The Big Picture

Here are some more photos of our film shoot this weekend. Our friends are amazing. They gave us a whole Saturday to help shoot this scene. We couldn't pay them, but did feed them Pizza and Sushi.

The Baron

This is the Baron! The Baron is a model at the Art School where I work. I work for the Illustration department, so our models usually wear costumes. If a teacher tells a model to go to the costume room and be a gladiator, they usually come back wearing plastic armor and a plastic sword. If you tell the Baron this, he comes in with his own costume that is metal and weighs, well a lot. He then proceeds to tell you a story about where this sword came from and that he is really a Prince. Are they "Large" stories? Who cares, the Baron entertains.

We have made many films now with the Baron. He has a great face. Today we started shooting our next short and the Baron is playing GOD.

Karaoke Kings!

My best friend from high school Kelly was recently in town on his honeymoon with Anna. We rented out a Private Karaoke room in Japantown and had a Concert of epic proportions!

Nenad's Art Opening

I know two people from Serbia. This guy is Nenad. He is the tall one in the photograph. Nenad is a work scholar at the school where I work. I'm his boss! He makes us call him Nenade (Nen-nah-day) because he says it makes him sound more important. Nenade is funny. He is going home soon. I have been glad to know him, but he is always late for work and I have to yell and curse at him frequently. With his Serbian accent he always says, "Dax, I must tell you." He then proceeds to give this amazing excuse. The other Serbian I know was always late too! Hmmmm.

Nenede is a painter. Last night he had an art opening in the Mission. He takes frames from actual movies and paints them. The changes are subtle but his concepts are deep! He is currently working on a series that will be amazing. It will be twelve frames of a finger pulling a trigger. How many frames does it take to kill someone? Deep!

CurlyHairedPeople Beginnings

A few years ago during my senior year as a sculpture student, I decided to make a movie with found objects for my final project. Bowling pins to be exact. The whole short film was me chasing them around the city trying to knock them down.

This is when I met Alessandro Squitti. He is straight out of Rome! I had been taking an Italian class for one of my LA classes and tried to speak Italian to him every time I saw him in the halls. For a while, he just looked at me like I was weird. But we quickly became friends.

I am second generation Italian. My grandparents came over on the boat. Aldo Santi and Joseph Giordano were friends, so my mother and father actually grew up together being in the two familys. The picture above is my father giving my mother his cub-scout ring! My grandfather was picked on for having an accent. Instead of becoming a gangster and shooting them, he decided that he was now an american and vowed to make his family as american as he could. So I just speak English.

Alex was into making movies and is actually a Jedi when it comes to computers. He helped me edit my film. We started talking about making another and CurlyHairedPeople Productions was born. The lighting in our first short is very bad, in fact we didn't even use "movie lights" but we had lots of fun. It can be seen at www.curlyhairedpeople.com. It is called Metallica Toothpaste. We shot it in the women's restroom where we work. While we were shooting the cleaning lady walking in on us. She still looks at me funny.

Nico Speaks!

Here is a picture of my brother Dion and my nephew Nico. Nico has just started speaking. He has a toy frog. Thing is he calls it his fuckie. He can also say clock, but Dion tells me he leaves off the L. So we still have a few kinks to work out but welcome to the world of language Nico.

Office Paper

I currently owe Sallie Mae so much in students loans that I'm embarrassed to say how many commas she uses when she sends me my statements.

So that leads to this post.  Since I graduated from college and while I wait for the fame and fortune that comes with an art degree, I've had to get an office job.  I've tried to massage those muscles on that side of the brain, but they are suffering from atrophy.  For instance, I had to spell check atrophy. I mean thats a big word like gymnasium and mayonnaise.  (here is how I spell gymnayzium without spell checker and I still don't believe mayo has two "n"s in it.)

 I sit at a computer all day. The only art I get to do for the day is paint a smile on my face.  Today its Picasso. It's not that bad, just trying to add some dramatic effect.  I actually work with some great people, and they are all artists too, trying to figure out how to fix the paper jam. 

So these two images show how my enviornment (fuck it, I'm not spell checking enviornment!) is affecting me. There is paper everywhere in my office. On the walls, under me, in front of me, behind me, in the recycling bin, in the trash bin cause sometimes I don't recycle, just to be an office rebel. Maybe that paper belongs in the regular trash!

I have one question for you.  Since you are reading this, does that mean I am blogging you right now?