School & WORK Journal 2007-2014

snippets, slices, slabs of moments and doings

irregular, infrequent, and incomplete thoughts & lists on learning, education, play. or sometimes just snippets of conversation with our kids amidst life, which is one of the most beautiful and wonderful ways of learning. I will possibly include older snippets and slices involving work of the past; many of which now degree hold some level of humor or eye-rolling, as many examinations or remembrances of the past tend to do.

2013 below

Coming soon

2013 above

2012 below

October 20, 2012

I want to bring a little warmth to a digital world.

March 7, 2012

I suppose I’m interested in Photography as not just a product, but as a process…and in a larger sense, in the creative process itself. I like to let students start learning out of the gate, stumbling, finding (in the visual arts), direction, shapes, and concept amidst their splats and squiggles and blurriness. What do they find amidst those early explorations that starts to click and to drive their interest in a more targeted, focused sense?

March 1, 2012

Jonny and I met at 78th St SB and talked about finding a work/gallery space. We talked about the idea of doing workshops once or twice a month teaching the basics of DSLR. It was with Jonny, so we could have talked about anything and it would have been good and meaningful. But this was especially nice, as it feels good to make plans and brainstorm with someone you you like and respect, to say nothing of adore. As a reminder, I was 11 years old when he was born. To see him now, flying, teaching me, surpassing me in a growing number of ways…it’s stunning, challenging, and beautiful.

I want to be a decent version of Andy Warhol. This is what I mean, specifically. Not Andy Warhol in every way. Andy Warhol like this:

I want a factory, where:

people: write, paint, make films, print, photograph, sew, craft, and make jewelry.

80/20. Education, Editing, Design 80, the freedom to pursue own projects 20

January 26, 2012

Jonny, shooting like crazy.
Me, teaching, editing.

2012 above

2011 below

August 26, 1.06am

We are not afraid to take a stand on this one. Ready? Here:

Education is important.

There. Put ourselves out on the line. Vulnerable. Let the hate mail come rolling in. Bring it. Because you know what? This is what: Education is important. Which is why we are excited to have the chance to educate formally once again. A couple classes in Photography/Visual Art and Digital Broadcasting at a lovely anonymous high school in Southeast Portland. Go Cougars.

Also: had a vibrant and engaging meeting with redacted this morning, co-author of The Magic of Redacted Redacted. That title just happens to include three words that we believe strongly in. We'll let you guess which ones. Anyway. We drank a lot of coffee and talked about good stuff.

P.S. one of the words is magic.

Much affection,

Mr. Professor Commander Joseph Long

June 2011 - Wrapup of Preschool 2010-11

I don’t even know what these designations mean. Kinder? Preschool? Pre-preschool? Pre-kindergarten? We just sort of plow ahead delicately, like a short-sighted warthog with a mercurial sense of humor. What I know is how much I love seeing her fall in love with words and language; the craft and art of shaping meaningless lines into meaningful symbols that’s she’s learning to code and decode. It is magnificent to behold and be a part of.

Lots of practicing sounds and syllables. What does ‘bridge’ start with? B-b-b-b-b-b r-rrrrrrr I-iiiiiii…and so on. Automobile rides are never boring when there’s windows to look out of and objects to name.

It’s also interesting to see the things she starts to skip, or want to skip, in workbooks. She got tired of practicing D. I looked at her Ds, and they looked decent, so…onto something more exciting?

More wrap-up: I do not grow weary of seeing the way she prints her name, on all sorts of paper; all capitals, her four-syllable full name condensed to the two-syllables of her current preferred moniker (at least for writing out). She’s carefully made her way through a preschool yearbook this year, dancing in and out of pages; it’s fascinating to see what she gravitates to and what she doesn’t. And what she skips or gets tired of.

Even more wrap-up: I look back through another of her workbooks. The careful, painstaking detail given to her name, and to all letters, more or less treated equally, except for when she tired of one, but kept going. I look at her careful circlings of pictures representing a word - apple, alligator, bat, nap. I look at the lines she’s drawn to get through mazes following the alphabet and the colorings of objects beginning with the letter B or b. I wonder why she skipped over certain ones. Did she skip C because it was too hard, and I didn’t catch the fact that she skipped it? Did we have a conversation about it? Was it too easy, not enough of a challenge? It’s not that I need or want to capture everything; it’s beautiful to have the gift of not remembering everything. But it’s also hard at some of these stages to know that things I don’t remember or understand are also likely things she’ll never remember or understand, so when I look at some of these and wonder what her thought process was with something like skipping a page, I have to find a peace in knowing I’ll never know, let alone understand.

My great hope, and I know Becca concurs, is that she sink into - or soar into - a life that is forever in wonder at the infinite opportunities for learning, at the wondrous joy in stretching yourself to pursue ideas and concepts and skills just beyond reach…and by stretching, you reach them. There is a joy in that, and I hope we can be catalysts for not only helping preserve that joy, but helping it to grow and thrive.

April 18, 2011

“Unfortunately, I failed to realize that most people would rather argue over the superficial merits of what they like (or dislike) than consider why they like (or dislike) anything.”
from Chuck Klosterman's IV, footnote on p. 327

February 22, 2011

If you have not watched Banksy's "Exit Through the Gift Shop" yet, there is still time before the Academy Awards. Go! Hilarious, inspiring, educational, and tragicomic. A tale of friendship, obsession, and commerce juxtaposed with the underground world of street art. Go watch!

