Raymond Abril

Taken on a recent trip to Huntington Beach, CA.

Thu, 11 Mar 2010 20:51:00 -0700

Taken on a recent trip to Huntington Beach, CA.

There is an ‘experimental walnut orchard’ next to my...

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 21:39:00 -0700

There is an ‘experimental walnut orchard’ next to my neighborhood, and the clouds were really pleasant today with the light rain. I couldn’t get it all in one exposure, so I tone mapped these three.

Been working on this panorama in my spare time. It is stitched...

Fri, 19 Feb 2010 00:24:00 -0700

Been working on this panorama in my spare time. It is stitched together from 129 images from my roof.

I’m enjoying making fractals now, and I’m looking to...

Mon, 18 Jan 2010 01:22:00 -0700

I’m enjoying making fractals now, and I’m looking to find other ways to be creative.

"[Cowboy Bebop is] like my environment of what I’d love life to be. Chasing across the solar..."

Tue, 08 Dec 2009 20:49:24 -0700

“[Cowboy Bebop is] like my environment of what I’d love life to be. Chasing across the solar system as a bounty hunter with cool jazz music in the background and film noir feel.”

- Me.

I’ve been wanting to write in here for a while, because...

Sun, 15 Nov 2009 19:13:00 -0700

Trying another setting!

Must capture as much as I can!

I think this picture means eternity.

Success! I'm smiling more than he is.

I’ve been wanting to write in here for a while, because the best part about writing about my inner thoughts is rediscovering my inner child. As a boy, I was a very curious, daring, energetic, and always questioning the physical reality that existed around me. Photography has been my primary tool for disseminating the world to be studied later, for I am a social scientist as well as a curious observer.

My first camera had 110 film, however I never had the money to develop most of the pictures I took. I wanted to take pictures of everything, from an ancient and majestic Saguaro cactus to cracks on a sidewalk. I remember being scolded for wasting film on supposedly unimportant and unlikely subjects, yet feeling overjoyed to see the results and look deeper into the picture than I had time to in person.

My heart taught me to learn from everything and try to understand why. Why beautiful plants in nature wither in the summer and re-grow triumphant in the spring. Why the creations of man are afflicted by time, and whether human consciousness transcends the limitations of one persons’s accomplishments. Why, for that matter, anything at all exists.

I learned through my cameras over the years, taking a hundred thousand pictures in the process, that experimentation with trial and error and more error that what you believe you know at any given point will someday become superseded by yet another more remarkable truth. I grew the belief that if I should stop trying, stop trying to reach beyond the boundaries of a mortal vantage and technological disadvantage that I would cease to be who I am entirely. It is through the gifts of innovation and the motivation to use everything that I know to learn more that I have become the man that I am.

For if we are to exist for such short periods known as life, why else should the reason for its briefness be except to endure, experiment, and enjoy all wonder that exists among us?

From my 3rd story studio, I can see every mountain in the...

Fri, 18 Sep 2009 01:11:42 -0700

From my 3rd story studio, I can see every mountain in the valley. I have experienced the sunrises and sunsets of the different seasons and began to understand early man’s fascination with understanding the relationship of where the sun rises and sets and the seasons.

The entire reason I decided to buy my house was because of the 3rd floor loft. To me, it is a romantic sensation to sit at my desk and look behind my monitor to see the whole city, or to DJ with only the light from the street lamps illuminating my mixer. I would not be able to choose if I prefer to watch the sun wake up from behind South Mountain or fall asleep behind the Estrella Mountains.

When I first moved in, I chose to tell time by where the sun was in the sky. This experiment was interesting to impress upon the minimal amount of illumination upon my perception of days versus nights. It was a glorious portion of my life where I was free to read, write, create, and understand the physical world. Within the city of Phoenix, people are so used to staying indoors with everything closed to keep out the incredible temperatures. 110 degrees Fahrenheit at midnight? From my studio, I can see the Earth around me and it impresses upon me inspiration that has no comparison to anything else. I am surrounded by activity. Planes land and take off at all hours, sometimes as dots of light and others as curious objects in the distance moving at an angle.

What this view represents is a promise I made to myself to stay with my hometown and be a part of it as it grows. Phoenix is the 5th largest city in the country, and yet it is so very new. Newcomers often quip about the lack of culture, yet they don’t provide any of their own. I see Phoenix as a hot center for the future. One of my dreams is to open my own art gallery.

