[open workflow]

epic downtime

2008-07-04T11:44:00.002-05:00

Hey folks (anyone who's still checking or subscribed that is)!

So I started working massive overtime and then my computer broke, and then I was too poor and tired to post blog entries. I've gotten a couple of weekends where I'm actually off work now, and hopefully soon I can get a new computer!

I'll want to overhaul the look of this space, and I'll be getting right back into posting music, and start catching up on film work. Also since I last posted, I've fallen into some actual paying graphic design work, some for a very interesting venture I'll talk more about when it launches, and some for a surprisingly dope local techno label called Klectic, which is run by a friend from work and his crew. More on that soon.

Peace
EKUNDAYO

its up!

2008-04-25T11:22:00.002-05:00

http://www.tmupictures.com/subject.html

What I did: everything you hear aside from the music.

[N'Gai Coral is my ****ing hero.]

2008-04-10T23:40:00.006-05:00

Real Talk arrives late to internet discourse on Race in Video Games! Film at 11!

MTV Multiplayer, the music network's video game focused blog, has been running a series on "Black Professionals in Games", kicking off with a fantastic interview with Newsweek's N'Gai Coral. GO READ IT.

It's a belated return to the all to quickly ignored controversy sparked by Capcom's Resident Evil 5 trailer which premiered this past summer. It showcased upcoming sequel's setting the Caribbean, and portrayed the white protagonist killing black zombies, which was originally commented on by many game news blogs, and then these posts where drowned comments full of the usual defensive rhetoric downplaying the significance of racial aspect of the trailer, calling "political correctness" fouls on the bloggers who drew attention to it, questioning weather racism is that big of a deal anymore, ad (literally) nauseum. I'm even nauseated just a bit by thinking about it again.

N'Gai is able to articulate exactly how this is all problematic, and in a very short space gives a clear, reasonable, and very balanced take on it. Yes, its just the trailer, and we don't know how the actual game will handle these images, but none the less, given the depth of the history involved, the way in which the trailer presents these images is irresponsible, and calls attention to the serious need for deeper understanding and engagement with this societies problems with race.

“It’s like when you engage that kind of imagery you have to be careful with it. It would be like saying you were going to do some sort of zombie movie that appeared to be set in Europe in the 1940’s with skinny, emaciated, Hasidic-looking people. If you put up that imagery people would be saying, ‘Are you crazy?’ Well, that’s what this stuff looks like. This imagery has a history. It has a history and you can’t pretend otherwise. That imagery still has a history that has to be engaged, that has to be understood. … If you’re going to engage imagery that has that potential, the onus is on the creator to be aware of that because there will be repercussions in the marketplace.”

OF COURSE - this fantastic article is itself a blog post, and quickly draws the exact same swarm of very carefully argued and even-toned comments that muted the impact of the original story. They calmly tell N'Gai he's overreacting. That's when my man draws his sword:

...As to your opinions on political correctness, and over-sensitivity, I’ll leave you to them. However, I will say that I find it interesting that in your world view, what’s required in order for us all to get along–to avoid “engender[ing] more resentment–is that I refrain from expressing my opinion in case you or others might consider it a “little trivial thing.” Or that I should somehow substitute your opinion of what are “egregious instances of racism or bigotry” for my own. That’s not going to happen. Ever.
Cheers,

N’Gai

Yeah! YEAAAH!

It's hard to think of a more cathartic blog reading moment, I can't even tell you.

I stopped reading the comments after that point, cause I'm sure the trolls will always have their last words. If you're still arguing with him after that, the hopes of a real discussion taking place will probably have to be deferred for a time.

