Abe Yang

abeyang.tumblr.com

Interesting to see the evolution of the iPod commercials. While this is not a comprehensive list of all the commercials that they’ve pumped out over the years, it does provide an overarching look at the current trends. To be honest, I wasn’t a big fan — no, I abhorred the original iPod commercials with the bright, neon backgrounds. However, I am digging the most recent one (by Coldplay) a lot. Perhaps it’s because it’s not an iPod commercial…

U2 – Vertigo

Eminem – 8 Mile

Mary J. Blige – Queen

Coldplay – Viva la Vida

John August on how to keep improving in the area of screenwriting:

My advice for you is to dedicate one day a week to disassembling good movies. Take existing films (and one-hour dramas) and break them down to cards. Think of yourself as an ordinary mechanic given the task of reverse-engineering a spaceship. Figure out what the pieces do, and why they were put together in that way.

John Gruber thinks “this [is] true for any craft.” I agree.

Snippet of the artist‘s own words that really struck me:

When I started I wanted to do more than simply show the scene of freed slaves crossing over a dry sea bed. I wanted to do something that went a little deeper into man’s relationship to God. I wanted to look much further into the expressions and the feelings of the Israelites while all this was going on. On the left you see people who are worried and nervous looking – People in doubt, but then in the middle you have a child silhouetted in front of the whales and ocean. He is in awe of God’s power. On the far right there is a hopeful and joyous mother and her child. Beyond that we have one guy who is looking distraught and pointing backward. Maybe he sees the Egyptian army approaching, or maybe he thinks they should all go back. I want to stress in the image that these aren’t perfect people. That most of these people are complaining, bickering and skeptical. The point is that God saves us in spite of ourselves.

One of four paintings from Thomas Cole’s The Voyage of Life series. I chose this one (“Manhood”) because I’ve finally hit the third stage of manhood (the first two being 18 and 21). But in all honesty, I think it’s the most interesting painting of the four.

This series also reminds me of Life in Four Frames...

From Ernest Hemingway’s Top 5 Tips for Writing Well:

Hemingway was famous for a terse minimalist style of writing that dispensed with flowery adjectives and got straight to the point. In short, Hemingway wrote with simple genius.

Perhaps his finest demonstration of short sentence prowess was when he was challenged to tell an entire story in only 6 words:

For sale: baby shoes, never used.

These photos made me smile.

Flame on!

I thought this image was so poignant and creative… until I remembered Safeway’s similar life icon.

Brilliant. Simply brilliant.

Very interesting — this actually does make me want to fill it out (except for the fact that I took it home so that I may post it onto my site).