New short film written and directed by my good friend Zach Frankart. I helped with cinematography on this film, shooting with Canon 5D Mark III's along with Zach and Johnny Hochstetler. Be sure to watch it and leave a rating on IMDb. (No Return contains violence and strong language.)
Weeks later, people are still talking about the Apple Watch. Despite the fact that very few people I know actually ordered one. Of those that did order, many haven’t yet received their watch.
Meanwhile, Tesla recently announced the Powerwall, which has gone on to generate a healthy reservation list, but has done little by way of generating actual conversation.
Why is that?
It’s all about framing the conversation. Apple talks benefits, not features. We see a picture of a stupid Chipotle burrito button and can’t share it fast enough. It’s silly, but we can start to piece together the little ways a device like the Apple Watch can reduce friction in our lives — whether at the airport, the checkout counter, or when tracking our fitness levels. But so few companies inspire thinking in that way.
Apple does it. So does Nike. There’s at least one company that should be included in that discussion, but isn’t yet: Tesla
And it’s their own fault.
What if Tesla simply said, “What would you do with an extra $100,000?”
With the introduction of Tesla Energy and its sleek product Powerwall, an opportunity was missed to truly inspire consumers. 38,000 reservations is a number to be proud of, but it should’ve been ten times that.
Here’s how sections of the product page read. Notice how it slips between touching on benefits and falling back on its features. That’s fine when you have a product to put in people’s hands. When you’re trying to generate buzz and sell something completely new, it’s harder to picture in your mind.
Powerwall is a home battery that charges using electricity generated from solar panels, or when utility rates are low, and powers your home in the evening. It also fortifies your home against power outages by providing a backup electricity supply. Automated, compact and simple to install, Powerwall offers independence from the utility grid and the security of an emergency backup.
Not bad, although it’s not really inspiring me to run and find my credit card. Sounds like a fancy backup power supply — I haven’t needed one, so I definitely don’t need an expensive one.
The average home uses more electricity in the morning and evening than during the day when solar energy is plentiful. Without a home battery, excess solar energy is often sold to the power company and purchased back in the evening. This mismatch adds demand on power plants and increases carbon emissions. Powerwall bridges this gap between renewable energy supply and demand by making your home’s solar energy available to you when you need it.
I’ll take your word for it.
Current generation home batteries are bulky, expensive to install and expensive to maintain. In contrast, Powerwall’s lithium ion battery inherits Tesla’s proven automotive battery technology to power your home safely and economically. Completely automated, it installs easily and requires no maintenance.
Yeah.
Powerwall comes in 10 kWh weekly cycle and 7 kWh daily cycle models. Both are guaranteed for ten years and are sufficient to power most homes during peak evening hours. Multiple batteries may be installed together for homes with greater energy need, up to 90 kWh total for the 10 kWh battery and 63 kWh total for the 7 kWh battery.
Oh. I’m not sure how many kWh I use though. Am I supposed to math?
Look, I’m not trying to blast what I’m sure are incredibly genuine people who are trying to communicate very complex and important ideas to the masses. It’s easier said than done. I applaud Elon Musk and the entire Tesla team for what they’re doing — and I wouldn’t compare them to Apple or Nike if I didn’t believe they were capable of amazing feats.
Right now, you pay an average of $2,200 per year on energy. Not to mention the stress our current forms of energy are placing on the environment and our one and only earth. A lifetime’s worth of energy comes bundled with staggering hidden costs.
What if you could change that with a single product?
Tesla’s Powerwall is here to help you do just that. For less than the cost of two years of energy bills, you can use a green, renewable energy source that will save you more than $100,000 over your lifetime. Most importantly, it will leave a positive imprint for all generations to follow.
The future of energy is here. We want to save you $100,000, making more money available to invest in you, your family, and the livelihood of all.
Will you join us?
From Frank Chimero's Other Halves:
Knowledge work has its name for a reason: the challenges naturally swing towards the cerebral, and doubly so if you work in design for digital products. You spend hours and hours considering ways to think about what is ultimately an immaterial thing. And who’s to know if it’s done or right?
Writing is a lot like that, too. So, on average, most of my waking hours are spent wrestling with ghosts.
After watching this video essay by Evan Puschak, you'll likely never look at paintings the same way again.