The entire series on Black Professionals in Games is proving to be very interesting, and is definitely worth keeping an eye on all week. One post, an interview with "Tomb Raider" producer Morgan Gray, who is mixed, is lots of fun to read for his take on how the faceless, voiceless main character in many games is only an effective proxy for white male players. He also uses a fantastic phrase which nails the uniquely modern form of this disease that has sickened our culture for so long, the one I grew up surrounded in, the one I see online and at work and in public, which has touched literally everyone my age and younger more times than we can count: "Casual Racism"

It goes to the heart of what's really insidious about this new racism. It's not cross-burning, its not hate crime racism. It's the subtle, self propagating, the things we hear and don't react to as strongly as we used to, the jokes we're ok with we guess, the movies we don't question quite hard enough, the nightly news stories we've been trained to expect, the ways we have of closing our eyes to our own thoughts and actions when we should instead be examining them. Casual Racism.

Enough talk!
Anyone who read this far, thanks, and good luck. We all need it.

[ekundayo]

Still Living

2008-04-08T23:13:00.002-05:00

I've been buried in work.

It only looks like it'll get worse - I was just asked in a voice mail, apparently without irony or hyperbole, to work "every day next month". Like as in all of them. We'll see.

Anyway, Subject is finished! At least for me. We did a final mix a couple weeks back. And I'm pleased to announce that it features the voice talents of the... what's the word I'm looking for? The Stupendous Ms. Emily Price, actress, singer, and world - class fire dispatch lady impersonator. You can see her currently at the Chicago Lyric Opera, supplementing the Chorus. Thank God. It needed some supplementing.

Anyway, It we had hoped Subject could hit the inter-webs last week, but some minor delays have prevented that for now. Very soon though, you'll get to see what I believe is my best sound design work to date, and quite a rattling little action/sci fi film, too. I'll post a link as soon as I can!

Other stuff is forthcoming. I was going to switch up the design here a day or two ago, but Blogger was coughing up error messages at me, and I didn't feel like getting into a fight with it. Some day soon, as a random-out-of-the-blue-dropped-in-my-lap-by-the-Allmighty graphic design project I'm working on is re-energizing the visual side of my brain like crazy. Thats a very exciting thing and I'll post info on that as soon as it's ripened to the point where it can be talked about and shown.

Yeah!

[ekundayo]

theme for the new year

2008-03-24T21:19:00.004-05:00

my idea with this open workflow concept was to show the "in" side as well as "out"... my moods and directions, thoughts, art of any kind that sucks me in or lifts me up, and in this case, tracks that come along and capture what I'm feeling in a moment better than anything I've learned to make myself...

oh. its really long by the way. hit up the first minute and a half if you're in a hurry, you'll get the idea.

Animal Collective - "Fireworks"

this is me right now...
punchy, crazy, loud, hopeful, a little angry, a little desperate, a little euphoric, running in some circles, eating up some time... but going in the right directions, buzzing with some kind of energy, just sick enough of the past to maybe find the future.

[construction]

2008-03-20T15:33:00.002-05:00

I'm messing with templates and new layouts, but since it turns out blogger's web based system is kinda wack, you'll probably see a lot of crap moving around or getting ugly until I figure it all out. I'm looking for something good and minimal that I can modify easily... something that feels a little more welcoming and vibrant than what I've got now, yet still not loud or crazy enough to distract from the actual posts.

I'm also moving towards translating my visual style (see flickr sidebar) into motion. This means 3D, so I'm trying to teach myself to use Blender which is, as it claims, free, open source, flexible, and powerful, but not precisely what I'd call "intuitive".

Also, I'm swamped and exhausted, so this is all going to take a while.

The good news is we're perhaps a week from finishing both Subject and Budd, both mentioned in my Project Roundup post, so hopefully I can post links or the actual videos here very soon.

[ekundayo]

[new beat]

2008-03-14T23:56:00.003-05:00

Ekundayo - my computer is fixed and I made this beat in 20 minutes

So, to give you a little insight into the naming process for this one, I think the main reason I decided to call it "my computer is fixed and I made this beat in 20 minutes" was because my computer is fixed and I made it (this beat) in 20 minutes. I think that's the best way of describing it. Oh, by the way, the second half is much better, so don't turn it off until then. Really.