I decided to stay in Phoenix and purchase a house instead of traveling the world. The personal growth I have accomplished within my home have allowed me to develop a concise understanding of myself. The more of which is the plan I have laid out to someday realize the rest of my dreams. Besides, there will be time to travel the world later; and I will have my home to come back to!

I combined 3 12-bit RAW pictures from my camera on a tripod and merged them to 32-bit per channel. Click the picture to view the full version. I have much to learn about the process, but I just wanted the detail in the clouds to stand out. I’m experimenting with the process, and I’ll keep working on it. My Brightkite will have other pictures from the city.

In the meantime, I am going to appreciate the lights of the city at night. :)

"The metric system is the tool of the devil! My car gets 40 rods to the hogshead and that’s the..."

Sat, 05 Sep 2009 20:59:25 -0700

“The metric system is the tool of the devil! My car gets 40 rods to the hogshead and that’s the way I likes it.”

- Abraham Simpson

Perhaps my fascination with flowers come from their rarity in...

Fri, 28 Aug 2009 02:07:00 -0700

Perhaps my fascination with flowers come from their rarity in the desert. When the rains come, they bloom en mass. If you wait too long, however, they are soon gone. Their beauty used to expand their empires and populate the world. I grabbed this picture on my way to get something to eat this morning. Actually, I was experimenting with the aperture override on my camera. Someday I’ll get a proper lens for taking macro shots.

I will be posting even so many more at my PixelBlog! I have so many sites and blogs to update and it does get tiresome, however soon I will have everything centralized. You’ll see :] A basic feed of everything I do can be found at my FriendFeed. With some time, I’ll have my page setup that shows everything I’m trying to accomplish and have finished… I’m excited!

As a child, I was always asking questions about the natural...

Wed, 26 Aug 2009 15:44:32 -0700

As a child, I was always asking questions about the natural world around me. My back-yard was South Mountain, and I was free to roam and explore. My curiosity was not limited to natural phenomena, for I always wanted to know how things worked. How did the alarm clock work? I wanted to take it apart, however considering I was only 5 years old I did not want to be unable to put it back together.

My parents bought me several books filled with questions and answers, yet as encyclopedic as these were they only fueled my thirst for knowledge. If only there was Wikipedia in the 80’s…

The ice crystals in the upper atmosphere were always more interesting to me than “the man in the moon.” I’ve never seen the man, for even with a hyperactive imagination I had to strain to guess that the upper two darker mares were the eyes and the lower its mouth. I read a story about an artist showing his capabilities by drawing a perfect circle, and so circles have been fascinating to me.

I took this picture with the camera laying on the fence pointing upwards with a 30 second exposure. Even within 30 seconds, at full resolution the stars are a line from the rotation of the Earth.

For all I know, I still know nothing.

Tue, 25 Aug 2009 02:50:34 -0700

For all I know, I still know nothing.

I’m not sure what the future holds, but what I do know is...

Tue, 25 Aug 2009 02:36:40 -0700

I’m not sure what the future holds, but what I do know is that the possibilities are infinite and unimaginable. What I expected my life to be at this point, that which I did think about for concerns that over-thinking my own life would disrupt the natural flow of events, is completely different than I ever dreamed.

Mostly, everything is phenomenally better than I had hoped. I feel enlightened, strong, enduring, proficient, and proud of myself. I do wish that I would have learned how to step away from work and relax by now. I am on a computer 14-18 hours a day or more, if there is work to be done. I love to work, I love the work I do, and there is so much more to accomplish.

It is a natural and fantastic feeling of satisfaction from accomplishing the things that I do. What I actually do is difficult to explain, and somehow & someday I will teach myself the needed linguistic technicalities to be able to comprehensively discuss my own life without feeling as though I am bragging about my accomplishments. I am more meek than that for I know that all I have done is nothing in the scheme of things. There is just so much more to explore, adventure throughout, and take advantage of as life develops and evolves in front of me.

For now, I think I should relax more. I have a big life ahead of me of Photography, Music Production, and actually working on my own websites instead of everyone else’s. Its time to focus on myself!

Watching my kittens grow up to be beautiful cats has been a...

