John Threat

Butter Couture Pilot Shoot

BUTTER COUTURE is 5 minute online show that gives women
and men tips on how to jazz up their look with industry insider
tips from superstar stylist Eric Santiago

Santiago makes the celebrities you love look great and solves
their crises before they hit the red carpet. Now, he shows you
those same industry tips for looking good before you go out
on the town. We enter Eric’s Laboratory, his “Butter Couture”
factory where he can make anyone red carpet-ready!

We finished up the Butter Couture Pilot - a joint project with
6th Floor
Developers , Media Threat and Eric Santiago of E-
Style

Google's Chrome Browser: An intelligent thoughtful review by a power user.

Okay - I'm not a power user - I'm a bum but, take it from me - Google's
Chrome Browser Beta Rocks. I've already made it the default browser for mainline viewing and my mom's computer is getting Chrome as well. I've seen a lot of hasty reviews up of it that complained about it missing features, that in fact, Chrome already has and implemented better than the competing browsers. It also has a cool logo that looks like a 50's flying saucer flew down and mated with a electronic pocket Simon game.

First off - this thing is fast. Lightening fast. It renders pages
faster than any browser out there and it's perfect for older
machines and for net books (i have a Everex) and it has made browsing fun - and tilted the scales to me using online applications - primarily Google's instead of desktop applications on the laptop.

The browser has in its initial configuration the most real estate
of any browser. This is the configuration I force my browser
into. So naturally this is a fit for me. There have been
complaints that it doesn't have enough Gigantic Icons or a
Home button. In fact it does have a home button that you can
turn on and off in the simple configuration menu but you don't
really need it with Chrome. Some people also complained that
they can't install the Google tool bar in Chrome - once again
you don't really need it because Chrome is the Google tool
bar.

You can type right in the bar at the top and it gives you
search suggestions both from your links and from Google's
massive database of sites. There is also a add new tab icon
readily available to the right of the existing tabs - something
that Firefox still doesn't make default in the browser yet - but
Chrome got right. No need for a plug-ins to make tabs
handier.

Chrome also features a default page of tombstones of all your
most visited sites. I love this feature - it also maintains a list
of recent bookmarks and other things you are working on. If
you work in a public place or office or even at home - be
careful if you visit a ton of porn or other sensitive sites - You'll
have thumbnails on those sites in your most visited list which
can easily be seen by the casual passerby or someone
borrowing your terminal. However Chrome has a feature just
for this - Icognito browsing.

You can go to links and browse incognito. This cool spy icon comes up and you can go to whatever conspiracy sites, hacking sites, porn sites or whatever your poison is and it won't get stuck in your history and other cached features in your browser - if you remember to use this clearly marked feature - you won't have anything to fear and you can go on I'm in Like With You without your better
half finding out. Just for the record - incognito isn't like
surfing via an anonymous proxy - they still know you have
been there and record your IP and any other information you
transmit.

My favorite feature is the sandbox - each tab is a separate
browser so that if one tab crashes, the other tabs are still
rocking strong! In Firefox and other browser I would do a ton
of research and then there would be a crash or memory leak
(happened a lot with flash and there is a huge preponderance
of flash with online video on pages) and I would lose my place
with all my work. Even with the new session manager - I still
sometimes would loose a few minutes putting things right.

Not with Chrome - and the best part - you can tear tabs right
off the bar and separate them from the initial browser - in
effect spawning a new browser group/session! I love this
feature especially since I have multiple screens. With Firefox I
had to click the icon and start another ram draining session to
have two windows of tabs. Sometimes I'd research or read in
one side while testing/coding/or watching in the other browser
window. Firefox would often balloon up to 200k in ram.
Chrome manages the ram really well.

Downloads has the coolest iconography and animation of any
browser to date. It pops up at the bottom with a cool arrow
and the icon of the item downloaded. It makes you want to
download more often!

The history and download's page is presented very nice and
clean format. The history looks like a forensic timeline. You
can also conveniently delete history by day as you go through
it to delete those days where you were just really really
naughty.

One thing that some privacy freaks will not like, is that the
chrome stores all the user name and passwords you save and
you can retrieve them easily. This is a *good* thing. There
are enough features you can use to prevent saving your
information in Chrome in a given session, but sometimes you
don't need to download and install a 3rd party tool just to
extract a password you used on a site. Chrome lets you
delete individual saved user name / passwords as well. Just
be careful however because saved passwords are a spurned
lover or spouses most powerful tool in this information age.

All the major plugins work such as Flash, Silverlight,
QuickTime and PDF's, and plugins like firebug may be
obsolete as Chrome gives you a lot of detailed accesses to
the DOM and objects and elements in this complex Web 2.0
world.

Firefox still gets used here 20% of the time now for some legacy reasons as I migrate off it - such as plugins in the browser that let you download FLV and other media , RSS Feeds as Folders, and multiple account Gmail management. Also auto-scroll doesn't work in Chrome with my mouse which I use quite often and spell check underlines the words and teases , but doesn't fix yet.

