For winter break, I went home to my family in Washington. It was just the perfect time to go home and recharge from a long semester at school and work. I hadn’t been home in a year, so it was great seeing my family. My mom, aunt, and I party pretty hard. J-Cubed has been reading. My brother is doing better. My dad and his wife are happy clams (with a wii!) and Kyle is working hard (duh!). Rosa has gained weight, but she is a happy dog nonetheless, and she has a newfound love of Captain Crunch. Totally good to be home! Here’s my favorite photos from my trip:

Its not phallic at all. I don't know what you're talking about. Wait, maybe I see it....

I had these laying around on my computer from the last session of Materials, just before I left for home last week. Here are some of the best shots of  the final projects in Materials. My little Empire State building was molded expertly with the help of the lovely Madeline, and she made sure it blinked FOR DOOM! I was slightly cracked out at the time from animating the TaB commercial, so I didn’t get the software side of the building working all that well, but I want to keep at it into the next semester as a side project so I can get it into the show. Dunno why it fascinates me, but it does. Sylvia said it looks kind of like a crystal dildo, but you be the judge, lol. While you are at it, marvel at my classmate’s awesome projects!

Maddy and Emeri got most of their awesome chromasphere working, so we were all O-MAZED! Dmitris won the coveted best jig award, and Diana made the most awesome martians to combat Jill’s giant uppity guppies.

Lest you forget, Elizabeth made the most awesome dress made out of dragonskin panels with LEDs embedded within that act out the game of LIFE. She modeled the finished product for me, and she was ON FREAKING GIZMODO, so check her out! YAYAYAYAYA!

Congratulations to Elizabeth! Many grants and press to her!

]]> http://geminijono.wordpress.com/2009/12/25/better-late-than-never-shopgasm/feed/ 0 40.758626 -73.999164 40.758626 -73.999164 geminijono photo _MG_4990 http://geminijono.wordpress.com/2009/12/25/happy-christmas-everyone/ http://geminijono.wordpress.com/2009/12/25/happy-christmas-everyone/#comments Fri, 25 Dec 2009 10:12:24 +0000 Jonathan Ystad http://geminijono.wordpress.com/?p=2293 ]]>

Rockefeller Center's tree looks brightly into 2010

I am at home with my family in Washington and we have been having a very merry Christmas. We are looking forward to a bright and beautiful 2010, and after all 2012 isn’t that far off. Better get to celebrating!

Things I liked most about 2009:

Making LOTS of new friends

Getting my own apartment

Having a fabulous job

Having my masters program almost finished (Heck Yes!)

Improving the things I am good at and learning many new tricks

Being sexier

Barack in the White House (awesome until most recently, but still cool!)

Hearing and seeing all kinds of things

Having a loving family

All these things meant more to me than anything that could come gift wrapped at this time of year.

What did you like most about 2009!?

My Mom back in washington state gave me the inside scoop on the Dreamliner and it’s first flight! It’s flight was a huge success for Boeing and I am so proud of my family that has been involved with the project from the start. One down, a few hundred to go!

BTW! This was my first blog post sent from my phone! Way to go WordPress App!

Madeline and I stayed up for an entire age of Aquarius working on this fauxmotional video for one of our favorite products of all time, TaB. It is the drink for beautiful people, obviously, and it is meant to be drank with a straw (obviously).

If you look up some of their classic commercials, you are instantly shocked by how bizarre they are. From blatant cross product endorsements to big hair and scary music, TaB has been there and done that—-until now.

Madeline and I sent TaB into the far reaches of space aboard the SS Mindsticker, which sets into motion a fateful duel that ends with TaB aplenty for all the denizens of the sea!

Check it out here

My favorite place to take photos lately, The Village Underground, had a lot of new sounds this week. There were new people in and out of the band, which was a cool change, and there were plenty of fantastic voices to hear. One guy read a poem off of his blackberry, and it was pretty awesome. Another guy from the UK sang a song that he wrote himself, and Trell and B. Thompson did their thing again. Trell even stayed in one spot the whole song! Yay Tre! Oh yeah, some particularly lovely ladies sang an Alicia Keys duet. Like WHOA.

So I am perfecting my secret sauce for making dreamy, crazy, fractal-y photos of all the best lights in New York. I spent some time snapping pics of the lights around me in Midtown, and downtown by school. I am going to make it work with THE TREE in Rockefeller later this week, and maybe Macy’s later on. So many lights, so little time before I fly home to Seattle. Soak in the shiny!