Fri, 07 Aug 2009 21:29:28 -0700

Watching my kittens grow up to be beautiful cats has been a humbling experience. I have been awake since early this morning because Locke wanted to snuggle on me, next to me, under the blanket, and then against my neck all morning. His meow is quaint, like a gentlemanly “mew.” He cries when I leave, and is an absolute daddy’s boy. To think that I almost did not adopt him:

When I first bought my house, I really wanted two kittens so that they would be able to play with eachother if I was not around. I was so excited and overwhelmed when I first saw their litter. There, on one of the last steps of the staircase, was a clump of fur made up of patches of different designs. All but one of the tiny kittens were sleeping together. The first one to catch my eye was the white cat that was chasing imaginary butterflies and jumping around completely crazy while the others slept. I knew I had to have him.

Next, I wanted a girl. There were two calicos and I decided to get the warmest and fluffiest of the two. As I picked her up, she melted in my arms and into my heart.

I had my two choices, but there was something that caught my eye. A cat with a fur coat that looked like he was wearing a tuxedo. I thought to myself that 3 cats would simply be too much, but he was handsome and I had to ask… can I have three? I would later tell people that it is because I have three floors in my house and so I could have one cat per floor, but honestly I’m not sure why I couldn’t leave him. He was just charming, sleeping there. Perhaps I liked the idea of balance - one crazy cat and one sleeping cat. Plus, since I was getting the ADHD kitten then I was sure that he would need a boy to play with. I was right.

The first night was so awkward. I thought to myself, what if they don’t like me and spend their time hiding somewhere? I had never had a cat before, and so many of my friend’s cats were loners when I was around. In order to get the white cat to calm down, I had to put him under the covers of my bed. The calico slept right next to me. The black cat slept at my feet. I was worried that he wouldn’t be fond of me… How surprised I would be.

I named them after Final Fantasy VI characters. Kupo is the white, hyperactive cat. Locke is the black gentleman cat. Celes is my calico, self appointed princess of the house.

Since I have such a huge house, we spent the first few weeks we getting to know it one floor at a time. Every night they slept on top of me. I would later count this as a mistake because now, two years later, they still sleep on top of me at times and I will wake up with a large weight crushing my chest and a fluffy tail in my face! After they became used to the whole house, they still did not like to be away from eachother and would meow when they became separated from eachother… or me!

Oh how they got in the way of my work! Sometimes I had to put them in a bedroom that was full of boxes just to get anything done. They were climbing on everything, and always sitting on my keyboard as I type.

Yet I have changed because of them. To have three cats follow me down 3 stories when I was just getting some water and then all the way up is love. To have them all cuddle up next to me as I lay down and purr at once is love. To be waken up 6 hours early because they just want my attention is selfish, but it is still love. And I love them back.

These days they give me a little more beathing room and as they grow up, they have relaxed. Still, Kupo is quite the attention getter and every visitor falls for him and so many people have wanted to take him for themselves! If only they knew how much of a pain he is!

I’m sure I would have amazing sleep, unscratched furniture, and a very quiet house if it wasn’t for their habits yet I am not sure that I would want to live a life without them. I’m not sure I was truly living life before they came into it. I know that I am now. They are my children and family, and I cannot live without them.

I am very fond of the desert and its cactus. They represent the...

Thu, 18 Jun 2009 23:40:21 -0700

I am very fond of the desert and its cactus. They represent the virtues that derive from acclimating to a harsh, arid environment and prospering. Some day I would like to have my own Saguaro cactus, however they are quite expensive considering they are both a protected species and incredibly old. Such a symbol would serve to others as a visual representation of wealth, however a common onlooker would likely not see such a cactus as I see it: That I love the Sonoran Desert and all of its beauty.

It was a beautiful day full of fluffy clouds when my friend Aaron Z and I decided to just drive out into the desert. We took turns picking directions. When we came to a fork in the road, we would choose left, right, or straight ahead. We almost became stuck in some soft sand at one point. We came across a biker gang having a bbq about 40 miles along the highway on a side road that ended at a trash collection facility. All the while, I was enjoying the clouds as they moved across the sky; sometimes they merged and parted. I thought to myself that those little fluffy clouds were somehow the key to inner peace and tranquility. If only I could reach out to them and truly understand what they represented, however I could never reach them in my hybrid.

