A new partnership.

Waiting For Superman [by Jr.canest]

Dare to say, then say twice:
Afterthoughts of conversations Joshua Rizer.

I wrote the text below following a conversation with Joshua Rizer. We discussed ways to improve his video feature in the Itzu Sketchbook Series. The thoughts are germane as concerns about dumb luck and deliberate choice saturate my subconscious at this time in my life. As a result, I feel compelled to perform arduous re-edits on the Sean Kelley, Hannah Hurrle and Ryan Haralson artist interview videos. I choose to publish these thoughts because in many ways, they reflect the core mission of this project. It hints at the immense potential for the video series to be a springboard for future talks about things that, in my opinion, really matter.

This isn’t a matter of bashing individuals with malicious intent. But by exposing some individual artists who are the sources of Rizer’s disagreements, the Kansas City arts community should be affected by the production in a way such that we can reasonably expect whole-hearted responses from them. The point is not to make others feel bad. My understanding of it all is that if an artist has stayed in the business long enough to be considered as a topic for discourse on the type of art they purport to create, then they likely have stood on the firing line before, defending their manifestations, and have developed thick skins in so doing. It is also my assumption that, in the art world, criticism is expected as it is welcomed. It is important too that these video documentaries communicate serious critical statements about the state of things in the art community today, and what’s on people’s minds. It is unclear whether such critical statements can be achieved without identifying definitive points of reference on a local scale to which our audience can relate. There are potential political ramifications and we could get ourselves into irreversible trouble.

Standard Artists Agency Launch Presented by vitaminwater zero

Standard Style is to launch their new Artists Agency tonight at OfficePort KC. To pull a quote from the facebook event page, I gather that the fledgling program seeks to “represent the best of Kansas City’s artists for commercial, editorial, advertising, and fashion work.” Sounds a lot like RVCA’s artist program, although Standard Style’s Artist Agency concept seems to have a more clearly defined intention.

Tonight’s event features music by The Oxfords, and is sponsored by vitaminwater zero, OfficePort, StagePort, Clear 10 Vodka, and Ink magazine.

8 p.m. – 1 a.m.

Admission is FREE.

Art Opening Tonight: Labors of Geniusness

Tonight kicks-off what is allegedly a holiday weekend. As an entrepreneur, I personally don’t get the pleasure of recieving memos from the front desk attendant, reporting the impending three-day weekend, typed in comic sans, decorated with low res clip art. Such thoughtful memo designs would be rendered utterly meaningless, though, if one were to find themselves absent from Zac Eubank’s latest art opening, entitled “Labors of Geniusness.”
6-11 p.m. The Slap And Tickle Gallery.

Nike Music Shoe

Stumbled across this video during a non-specific Interweb commute. We likey.

Dare I say, ‘progress in all areas…’

After two weeks of Luminopolis coding, we presented the v4 Studio 33 website to the client team at Nelson-Atkins. Hicks’ video features for the American Indian Galleries have been approved. And on Sunday, we ran a second artist interview of Joshua Rizer for a Sketchbook Series feature. Eubank’s lens was precise as ever.

We now are jumping right into shooting a Pre-Visit video for the Nelson crew. Thursday is a full day of playing the proverbial “fly on the wall” as we film in full HD the components of a field trip to the Nelson. Our task is to create a video that shows school teachers and students how their museum field trip would look and feel. I’m particularly interested in showing the value of social objects as educational tools, and the variety of them found at the museum.

The schedule remains full. I am perpetually awestruck with the Team’s ability to combine technical specialty with creative wit, and the quality media pieces that result.

Sending Overdue Thanks

Itzu would like to say thanks Moving Brands in the UK. Having developed many websites for clients using Wordpress as the CMS, we know the amount of hard work and time that goes into the development of a custom WP theme. And that the development team generously provided the unhooked code proved to be a powerful convenience for a small company working on a $0 internal budget.

Three Weeks in Postproduction, Impressive Results.

Much of the last three weeks was spent wrapping up postproduction on the Nelson-Atkins visitor interviews.  In total we interviewed 60 visitors in 30 GB of beautiful 1080 HD footage.  Editor and motion designer John Paul Giago has been magical with his cutting skills, resulting in a crisp video that “totally impressed” our client-side producer Emily Black.  Giago also spent time upgrading the video bookend from 720 to 1080, which was surprisingly a lot of work, as the Oldenberg Shuttlecock graphics had to be re-rendered in the 3D environment (pictured).   Big shouts to everyone on the project.