[ekundayo]

Noise? Why thats just old Titanium!

2008-03-12T21:00:00.004-05:00

So my present, old, downtrodden, slow, sleepy powerbook is being looked over by a team of the finest that the greater Skokie, Ill area has to offer, or at least the ones that happen to be on shift and have decided to work at the apple store, because, hey, its better than best buy right?

It's been since friday that I've been waiting to find out if they fix the problem for free under Apple Care, or give it back to me unfixed and charge me a $75 "Slap in the face" fee for wasting their time. Really. Thats how it works.

So since then I've been working on my previous, older, more downtrodden, slower, sleepier powerbook, from the now vintage "Titanium" generation. The first of Apple's powerbooks to run on the G4 chipset, this little baby clocks in at a blazing 800 mhz. It's cooled by an advanced forced air system which utilizes a variable high speed fan to create buffeting waves of sound that deafen the user. Any heat not dissipated by this primary system (usually about 99%) is vented out of the motherboard, into the surrounding titanium construction of the outer case, and into the users thighs. This watery organic mass can absorb a surprising amount of thermal energy, but of course everything has its limits, so this secondary cooling system is assisted by a safety feature in which, when the computer has reaches a certain temperature from prolonged use, the operating system freezes, forcing the user to force shut down, deactivating the heat source.

While this sleak, minimalist icon of industrial design can run up to two (2) modern script and flash based websites simultaneously, and perform a host of high powered word processing tasks, its abilities stop short of actually running any of my music and sound programs. Though it can run a few of the visual art applications I use in slow motion, I just haven't had the heart to ask it to do that. It needs its rest.

So until these guys actually call me, I'm going crazy with beat ideas and a backlog of sound work is piling up. If this continues much longer, I'll be writing about the near constant stream of media I consume, letting you all in on music, shows, art, & etc that has been blowing my mind lately.

[imagine one of those classic "Hang In There" posters with a kitten in some kind of comical predicament here]

[ekundayo]

imagine the nightmares

2008-03-05T13:26:00.007-06:00

As some of you are aware, The Fast sometimes means going to bed after eating pre-sunrise breakfast. This often means bizarre dreams. The one I woke up from just a while ago featured but was not limited to:

• A huge conference of some kind in a dream version of Paris.
• An attractive, fun young woman everyone was extra nice to now that she had suffered some kind of brain trauma that made her spacial perception go all weird. She had a hard time understanding where she was, but was trying to make the best of it.
• Plans to go out to some trendy lounge on the last night of the conference with this woman who was totally not my type.
• Those plans being dashed at the 11th hour by a bizarre series of events in which a groundhog urinated on me and was quickly chased off by Lev, and then while he was busy fending off the groundhog, I was rushed by a skunk. The skunk got me, but it was some kind of stun spray that didn't smell, but left me immobile for a few seconds. Nonetheless, clothes ruined. My date for the night was understanding, and we talked about how I probably wouldn't have gotten into the club, anyway, as the clothes, even before being ruined, where simply not expensive enough.
• The realization that while post - skunk incident, this young woman was Persian, the dream had changed, and when we originally made the plans to go out she was some kind of Fairy Royalty (the old school kind of Fairy, not the Disney kind), and was far more self possessed and fascinating as a character...*
• A screening of a film I was working on.
• A huge conference hall where I chose to sit with my parents instead of my friends.
• A short, mostly harmless conversation that I've been pondering the meaning of for a few hours now.

When I woke up, the very same Lev happened to call in real life from some kind of technology conference in Boston to tell me about a machine which holds a book, flips pages with its little mechanical arms, and scans each page into digital form with creepy/adorable quickness and precision. A whole bunch of them where running at once. He said it looked like a Bjork video. Briefly checking to see if I was still dreaming, I thanked him for having my back with the Groundhog thing, and told him not to blame himself for letting the skunk get past him. It was for the better, in the end.