This is adapted from a Backer's Only update for my Kickstarter project Portrait, originally posted on June 4, 2012.
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I've been doing a lot of preparation and planning for my trip to Seattle - where my production partner Zach and I will be heading to film Portrait!
As much as this film will be about photography, the biggest focus will be on the creative process. What does it mean to be a creative and to chase your dreams? More importantly, how do you construct those dreams in reality and translate an internal inspiration into something others can enjoy? A lot of it comes down to design. Just as Apple designs an amazing product, a filmmaker designs a great film, or a photographer designs the picture hanging on your wall. It's years of practice, learning, and inspiration that make up various parts of the design process.
I've been reading Frank Chimero's The Shape of Design to look at the different ways to approach the topic of design and creative process. From the book:
"First, design is imagining a future and working toward it with intelligence and cleverness. We use design to close the gap between the situation we have and the one we desire. Second, design is a practice built upon making things for other people. We are all on the road together."
I highly recommend buying his book. You can get the digital version for $10 or a hardcover for $30 here.
I've also revisited Walter Isaacson's Steve Jobs. Steve believed in design and being a true artist with your work. When he was younger, he talked about getting older and looking to the future:
"Your thoughts construct patterns like scaffolding in your mind. You are really etching chemical patterns. In most cases, people get stuck in those patterns, just like grooves in a record, and they never get out of them."
He goes on to say:
"If you want to live your life in a creative way, as an artist, you have to not look back too much. You have to be willing to take whatever you've done and whoever you were and throw them away.
The more the outside world tries to reinforce an image of you, the harder it is to continue to be an artist, which is why a lot of times, artists have to say, "Bye. I have to go. I'm going crazy and I'm getting out of here." And they go and hibernate somewhere. Maybe later they re-emerge a little differently."
I feel like both of these are fitting definitions for the creative process.
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You can watch Portrait here.
Art is not - and should never be - all things to all people. Every picture has a unique lens through which the photographer presses her shutter-release button. Every novel has a different set of experiences the writer brings as he sits down in front of his computer or with pencil and paper.
There will always be margins. Gaps in coverage. Pieces of the conversation left out intentionally or unintentionally.
Art should consider all people, because art is about people and our expression. But it doesn't need to represent, or speak for, or even speak to, all people.
Art is honest. Art is raw. It makes you feel, makes you think, makes you cry, makes you angry. But some art may not affect you personally. And that's ok.
Frank Chimero on designing without borders:
Edgelessness is in the web’s structure: it’s comprised of individual pages linked together, so its structure can branch out forever.
Edgelessness applies to the screens that show the web, because they offer an infinite canvas that can scroll in any direction for however long. Boy, do we take for granted that a screen can show more content than is able to be displayed in a single shot.
Later, he continues:
A quick example from my life: Twitter didn’t replace Facebook. The iPad didn’t replace my phone. My phone didn’t replace my TV. Now, I watch YouTube on my iPad, toss the video up to my TV, while checking Twitter and Facebook on my phone. It’s a little constellation of technology. But I keep asking myself: how many more things can I juggle? And for how long?
Read the whole thing - it's a storytelling and design experience that shouldn't be missed by anyone with any interest in how designing for the internet should work.
If you look hard enough, it translates to all forms of storytelling. One film-related example is crafting an interactive documentary experience, like Elaine McMillon's Hollow. Or any modern marketing campaign. It's about taking little pieces of a larger whole - a picture here, a tweet there, and creating a cohesive message that connects you with people who want to see your work. It's like a sophisticated method of tearing a bunch of pages out of a book and piecing them back together side by side.
Ian Parker profiles Apple's Jony Ive for The New Yorker:
According to Clive Grinyer, “Jon’s always wanted to do luxury.” By this point, Grinyer said, Ive had already fulfilled one duty of industrial design: to design a perfect stapler, for everyone, in a world of lousy staplers. (Most designers driven by that philosophy “didn’t really rule the world,” Grinyer said. “They just ruled staplers.”)
The key to designing the perfect stapler, in my mind, is to make paper nearly obsolete by designing the iPhone, iPad, and Mac.
