Radius Game Music
So it has indeed been awhile since I've posted. More importantly, it's been awhile since I've made a post regarding my music. That's because I hadn't been working on music lately and have hijacked my own site here to discuss my photography. But the whole point to jido-genshi.com was to discuss and post news related to my music. So to remedy this, I have created a separate blog under my actual name, completely dedicated to my photography (and what ever else strikes my fancy!) To check it out, go to http://craigperkins.wordpress.com. I will try to keep this site here more geared towards music related posts...
And as far as music goes, I haven't been too inspired lately (and have been quite busy with photography) but I recently had the good pleasure to have been commissioned by the fine folks at Pattern Making Co to compose several tracks for their new iPhone game called Radius. I am very excited to be working with them and look forward to a long and prosperous future in contributing music and sounds to their games (and to anyone elses that may be interested in my stuff!)
The game is already out and available on the iPhone's App Store but the music is not in it yet; should be in by the next free update, coming shortly.
Back To Film
Well, after the past couple of years of taking digital photos, I am just not satisfied. Everything is just too sharp and clean and pristine and, well, digital! Yes, of course, I can dirty things up in Photoshop and I have become quite good at doing that, but there was something I was missing that I used to get with shooting film.
So, I've decided to go back to the basics. I took out my old Holga 120S (a $10 plastic toy camera that leaks light through the edges of the camera body) and my Seagull Twin-Lens Reflex (a cheapy $100 Medium Format camera) loaded them both with Ilford Delta 3200 Pro and Ilford 100 Delta Pro film respectively and started shooting away. No light meters, no focusing (on the Holga at least). In my opinion, some beautiful shots were made that I wasn't able to capture on my $4000 Canon Digital SLR.
Click on the Thumbnails below to see the results of this shoot, keeping in mind that NO photoshopping was involved at all. These are the photos straight from the camera!
Edited: 02/10/2008 - With all that being said, the next day I did take a couple of photographs that I really like using my Digital SLR, so I won't be giving that up anytime soon. It just made me realize, like my music, it's not the tools that you have, it's the inspiration!
If you would like to see more of my photos, you can check them out on my Flickr page!
Apple, iTunes And What I Buy
It's been awhile since I've updated... and it's all Apple Inc.'s fault! Yes, they've been on a roll with releasing so many cool products, first with the iPhone (yes, I waited in line on the first day for this technological marvel of elegant simplicity!) and then with their various updates, software and new iMac releases (not to mention the new Web Gallery feature!) This post specifically is to test their new My iTunes widget that embeds what I have recently purchased (and/or my favorites) from my iTunes.
Abstract Video Test
I dug up a video I did last year for my single "The Warm Wet Low" and since I recently received Adobe's CS3 Web Design Premium package, I thought I'd test out the video encoder and flash functionality.
The video itself was created by an abstract piece of [brilliant] software that goes by the name of Argeïphontes Lyre 3b3 Summer.
Vote For My Photo Part 3
Ok, my favorite photo has been selected for consideration to issue 11 of JPG magazine, but it's going to take your votes to make it into this issue. The theme this time around is America and it's sad to say, this photo does represent a big (and mostly overlooked) side of America.
Please vote for this photo, not only to get me into the magazine, but to raise the awareness on the homelessness issue...
If you would like to see more of my photos, check them out on my Flickr page!
Thanks!
The Alison Sessions
I am re-releasing an older album of mine entitled "The Alison Sessions" which is now available on iTunes. This is more experimental and electronic based than the recent "The Warm Wet Low" album.
Please feel free to go to the iTunes Music Store to preview "The Alison Sessions".
The cover was created by my self in the Hyperreality style most exemplified by artists such as Gottfried Helnwein. It is a style that is both very photorealistic and normal while being unsettling and subtly surreal.
I am currently working on a new jido-genshi album which will be sonically different than any other of the jido-genshi albums, and I am also working on the cell:burn project as mentioned in the post on 08/10/2006. Keep checking back for updates!
Vote For My Photo Part 2
Once again I have a photo submitted for consideration in JPG magazine. The theme this time is Intimacy and I sure would appreciate all of your votes!
If you would like to see more of my photos, check them out on my Flickr page!
Thanks!
Vote For My Photo!
I've recently got heavily back into photography and decided to try and publish a book. In order to practice and reacquaint myself with the process, I am trying to get a few photos published in this little magazine called JPG. Most of the photos are not too bad, but my self-portrait shot is my weakest one and needs some help. Part of the problem is that I hate being in front of the camera, and I was just not into doing this particular photo, but I had a deadline...
Anyway, I'd appreciate it if you would cast your vote to ensure that this self-portrait makes it into the magazine. And if you would like to see more of these practice photos, check them out on my Flickr page!
Thanks!
The Warm Wet Low on iTunes
My album "The Warm Wet Low" is finally out on the iTunes Music Store along with some nice little reviews. (SIDE NOTE: The Warm Wet Low was originally going to be a graphic novel with accompanying music, but I never finished the art work for the graphic novel, so the music stands alone with your imagination!)
Have a listen and if interested, feel free to purchase it and even write a review! And this album is priced lower at $5.94 due to it being considered EP length, so that's only the price of a cup of coffee (at certain coffee houses at least!)