[ekundayo]

*Clarification - this is not to imply that Persians are not fascinating, but that this particular dream character was, in the second part of the dream, an average and mild mannered young woman who happened to be Persian, whereas in earlier parts of the dream I recall her as being imbued with concealed supernatural power and a subtly regal bearing which made her magnetic and a bit scary. My dreams make random switches like that all the time, which leads me to believe that my brain's writers are a bit overworked and have nobody checking continuity for them.

continued workflow - the variations process

2008-03-03T22:02:00.007-06:00

Ok, I know most of you haven't even read/listened to last night's post, so you should do that first.

I did that second one in last nights post in about 15 minutes, and now I've decided I don't like it enough. So I just banged out two more variations with the same instruments. I don't think I'll use ether of these as the final version, but hopefully it gives the picture of how I keep working tracks until they feel right...

Ekundayo - like we used to be (version 2)

Ekundayo - like we used to be (version 3)

I think version 2 is probably closer to what I'm going for, but I like the drum style of version 3. I'll probably refine 2 for a while, and make a completely new beat with the version 3 drums, maybe with some samples, something more rugged.

It's gonna be a crazy week for me, with The Fast starting up and litteraly twice the amount of working days for that lighting company as I usually have in a week. Also, I hear my boy Kiser is in town. So I may not be getting any more posts up, but I feel like trying, now that I've bitten the bullet and, you know, actually [opened] the aforementioned [workflow]. Wish me luck!

[ekundayo]

Actual Workflow! - Beat Tape Vol. 2 Previews

2008-03-02T23:19:00.010-06:00

I'm a little embarrassed it took me this long to start making this blog live up to its name, but... NEWNESS:

Ekundayo - puzzle (draft)

Ekundayo - like we used to be (draft)

I wanted to get Beat Tape Vol. 1 up here first, but I'm having a delay - heavy couple of weeks. Constant work, my computer and pro tools gear breaking, perpetual lack of sleep, money, a steady normal person job, etc.

SO SCREW IT - above are two working versions of beats that are going in my next volume of new stuff that will go out to everyone I work with. They're rough, but I think they show where I'm going. I might throw up more, but I'm holding the secret weapons in reserve till the final release - like the fiery second half of "puzzle", a few wacky remixes, some funny samples, short & sweet beats, everything that makes instrumental hip hop work without the MC.

Don't worry - Vol 1. is still going up some time soon. I played it for some friends over the weekend - even though 6 months is a long time in the evolution of anyone's style, I think I still feel pretty good about those beats. Stay tuned!

[ekundayo]

Quick Update

2008-02-21T08:25:00.006-06:00

Gooooood Morning -

I've started to receive comment love from the peoples, thanks very much erryone...
I've also been granted a shout at the ever unstoppable Andropolis.org, so no doubt his massive fan base will be stampeding in here any second to find out what the fuss is about. Details on the fuss are forthcoming!

I've been working in event lighting again, putting up things like this and this. It's a job I fell into when I first moved to Chicago... friends from this period will remember what my schedule was like when I was doing this before, but lets run through it again for those of you just joining us:

• Scheduler guy calls and says "Can you work on (day x) at (venue y) at (time of day n_early) and come back for the takedown at (time of night n_ungodly)?" Let T = the time they say it will take.

• I say "Sure"

• I show up at y on x at n_early, and we work on setting up for the event until T+4 hours (+ or - a 2 hour luck factor).

• I come back to y at n_ungodly and take it all back down again till T + ∞.

• I get paid for my trouble.

So, hence the lack of actual content on this now more than a week old blog. It's actualy pretty cool - I'll take some pictures from jobsites when I can.

Coming up when I get the chance to breathe: the visual side of the project rundown, all my old art from the LJ posted as a flickr set and tossed in a nifty sidebox, and that beat tape just as soon as I figure out how to work an XPSF flash player. Or maybe I'll cop out and put it on imeem. Ether way. Technical people who know more than me are invited to comment with advice! Thanks!