The following is from Jon Ronson, writing an adaptation from his upcoming book, “So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed,” for The New York Times Magazine. On Justine Sacco:
Sacco had been three hours or so into her flight when retweets of her joke began to overwhelm my Twitter feed. I could understand why some people found it offensive. Read literally, she said that white people don’t get AIDS, but it seems doubtful many interpreted it that way. More likely it was her apparently gleeful flaunting of her privilege that angered people. But after thinking about her tweet for a few seconds more, I began to suspect that it wasn’t racist but a reflexive critique of white privilege — on our tendency to naïvely imagine ourselves immune from life’s horrors. Sacco, like Stone, had been yanked violently out of the context of her small social circle. Right?
Sam Biddle for Gawker in a mea culpa of sorts:
Justine Sacco has a PR job she enjoys now, but she deserves the best and biggest PR job, whatever that may be. Give it all to her.
These articles, while important for entirely different reasons, are missing the bigger issue. They’re looking at a woman against a mob, which is certainly one angle, but I believe a more pressing conversation could have come from this situation. This was a chance to begin a conversation about the mentality of white free-from-consequence privilge. Instead, we seem to be set to perpetuate that privilge.
A day after this happened, back on December 21, 2013, I wrote about this. Some of it will be quoted below. I still stand behind every word I wrote.
Perpetuating her privilge is why comments coming from white guys like Ronson, Biddle, and Dave Pell claiming, “It was almost all about fun and entertainment,” really piss me off. I’m not going to rail on any of these writers for having blind spots, but I do have a problem with them putting everyone in buckets, and more or less apologizing for her after the fact. What she said was terrible. Yet, the overreaction following has absolutely nothing—nothing—to do with the real issue here: Why it was wrong for a person whose job title included the words senior public relations to ever say that in a public forum.
They may claim, “Of course it was awful! I would never condone anything like that,” and I would believe them. I don’t doubt that they’re good people. That still doesn’t change this attempt (by a PR professional, no less) to whitewash this incident after the fact. To make the top Google search result a positive Justine Sacco story, instead of a critical conversation about race.
Job well done.
So, as for my question from 14 months ago:
Although she now finds herself without a job, that simply sweeps the issue under the rug. The internet feels like they won. And while someone who probably should not have been in a high ranking position at a huge company like IAC (About.com, Dictionary.com, Match.com, CollegeHumor, Vimeo, and many more websites you’ve heard of) lost her job, did she — or anyone, for that matter — actually learn anything?
The answer is a resounding, “No.”
Now, there is absolutely a point to be made by those quoted before. The mob mentality of the internet is downright dangerous. One thing I made sure to be very clear about in my original post was the following:
[She doesn’t deserve] to be torn apart for the downright dumb things [she] said this week. Nothing should condone violence. Anyone threatening Ms. Sacco for her racist remark is just as wrong as she was when she hit “Tweet.”
But I’d argue there’s better causes right under their noses worth calling out than trying to clear the name of Justine Sacco.
No matter how innocent her intent, no matter her family history, no matter the inappropriate response of many (most?), some things have not changed.
Like this:
I have to interview with people like Ms. Sacco if I want a job in communication or marketing … And while it’d be just as wrong of me to generalize every white person in a managerial position at every company, hearing comments like this are harder and harder to digest when I get rejection letter after rejection letter.
This still hasn’t changed:
How am I supposed to feel when I see company websites featuring pictures of their employees and not a single one is black?
Or this:
It’s not about ignoring color, or gender, or sexuality. I know many gay people who are all extremely proud of their sexuality, as they should be, and pretending like their sexuality doesn’t exist is just as unfair.
But most of all:
It’s about understanding that when you surround yourself only with people who look, and talk, and act like you — you can’t pretend to know how someone else feels.
And finally:
Ms. Sacco can delete her Twitter account (and she has) and while she’s currently without a job, I doubt it will be a permanent situation. If over 1.7 million people support Phil Robertson, I’m sure she’ll find at least one who supports her.
But the rest of us can’t change our skin color, or gender, or sexual orientation. And that’s why comments like this are not ok.
We wonder why diversity in tech is almost nonexistent, but then we’re willing to so quickly move on from this. We’re willing to ignore the attitude that shapes the culture that influences the hiring decisions.