We eventually stumbled across the entrance to the Sonoran Desert and went for a short hike through the brush. The time of year was perfect and the temperature very comfortable. I was happy to spend time with my long time friend just wandering content knowing that as soon as the sun set, we would have to venture back home and I needed to savor as much of the experience as I could.

I don’t know how Aaron did all of the hiking in his sandals. I was prepared with multiple shoes and water, seeing as how I grew up playing in this desert as a child and as long as the basic necessities are addressed there was nothing to fear. Even if we somehow became lost, it was all part of wandering as a free soul with a free mind. I was experiencing clarity unlike any that I had experienced before and I was enjoying every moment of it.

The vastness of the desert is difficult to describe, however I created my first panorama of the desert from this very hill. You can see Aaron as a speck at the bottom left. I almost fell down the hill from tripping over my tripod.

As a young boy, I would often wander the desert surrounding South Mountain barefoot or on bike. To this day I recall experiencing the magnitude of life that persists in the desert, even as others tend to think that the desert is a lifeless biome. Indeed it is not! I have seen a family of Quail cross the dirt path, a Gila Monster wander by, and the birds and reptiles exploring the underbrush for food. I remember finding a cave along the mountain and to this day I have yet to find it again.

Today, most of that desert is gone. It was bulldozed before my very eyes so a prime housing development could take its place. This necessitates driving further into the dirt just to escape people. My connection to the desert exists on a plane of appreciative love. I still feel surprised when I find another creature, a sense of awe when I discover a 200 year old Saguaro, and humility when I consider that in the short time that humans have populated the deserts surrounding Phoenix, Arizona that constant development has not eradicated all of the beauty. The flowers I have seen on my trips are perhaps the most beautiful I have ever seen, yet to attempt to describe their beauty with a human language could never fully express the visions I hold so dear and close to my heart.

Someday others will see what I have seen, but for now it feels like it is too late. Children in the city no longer enjoy free open spaces. This is the price of progress and development, and I feel as though the last the adventurers.

Someday, would you ever wander into the desert and explore the magnitude of nature’s beauty?

Added my blogs to Technorati

Tue, 09 Jun 2009 00:10:00 -0700

Added my blogs to Technorati:

My Technorati Profile is a starting point among many other social networks in an attempt to get myself out there more. It is curious that this blog, which has only existed for a short while, has a much higher rating than Hardcoredreamer.com, where I have been posting a myriad of writings. This blog is a specialized blog where I want to express myself through a simple use of my own collection of multi-media to stimulate my writing process.

On the topic of my Sapphire Mix from my previous post, I have...

Wed, 27 May 2009 07:48:00 -0700

On the topic of my Sapphire Mix from my previous post, I have always wanted to dive into the thought processes and the difficulty in finally accomplishing my first Promo CD. It was so well received that to this day I still get compliments from friends and strangers. When I finally completed this mix, after my 7th or 8th try, I felt that I had reached a barrier that kept me behind what my dreams were capable of.

The idea of Sapphire Mix came about from the feelings I wanted to convey through the use of Progressive House, specific styles of Trance such as deep vocal, as well as integrating solidly and fluidly harder sounds such as near-Techno and breakbeats. I wanted to create a mix that would take you from one point of being along an emotional roller-coaster that through my physical vinyl record collection, I could prove myself. To this day, I am still pleased with the result especially considering the technical challenges I faced.

My Sapphire Mix, as I declared earlier, was recorded using 2 Technics SL-1200 MK-IIs I had borrowed from a good friend of mine, Ben Sparrow. My mixer was an ill-fated Numark with one advantage - predictable kill switches that did not cut the frequencies in the cue monitoring. This let me anticipate what more expensive meters call a PFL - Pre Fader Level. The downside - extensive use of the faders meant that I could only use %50-%60 of their levels before succumbing to mix ruining disruption. Recording to my computer with a 3.5mm cable at 16bit, 44khz was the least of my worries should the noise of using my faders become recorded and ruin the mix.

I had a distinct advantage that came about as a brilliant idea - Why not use the gain knobs in conjunction with the bass kill switches. At this time, I still prefer to mix in headphones in stereo to make my beats match up solidly, and the degradation of audio along with the tiny delay between the cue and the master out made the only real way of obtaining true BPM sync by playing both records through my headphone cue. Easier said than done as you have to pick out the transient patterns and adjust accordingly.

