Sometimes Mistakes Make Art

Posted on March 27, 2012 by C. Patrick

[Note: this essay originally appeared on the Creative Wandererwebsite]

Recently, I’ve begun experimenting with HDR photography. In HDR (High Dynamic Range) photography, you take several different exposures of a subject (a tripod is essential for this part) and then you merge them together in post production using a program like Photomatix (which has a good inexpensive version and thus is the one that I like). The program merges the images (up to five different exposures in the case of Photomatix), creating a layering of light and shadow and color that can’t be obtained through normal photographic techniques. There’s additional playing around you can do at that point, too — different effects that can be experimented with; different settings that can be tweaked.

However, sometimes the program glitches. This happened to me yesterday. I got a picture I’d taken in Missouri wine country just about right, so that it looked like Image 1.

HDR shot of the winery road as it was supposed to look

This is how the HDR shot was supposed to come out.

Pretty good. Very dramatic. So I saved it. But what I saved came out looking like Image 2.

This is what my HDR program did to the picture.

This is how the picture ended up coming out the other side of the HDR program's mixmaster.

A much different effect, but, in fact, one that I like considerably better. It has a haunted, Van Gogh-like feel to it that is very evocative of October days and Halloween moods.

Now all I have to do is figure out how to replicate that skewing in the future so that I can do it on purpose. Or, maybe, this is just a one-of-a-kind success by way of a mistake. In this way, it almost becomes ‘found’ art: art that wasn’t meant to be ‘artistic’ but rather utilitarian, like warning signs in subway stations that become poetry when the lines are re-arranged to appear more ‘poetic’, or the chance juxtaposition of a billboard and something going on below it that is either ironic or apt (Image 3).

Life After Meth

In this 'found art' image, the billboard above the partiers creates an ironic juxtaposition, implying that 'Life After Meth' can be just as strange.

In either case, don’t be too upset when your photography program messes up your work, or when you spill a jar of paint on a nearly-completed canvas, or when the characters in a story you’re writing seem to refuse to do what you want them to do. Go with it. See what happens. It might turn out to be art.

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Resolution

Posted on December 26, 2011 by C. Patrick

New Year’s is coming up but I’m not going to make any resolutions this time. No, you see, I’m tired of doing all the work. Every New Year’s is the same: it’s up to me to be healthier, to get more creative work done, to meet various goals in my professional and personal life.

Nope. Not going to do it this year.

Instead, I’m going to make a demand of everyone else. It’s about time that the world steps up and does something to make itself a better place. So here’s the resolution I want the planet to make:

Stop being mean to one another.

See? Not so hard.

That's just mean. Or possibly it's something I saw on the SyFy channel. Not sure which.

Don't be mean

Sure, that guy over in cubicle 19-b may have horrible breath and a penchant for using your stapler without permission, but that’s no reason not to be nice to him. He’s got it bad enough, what with working in a cubicle and having chronic halitosis. Go ahead and let him use the stapler; it’s not that big of a deal.

And sure, I know that traffic can get those angry juices flowing, make you want to pound on the steering wheel, yell out the window, and lay on the horn. But honking isn’t going to get the light to change. Yelling isn’t going to do anything but make someone else mad. And pounding on, well, anything at all isn’t going to do a bit of good. Plus, you’re most likely going to tear up your hand and/or car.

Oh, and if you’re young enough to still be in high school? Guess what? Being cruel to any of your fellow students may get you a few laughs from your clique, but in the end (ie: your twenties), your peers won’t remember that you were on the yearbook staff, were the quarterback, were whatever; they’ll remember that you were an mean-spirited person. I know this is true because I’ve watched several movies and After School specials on this subject. In these, it’s the good-hearted people who always get the bestest boyfriend/girlfriend/vampire. The cruel students have houses dropped on their heads or, worse, end up old, alone, and with blotchy skin.

And finally, I don’t care what religion or philosophical philosophy you follow, if your holy book or spirit guide or manifesto or cow entrails is telling you to be mean to someone else for any reason whatsoever, then you’re reading it wrong. Ditch it and page through some Dr. Seuss, instead.

Get it through your heads that regardless what any given person’s nationality, sexual preference, race, or eating habits are (especially in the case of zombies in this latter instance), you trying to change them is likely to fail and certainly isn’t going to do a whit to make you a better person (and in the case of zombies will just get you eaten). Being someone who is preachy, judgmental, and–darn it–mean, isn’t going to make the world a more pleasant place to live in for everyone.

Here’s how it works. If you have power, be it money, influence, good looks, or the ability to fire laser beams from your eyes, don’t abuse it. Using your power (especially the laser beam one) in ways that benefit you but hurt others may sound good, but it doesn’t work, even if you do find yourself wallowing in a pile of cash for a few days or possibly weeks. Eventually you’ll wind up in jail. Or you’ll annoy the wrong person and find yourself scrounging for scraps in a dumpster somewhere, fighting with a mangy stray cat named Rollow over a greasy McDonald’s Happy Meal lid (trust me on this one). Or your nemesis will realize that your superpowers can be negated by the swift application of either kryptonite or a year-old fruitcake and you’ll be wide open to being kicked harshly in very sensitive areas of your anatomy.

If everyone were nice to one or even two more people a day then they are normally nice to, pretty soon the whole world would be being nice to one another.

So there’s that.

Hmm, I have some space left. Alright, while we’re on the subject of resolutions, I have one more thing I’d like to bring to the attention of certain people in the world–particularly the broadcasting world.