[-ekundayo]

[Project Roundup - SOUNDS]

2008-02-17T13:39:00.006-06:00

Ok. Time to start this thing for real.
Here's a rundown of all the projects I'm working on, which will be represented in the coming month or two here in the workflow. This post is for projects you'll be hearing. Check back soon for things you'll be seeing.

[Sound For Film]

"Subject"
What it is:
A short film my crew has been working on for over a year now. It follows a fireman who is taken from the scene of a suspicious accident by forces unknown.
What I'm doing:
Full sound design and mixing for the entire short, cut together from heavily edited and modified sounds from various sound effects libraries, as well as some I recorded and/or synthesized myself. In short: everything you hear but the music.
Why it'll be awesome:
Really impressive production values for a micro-budget student project; fantastic cinematography, tight, highly focused editing, great production design, and the talents of Mr. John Turk as The Fireman.
When? Where? I'm all but finished with my work - we're just waiting on some digital special effects and compositing to get done so I can give it a final layer of polish. You'll see it linked here, and probably in its full lenght at the TMUPictures website.

"Budd"
What it is:
A mockup commercial featuring a giant robot designed to guard a beer warehouse.
What I'm doing:
Lots of robot sounds!
Why it'll be awesome:
Giant Robot!
When? Where?
Again, at the TMUPictures website.

[Music]

"Ekundayo Beat Tape Vol. 2: Hot Winter Jams" (tentative tittle)
What it is:
Some of you may remember this summer I released, to an email list of my musical collaborators and close friends, a 17-track, 25 minute mix of new beats - a way for me to show everybody some of the new styles I was developing, spark of some new projects, but mostly for me to really just put something together, long form, for the first time. My first mini-album, which was supposed to stand as a collection and not just individual tracks. I'm going to try to find a way to put this up on the site in some kind of flash-player form for all of you who didn't get in on the email...
6 months or so later, Vol 2 is shaping up.
What I'm doing:
Following the format I set in Vol 1.: Lots of beats in a short amount of time, a handful of my bootleg remixes of tracks by Mos Def, Nas, and others, and decent amount of sample-free tracks (more sustainable!). What's new will be a better understanding of mixing and other technical stuff, and 6 months of new life, learning, skills and inspiration going into the work.
Why it'll be awesome:
Well hey. At very least it'll be awesome for me.
When? Where? Here, in the next month or so.

"The Zalusta Project"
What it is:
A concept album collaboration with Jordan Streiff, aka Skuzzy. He's an MC from der ATL who recently jumped continents to China, but before he bounced he took the Greyhound up here to crash for a week and work on ideas. The album is 7 or so tracks, and tells a story.
What I'm doing:
The beats - the crazy, sci fi inspired, wildly unusual beats. Jordan's ideas have set the stage for me to get weird with it, which I love.
Why it'll be awesome:
Concept albums can be hit or miss, but nobody can deny the raw, nerdy power they hold over us music fans.
When? Where?:
I'd say sometime this year, probably closer to spring or summer. The kid doesn't get back till then, so recording may be tough before that...

"(Untitled Badi & Ekundayo EP)"
What it is:
The genesis of this idea dates back almost exactly year ago, when Badi hit me up like "Lets do an EP for Neby Fest". Ultimately that didn't happen, but the title track of this proposed project, "The Departure" which we banged out back and forth over the internets in the space of a short, productive week, would eventually evolve into the new title track for his full length album, which JUST THIS WEEKEND premiered at Neby Fest 08. Those who where there know it rocks.
Well now, having cannibalized our first EP's title and main hotness for his album, dude owes me an EP.
What I'm doing:
Conceptualizing, consulting, and building on ideas, and of course producing the whole thing, hopefully wid out any samples this time, so we can bring it to YOU, the people, minus any copywrite politiks.
Why it'll be awesome:
Cus Badi is awsome, and cus MC-Producer duos are the best.
When? Where?:
Stay Tuned.