Recorded with Ortofon Blue needles, which today remain my favorite for use on Vinyl, the Vinyl records themselves have a story that I have always wanted to told. Of the tracklist, perhaps 6 records were found in bargin bins at music stores that had no idea the value of the second hand record they were sold. It was a steal to get Dave Seaman - My Worst Enemy and U.N.K.L.E. - In A State for perhaps $1.99 each. The rest of the records I had picked up from the local store London West. It was actually the discovery of Kilowatt’s Grasiento Remix of DPP - M3X1CO that was the turning point of what I could accomplish with the records I had in my collection.

I have spent a great deal of time listening to the great DJ/Producer masters that I have come to respect for a decade now. Sasha, Dave Seaman, Nick Warren, John Digweed, Danny T… just to name a few. On paper, being able to express a ‘perfect’ mix through the mixing of ‘imperfect’ records sounds great, but the work of getting them to fit together just right using timing, holding my breath during fades, and having to be dead on accurate because there is no un-do in mixing Vinyl records.

I always felt that I followed the Spacey style with quirky vocal interludes that Dave Seaman masterfully programmed into his mixes, the emotional rollercoaster that is the work of Sasha, and the skilled transistions of John Digweed. (Is it any wonder that I am a huge fan of the Global Underground series?)

Still, my Sapphire Mix was never intended to be an exact copy. There exists a live mixing style that is very unique to the Southwest United States, created from a culture that rewards DJs with little to no monetary gain and so in order to continue the party culture, DJs themselves had to fork out the money for new records on their own. By watching our top-notch Arizona DJs like CL McSpadden, DJ Diosa, and certain Hardstyle/Hardcore fanatics as well as and other DJs from California such a Christopher Lawrence, I endeavoured to give a specific touch to the mix by mixing timing with intense EQ shifts based on delayed, and extremely lengthly transition times. Some may contribute this to DJ Tiesto, however I have never seen his live sets and the recordings I have of his live sets do not include what I’ve been told.

With the stage set that I wanted to program my set in a way that other local DJ Demos did not partake in, I had to painstakingly learn the cue points off of counting beats. I would hold my breath and tell myself that the beat-matching was spot on and touching the records, being a bad habit of mine, would ruin it. I’m glad I trusted my instincts. The hardest, yet perhaps the coolest transition is between Nubreed – Depth, Dave Seaman Presents Group Therapy featuring Nat Leonard – My Own Worst Enemy, and DPP – M3X1CO – KiloWatt’s Grasiento Remix. These songs were definately not meant to easily mix into eachother and I had to scrap my recording and start over several times. I can still hear a slight nudge somewhere in there, but after so many takes I was just going to live with it.

The last song, U.N.K.L.E. – In A State – Sasha Remix, was actually decided at the last minute. I always loved how Sasha and Dave Seaman would end their mix CDs with a closing song that you wish would never end. This record had been picked up used and had a considerable amount of dust in it. I was able to digitally remove some pops and clicks, but opted to leave the noise produced from the needle on the record as a statement that I accomplished this mix with real records. To this day I dislike the CD version of this song because there is a moment of silence that in my mix is filled with a low hum and some crackles that elevate the complexity of the track.

I lucked out in that Steve Frederick of LP/Project Argo was around to help me master it. Although I had recorded it as close to baseline as possible, he introduced me to multi-band dynamic compression and really brought out the progressive experience.

Happily and hastily, I printed out as many blue Sapphire Mix CD Labels as I could, but the mix was so close to a full 80 minutes that half of the CDs that I burned were ruined in the last few minutes.

I had a label on them to share them with your friends, and ever since then it has been shared around the scene. I brought some copies to the first Anizona in order to give out as prizes. The first party I could attend to pass them out was one called Enchantment, located in a warehouse across the street from my day job. I had spent so much time away from the party scene that I thought people would have forgotten me… and I was dead wrong. I gave out all of the copies. I had run out of blue ink and created a second edition with red and yellow ink (since that was all that was left in my printer) and passed them out to friends hoping to get some real feedback.

And I was really pleased.