Chrome does seem to handle form input a little differently in
text areas which has affected my custom back end on this
site, but maybe I can fix that with an attribute or two on the
form element. Chrome also highlights which form element has
focus by the way. Very Sweet!

I never use Internet Explorer even though they are trying to get out IE 8 - Microsoft sat stagnant way to long for a piece of software that literally is the touchstone of how we work and interact on the Internets.

Jem -vs- The Spice Girls Teaser

I watch any cartoon I can get my hands on, but I used to watch Jem, which shaped forever how I deal with women to this day. I used to have a crush for more substantial women more like Valerie from Josie and the Pussycats or Velma from Scooby Doo, who were both super smart and helped get their crews out of a jam, and voluptuous to boot! Valerie could escape a locked rocket cabin with a tampon and a paper clip and Velma always read books and newspaper clippings and ran surprisingly fast for a bookish stout girl - but then I realized that most of the women I met were more like Jem - who wanted to be famous at all cost regardless of their actual level of talent in order to satisfy some need to feel loved.

Ooh yeah - Okay i got distracted, from these pictures you can see why - Check it out Jem wasn't really a good cartoon per se - It was badly animated other than the intro which had some cool rotoscoped animated sequences. It also had the biggest crime of having *really* bad music. There are clapping animatronic monkey's with symbol toys that make better music. Only the original theme song was rocking.

What it did have that girls dug - was non-sexual love sequences betwixt Rio and Jem - but like most people - I found their nemesis the Misfits a lot more interesting (but just as unattractive.) - It also seemed like the other girls in the band were asexual and just liked enjoying Jem's unconsummated relationship with Rio. They would even put a flash over them kissing - because kissing after all leads to heavy petty - which leads to pregnancy from toilet seats.

So here is a teaser from the upcoming mashup between Jem vs The Spice Girls - who sing a lot better than Jem and the Holograms! Hopefully I'll finish this mashup sometime this month. I want to do a battle between The Amazing Chan and the Chan Clan -vs- Josie and The PussyCats.

Confessionsofa Ex-Doofus-ItchyFooted Mutha at Tribeca Film Festival

Confessionsofa Ex-Doofus-ItchyFooted Mutha at Tribeca Film Festival is at Tribeca Film Festival this year. It's the Premiere - first time shown anywhere. Took us two years to shoot and edit this film. Melvin and me are hanging around the festival partying a bit and talking about the film. In fact it is the first time I've ever set foot in the Apple Store! Check this link to see us at Variety.com sauced on gratis libation for the camera.

Come out and see it - Its a adventure that takes places all around the world. Come check it out at one of these two dates below. Melvin and Mario will be there as well as a bunch of other cats you want to catch up with - and of course - I'll get you into the Tribeca Parties :) More info at this link to buy tickets in advance: Tribeca Film Festival

World Premiere: Sunday April 27th 7:30 PM
Pace University (3 Spruce Street)
and
Thursday, May 01, 6:30PM
Director’s Guild Theater (110 W 57th St )

I think May 1st at the DGA might be sold out - so hurry up.

Here are some inside sneak look at some scenes from the movie:

100 Grand Bar: The Bachelorette Party

Check out this Commercial Spec I cobbled together for 100 Grand called: The Bachelorette Party.

It features Jonelle Ownes, Chantel, Aiesha Tong and Michelle Reynoso as girls who are partying with their favorite friend - the 100 Grand Nestle Bar, but unfortunately while dancing energetically the candy bar rips it's clothes and the girls see the raw naked power of a fully operational candy bar in all it's splendid glory which transports them to nirvana. Roslyn Tate also kicks in for the finale mouth eating scene and voice over.

P.S.: The Candy bar is a stripper. Girls just wanna have fun! :)

I shot this spec in my apartment and the girls screamed which almost made me legend in the building. My neighbors heard the commotion and saw the sign on the door and they thought I was giving a private show for some girls and I must have been delivering the goods, because the girls were really shouting loud and dancing hard to the music.

Later I hand animated with candy bar with a variety of methods, from hand to strings although you only see a few seconds of it - after all - less is usually more in these situations and it's only a 30 seconds spot. Women really seem to dig the spot,but undressing candy bars may be better suited to Europe.

Betty Crocker Warm Delights - Best Ingestible On The Planet.

I recently capped off a 10 day fast by going to the store ravenous. I came across this new product I had seen in the cake and confection aisle and began to stare at it. Enter: Betty Crocker's Warm Delights. Three minutes to a warm molten chocolate cake. Impossible, one thinks!. I purchased it for the nominal price of $2.00.

What a mistake that was.

Thirty something bowls of Warm Delight later - I haven't really gained that much weight from it, but man this thing is literally the best tasting confection on the planet. I'm no Orhan Yegen, when it comes to tasting food - but I have criss-crossed the the planet in search of gastronomic delights, and I have yet to come across something so tasty whose barrier to preparation and cost is so low. I was doing like 2 hits a day at one point. Microwavable crack, really.