She wasn’t doing her best Stephen Colbert impression. She wasn’t writing headlines for The Onion. Instead, she posted a bad joke on her personal Twitter account to only a handful of friends and followers, mixed in between what were completely average, benign tweets.
Am I the only one that finds it dangerous to retroactively file that under “satire”?
Bradford Young, director of photography for films including Selma, Ain't Them Bodies Saints, and A Most Violent Year in an interview with Grantland:
Filmmaking isn’t considered an art form in America, it’s considered a business first and foremost. Those who are artists, who get a chance to say something in the context of a business outfit, are the lucky ones, and they are far and few between. There are not a lot of us who can say we’re artists working in the film context. Basically, all this reminds us is that we’ve got to know who we are, we’ve got to remember who we are, and we’ve got to know that we come from culture and we come from stories, and stories are not about fact. Storytelling is the oldest art form in the world, and what it consists of is allegory and mythology. Stories were never sanctioned to be real, that’s not why we do what we do.
From Still Smokin': An Interview with Paul Thomas Anderson by David Ehrlich:
Save for perhaps Punch-Drunk Love, which exists in the sweet synesthesia of its own dimension, each of Anderson’s films is a time capsule, a period piece, or both. With each successive feature, it grows ever more tempting to re-arrange his features by the chronology of their stories and look at his body of work as an alternate history of 20th century America. Anderson may not see much value in such an exercise (“Fuck. I mean, that would be cool, I guess. That would be wild!”), but his films nevertheless evince an uncanny ability to recreate the past so that it feels ineffably present.
I'm going to do that one day.
Originally published in Culture Club on Medium.
Black privilege is being asked dozens of times throughout your life, “What are you?”
Black privilege is being asked, “Are you sure your name isn’t Muhammad? Are you here to blow the place up?”
Black privilege is having a conversation with your spouse about whether to check “White” or “Black” on your mixed-race child’s medical forms, because there’s no “Other,” “Mixed,” or “Choose to not identify,” in 2014.
Black privilege is worrying that someday, someone might ask whether or not your kid belongs to you because your skin is a bit darker than his.
Black privilege is having your friends tell you, “You act so white,” because you like the same music they do.
Black privilege is being passed over for that job you’re well qualified for because of the way you look.
Black privilege is making up as little as 1 or 2% of the workforce at many of today’s hottest companies—Apple, Google, Facebook, Twitter, Square, and from what I can see, Medium—despite making up more than 13% of the U.S. population.
Black privilege is applying for jobs at those companies and being perceived as “not a culture fit.”
Black privilege is being told, “I’m surprised they didn’t pick you for the random security screening,” at the airport.
Black privilege is being asked if you belong here.
Black privilege is being told, “Go back to Africa,” even though you’ve never even visited Africa.
Black privilege is watching women and men clutch their bags or pull their children away from you because the color of your skin is an intimidating brown.
Black privilege is having the police called on you because you’re walking outside in freezing temperatures with your hands in your pockets.
Black privilege is having a cop scream in your face, because he directed you to go, then changed his mind and told you to stop. Later, you’re thankful that the cop saw you simply as a nuisance and not as a threat. Because we know what can happen when they see you as a threat.
Black privilege is being 3.5 times more likely to be suspended or expelledthan white kids in school.
Black privilege is worrying if your son will come home safely, or if he may be shot dead because of the shade of his skin.
Black privilege is being 21 times more likely to be shot by a police officer as a teen.
White privilege is living your life without ever worrying about any of that.
President Obama in response to the recent Sony hacks that led to The Interview being pulled from theaters:
"We cannot have a society where some dictator someplace can start imposing censorship here in the United States, because if somebody is able to intimidate folks out of releasing a satirical movie, imagine what they'll do when they see a documentary that they don't like, or news reports that they don't like -- or even worse, imagine if producers or distributors or others start engaging in self-censorship because they don't want to offend the sensibilities of somebody whose sensibilities probably need to be offended," Obama said.
I've been thinking about self-censorship a lot lately. I have a lot of ideas. But many I don't pursue. Why?
Part of the reason is self-censorship - particularly that a certain project or idea doesn't fit me. Or that it may offend someone.