Once upon a time, I could turn on the television and go to the History Channel and learn about history (true, it was mostly history about World War II, but still, history), I could turn to Discovery and learn about science (“Science!”), I could go to TLC (The Learning Channel) and learn about, um, stuff. Heck, I could even flip over to the SciFi channel and watch science fiction.

Now, although there’s nothing inherently wrong with ‘reality’ shows that follow sleazy pawn shop owners as they buy up forfeited storage lockers, it’s not exactly what I think of when I think of A&E (Arts & Entertainment). And the World Wrestling Federation, although it could possibly be argued (just saying ‘possibly’ here, people) that it’s fiction, it’s not ‘science’ fiction and doesn’t belong on Syfy. There’s a difference.

If you’re going to have a themed cable network, then stick to your theme. It’s not that hard.

Those are the resolutions I’m asking of everyone else. Please stick to them. We’ll all be happier for it.

Now I’m going to go bake some cookies, because that’ll make the world a better place, too.

Have a very happy new year!

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The Zombie Occupation

Posted on November 18, 2011 by C. Patrick

I’ve written about the coming zombiepocalypse before in these pages. If you missed it here, then you’ve probably seen something about it on television or at the movies. There are so many TV shows and movies about zombies that it’s hard not to think that the walking dead are going to overwhelm our cities, suburbs, towns, farmsteads, and campsites at any moment.

Hollywood, in their wisdom, has been preparing us for the zombiepocalypse for years. And it’s paid off, because the z-poc is now!

What, you haven’t seen the supernaturally-reanimated traipsing around your local shopping arcade and/or Farmer’s Market? Well, true. No comets appeared in the sky shedding strange cosmic dust to reanimate the recently deceased. No secret government mad science experiments have gotten into the wrong hands (not that we know of anyway). No aliens have hovered above our cemeteries, raising armies of the dead to use in world conquest. And, as far as I know, no Nazi zombies are currently harassing any ski bunnies on the slopes in Colorado, Switzerland, or elsewhere (zombie Nazis + snow + snow bunnies = the movie “Dead Snow”).

Yet the zombiepocalypse is upon us anyway, in the form of the Occupy Movement.

This is a comparison pic. Hmmm, does anyone read this alternate text? Ever?

Left: An Occupier occupying St. Louis; Right: A zombie.

Now, just wait a minute. I don’t mean what you think I mean. For those of you nodding your heads and saying, “Yeah, bunch ‘o hippie zombies, that’s what those no-goods are!”, no, I don’t mean that. And for those of you saying, “How dare you compare those agents of change, those crusaders of righteousness, to mindless, shambling zombies,” that’s not what I mean, either.

From Hollywood, independent filmmakers (especially here in Springfield, the Middle West, which I firmly believe is the independent films about zombie capitol of the US), books, comics, comics-made-into-TV-series, and History Channel documentaries, we know a great deal about zombies. From Fox News, CNN, and other media coverage, we don’t know quite as much about the Occupiers, other than that they carry signs, like tents, and are fond of math, but if we scour the intertubewebs, the newspapers, and our Twitter feeds, we can still put together a more-or-less comprehensive composite.

So let’s take a look for a moment at the Zombie and the Occupiers and see if we can find a convergence.

The greatest single defining trait of zombies is not that they are dead. That’s a misconception. There are a number of movies (“28 Days Later” and, erm, some others) wherein the zombies aren’t reanimated corpses, but rather people driven to a rage by some form of external influence (Oh! “The Crazies” — that’s another one). No, the single defining trait of zombies is that they want to eat brains. Not cow brains, which is a dish called sauteed cerveaux in French and can therefore be found at the more upscale French restaurants and other like-minded places where you won’t find me. No, zombies want fresh human brains.

Well, apparently so do the Occupiers. They claim to want people to think about the system — how it works; how it fails — and figure out how to fix the parts that are failing. They also want the people who are part of the overclass to rethink how the failures of the process affect the populace at large. So, okay, maybe the Occupiers don’t want to actually eat brains, but they do want to possess other people’s brains and get them to think differently about, y’know, stuff.

Hmm, speaking of rage induced by some form of external influence, I’d say we can call that a match, too (the banking system, anyone?).

Zombies infect those they come in contact with, thereby increasing their numbers exponentially. As for the Occupiers, well, they started out occupying Wall Street. Then their ideas began to spread (infected, depending on your world-view) others around the country. Soon enough there was Occupy San Francisco, Occupy St. Louis, Occupy This and Occupy That. At this rate, it can’t be long before there’s an Occupy Fargo and an Occupy the Grand Canyon. Occupiers everywhere.

Zombies are considered mindless (even though the only way to kill them is by destroying their brains–which seems a bit ironic). Listen to any Conservative talk show outlet for very long and you’ll find that there are certainly those out there who consider the Occupiers to be ‘mindless’ as well (although I believe “idiots” is the term actually used). But, beyond that, one of the primary indictments of the Occupy Movement is that it doesn’t seem to have a plan, other than a vague “We need to effect change” kinda plan. Without a plan, the Occupiers can easily be seen as a (zombie) horde, mindlessly seeking destruction without consideration for what needs to be erected in the face of that anarchy.

So the zombiepocalypse has arrived; it just isn’t exactly what we were expecting. After all, if I saw some of those George Romero zombies shambling toward me, I’d know for sure I needed to run away from them rather than sit down and have a chat over some tea or Starbuck’s coffee.

Oh, by the way, let’s be clear here: I’m not advocating that you go out and hit an Occupier over the head with a spiked baseball bat.

But if you see a zombie Nazi in the snow? Go for it.

[Some people claim that the author became zombiefied many years ago. Despite this, he can be contacted via the Comments section, below or you can follow his Twitter feed @parablehead]

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