I warn you, for god's sake man, do not buy this thing.

Slim Fast Viral Video

I just wrapped shooting a Silm Fast Viral Video. It features 3 women (Hazel Dolphy, Rhonelle Bruder, and Lauren Munger ) who tell their stories about becoming comfortable with their own body image in an organic way and talk about a friend they have to help them count calories and reach their goals.

That friend of course for the video is an actual anatomically correct working milk chocolately flavored can of slim fast - that they can confide in, dance with, drink richly from, talk to, and cry with. The can is a metaphorical allusion to a whole group of products and services provided by Slim*Fast - from actual low-calorie great tasting snacks and meal replacements - to a community website for support and ideas and issues related to reaching your weight goals.

Here is a couple of pictures of the different phases of can creation - it wound up looking good on camera, although I admit when looking at it in person - it's a lot less impressive:

1) I picked the barrel up from a Carribean shipping company - and some spray paint from Home Depot - and laid down the white base.

2) Next I used some stencils to spray paint the main logo. I actually painted it the wrong way up in my haste to make the deadline! This robbed me of being able to keep the metal top for more realism. Instead I had to use the cardboard bottom for the top.

3) Next was the weird yellow area which spraypaint was good at laying down the fuzzy lines for it.

4) Last was the splash which unless I was Taki 231 or a Coney Island t-shirt airbrush expert I wasn't going to be able to nail 100%. - but I got the general feel of the splash and then I stenciled in the last of the text on the can with multi-coloured sharpies.

5) Rock out! Finished Slim-Fast Can - Shake Well My Friend.

Everex Cloudbook vs Macbook Air

Looks like Apple has unleashed another amazing laptop that literally would get you a partner of your choice for intercourse just by showing up to Starbucks with it. However appealing that is, I wouldn't shell out over 2k for the Macbook Air. It's ultra thin design looks great and it looks like a super reduction in weight, but can you imagine the cost to fix this thing? This thing is going to be prone to breaking. The thinness of this laptop will cause issues with heat and kinetic damage. This thing is going to snap in half very easily - and the miniaturization of it's custom components will mean that it will be like fixing something simple like a air filter on a Lamborghini - prohibitively expensive. It's very Bang and Olufsen - esque - but this isn't a good solution for real road warrior and mobile computing.

Enter the Cloudbook- coming out on the 25th of this month finally. It's the real future of mobile computing. This sub-notebook only cost $399 - so if you lose or break it - no need to stand in line like a dummy at the apple store - you can just replace it with you pocket change. It's got a full keyboard , wifi, and tons of other toys. It's what you need on the road. You won't be editing your film on this thing, but you can write, surf, email, look at youtube videos and pipe video out for presentation with this baby. It's super tiny, can survive a fall, go with you when you climb a mountain - or my favorite sport - downhill mountain bike hunting. You ride downhill and chase wild boar and jump off the bike an wrestle the animal and try to capture it. Now I can take my laptop with me and know I can bang out a graph for a Hackateer script right after my hollow victory over swine!

If your self-esteem is married to the superficial and you care what other people think and you also wish to engage in empty dialog with strangers that could result in sexual activity at some point - get the Macbook Air - and a black turtleneck.

If you actually do work and create things and work hard to make the world a better place one battle at a time - you are an exemplary individual who values independent thought who would find against repressive totalitarian regimes - or you are just a cheapskate like me - then you'll go with the Cloudbook. Rock On!

The Science Of Captcha

Well the world of Captcha has become almost a standard on the Internet thanks to spammers and automated scripts. They slow down the process of signing up and destroy the usability of sites everywhere.

After running several versions of self-programmed Captcha systems over the last year - I think I have several methods that work - of course this isn't a high traffic site - it's a vanity blog of a sporadic-posting director - which means the big brains of the spammers haven't had a chance to work their magic against my systems - but first let's look at how ridiculous Captcha images have become:

Here is an example of the cat scratch method of obfuscation - it looks like a mashup of a Marlyn Manson and AHA! music video - which is rather difficult to read.

This one tries a Barbarella style color warp , staggered system fonts in a LSD nightmare.

This Captcha graphic combines two random words together and then makes them look like like it laid with a porcupine - in the biblical sense. Difficult to read.

This one was on one of Google's sites. It tries a white border outline on the text over beautiful color hue shifts with random letters. Very readable and pretty - probably smells good too.

This one attempts to uses random line drawn over skewed randomly selected alphanumeric characters on a solid color background. this simplistic Captcha falls in the middle of readability - but do you really want to bother?

This is just desperation. Super sized letters on a seizure inducing background with a white grid. It's perhaps the largest Captcha image on the planet in use - probably hoping to fool the spambots that it's a regular picture.

This one goes the other was in desperation - let's make it infinitesimally small so that spambots will assume it's some sort of spacing graphic from a pre-css Adobe's GoLive, you'll need a electron microscope to decipher this.