I think some of that is healthy. There's too much garbage out there that offends just to offend. That in itself isn't art. It's insignificant. But on the other hand, what ideas am I passing on that could speak to something important, but perhaps may not be easy to watch - or for that matter, to create?
You can't write a film like 12 Years A Slave with that mindset. You have to go all in. You have to be willing to lose those viewers to be true. To have impact. The people you lose, you were never going to reach them anyway.
Bass: The law says you have the right to hold a nigger, but begging the law's pardon... it lies. Is everything right because the law allows it? Suppose they'd pass a law taking away your liberty and making you a slave? Edwin Epps: Ha! Bass: Suppose! Edwin Epps: That ain't a supposable case. Bass: Because the law states that your liberties are undeniable? Because society deems it so? Laws change. Social systems crumble. Universal truths are constant. It is a fact, it is a plain fact that what is true and right is true and right for all. White and black alike.
excerpted from the 12 Years A Slave screenplay by John Ridley
It's easier said than done. There's a reason you don't see scripts and films like this every day.
Sometimes the things that push boundaries are hard to write simply because you don't want to think about them. But it's critical to be mindful of this. It's important to not fear that someone may be upset by what you say.
Because if what you have to say matters, then say it.
Kat Candler, director of Hellion, on life after Sundance:
I do want to emphasize that this wasn’t an overnight success. I’ve been making movies, for well over a decade … shorts, features, music videos, commercials and I’ve been writing lots and lots of scripts. I submitted to Sundance more than I can count on two hands and have gotten rejected almost all those times. But then one day after years and years of honing my craft, taking risks, learning and growing and sticking to my guns, I got in. And yes, it changed my life. And yes, even after having three films play at Sundance, I can’t sit back, relax and wait for the opportunities to roll in. Instead, I still have to get in the ring, put my little gloves on and fight for my life.
Another important reminder that what seems like an overnight success is usually years in the making.
I was fortunate enough to meet up with Tyler Deeb this past spring to talk about his company, Misc. Goods Co., and his creative process for my series Why We Create. His perspective was refreshing - particularly his focus on the idea that nothing lasts forever, so why make everything out to be a life or death decision?
He just released a new Kickstarter for a genius method to make iced coffee. It's called Coil. I caught up with Tyler to chat about Coil, but first, watch his installment of Why We Create if you haven't yet.
Do you have any specific processes when coming up with a concept like Coil?
I'm not much of a process thinker -- not sure why that is. I've always been inclined to rely on my gut reaction to ideas and I've often found it difficult to overthink anything. I've wondered in the past if this was my laziness coming through. As if I just was too indifferent to create 10 models of something and critique each one. I've ruled out laziness at this point -- because I objectively look at my work days and see very little slothfulness. Instead, I've come to the working idea that I prefer things to be simple -- and I have a very specific idea of how to see that idea, and when it clicks ... it clicks.
What was your inspiration for creating Coil?
We made Coil for the simple reason that it didn't exist yet, and we believe it has importance. The coffee industry is growing more and more each year; the level of commitment to process is growing with it's popularity. We felt that people were making huge strides in hot brew methods, but that cold coffee was left without a great brewing solution. We thought our Coil solution was better then what is already out there, and we wanted to give it a shot.
What's your process like for translating a complex design into a physical prototype?
So for Coil it started with a prototype that the inventor, Chris Heiniger, showed me. It was a 1 gallon ice cream container with a ton of copper crammed into it. The concept seemed so important and simple that I was immediately attracted to it. From there I drew one sketch in Illustrator, I came back to it every so often over the course of several months and made tweaks. Once I felt as though it was finished I contacted my 3d illustrator and began working with him on a 3d model. After that we printed the model as a 3d print and sent it over to my ceramicist to create a temporary mold. From there we tested several different glazes and finally landed on the iteration you see now.
What's the future for Misc. Goods Co.? Do you think you'll go down the path of coffee-related hardware and expand Coil, or will you continue trying different things?
We believe there is still a lot of room for Coil to grow. I believe that once industry influencers and others get a chance to try the product we will get a second wave of popularity that will outweigh the first. If I'm right, then we will just let the wave carry us as far as it will -- and I'm open to creating more coffee products, as long as I believe they're worth making. But our next product will not be related to coffee -- which I'm equally excited about. We hope to release that product by the summer.