The "Warm Wet Low" is also available through RealNetworks' Rhapsody Online service.
Hope you enjoy it!
Also, stay tuned for details on the relaunch of my industrial-cyberpunk project, cell:burn. This is actually one of my favorite musical projects and is more me in the way I see myself in terms of music.
More details coming soon...
Designer Toys
It's been awhile (again) since I've last posted. Music has been on hold as well...
Reason: For the last several months I have been working on a semi-secret, non-music related project. Yes, that's right ladies and jellyspoons, I have been working as a Designer Toy Maker!
Instead of giving a long dissertation on the whys, whats and wheres, here is a link to my first soon to be recently released toy, the Broken Heart Robot. Read all about it!
Rest assured, more music is coming soon as I will begin work on a new album this summer and it will be the most epic and ambitious project I have conceived of to date! Stay tuned for more information... (my back catalogue of music will be available soon on iTunes through my record label ZERO:GENSHI.)
Duncan Sheik Project
Well, today is the release of Duncan Sheik's "White Limousine" album. "So? Why do you care?" you say...
Yes, not normally my cup-of-tea but it is actually a very beautiful album. Also, I worked on it! Seriously though, I'm not being bias. It is a beautiful album and I had no creative input on the album itself; it was stricktly a technical thing. So this is the deal:
"White Limousine" is being released as a CD with 12 songs and a DVD with seperated mastered tracks (bass, guitars, drums, strings, vocals, etc.) of every song on the album in Ableton Live format so that people can remix any or all of the songs. There is even a "lesson" built into the Live interface which I created that explains what this is all about. So that is what I did, the entire DVD. Basically, I was contacted by one of the marketing guys at M-Audio to create this DVD. When I agreed, I was sent the original Pro Tools sessions by Kevin Killen, Duncan's engineer. I then converted these sessions into Ableton's Live format and then wrote and created the Lesson, built the project and created the master DVD.
Unfortunately I wasn't provided any information on time signatures, tempo information, etc. so I guessed most of it, and on a couple of tracks, the guesses were a bit off. So thankfully Duncan's drummer Doug Yowell came out from New York to lend a hand (he was brilliant by the way!) and after many, many hours and days, we got it all working the way it should with the timing.
Another unfortunate thing was that Duncan's record label gave us absolutely no time to do this (and in fact almost canceled the DVD version because they didn"t think it was worth it or something) so if I had a proper amount of time to do this the way I wanted to, it would have been much different. For example [for those of you that know Ableton Live] I would have taken the tracks and cut them into Session clips for proper remixing capabilities and options, but as it is now, it is only the full length tracks in the Arrangement view, which is still cool because now the Live user can cut the tracks into clips the way they want.
But all-in-all it was a cool and enjoyable experience; even though it didn't pay, I did get some cool equiptment out of it like the M-Audio ProjectMix I/O! (I LOVE this thing!!!)
Thanks goes to Kevin Walt at M-Audio for hooking me up, Doug Yowell for the incredible help and to Duncan Sheik for allowing me to do this project and for the inspiration (yes, you have made a new fan out of me!)
Stay tuned for the announcement of my next and most exciting personal project yet... and it is non-music related!
World Wide Distribution
Busy, busy, busy...
My record label, ZERO:GENSHI has recently signed a world-wide distribution deal which allows me and my other artists into many digital channels including:
- Apple iTunes Music Store
- Microsoft MSN Music Store
- Sony Connect
- Napster
- RHAPSODY (Real Networks numerous co-brands)
- Starbucks/HEAR Music
- Liquid Audio (includes Wal-Mart, Tower Records and more)
- MusicNow (Circuit City)
- Bleep (Warp Records)
... and many more! For further information, please check out my label site at www.ZeroGenshi.com.
My Podcast
I have too many projects going on at the moment, which is why it has been awhile since I last posted...
I have been playing with the idea of Podcasting and have created a home for my new podcasting station, Zero:Genshi Podcasting Network, or ZGPN for short. At the moment I only have one Podcast, the music from my WarmWetLow project, but soon I will have all sorts of fun and (hopefully) entertaining content for all to enjoy!
I would welcome feedback from those of you who try this out, but one thing to keep in mind before you do; you need to have the latest version of iTunes 4.9 installed on your system.
Ok, enjoy!
The Graphic Novel
As I have previously mentioned elsewhere on this site, I am working on creating an online graphic novel entitled The WarmWetLow.
The first step is the technique. Being that I can't really draw, I had to rely upon what I know; music and photography. The music is what inspired this particular concept in the first place when I wrote the piece WarmWetLow.mp3. Next, using photographs I have taken, I am attempting to manipulate them in a way that will appear painted or drawn while still keeping a bit of the realism. Hopefully this will create an effect of Hyperrealism and will draw the reader into the story.
Since I am just starting out, I am still in the experimental or, "alpha" stages of creating this project. I do have an initial Proof Of Concept preview version of this online graphic novel which can be found by clicking here on The WarmWetLow Preview. Keep in mind that this is a VERY rough preview version; The story is not quite there yet and I am just getting my feet wet with this whole thing by trying out different design techniques.
Credits & Copyright
This site, the music and all other content is copyright © 2006/ 2007 Genshi Media Group. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.