Craigslist's standard - nonsensical words on a dotted and concentric circle pattern that obscures the outlines of letters making it hard to perform a proper exegesis on it. Prepare to reenter it multiple times to get anything done.

Some sites try to offset these unreadable images with audio files that you can listen to in case you can't read the image - but there is software out there that you can use to decode the audio clips to text so you can compare them in a spambot.

At the moment - what works for me is breaking the letters and numbers for the Captcha image into separate images. Random size images will throw off spam bots a lot - it would be difficult to know how to repatch the images into a single image for processing, but still be legible for the end-user.

I believe some people are starting to use flash, which is one way to also slow spambots as well, but not everyone has flash, especially on mobile.

What about a text message verification to your cellphone? Imagine combining this with OpenID where the site sends you a text message code that you use to verify your identity before you post would allow your cellphone not to get into the hands of every site.

This is something that can be easily done and adds a extra layer of security (it also peels a way a layer of anonymity and privacy which is bad ) - and this could be good for really closed, private, insular sites or specific intensive web applications. What do you think the future of Captcha is.

Deviants Of Reality - Mystikal

Here is the final on the Deviants Of Reality Music Video for their European hit "Mysitkal." The artist asked for a retro 80's feel to the video so we shot with warm saturated colors with a close intimate feel with the artist and the extras. For some reason, people seem to really like this throwback style video - it really appeals to women with it's non-threatening vibe and crystal clear simplistic lyrics and warm visuals.

We shot the video over a one day period in Red Bank, NJ, which I had never even heard of. The feature girl, Mounia was flown in from Europe for the occasion, a model who was a favorite of Dj Alex J. There are two effect shots in the music video, which were composited by Johnathan T. Winbush. They should be easy to spot.

There was a scrapped scene due to time constraints imposed by a restless bar owner where the feature girl, Mounia would have walked backlit by a glowing ring almost like a body halo toward the music artist. Hopefully that scene reappears in another video one day.

The original treatment I submitted for the video included a climatic scene where the feature girl ultimately lure DJ Alex J to the kitchen and cooked him on the grill and ate their innards as he still performed - now that would have been mystical!

In retrospect, maybe the whole cannibalism thing wasn't really right for them - but one day!

Comment Spam, Image Verification and the sweet spot in between.

I recently had abandoned this blog for a while because I had become overwhelmed by comment spam. It had put me into a tail spin because I couldn't find the focus to write a script that would stop the comment spam. Of course, once I actually sat down to write it: it took 5 minutes.

However during the process of testing the code, I accidentally deleted all the frigging comments in MYSQL via a clumsily placed less than sign. The lowest of operators had felled my comment database. 700 Comments gone, just like that...

So the current battle goes something like this chronologically.

Phase 1. Comment Spammers appear with automated scripts that post on blogs repeatedly by filling out forms or using unprotected query strings. They had free reign and life was good for spammers.

Phase 2. Comment and Registration verification images appear, to psych out robots. Random words or number strings appear in regular text that need to be input in the form to complete the process known as CAPTCHA (Completely Automated Public Turing Test). The Robots add OCR to their toolbox and circumvent this.

Phase 3. Comment verification images now include dots, smudges. lines,wave distortion, grids, and mismatched letter sizes and fonts to fool OCR script spammers. The technique works for a while but the OCR got even more sophisticated and they got around that.

Phase 4. Now comment verification images now include everything from phase 3, but now include multiple color patterns so they now look like Technicolor yawns or good LSD trips in little portable network graphic boxes.

Phase 5. We'll need to order stereoscopic 3d glasses to read verification words like the robot stats on the back of the original transformer toys.

Hold everything! Let's not get to phase 5. Why is everyone using a single image for CAPTCHA? Why not use a series of images automatically generated but sliced up and put together? All their software is concentrated on finding a single image. If the slices happen across letters, and the image names are random, the OCR would have a devil of a time finding the images and then putting them together in the right order in order to scan them.

Just stitch them together and it will fool the robot spamming software for quite a while. You could even make the number of slices random, to further confound the process. They would have to do OCR on each individual image, if they can correctly source it out of the code. I've instituted it here, let's see if the theory bares fruit. So far so good! The harder part will be if people post on this site again after such a long hiatus. :)

Whats your idea?

Video Mashup: Beyonce -vs- Betty Boop

Downtime between directing gigs is no time for slacking. I cooked this up while waiting for film to get back from being transfered. It's part art, part social commentary, but mostly just fun.

Video mashups!

The first episode is a re-imagining of the music video for superstar Beyonce's (featuring Jay-Z) megahit "Crazy in Love." It combines that song with sexy moves of Betty Boop. Cut on FCP, this piece achieves sync from various editing tricks of the trade including but not limited to invisible speed ramps.

The real secret is that the origin of many things have a common starting point, but myopic thinking and limited world views sometimes obscures those origins. I'll expand upon that theory later. The truth is.. the kids love video mashups. It's the new form of communication. I plan to incorporate mashups into a new secret project I'm casting for even as we speak.