Ideas are easy. So why is coming up with a great idea so hard?
Jason Santa Maria writes:
Over time, I came to realize that the only way to get to the good ideas was to trudge through all the obvious and bad ones first.
I started keeping track of every single idea - whether for a film or other creative project - in text documents, and I soon noticed something. My ideas got better. The more I wrote, the easier it was to write more. Writing really does encourage writing. Ideas formulate more easily the more time you spend in that mindset. Ultimately, it gives you a chance to get through the bad ideas - the ones that are obvious and just sitting on the surface - and get down deep to the better ideas.
But it's important to keep track of the bad ones, too. You can use a notebook or Google docs. I use Notational Velocity on Mac, 1Writer (and sometimes Byword) on iOS, and I sync all the notes in Dropbox. You never know when the dots will connect. A bad idea might inspire a good idea, or maybe it's the missing piece of a different puzzle that you're working on.
The other cool thing is, months or years later, you can look back on all those notes and ideas. You can see where your head was at. You can be reminded of things that you forgot. Little things that seemed dumb, now make sense in a different way. Sometimes you'll combine them. Sometimes you'll scrap the ones that are really, really bad. Whatever your approach, tracking all your ideas will give you a forward sense of momentum that keeps you from getting stuck. And if you do feel stuck, go grab an old idea and try to look at it in a different way. It works.
Photos provided by Edd Schultz
Originally posted on The Cannon at SB Nation.
Hockey games are special. Being packed in an arena with 18,000 of your closest friends, rooting on your hometown team is one of the best sports experiences I can remember. What stands out even more than those games played in the friendly confines of Nationwide Arena are the times I've been fortunate enough to see the Blue Jackets play on the road. After seeing the Blue Jackets play in the Honda Center in Anaheim, California, I thought now might be a good time to share some experiences.
First, a fair warning. The first game I saw on the road was in 2007 in Nashville. So it's been seven years. I've also only been to six arenas total for NHL hockey, including Nationwide. I'm sure there are people who've traveled a lot more than I have. I also imagine my experience might be different if, say, I traveled to Philadelphia as a Penguins fan. Until the Blue Jackets make some more noise in the playoffs and enemies on the ice though, I'd say we're pretty safe to travel to any arena without much heckling or hassle.
As mentioned, we first set out on the road to see the Jackets play in Nashville at the Gaylord Entertainment Center (now Bridgestone Arena). My then-girlfriend-now-wife and I hit the road for the long drive from Columbus for an evening of fun. It was our first time doing anything like that, and neither of us knew quite what to expect.
We were, to be honest, shocked at how kind the people of Nashville were. We left in the morning and arrived a few hours before the game, so we didn't have a ton of time to explore. But we did walk around Broadway in our Blue Jackets gear and had nothing but nice interactions with other hockey fans. We had dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe, because sometimes you just have to be a tourist when you're away from home.
This was the year the Predators were one of the top teams in the league, and we got to see the likes of Peter Forsberg, Paul Kariya, and Kimmo Timonen take the ice together down south. The fans were not only kind, but once the game started, they were loud. Every fan group should aspire to be like Section 303.
I'm not sure if they still do this, but really not a fan of the giant "Predator" head that lowers down and the team skates through at the start of the game. A cheesy gimmick.
Overall, I couldn't recommend Nashville more, especially for your first road game experience. Being from Columbus, you definitely have a different perspective of the so-called "small market" teams. While a team like a Predators may not rival the Toronto Maple Leafs in terms of history, Stanley Cups, or any other metric that matters to some, what we know better than anyone is there are passionate fans everywhere. And maybe it's because hockey isn't as popular of a sport, or the arenas aren't quite as big as NFL stadiums, so it doesn't attract quite as many people–but we have yet to meet a single jerk. Everyone's just a fan of their team, a fan of this game, and they know that you are, too.
Our next road game experience was in 2008. We drove up from Columbus to Joe Louis Arena in Detroit. It's old. Yes, you see sights of hockey's past and many greats that have played for the Detroit Red Wings, but the place has been dying for an upgrade. (Which is finally on the roadmap.) Still, I'd recommend seeing a game there while you can–especially now that you can actually see the Jackets beat the Wings on the road. :)
The Wings went on to win the Stanley Cup that season.