So here is the download link and the full track-listing of the mix. Although this is 1/2 of episode 1 of TranceDesign, the quality is not as great as this direct download.

RayRay – Sapphire Mix Tracklisting

Progressive House, Trance, and Breaks

Pole Folder Feat. Sandra Ferretti – Protected – M.A.S. Collective black curtain dub mix – Modo Records
Steve Porter – Definite form – Remy & Roland Remix – Little Moutain Recordings
Subsky – Discollective E.P. – Do you want to play – Focus
U & K – Atmosphere – Panoptic’s Cold Depth Remix – Confi-Danace
Koala – Imagine – Disc 2 – U & K’s “V+T” Remix – Cuba
Nubreed – Depth – Bonzai Limited
Dave Seaman Presents Group Therapy featuring Nat Leonard – My Own Worst Enemy – Audio Therapy
DPP – M3X1CO – KiloWatt’s Grasiento Remix – Sunkissed Records
Descent – Projection – Original Mix – 3Beat/Release Records
Chris Domingo – Darklight – Thomas Penton Remix – BozBoz
U.N.K.L.E. – In A State – Sasha Remix – Cha Chat Records

[CUE FILE]

I still hope to make a true follow-up, however I have yet to find songs that I could once again create a real emotional journey. Someday I will, and I will be quite proud then. Since this mix was recorded in March of 2005, I’ve come a long way. I still refuse to compromise on the songs and perhaps I can get vinyl records instead of MP3s so I can continue a trend. MP3 downloads from Beatport just can not replace the tactile sensation of handling real vinyl. This could just be an excuse, but maybe I’m just appreciative of an older style where difficulty meant something spectacular.

For those of you who have heard it, what do you think of my Sapphire Mix?

My favorite DJ gigs have been those at Anime Conventions. I was...

Tue, 19 May 2009 20:27:00 -0700

My favorite DJ gigs have been those at Anime Conventions. I was first introduced to them when Arizona had its first real Anime Convention called Anizona in 2005.

I believe originally I was just going to be the MC for the Karaoke contest, which was a turning point in my life in knowing that I absolutely can not pronounce Japanese songs. I also learned that I’m not afraid to stand in front of maybe 500 kids dressed up in full Cosplay trying to tell jokes, ask trivia questions, and hand out prizes both of my own mix CD (My Sapphire Mix) that I had just accomplished and prizes that made the Otaku in the audience quite excited such as DVDs of shows I had never heard of, or tried to pronounce ahead of time. I had a crack team of video game gurus thinking up new trivia questions to ask.

Actually it was intimidating at first. I was shown a video of a MC of a Los Angeles Anime Convention head of time to get an idea of what it would be like. I opted not to worry about what the first thing was that I was going to say.

Anizona was a real life changing experience because until my first Anime Convention, I was used to the club and warehouse party scene’s mass of people and had learned how to talk to strangers over the years without fear. Being around 1,000 die hard Anime fans changed things enough that I was for the first time in ages taxed to meet and greet new people in a way that is unique to their culture. It was exhilarating, running around the Embassy Suites hotel grounds meeting new people dressed up as their favorite characters from Anime, Video Games, and other media. I told a guy dressed up like Spike from Cowboy Bebop that his cigarette was too perfect. Spike’s cigarettes are always slightly bent. He agreed and bent it up a little making his homage spot on perfect. In one of the lounges, a kid who I somehow must have met before but as always I could not remember asked me a simple question: “Pirates or Ninjas?”

Great! It all made sense to me now. I was finally home.

Anizona 2005’s guest was the great Yoshitaka Amano, perhaps best known as the brilliant artist behind the Final Fantasy video game series characters. This brought Cosplayers from other states to Arizona’s first Anime Convention and in fact made it so popular, because of his status, that the convention simply did not have enough room for everyone and was turning away people at the admissions desk in mass. This meant that everything was simply at capacity, and incredibly exciting to be part of.

As the time for the Karaoke competition drew near, I felt that I had absorbed enough culture to make it through. The room filled and the seats were taken up by every character I could imagine, especially from Final Fantasy. When the time came, I had one thing to say in mind, hoping it would break the ice between me and a room that was trying to decipher the words coming out of my mouth as I explained the prizes.