As per my weekly visit to the Village Underground, I took photos galore of some of the best singers in town, my good friends B. Thompson and Trell Hurst included. I made new friends, like Kim and Ron, and listened to them all hit those sweet notes. I kind of like ending one week, and starting the next to the sounds of Village Underground, and I love being able to go there, chill, listen, and take photos of all the performers. This week, there were some new faces, and everyone there showed them love. The atmosphere there is so encouraging to new artists so I think that is what makes the place so special and so popular. Take a look at all the faces here, and make your way there this Sunday to celebrate the end of one week and the beginning of another to the best sounds in town.

My god! Its full of STARS!!!!

Last Friday was the Big Screens show for Winter 2009. It was hosted at the IAC in the meatpacking district and several ITP students worked in teams and on their own to produce some of the most amazing imagery I have ever seen. Truly mindblargling. The canvas that they were able to use was the 120 foot long screen at IAC that spans the entire length of their lobby. The sheer scale of the screen gave the students the chance to tell stories on a level that few ever get to realize, and since hundreds of people attended the event, their messages were seen, heard, and felt by many people. I got a sneak peek of the pieces a couple days early at their rehearsal, and it was even more moving then to see them, since there weren’t so many people around. It was special. The class, Big Screens, is taught by Daniel Schiffman, codemaster extraordinaire, and he couldn’t have been more proud of the impact his class had on the local art scene that night. Surely, the pieces that were shown could tantalize and entertain in other venues, so I look forward to the artists and creators getting plenty of press and replay of their material elsewhere. However, I can’t think of a better, bigger screen that they could have made their big debut on. Congratulations to the entire class! I am definitely looking forward to coming back each year to see just how much larger the imaginations represented on the screen grow over time. Please excuse any granularity in the pictures because of a use of high ISOs and a semifast shutter: I wanted to capture as much motion as I could without bouncing a flash on the reflective screens. And now, consume nothing but beautiful imagery with your eyes from some of ITPs most talented artists!

Project 21 by Anthony Ptak

Moonflight by Jayoung Chung

Big Screams by Elie Zananiri

Momentary by Eyal Ohana & Elizabeth Fuller

Rain by Lina Maria Giraldo

Cover It Green by Sue G. Syn

Dancing, Moment by SooJung Huh

Climb Up! by Asli Sevinc

The Drop by Michelle Mayer & Nicholas Rubin

Women in Love by Sara Bremen

Machinema by Adi Marom & Filippo Vanucci

]]> http://geminijono.wordpress.com/2009/12/08/big-eye-candy-on-the-big-screen-iac/feed/ 7 40.745032 -74.007319 40.745032 -74.007319 geminijono mymymy _MG_2542 _MG_3339 _MG_3200 _MG_3149 _MG_3141 _MG_3105 _MG_2557 _MG_3047 _MG_2971 _MG_2928 _MG_2521 http://geminijono.wordpress.com/2009/12/03/a-week-ago-today-i-ate-it-all/ http://geminijono.wordpress.com/2009/12/03/a-week-ago-today-i-ate-it-all/#comments Fri, 04 Dec 2009 00:04:11 +0000 Jonathan Ystad http://geminijono.wordpress.com/?p=1900 ]]>

Directly to my FACE!

A week ago, I went over to my friend Trell’s place for Thanksgiving. He COOKED HIS ASS OFF for me and a dozen friends. All I had to bring was dessert, so I made four pies: 2 chocolate pecan pies, and 2 pecan pies. Those were a lot of fun to make, and I have a super seeeecret recipe to make them just perfect:

Combine 2 eggs, couple pinches of salt, 1/4 sugar, 2 lumps of flour, a dash of cinnamon.

Dump a bunch of pecans into your pie crust, probably 1/2 cup.

Dump your mixture on top of your pecans

Put your pie into your pre-heated oven that is set to 350 degrees. Let your pie bake in there for about 50 minutes.

Proceed with stuffing your face with warm, delicious pecan pie. BONUS STEP: Use a chocolate pie crust and drizzle chocolate sauce on top of the pie after baking for AWESOMELY GOOD CHOCOLATE PECAN PIE.

This year, I was thankful that I had so many great people to be around and celebrate with, because last year I was new here and didn’t have much of anyone around. Life is good so I am happy.

Trell took our photo!

Later in the weekend, I went to my friend Maurice’s 20th birthday party. It was pretty fun, but options are weird when you aren’t quite legal. After some haranguing, we got him a party at Taj II in the Flatiron District. Fun times with Chris there taking photos of people dancing around.

Obligatory low light photo of girl dancing in nightclub.

On Sunday, the Brunch Crew convened at Calle Ocho for the first time in a long time. We inducted Fritz to the club and stuffed our faces full of foods and sangria. That was the perfect way to end one week and start another.

Seductive Sangriaaaaaaaa

This concludes my photo catch up. New NEW material posting will commence tomorrow.