We hung out around Comerica Park and Ford Field, and ate at a sports bar in the area. I'm sure there are fun things to do in town if you know where to look, but the next time we went to see a game in Detroit, we hopped the border and stayed at Caeser's Palace in Windsor, Ontario.
This trip happened in 2009, while I was a Website Production Intern with the Blue Jackets, which I wrote about here. We ate lunch at the Souper Bowl. This was while it was still the old Igloo, but I can only imagine the Consol Energy Centerand surrounding areas are beautiful now, especially since it's been modeled after the Arena District in Columbus.
Penguins fans are loud, but that was back in 2009, the year they won the Stanley Cup. (Oh, man. Is that becoming a theme?) At any rate, Blue Jackets fans give them a run for their money now.
Since I was there for work, I didn't get to experience the game from a fan's perspective. Sat up in the press box, you can't exactly cheer your team on. I bet it'd be a lot of fun now with the budding rivalry between the two teams.
Also in 2009, we made it to the United Center to see the Jackets take on the Chicago Blackhawks. Between the Blackhawks and Bulls, this is an arena that has heaps of history but doesn't feel old.
The National Anthem is historic. It was fun to witness in person. Although this wasn't "The Game," it was Antoine Vermette's first game after being acquired from Ottawa. Vermette scored two goals and the Blue Jackets won 5-3. It's definitely more fun when they win on the road.
There's not much to do around the United Center, but we did (years later) watch a Bulls playoff game at the Billy Goat Tavern down the street. Beyond that, there's too much good food and too many fun things to do in Chicago to even recommend here.
We went back to Detroit in 2011, and I don't really have anything to add except it was cool to see Nicklas Lidstrom play in Detroit in his final season. Those are the little kinds of cool experiences you have at the time without even realizing it. Later, it becomes maybe the only thing I remember about that game.
We just moved our little family to Los Angeles this month. No, I'm not becoming a Kings fan, although I did pick them to repeat and win the Cup again this year.
Anyway, we made it down to Anaheim this past weekend, which is what spurred to me to collect my thoughts on road games. The Jackets played the Ducks at the Honda Center. You know how it went.
The Honda Center was really nice, and the fans were great. The most ribbing you'll get is a comment like, "Have fun... but not too much fun." I like hockey fans.
Our one-year-old, Jack, didn't understand why we were the only ones in our section not cheering. He joined in on clapping once, and tried to mimic the "Let's Go Ducks!" chant from a few young kids in the seats in front of us. I'll work on that.
My wife ran into a Blue Jackets family who was making the whole West Coast trip, so they had just been in San Jose the night before. If you're reading this, shout out to you road warriors. We'll enjoy the sunshine for you.
California's beautiful. I don't have a bad thing to say about it. Yes, it took over two hours to drive to Anaheim. (It's not that far. And it only took one hour to get home when there was moderate to no traffic. Sick.) But if traffic is the worst part of being able to go to the beach or Hollywood or the mountains, and you literally never have to check the weather because it's perfect every day, then I'm ok with that. Now that the Blue Jackets should always keep playing Anaheim and Los Angeles in the same weekend just once a year, I'd highly recommend getting it on the calendar. Unless you plan on going to Disneyland though, you'll probably end up staying more near Los Angeles. Give yourself at least a few extra hours if you want to make it down and explore Anaheim before the game.
(If the Ducks win the Cup this season, I'll make sure to attend a "road game" in Columbus next year. And, sorry.)
I guess all this is to say, it's a heck of a lot of fun to go to road games. And it doesn't have to be expensive, either. I'll bet there's a pretty good chance you probably live within a few hours of an NHL team. We've made some of these trips, there and back, on a single tank of gas (we even drove to and from Nashville in the same day, although I do not recommend it) and we sat in the cheap seats. It's worth it for the experience and the memories. It's worth it to be one of a handful of fans cheering on your team on the road.
With Yelp and Foursquare, you don't really need my recommendations on where to stay or where to eat. The point of all this is that these are memories I'll have forever. Sometimes we get so caught up in the wins and losses and injury reports that we forget hockey's a game. The Blue Jackets, both the players on the team team and the organization as a whole, have provided me with life experiences that I'll share with Jack's kids one day. That's special.
