Beginning construction

NEWS:
I was contacted by someone from deviantART that someone who called himself “Richard Chang” had been stealing my artwork and posting them at deviantART as his. This person even took what I wrote in my “About Me” section on my site and pasted it over my photo. I had no idea why anyone would do that because he’s basically posing as me, but he was so confused that he mistakenly thought my name was Richard. Then I was told he was probably trying to sell prints of my work and it all made sense.

As someone who spends his life pursuing creative endeavors, I have strong feelings about artistic pride and personal integrity, and I can’t for the life of me understand why anyone would do such a thing. Is it really worth it to steal the works of others and call it your own? Does it ever turn out to be a positive thing in one’s life? Where does one shove the feelings of shame and guilt when doing such a thing, and how long can you push those feelings aside? Maybe some people are just incapable of feeling shame and guilt, and they somehow manage to delude themselves into thinking they have done no wrong, and in fact pat themselves on the back for being so clever? I guess considering the world we live in have spawned war criminals, rapists, child molesters, murderers…etc, it really shouldn’t surprise me at all that lesser crimes exist.

Anyway, I have gone ahead and uploaded my stuff to DeviantART. They offer a printing service there, and if I start getting a lot of request, I’ll probably go ahead and do the print thing as well. Now with an actualy presence there, I hope there won’t be any more imposters.

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My next music project is to score a sci-fi action short film. It’s kind of Matrix-y in style and should be a lot of fun to score. The director wants the music to really hit hard and be very dramatic, so I’m thinking a hybrid orchestral and electronic/industrial score should be just about right for this film. Can’t wait to get started on it.

The last score I worked on was also sci-fi action, so I have a feeling I’m going to be longing to do something more cerebral or emotional after this short film.

WEBLOG:
We are now in China staying at a temporary apartment, while trying to finish the construction on our new home. It’s an interesting experience to go and shop for construction material, picking out every little thing for your future home such as tiles to be used in the kitchen and bathroom, the most comfy toilet you can find, soundproof windows so you can sleep in as late as you want, to water filtration system for the whole house. My main concern is the recording studio which will be built into the second floor (our new home is technically a loft apartment, roughly 2,200 square feet), as professional quality recording studio construction is a very obscure thing in Fuzhou (it’s not a big city like Beijing or Shanghai afterall). In fact, after consulting numerous construction companies–even those that have done some kind of soundproofing or acoustic treatment jobs, I quickly realized that I actually know a lot more about the subject than they do, although my knowledge is not from experience but from books written by studio design and construction experts such as Rod Gervais, Jeff Cooper, and Mitch Gallagher. The biggest challenge is to find the appropriate construction materials here, and I wouldn’t be surprised if we end up having to ship them from elsewhere to get the job done.

Here’s a photo of what I have in mind for the studio:

Here’s what the apartment looks like from the outside:

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I just put together a new DAW (Q6600 Quadcore 2.4Ghz, 4GB RAM, WinXP Pro, separate SATA drives each for OS, audio/project files, and sample libraries), and I’m still in the middle of installing all the necessary softwares (it always takes forever to install and configure) before I can really put it through its paces on a serious project. I chose to not move up to a 64bit OS because some of the softwares I use aren’t compatible with 64bit yet, so I need to wait until 64bit becomes truly universal before upgrading. The main drawback is that I can’t use more than 3 GB of RAM in any given software in 32bit, and that’s the price I have to pay.

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One of the worst things about living in China is the driving. I’m probably going to shoot a video one of these days while I’m in a taxi so you guys can see how absolutely insane they drive here in Fuzhou. Taxi drivers constantly pass cars in front of them by CROSSING THE DOUBLE YELLOW LINE, and you sit there and watch the cars from the other direction coming closer and closer and you just pray that your car makes it back to its side of the traffic before you die in a head on collision. I keep telling the taxi drivers to not do it and they just laugh in my face. If I don’t take taxi’s here then I’d never get anywhere because I’d then have to deal with the crappy public transportation.

The second worst thing would probably have to be the unsafe food. If you are not careful, you will end up eating food that was prepared in a manner that can only be described as shockingly disgusting, using material that can only be described as unholy. Some are so bad that the people who produced them used nothing but cheap chemicals to make something look like food and then cover up the strange taste with seasoning, but will probably kill you if you were unfortunate enough to have bought it and ate it unknowingly. I once had severe food poisoning a few years ago from a carton of milk that was basically all chemicals with artificial flavoring to make it taste like milk. For all I know, it could’ve been dilluted glue. Thank God I didn’t die from it (although I was very sick for several days). The only way to remain safe is to only shop from reputable large supermarkets, and never from small street corner grocery stores or stalls.