Check it out in:

Windows Media | Quicktime| Flash| PSP

PS: Cartoon Network or Boomerang has on a Betty Boop mashup that was, well, just ok. I wonder if it predates mine, or did someone see it and rip the idea off.

This post has been screenhead approved!

Video Mashup: Amerie -vs- Betty Boop

The second installment is a re-imagining of the music video for Georgetown University's Amerie summer anthem "One Thing." This video uses high energy cuts, transitions on movement to keep the energy level high. There is also some other tricks of the trade to keep the mouth in sync.

Oh yeah.. I Showed it to Amerie, she loved it! She even put a comment on my myspace page. Hope I get to direct a video off her next album!

Check it out in:

Windows Media | Quicktime| Flash| PSP

This post has been screenhead approved!

How to handle your first IMDB Entry

I got my first IMDB entry and like most people, I feel like at least one or two other things I've done should be on there already, so it's a mixed bag of elation of cracking the professional director's circuit and the ennui of the now blank creditless slate in pantheon of notable directors in imdb's SQL databases. I felt compelled to make a list of things that you will inevitably do when it happens to you.

1. Send the link via e-mail, instant messenger, txt message , blog post and any other eletronic medium to not just your friends and family, but estranged aquaintences. The irony will be that the estranged aquaintences will be more likely to want to re-assess being closer to you rather than stewing in the juices, while your close friends who should be happy will be stewing in their juice and re-assess being so close to you. Go figure.

2. Search for a free way to put up an image. You'll go pretty far before IMDB let's you realize that you aren't going to be able to put up a picture without paying a small fee. It's tantalizing, but it's probably better to wait till they deem you big time enough to have one, or your publicist does it for you and amortizes the cost.

3. E-mail IMDB hounding them to correct your name, credit, and to recognize your greatness. The truly obessive and rude will plunge ahead and do this. No particular ill will come from it, and in fact, it will probably kickstart the negative karma that you inevitably need to be a huge star.

4. Follow every link to see who in connected to you and wonder why they have so many more credits than you!

5. Whatever you do, don't post a message to your own board - you'll live to regret it very shortly after. The jubiliation will soon pass, and whatever you post can and will be held against you later.

6. Remember, at the end of a day - it's just a database. It's an extemely useful referrence tool - but it's just about as important as let's say amazon's inventory database or the IRS tax returns - ok maybe it is fairly important - but try not to lose sleep over it. If your entry is empty - it just means you should be making more films!

Bio-Warfare @ Brooklyn Acamedy of Music ?

80 Hanson Place. Home to the venerable Brooklyn Academy of Music expansion plans. Inside this building is the MoCADA (Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts) and other BAM related projects and art spaces. It looks like amazing architectural building in a upscale neighborhood that is handicap accessible as well. This seemingly benign countenance is haunted by dark side that no one seems to be aware of.

In the early eighties crack ruled the streets of Brooklyn and as you can see from this image. Hanson Place was very different. The overgrown lot on the top right of this image is where the Atlantic Mall complex would eventually rise. The street was a drug dealing haven and many abandoned apartments were stash houses.

The street was roped off because something dark happened that day at 80 Hanson Place.

Anyone who lived here during this time remember that when you walked down Hanson Place at night, the howls of monkey's in pain could be heard up and down the street and that security at the building was odd for a block that was dominated by the crack trade. That all was interrupted the day men from the government came in environmental suits and entered 80 Hanson Place to remove bodies of animals.

Over time, several of us had become friends with some of the people that worked in the building. When pressed about what they did for a living, they would dissuade us from asking about it. They would hint that it was a laboratory when their guard slipped. Then one day, one of the workers we were friendly with disappeared. We asked what happened to him, and his co-workers mentioned he died suddenly. They seemed really spooked about his death and stressed, this caused them to slip even more about what was going on.

You can clearly see the beautiful but dilapidated 4 family brownstones that were knocked down on Hanson place to make room for the newest development that at the time house people living next to something horrible going on in the photos.

Shortly after that, more workers in the lab began to die. They just packed up quickly and moved out. The howling of the monkeys fell silent. We assumed they took them all with them, but we were disturbed to see them bring out human and animal body bags from the building and put them in two different vehicles.

What happens is that we speculate that 80 Hanson Place was actually a bio-warfare research lab. I really didn't think about it during that time period otherwise I would have done some research on it using alternative means available to me at the time. What they created in there is a mystery, but we do now that there were unexplained deaths among the staff working there and that they pulled out rapidly and cleaned up the bodies and medical equipment later. Did a Andromeda Strain type scenario play out in this building?

This was the time frame that AIDS first appeared on the scene, although I wouldn't want to feed any conspiracy theories, but certainly something was at play here. After BAM purchased the building, it seems as though they did a thorough clean up, but is it really safe? I attended the opening night of the MoCADA which I really enjoyed and I think everyone should check it out, but I must say I am concerned. What if the clean up wasn't that good? Should I wear a face mask to First Friday's? What if I got biological contaminants in my martini? I knew that olive looked funny.