Thats that. Look for samples of some, any, all of this stuff up here soon.
Check back in a few days for updates on graphic art, animation, & photography.

[-ekundayo]

[post 002] St. Valentine's Day

2008-02-14T11:19:00.009-06:00

It's been my tradition to mark the occasion of valentines day with some kind of cartoonish piece that depicts violence against a hapless, heart shaped personification of the day itself. In keeping with the new spirit of this blog, I thought I'd share some history of this ancient observation of romantic love with you instead!

Via Wikipedia

"Saint Valentine (in Latin, Valentinus) is the name of several martyred saints of ancient Rome. Of the Saint Valentine whose feast is on February 14, nothing is known except his name and that he was buried at the Via Flaminia north of Rome on February 14"

Oh. Uh. Hmm. Well...

"The feast of St. Valentine was first established in 496 by Pope Gelasius I, who included Valentine among those "... whose names are justly reverenced among men, but whose acts are known only to God." As Gelasius implied, nothing was known, even then, about the lives of any of these martyrs."

I see. Surely, then...

The first recorded association of Valentine's Day with romantic love is in Parlement of Foules (1382) by Geoffrey Chaucer:^[5]

For this was on seynt Volantynys day

Whan euery bryd comyth there to chese [choose] his make [mate].

This poem was written to honor the first anniversary of the engagement of King Richard II of England to Anne of Bohemia^[6]. A treaty providing for a marriage was signed on May 2, 1381.^[7] (When they were married eight months later, he was 13 or 14. She was 14.)"

Woah, woah woah, ok. Ok. Let's... lets not give up just yet.
Ok, lets see, uh french courts, no, imprisoned in the tower of london, ok ok, referenced by Ophelia in Hamlet, no definitely not, Removed from Roman Catholic calendar in 1969, damn this isn't going well. Umm... Ah! Here we go:

"In the United States, the first mass-produced valentines of embossed paper lace were produced and sold shortly after 1847 by Esther Howland (1828-1904) of Worcester, Massachusetts... In the 1980s, the diamond industry began to promote Valentine's Day as an occasion for giving jewelry."

There! I knew if we dug long enough we'd find the long standing traditional and ancient roots of this wonderful celebration!

[-ekundayo]

[INTRO]

2008-02-12T23:21:00.004-06:00

What's good?

Welcome to [open workflow]

While my LiveJournal was a mix of rants, irregular art posts, cryptic, incomplete thoughts, and the occasional barely contained personal crisis, I want this new space to be something else. Don't get me wrong - I loved doing what I did there, and a lot of what I wrote and created still feels true to me, but it's time is over. [open workflow] will be more focused, more accessible, cleaner, more consistent, more fun - a flow of what I'm doing rather than an inscrutable machine that spits out college aged emo jabber and strange half explained theme projects.

I'll be posting new work here - beats I'm working on, info & samples of films and shorts that I've done sound work on, graphic art, animation experiments, and attempts to mix any/or/all of the above. And I'll be writing about process, writing about what I've watched/heard/read/seen lately - anything that effects me.

When I started writing and throwing up images holy crap what are the odds EXACTLY 4 Years & a month ago, I was restless, I was kind of needy, I was completely aimless about how and why I was creating. I just wanted a place to put things. [open workflow] is a channel through which I can measure just how much I've changed since then. An open flow of what's going in and what's coming out of my efforts to express. But it's also about moving toward producing art and media that not only is shaped by where I'm at, but actively shapes where I'm at - creating in a way that creates around me , letting that which creates in the world create through me. It will also, where possible, be hilarious.

All this is why I went with a simple, almost literal name, to say directly what I want to do, then do it. That and I was out of Grosse Point Blank quotes.

more soon.
[-ekundayo]

workflow], [open

2008-02-12T19:14:00.002-06:00

[workflow begins soon]