australian owned and operated, you can also design and make your own tshirts, hoodies and aprons. AJ's helped out with the logo and design of the website and will hopefully be a regular contributor to the site. If you would like to get on board and create and sell your own tshirt or clothing designs feel free to get in contact with us:)  

AJ is currently working on a sketch of a girl inspired by the Khalesi blond girl from the Game of Thrones television series. I suspect this is due to the fact that she is semi naked for most of her screen time. A current challenge is what he's going to clothe her in and whether there will be dragons mounted around her. If you grab his uni sketchbook you’ll find it filled with random doodles and sketches inspired by his ‘stimulating’ and ‘engaging’ psychology lectures. 

His inspiration has been anime and comic books since high school- mainly Marvel characters especially Spiderman. He went through a mad anime phase that inspired his earlier stuff. He likes to mix and match Western and Eastern styles. According to AJ- sometimes it looks good, sometimes it looks odd. He goes through phases depending on what he is watching or reading at the time. 

Most of his work is still on pencil and paper but in 2005 he upgraded to Photoshop and a tablet to help give him more control with colouring and shading. He has been a regular contributor on deviantart.com and has received positive feedback from other budding and upcoming artists and comic book lovers. Check out his page at http://truze.deviantart.com/ for more of his colouring and unique artworks. He's never had official lessons but has learnt most of his craft from the deviantart community and the instant support networks he's found there. 

(We broke the conversation to welcome a friend into AJ's house and for a tangent discussion about how Albee's Kitchen satay and Malaysian is pretty good.)

The rest of the interview time was spent taking photos in his room and checking out the numerous art books he's accumulated over the years. AJ's fascination with Deadpool and comic book characters stems from the complex stories and characters along with the amazing artwork he aspires to. Apparently Deadpool is one of only two comic book characters to break the '4th Wall' and knows that he's a character. Personally I'm not sure how this makes him that much better but I guess it's cool... 

I'm looking forward to seeing what else AJ comes up with and maybe get some free career counselling (if you're interested he's currently doing some placements at UNSW as part of his Masters in Psychology). 


Check out the rest of the photos from the interview and if you're keen let me know what you think :) 

Weekend Reflections [02]

It's been a crazy couple of weeks. I've now got two jobs, turned down probably twice as many and am now doing 6 subjects at uni. 

Good times. 

I've still got the interview with AJ still in the pipeline and it should hopefully be up soon :) 

I've acquired a new 50mm 1.4 lens and I'm looking forward to trying it out. 

In the mean time I had a nice summer/ spring lunch time in Hyde Park with some mates and took some happy snaps with Bianca. 

Hope you enjoy them and have a great week :) 

Finding a voice

I'm loving my creative writing unit readings at the moment. They're all about finding your voice and remembering that noone has to read your work. Thanks for reading my work :) 

In practice, you hear it coming from somebody else, you hear something in another writer’s sounds that flows in through your ear and enters the echo-chamber of your head and delights your whole nervous system in such a way that your reaction will be, ‘Ah, I wish I had said that, in that particular way.’ This other writer, in fact, has spoken something essential to you, something you recognise instinctively as a true sounding of aspects of yourself and your experience. And your first steps as a writer will be to imitate, consciously or unconsciously, those sounds that flowed in, that in-fluence.

(Heaney 2002)

I never know whether what I'm writing is good or not. Although at the moment I don't really care. I'm just enjoying getting it out of my head and in to something tangible. 

Why learn something if it's not practical and can't be expressed in some form or another? 

I hope eventually my voice actually comes out on the pages. 

In other news- James Squire is releasing a new flavour (taste?) Not sure if I should be posting it but it's not like I have massive numbers of readers. I'll be helping promote it with free taste testing apparently. 

Hope you guys have a good one:) How's your day been anyways?

ROFL

I've never been one to ROFL or LOL although I will make random noises in front of the computer screen. It's especially awkward at work. It's interesting how we convert emotions and actions into random symbols. 


Anyways this has been a good week. I think I'm getting some casual work and I've just started a Creative Writing unit :) Hopefully that means this blog gets better...

Weekend Reflections 01

The weekend has come and gone. Friends from Japan came down under and we were able to reminisce about the good old days. The days of dressing up as Pingu and terrorising cute little Japanese children. 


The days when there was too much snow that the lifts had to stop because the chairs were stuck. 


Congrats to my friend Hiro for getting married and it was awesome to meet his wife. Who is also a primary school teacher :) 


Congrats to Bianca and Francis for buying a place- can't wait for the housewarming and seeing the renovations complete :) 


Congrats for having an awesome cute moodle, Molly :) Thanks to Bianca for taking the photos for me...

Youtube of the day (shout out to Ashton for posting it on his wall)



Coming Soon:
I also completed an interview with AJ, which turned into a photo shoot with Hendy (who knows how it happens). He's come on board with LimitlessTees and with the interview will come the official launch of LimitlessTees, a place where you will be able to create your own tshirts and clothes. You'll also be able to request designs, sell your own designs and purchase cool, unique clothes. Make sure you come back for it :)

Caption this...

Here's a sneak peek of some photos we took during AJ's interview on the weekend. Have a crack at adding a caption for this dp for Hendy.

Gucci and Golbana

To be honest I'm not sure why I'm still awake. It's 12:39am on  Friday night/Saturday morning. Surely I should be asleep. But after a massive Lowenbrau dinner and San Churros dessert with some old Japanese ski instructor friends I'm still buzzing from the sugar and the high of using my Japanese again. 


It's sad how we lose touch with languages and friends over the years. I guess everything worthwhile in life takes effort. 


But I'm going off in some sentimental tangent....


Today I had the opportunity to meet Gucci- Paul's awesome and cute 8 month old purebreed pug. Dogs are cool- and so much better than cats. Why do people like cats? Sure I can understand sometimes when a cat decides they like me and sits on my lap and provides some warmth. But dogs are always like that. They never have their periods where they'll scratch and claw you to death. They always come around for a hug and to say hello. 


Gucci certainly has a lot of character and hopefully I captured some of it. I'm looking forward to tomorrow- I'm kicking off what will hopefully be an interesting series of interviews with people in my life who I admire for some reason. I'd like to delve a bit deeper into what makes them tick, learn from what they've been through, their advice and their thoughts on life in general. 


Hope you guys have a good weekend and that you get more sleep than me :) 


Here are a few of my favourites- the rest are in the slideshow or on my flickr page

1st Birthdays!

Zumbo V8 Cake- Jemima has classy taste:)

Do you still remember your first birthday? On the weekend Bianca and I celebrated Jemima's first birthday with her and her girlfriends. I wasn't sure exactly what happens at a first birthday obviously because I can't remember my own. There were a lot of balloons, roti, curry and an awesoome Zumbo V8 cake. It was a great chance to catch up with people and also bust out the camera again. We hope Jemima and her friends had fun and perhaps remember what happened years down the track. In the meantime enjoy the photos and let me know what you think of the photos- you can't say no to those baby eyes :s Check out Bianca's photos and blog of the day here. 

Happy Birthday Jemima!

Balloons!!

BFFs!!

See the full slideshow from flickr or check out the images and more at http://www.flickr.com/photos/thejian/