“Pirates or Ninjas?” The room exploded with hundreds of voices shouting Pirates! Ninjas! “Nintendo DS or PSP? Again shouts from both camps as they proudly held up their video game consoles that they were all playing! Success and adrenaline pumping through my body, the show went on. I would ocassionally ask a question such as “Who is the secret character you obtain in Final Fantasy VI?” That’s quite a question considering that the game was released in the United States as Final Fantasy III and you had to be eaten by a monster in the game to discover him. One girl had the answer, and I gave her my prize of my mix CD.

I had some misses, blunders, and times where I wondered if I had lost the audience. By going to look at the prizes and try to figure out how to pronounce the names out-loud, I had distracted a contestant. Still, it was a grand experience. I would later find out that I was the MC for the following Anizona when I read the programming guide. Not only that, but I had been up all night at various parties and decided to be as silly as I could on the outdoor stage.

Anyways, I was also DJing at this convention. Conventions in Los Angeles, I was told, played primarily hip-hop. This was unpopular here and I wanted to do it right. I hired a real lighting crew and spent hours listening to music that is popular with the Otaku crowd such as J-Pop and Video game songs. This was an entirely new DJing experience because there were no limitations and I was to play 4 hour sets on two nights.

Parties these days are plagued with one hour DJ sets for each DJ. One hour is just enough time to get a crowd into what you’re playing, and not enough time to really perform. I really had no idea if I could please anybody nor if what I was about to do would be fun for either the crowd or myself.

Anizona is the reason I decided to purchase Final Scratch. I wanted to be able to have at my disposal as many thousands of possible songs as I could possibly need for a crowd of enormous possibility of losing touch with. Happily, there was a great team behind every corner to make the technical challenges solvable. I did not accomplish these things alone, and there are so many names to thank. Having problems solved, I still had my chance to pull it off. And it was mind blowing fascinating.

My first song was “Alice Deejay - Better Off Alone” because of its commercial popularity I felt that it would be immediately likable. I had also looked through the song lists of the Dance Dance Revolution series of games and bought vinyl records of songs that were also likely known. It worked! The whole room was packed of kids dressed up in their intricate costumes. For some reason I thought that they might also like a song from the Asian culture and played it next… and it was immediately a flop because it wasn’t a dance song. The whole crowd in unison shouted: “More Techno!”

Happily obliged and completely prepared, I put on the record of “ATB - Don’t Stop.” and next the Condor remix of “Aurora - Ordinary World.” It was a real proving ground for Dj-ing because over 4 hours I played nearly 2 dozen styles of music including the Psychedelic Trance opus by Infected Mushroom, Drum & Bass, Breakbeats, Eurobeat, J-Pop, and of course the Hard House remix of Tetris made popular by DJ Venom. That would be the anthem of the night and perhaps every convention I’ve ever played at. I not seen a crowd go as crazy to a song in my life.

I really used this opportunity to experiment. I had spent $50 on the actual vinyl record for “Ayumi Hamasaki - Dearest”. On stage, I removed it from its protective sleeves and lining, ruining its collector’s value in order to play the ending theme from the popular Anime series Inuyasha. On beat, I changed from the original remix into a breakbeat remix and into a club dance remix and finally into a high energy remake. I was switching styles as fast as I could because this room that was the same room I had previously been an MC in was packed full of kids used to the shorter versions of songs available on DDR - and they were full of so much energy that I was reaching 280 BPM (Beats Per Minute) and they still would not stop. When I tell other DJs that I’ve played sets between 60-300BPM, I always get a look of bewilderment. It shouldn’t be possible, but it was and continued to be.

The greatest part about these dances was that since these are at hotels, people can come and go as they please and so as some leave to catch their breath, others fill the room and the beat goes on. Everyone is listening, as opposed to warehouse parties where people are wandering about or barely paying attention to the music.

I’ve been asked to play at a convention later this year and more details will be available soon, but here is a list of every convention I’ve had the honor of playing at so far:

Anizona 2005
Anizona 2006
Anizona 2007
Phoenix Anime Fest 2006
Phoenix Con Games 2007
Phoenix Con Games 2008
Otaku University 2007
Phoenix Cactus Comicon 2009
SabotenCon 2009 (Upcoming)

Sometimes I’ve played really experimental music, and others I’ve poured over the hundreds of video game remixes available at OverClocked just to narrow down the list to 50. I’ve brought in friends to play whatever they want so the every night, often two, are as fun as possible. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting and DJing along side Greg Ayers, who unbeknown to me I had seen DJ previously at an Anime convention in Texas, Oni-Con. Greg’s absolutely incredible capability of ramping up the crowd with his DJ sets and microphone work are awesome. I know I’ll always have a bar beyond what I’ve accomplished until I can deliver a night as amazing as him.