2011 above

2010 below

November 29, 2010, 1.16am

‘The Creative Business. The Creative Business of Stylistically Documenting Reality.’

It is post-1 a.m. and it just seemed like a pre-thought I should Twitter.
Except I don't Twit. Tweet? So I just braindump onto here.

Gute nacht/morgen.

November 15, 2.25am

Several years ago, I told brother Jonny that I wanted no idol worship.

You will surpass me someday, I said. I do not want your adulation. I want your respect, but it should come as you are huffing and puffing and pushing yourself to overtake me...and overtake anyone else you admire creatively.

Because that is what we do, what we should do as artists. Push each other. In a healthy way. If you do not acknowledge the changing dynamics of a mentor/protege relationship early on, then it will bite your bottom painfully in the future. If you prepare yourself for the pain and exultation of being surpassed, as every great parent and teacher and mentor someday experiences, then you will be joyful in that moment when you recognize you are now on the lower rung of that hierarchy.

I got joy, because that moment has clanged its way upon me. It is here, in the field once owned by Jacques Daguerre and Edward Weston and now filled with the youthful and confident eyes of my little brother. Jonny Long, Photographic Artist.

So if you have Photographic Inquiries, I direct you to him. I shall keep clicking away on the street, in my best Bressonian impression. But aside from that, I shall stand by his side and humbly await his directives as we click away on the growing number of shoots he has lined up...more on that soon.

JL Photography blog

September 2010

This is a girl who likes learning. I think she’s going to like books. Am I willing that into existence? Perhaps, but I think I am merely acknowledging what is there. How do we do this ‘school thing’ ahead? Well, the formal course of our/her formal learning will likely be here, at home, for a (long) while to come. We shall see how that progresses. She’s three.

August 25, 2010

Jonny and I began teaching some video, art, and photography classes this week.

Mr. Long and Mr. Long, is what students call us. Except for a few, who go with Professor.

We have been bantering, and publicly quarreling, and just doing a terrific job of educating young minds thus far.

Brother Jeremy is in our Digital Broadcasting class. Raised his hand partway through class.

Yes Jeremy?
Uhh, Mom wants you to call her.
Funny.

August 11, 2010

We have been gone, which many of you have commented on. Sorry, we have been playing.
Other stuff:

: New website will be up in the next two weeks.
: We start teaching in the next few weeks. Very excited to be formally dabbling in education as a corporate entity, together.
: Jonny is off to Cali for a few days. Ahh, life of a media mogul.

Good to be back.

June 24, 2010

I have been thinking a lot about Media Independent Storytelling. Finally, a phrase that simply articulates the type of storytelling we are pursuing...

March 17, 2010

Am sitting with Jonny, in studio, enjoying a cuppa cafe au lait and finalizing the script for Harvey.

2010 above

2009 below

December 14/15, 2009, 12.51am

Our 29-month old is very excited about learning the Presidents. “Will you help me learn them?” she’s kept asking. So I keep quizzing her. Has 12-15 of them down decent. Abraham Lincoln, of course, was the 16th, so you might wonder: why doesn’t she have 16 down? And the answer is that her sequencing and chronology leave something to be desired, and let’s face it: numbers 13-15 are a little tough (Fillmore, Pierce, Buchanan). I hope this won’t mess up her understanding of history down the road.

December 11 : not really, but maybe a little more?

Q: What do I want?

A: A lot of money. Pretty sure the worries end with enough of it, regardless of what the movies might say.

November 1, a Sunday 8.41pm

Rabbit rabbit, time change. What would normally be 9.41 is…8.41.

An awful day, mostly. At the office doing cleanup on an untitled project…from three #$#SD$ months back. Jonny has been my sounding board. So thankful for him.

September 29, 2009, a Tuesday 11pm

Humane Society project: done.

July 31, a Friday 11.01am

Twitching. Have not been to bed, except for a short snooze during a render in the mid-A.M. hours. I hate this. Re-rendering the entire **** video and DVD because of two audio frames out of sync at the beginning. Finally got it in at 6.30 this morning.

July 28, 1.19am

Almost finished the OC edit. Will be very glad to be done.

June 8, 9.25pm

I am contemplating becoming a rock'n'roll star. Any thoughts on this career shift? Just an idea.

While waiting feedback, I will continue my leadership duties with The Company.

Love,

The Prez.

March 24, a Tuesday, 9.41pm

Jamey at the office: has production high, schedule is full, parents are loving it and having him. Very cool.

I am on the animal couch, flossing, watching House, and waiting for a giant render to complete.

Note to self: just find some festivals to submit to: use the guidelines as my rough structure/parameters/content and idea generation. (Note, 14 years later: what exactly did I mean? 20231014)

January 15

This blog will be updated occasionally, probably Wednesdays or Thursdays. Thanks for checking in!

- Joseph

2009 above

2008 below

August 27, 2008, 11.39pm

I am moving VLM HQ downtown. To a shared space. To happen imminently. Exciting.

August 13 : Wednesday, 8.13am, Sumter (OR)

Approximately 30 miles out of Baker City. On a shoot for a hybrid book-web-video hybrid series. Watched Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead with a fellow crew member in his RV after filming. Sydney Lumet : that saturation-drenched, orange-ish visual indicative of so many ‘70s auteurs.

I might - MIGHT - need to, uhh, decommission my relationship with coffee slightly. Maybe…
…no, I’m fine.

July 31, almost 2am

Another long, late night. Working on a short commissioned piece by a couple for their wedding. Lengthy day with our daughter, in conjunction. Afternoon in Portland.