So get out. Explore a new city. Cheer on the Jackets. Have fun. Make a few friends wearing the wrong color jerseys. And then share those good times so other people are encouraged to have those experiences, too. You all deserve it.
Enemy, Denis Villeneuve’s (Prisoners) latest film, leaves you with a lot to think about — whether you want to or not. It does something relatively simple throughout the film and does it without apology, taking the dread and tension of Prisoners to an unsettling extreme.
I’m purposely writing this without having read many reviews or theories, aside from David Ehrlich’s review of the film. This is the kind of film that makes you want to think, read, and talk about it, so these are my initial thoughts and scattershot ideas, with full acceptance that there may be deeper connections and theories that I’m not yet considering.
It’s not a perfect film, but I like the idea of a piece of work that leaves room for interpretation. A viewer can bring their own baggage into the analysis (for better or worse), and in turn, change the experience of thinking about Enemy.
The film can come across as pretentious, and shots and sequences go on for a good 10 seconds longer than you want. Maybe that’s intentional—to draw attention to the fact that you are watching this film and forced to think about what you are seeing, and not simply swept up in experiencing something.
Massive spoilers for Enemy below. Not only will it spoil the end of the film, it probably won’t make a bit of sense if you haven’t seen it.
Jake Gyllenhaal as Adam Bell, the history teacher, leads a monotonous, nearly miserable life. To escape from the monotony, he’s created a dream world in which he has everything—a very mildly successful career as an actor, a beautiful wife with a baby on the way, and an apartment to match.
But, as True Detective’s Rust Cohle puts it, “Like a lot of dreams, there’s a monster at the end of it.”
The spiders represent Adam’s biggest fear. Perhaps it’s the fear of being consumed into nothingness. The thought of just being one in a billion. Maybe it’s representative of buried guilt.
He lives out the monotony of his real life, not pushing back too much. Slowly, just like his life, his dreams have become overrun by his greatest fears. Then his dream world begins to fight back.
I think it’s important to reiterate that he’s created a dream world, not simply a fantasy version of himself, or that Anthony St. Claire, the actor, is a manifestation of a split personality disorder. And even in this dream world, he can’t escape his greatest fear.
The idea of a dream world explains a few things — first, the giant spider walking over Toronto. This shows that it, too, is not reality. Second, the scene with Adam and Helen (Sarah Gadon) outside of the school. She’s his illusion. Her call to Anthony, while played up for thematic tension, is meaningless. It’s two whispers of a thought trying to connect.
His subconscious dream world, led by Anthony, rebels from the thought of his fears bleeding into his dreams. In its revolt, his subconscious destroys the only real thing he has—Mary (Mélanie Laurent), who he’s long since grown distant from, preferring the slightly more perfect dream version of his relationship.
Finally, Adam chooses the dream world, letting Anthony get his way, but he only realizes this at the very end, when he sees the spider.
And maybe his look at the end, rather than jolting awake, is his acceptance of not waking up and returning to reality.
I hate spiders.
I'm proud to announce I've been selected as a Platinum Award Winner by the AVA Digital Awards for Creativity in Video Production as Director of Portrait.
I consider myself very lucky to be able to share stories of wonderful people like Andria and Cory, stories that reach and inspire tens of thousands of people. It wouldn't have been possible without the support of my wonderful Kickstarter backers, my wife, my mom, and my partner in crime in producing the project, Zach Frankart.
Portrait was a passion project from the beginning, and I'm happy I was able to share that passion with you.
AVA Digital recognizes outstanding achievement by creative professionals involved in the concept, direction, design and production of media that is part of the evolution of digital communication.
AVA Digital Awards is sponsored and judged by the Association of Marketing and Communication Professionals (AMCP). The international organization consists of several thousand production, marketing, communication, advertising, public relations, and freelance professionals. AMCP administers recognition programs; provides judges and rewards outstanding achievement and service to the profession. As part of its mission, AMCP fosters and supports the efforts of creative professionals who contribute their unique talents to public service and charitable organizations.
Judges are industry professionals who look for companies and individuals whose talent exceeds a high standard of excellence and whose work serves as a benchmark for the industry.
The Platinum Award is the organization's top honor.