I can't possibly answer all the questions that this raises, but I was there and live through it. Ask anyone from Fort Greene who was here before the gentrification and they will tell you about the painful blood curdling screams that erupted every night from 80 Hanson Place, echoing down to 4th Avenue on a quiet night. Was Brooklyn home to a BioWarfare Lab? Maybe they were developing biological agents like AIDS, or maybe they were putting the finishing touches on Elizabeth Taylor's White Diamonds. Shame on them for unleashing either one of these things on the world.

Things That Don't Mix: A Primer

Check out this flash cartoon that I made a while back. It explores things in this world you absolutely should not mix.

I decided to post it because the other day I saw some pigeons eating vomit and it reminded me the horrible conditions here in the city that they have been forced to endure. They gobbled up that vomit like they hadn't had a decent meal in ages.

The worst pigeon story I remember was once time they took us on a class trip to the Bronx Zoo and we were transfixed by the elephants. I mean Pachyderm's are usually a site to behold in person, but all of a sudden Dumbo just took a giant dump. It litteraly fell out like a huge brick the size of a small cathode-ray tube television (remember those?). The pigeons decented on it like someone dropped off a box of Beluga Caviar in front of Lincoln Center. The huge flock literally devoured it in seconds as though it was a gourmet treat.

Yes.. you can blow pigeons up with Alka Seltzer. Their tiny stomaches can't hold the full force of ant-acid tablet in action that even a peice of Alka Seltzer can provide. They tend to try to fly off before they explode with a sicking pop into a rain of organic debris. Sometime's they don't explode, they just distend outward and lay there thrashing around in a painful death that you wouldn't wish on your worst enemies, but maybe on someone who skips you in line at the supermarket.

Harry Allen interviews John Threat On the Radio

Today June 9th: 2pm - 3pm on WBAI. Harry Allen will have me as a guest on his show NON-FICTION. We will chop it up about Dead Prez: Bigger Than Hip Hop and other weirdo topics that are evidently all true.

It's on 99.5 fm on your radio dial here in New York, or you can listen to it via internet streaming radio using mp3 or real media streams.

Check it out, cuz chances are I will be mentioning you!

New York Premiere Of Dead Prez: Bigger Than Hip Hop

The New York Premiere of Dead Prez: Bigger Than Hip Hop went off down at B.B. Kings. It was a lush affair with very tasty Hors D'oeuvres, top-shelf open bar all night, and gift bags with more than just a t-shirt and a magazine. All the usual accoutrements one expects from a shindig like that.

I rolled up in the Jeep down 42nd street playing Alice Smith's "Dreams," as all the teeny-boopers and bridge and tunnel throngs queue on line for movies turned their head and wondered who was that nicely dressed asshole pumping alternative rock. My pockets were turning up rabbit ears, but I didn't let that deter me, the red carpet beckoned me and I just knew I would be ushered in to the VIP area sipping on $30 mixed drinks with gold flakes and eating carmelized truffled stuffed mushroom caps with fish eggs on it.

I parked the jeep, walked up the front of B.B. Kings, where I was promptly ignored by the bouncer with the list. I stood there smiling vacantly as he artfully articulated his neck in an astonishing number of permutations in order to not acknowledge me. Luckily several people came to the door and mentioned politely that I was the director of the film, to which he replied "I don't care, he isn't getting in." So I spent the better part of the premiere standing outside purposely. I just gathered up a huge crowd of people who knew me until it was cleared with the bouncer that I could come in, and I just bought in an entirely too large entourage. I later shook the bouncers hand. No hard feelings, it's just a frigging party. I had more important things to attend to!

I had to get my all access pass, but for some reason, my all access pass had been given to someone! I didn't really care about having one, but it seemed I needed it to walk people in who were supposed to be on the list. Unforuantely, the person who had my pass didn't want to give it up even after being asked to reliquish it several times. They wanted to perpetrate with it all night. Seems as though a laminated placard on a lanyard is worth a puglistic episode these days. I finally got it and I promptly zipped up my coat to cover it so that I wouldn't seem so pretentious.

They only showed a short trailer which was good because most people were fully buzzed if not totally inebrieated by the time the projector went on. I couldn't bare to watch because the projector really didn't do the HD footage justice. One of the network execs asked me while I was ignoring the travesty of low-res lcd projectors, where my girlfriend was and I sheepishly said I was single. It's been so long I forgot how I ended up single, but luckily after a few peices of catfish, temporal amnesia set in.

Dead Prez jumped on to perform and the rocked the crowd. Then my surrogate pops Melvin Van Peebles jumped up and did an impromptu rhyme! Gotta give it up to MVP, he is the man. We finally rolled out around 1am, and I had to bum some cash to get my jeep out of the parking lot. I was exhausted, so I skipped the after party for the comfort of home, kicked back and watched The Cartoon Network and drifted off to sleep counting apple martini's as they danced in my head.