So there’s my experience DJing at Anime Conventions. I ponder often about what I can do that is new and different, but one question always prevails: “Pirates or Ninjas?”

I love the desert and the mountains. I was born here, and as a...

Sat, 16 May 2009 01:45:00 -0700

I love the desert and the mountains. I was born here, and as a child I was fearless among the cacti and other living creatures whom I shared the open space with. As a man, I have come to respect the desert and admire it for its beauty and charm. I share my appreciation for the Sonoran desert through my pictures. I have no conquered this mountain, for I was only a visitor who came to climb its peak and read poetry.

Piestewa Peak was just recently named for the heroic, fallen Native American soldier while she was in Iraq. She also came from the desert, a member of the Hopi tribe, and her name will live on in maps and memories of politics rushed to forget the old name of this peak. I remembered her on this climb, that which I knew from the news reports; each conflicting another with sparse details and quasi facts concerning her last few moments of life. I imagined that if the name should be connected to the physical world, then being a physical being I could discover through tactile means what it feels to be immortal.

The pain I may have felt from those jagged rocks or the sweat pouring from my brow were nothing compared to bullets and shards of glass on a lost, back road in the middle east. I knew that only the heat could compare, but that would not keep me from the peak. The heat is a driving force. The heat reminds me that I am alive.

With my tripod, camera, backpack, headphones, and Richard Brautigan’s Trout Fishing in America, I had at last found peace in the middle of the megalopolis. At the elevation of 2,200 ft, the noise of the adjacent freeway drowned itself in the magnificent view. I could see the sky as blue as I imagined the Hohokam had, before they abandoned the Valley of the Sun; a necessary event for the City of Phoenix to be born from its ashes.

Maybe all spiritual knowledge requires an abstraction layer from the ordinary. Perhaps anything I learned is in itself a layer imaginary. The arbitrary experience may be a temporary distraction, however I can say that I learned that by distracting the reality of the accomplishment I came away with one important detail.

The price of immortality includes having inquisitive people often misspell your family name and climb all over you asking questions. I wanted to give SPC Lori Piestewa an answer in return. Thank you. If I had the water left in me to shed a tear in the 110F afternoon, I would have. All I could do, was to say thank you and take a self portrait to forever remind myself that jagged rocks, deathly sunshine, and almost falling over the edge by tripping over my tripod are nothing.

RayRay Is Forever – Amber Mix

Wed, 13 May 2009 23:38:00 -0700

RayRay Is Forever – Amber Mix:

This is a Progressive Techno DJ Mix I recorded for the Trance Design Podcast.

Giash - Til Yali My Little Lady Birds (Remix)
Delicious & Abigail - Bailey Bounce (Original Mix)
Dataworx - Control (Original Mix)
D-Unity - Shake it (D-Unitys Shaker Mix)
Mihalis Safras & Mark Broom - Crabsticks (District One Aka Bart Skills Remix)
Polder Ginger - (District One Aka Anton Pieete And Bart Skils Remix)
Uto Karem - Trentatre
Adam Shaw - Six Degrees (Original Mix)
Butch - Earth (Roland M. Dills Major Sky Remix)
Olivier Giacomotto & DJ Tonio - Eat What You Kill (Kiko Remix)
Devilfish & Roel Salemink - Manalive (Jon Rundell Remix)
Matt Nordstrom - Lucky Drawls (Original Mix)
Mark Mendes - Straight Away
John Starlight - Road Rage (Popof Remix)
Dubfire & Oliver Huntemann - Diablo (Original Mix)

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"To be great is to be misunderstood."

Wed, 13 May 2009 22:12:00 -0700

““To be great is to be misunderstood.””

- Ralph Waldo Emmerson’s First Essay on Self Reliance available at the Gutenberg Project for free. I highly recommend reading this work of literature as it has inspired me throughout my life.