The third would have to be the people in general. Although like anywhere else in the world there are the good and the bad, in a country like China, the bad far outweighs the good. Lies, corruption, unprofessional conduct, backstabbing, greed, apathy, selfishness, appalling work ethic, low standard of quality, ignorance, hubris–the list goes on and on. When the Olympics roll around the corner with the whole world watching, we’ll see a lot of this stuff blown wide open for the world to see. People from around the world will be documenting what they see in China with videos, photos, and words, and although people have been doing it long before the Olympics, the media attention because of the Olympics will intensify the frequency and hopefully, most recorded materal will make it out of China without being confiscated. I think that being as full hubris as China is, it’ll need to be shamed into facing its problems before willing to take steps to make a serious effort to change things for the better.

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My friend Patrick, who worked as a cook in Shanghai, visited me last week. He’s in the middle of backpacking through Southeast Asia, and after that he’ll try to get a job in New York, continuing his ascension in the culinary world. I actually met him years ago on some Xbox hacking group that was trying to extract all the 3D assets from the Dead or Alive games, and we’ve been in touch ever since, although neither of us has touched a Xbox for years now (he’s concentrating on food, and my Xbox was stolen). He’s currently trying to apply to Per Se, the sister restaurant of French Laundry (for those of you that are into fine dining, you’ll know what that means). It would be so awesome if he gets in.

Speaking of fine dining, my brother Dennis and his wife Liz treated us to Michael Minna’s in San Francisco before we left the States. We had the tasting menu and it was pretty good, but not mind-blowing as I had hoped. On the whole, Elena and I liked Manresa’s food more. One of these days we have to go try the French Laundry just to see if it’s really head above shoulders better than the rest.

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I’m currently in the middle of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. It’s a fun game just like the previous ones, but I always wished that the CoD series could be more emotionally involving, instead of focussing strictly on the visceral. The “Death From Above” part of the game had me laughing because it came directly from a real video that was uploaded not long ago and circulated around the internet, showing an American military plane on a mission. Even the dialogs in the game were almost exactly the same as that video.

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Quickie movie reviews:

Gone Baby Gone – Excellent directorial debut by Ben Affleck. I was never a fan of his acting (particularly after that embarrassing monologue in Jersy Girl, but I suspect it was more Kevin Smith’s fault), and I hope he’ll stick to directing more from now on. This film was a bit of a relief for us because Elena and I had watched a few stinkers in a row and finally got out of the funk with this thought-provoking film.

*SPOILER*
We both agreed that we were on the side of the cops when the film ended. I know plenty of people who could’ve turned out much better had they been given a decent, loving home, but because of the horrible environment they grew up in, their fate was sealed before they even had a chance to walk away from all the misery and chaos. We do not believe that all human beings have the same rights, because some people are just so poisoned by their own demons and ineptitude that they end up poisoning everyone else around them–especially the helpless and the innocent. How many children are physically abused or have died accidentally because of their drunken or junkie parents? If you can’t get your act straight, you should not be allowed to raise children. Although I partly agree with the protagonist when he said that instead of taking the child, she should’ve simply been sent to a foster home of some sort, but I would venture to say that Morgan Freeman’s character displayed the kind of moral ground that I feel is much higher than the average foster home parents (I have heard plenty of horror stories about foster homes).
*END SPOILER*

Diary of the Dead – What a disappointment. People who know me well know that I’m a huge fan of zombies in general, and I have never disliked any zombie films from Romero, but this latest one just blows. Horrible acting, horrible directing, and horrible writing. If I didn’t know it was directed by Romero, I’d have thought it was done by a skilled fanboy who’s trying his hand at directing for the first time using local community theater actors. Maybe it’s time for Romero to hand over the torch and retire (as much as it breaks my heart to say it).

The Kite Runner – A film about friendship, betrayal, and redemption. On the whole it worked, but I think the film lacked the kind of dramatic tension it needed to really shine.

Charlie Wilson’s War – When a film about politics and war is done with a sense of humor, I tend to feel it is an inappropriate approach unless it’s from a perspecitve of optimism and idealism (the TV series West Wing, for example), otherwise, I can’t help feel that the humor takes away from the gravity of the subject matter. Very few writers and directors can pull it off, and David O. Russel’s Three Kings is one of few examples I feel not only worked, but worked brilliantly. Charlie Wilson’s War didn’t pull it off in my opinion.

Bug – This was an interesting film, although Ashley Judd’s character’s descent into schizophrenia seemed a little too quick and too easy. I find films that use very limited number of sets fascinating because it requires the cinematography to be spot on to get away with it.

10,000 BC – I don’t know why I bothered with this one. I guess I punish myself with this kind of crap because in the back of my mind, I tell myself I’m involved with the entertainment industry as an artist and composer, and I should watch all the big blockbuster films because it keeps me up to date on what the mainstream style is currently like. But man, the writer/director part of me just wants to lay down and die when I watch crap like this.

Nation Treasure 2: Book of Secrets – I really have no excuse. Sometime I watch a movie just to relax, and as long as it’s not painfully bad, I’ll sit through it and switch off the inner critic.