Side note: There was also an Atlanta Premiere that was a lot of fun, as well, although not as laced as the NY Premiere, I had a lot of fun, since it included drunken relvery, bluffing into $50 clubs for free, high speed car chases in Macon, GA, crashing cribs, rescueing pretty girls from down-low barflys, and raucous recollections over hatless sushi dinners with unlimited bottles of white wine: Thanks to those special people who made my trip more than just a pit stop.

Watch Dead Prez: Bigger Than Hip Hop - June 9th 10pm on Starz in Black!

HTC Wizard / T-mobile MDA Review: Best Phone Ever Created?

I've had the MDA now for a few weeks and I have to say that it's the best smart phone I've owned to date. I used to have the Handspring Visor with the phone attachment because I was so desperate to have a smart phone.

The full, back-lit keyboard helps me use my favorite function, text messaging at full capacity. It has Bluetooth, robust Word, Excel and Outlook syncing ability and WIFI! So you can surf fast when you can't get a slow EDGE signal. It has a 1.3 Megapixel camera which is ok, and a SD slot for up to 2 gigs of storage. A lot of software rounds out this package that makes the palm-based Treo old news.

I currently use emoze to help me achieve instant push e-mail with the device. It also syncs my contacts and calendar remotely as well. It has worked for me on business trips, but the software is still beta, so don't expect mission critical solidiness yet. It also tags on a message about emoze at the end of the outgoing email, which I could strip out, but it's free software for now, so I'll let them ride off my back for now.

Always a crowd pleaser is talking to the MDA to make it do stuff using Microsoft's Voice Commander. It works really well in even noisy conditions, so you can operate truly hands free. It also plays video and mp3's very well and the storage allows me to bring tons of music and listen to it on a stereo Bluetooth headset. Bye Bye IPOD. (not that I had one, I'm anti-Apple! I learned computers on a Apple ][+, but I had a negative experience as a child at a user group meeting that I will never forget!)

One issue that hasn't been solved with anything mobile running windows is the battery life. It's the best unit so far, but it's still going to drain out if you do anything cool being text message and the occasional phone call. It's highly customizable by nature, or you can go further by hacking the registry or update the firmware and really get your device humming uniquely to your tune. Yes, my business productivity is up nearly 50% after investing in this unit!

Other than that, WM5 is finally stable and this year marks the rise of Windows as a viable mobile platform with seamless integration into the desktop. If I was Palm? I'd seek investment money and develop a full scale desktop/laptop OS. The world could use a third OS with enough resources behind it to bring it to market. Without this? Apple will bring a PDA evenutally to market as the IPOD just won't be enough and it will be Microsoft -vs- Apple.

Back To Back Videos: Deviants - 'Mystikal' and Heather Hunters - 'In Love'

Me and a friend of mine grinded thru back to back videos this month. The first one, Giles Francis directed Heather Hunter who now goes by "Double H" for the song "In Love." A R&B tune that will be perfect for the lazy August months when you meet a new girl. I lensed it for him in the DP slot. We shot it over 3 days in the Dumbo area of Brooklyn. It stars the comedian Michael Collie chilling in his Benz. Heather's last video, also directed by Giles is still in rotation on BET Uncut. We really nailed an awesome shower scene. Here are a few shots from the video:

The next video was for Deviants Of Reality and their song "Mystikal." shot in 1 day in Red Bank, New Jersey that I directed. The Deviants asked me to craft a retro- later 80's, early 90's rap video feel. They flew in Mouina so her hair could star as the main love interest.

The song has a real lounge trip-hop vibe to it. Dare I say it? Laid Back! Hip-hop smoothed out on the R&B tip with a Pop Feel Appeal? (Thanks Bell Biv Devoe!). I watched some old Tribe called quest, Club Nouveau, and others from that time period. We picked some reddish and sepia color palettes to work with. Add in some Marcus Raboy style fades to black, and you've gone retro!

The artist, label, and distributor XYZ loved it and they decided to release a double CD/DVD case for their units with the video on the DVD. It will be primarily marketed in Europe and abroad. Here are some shots from the video:

Attached to this is a sample of the video for 'Mystikal' which is still undergoing a last pass for color correction and two special effects shots to be inserted. Both videos should hit their respective markets in July.

Underwater Shooting . The DVX-100 . And The Cold.

Sorry for the hiatus! I've been working on Melvin Van Peebles new feature as the primary shooter. It's been time consuming, but fun. I'm gonna shoot my own feature in the middle of this year, but more on that later.

On this shoot, we worked with the Equinox Underwater Housing for the DVX-100A. I actually was a little pissed because I couldn't find one in New York for the Canon XL-2, but that's probably for the best, as it was probably easier to manuever the smaller DVX-100 Housing. We shot around Feburary 12, which was like the coldest day of the year in a deep pool in upstate New York. Setting up the unit is pretty straight forward, but make sure those rubber gromits are in before you attach the end plates.

I found that in the water, its almost impossible to really see and focus by looking into the unit. The unit has a video tap and you can that back to the surface, but i found keeping it wide and on infinity on the fake plastic focus ring, is the best bet for your masters. The unit also is quite bouyant, so if you want to shoot deep underwater, prepare to hold onto something, or have a weight belt. You can also get pretty decent shots by putting the unit underwater and holding it at the depth you need and capturing the action for masters. The device has pistol grips making it easy to guide in the water and you can swim with it and follow or lead the subject you are filming. Here is a still from the footage we captured that day:

I'd work with this unit again, the camera came out dry. I highly recommend the unit. If only I could get a Canon XL2 one! We shot about 15 minutes of footage for the hours of setup. I really wanted to stay in and get more footage, but the water was turning to ice on us. Next time hopefully it's warmer.

LipStick Cameras, Experimental Films, and Tony Hawk

How do these things relate you ask? Frustrated recently by my interactions with women, I took to the highway along the east side of manhattan known as the FDR Drive named after Franklin Delalno Roosevelt (who I believe wasn't known for being swift), and agressively ate it up at a modest 80+ MPH, which ain't easy in a top heavy jeep running 31", but I made it from Brooklyn to the Bronx in about 5 minutes using 3 lane power drifts and tight cornering.

So, here is a great idea! Why not attach a camera to the jeep's grill and record driving down some of the coolest parts of Manhattan and Brooklyn! I saw the Tony Hawk Helmet Cam, and realized it was perfect for this. I could purchase this for $99 and mount it, and share the cool results via this blog, or pester my freind Jen Bekman to show it in her art gallery as a video installation peice.

With a quick search with google I found out that someone made a cool film like this in 1978. French Filmmaker Claude Lelouch made
C'était un rendez-vous, where he afixed a camera to his Ferrari and ran red lights at 120mph+ thru the streets of France. When he first showed it in public, he was arrested. It's impressive and you can view it here in quicktime and in flash. They are re-releasing it on DVD, which I may have to, excuse the expression, cop.

I don't know yet, if speed is really what I am going for, and the other debate is should I spring for a better lipstick camera such as this one. It has a better resolution and certainly could be used for other purposes, however the tony hawk device is cheap enough to be dispoable and it has it's own recording mechanism, which is a plus. I'll pull the trigger on one soon.

PS: Can anyone out there make me a better button for downloading a flash or quicktime video? I think the buttons I have are unclear that there is a download attached to the post.

The Motorola HT-820

I picked these up along side a Nokia 770 for the new year. These things rock! I got tired of using the one ear clip on bluetooth earpeice. THey looked kind coool at first, but after a while, you look like a jerk with them. They are too nerdy, they fall off if you move faster than 2.5 miles per hour, they don't work so well in crowded places, and they don't work with music very well!

Enter the Motorola HT-820. They have cool glowning M's on either side and the sling voer the back of your neck. They allow you to not only pair with Bluetooth enabled MP3 players and listen to music, but they allow you to take phone calls as well! The music will stop and the call will come thru. You can also listen to online radio stations and audio from your computer if it's bluetooth enabled. Hell you can even take Skype and Voip calls with it as well.

It's great in the car as my jeep has huge road noise in the winter win covered and a lot of wind in the summertime. Now with the headphones I can hear the caller in stereo with noise cancelling elements in play. I recommend these if you are in cool out mode over any of those lame 1 ear peice deals. More is More in this case, and the Motorola HT-820 is a better deal than the HS-850!

On becoming A Man

"On Becoming A Man" by Harold Shryock M.D. I read this book on the plane to San Francisco, after finding it my friend's Rochelle's house. Her bookshelfs are littered with old ecumenical texts from the 50's that probably the 700 Club would love to own. I meant to wrap it in a brown paper bag, as I am sure the airline stewards were having a giggle at my expense when they saw the cover.

Published in 1951, It was funny to see the 50's american style ideal virtuous life, which really glossed over a steaming caludron of abuse, sexual opression, and weird things that have evolved into today's rapidly changing society. Our first human / dolphin marraige has taken place, so we can only speculate what comes next.

The book boasts such chapters as "Evidences Of ManHood," "Secrets About Girls," and the particularlly weighty subject of "Where Did you come From." If you find a copy, grab it and read it, for a roadmap to becoming a man. It's hard enough to find your way in this world, maybe this book can help.

Volkswagen GX3

This is the new hot vehicle.The Volkswagen GX3 It's a hybird between a motorcycle and a car , seats two, and might just cost south of $20k if it goes to production. I can't wait to take one of these for a test drive. Great styling and a small engine footprint with great gas economy. The only road vehicle that can get more chicks than this is the aquagibb, but you have to be near the water to demonstrate how cool that car is. This one has instant cool written all over it.

Who is going to use it for a music video first!