Mobile Photography Nostalgia

sony ericsson t610
My dead Sony Ericsson T-610s soul taken by the Nokia 6300.

I don’t take very many pictures with my cellphone. But, occasionally it is the only tool available to record a moment in time. Usually the picture is forgotten as soon as it is taken. When my trusty Sony Ericsson T-610 died a few weeks ago I was compelled to take a look at the pictures I’ve taken with it during the five (!) years it served as my phone. Its camera wasn’t great and the pictures were very low resolution… on top of that, I’m not a great photographer. But the grainy, low-quality images have already acquired that warm and familiar sheen of nostalgia… the same kind of sheen that we experience listening to vinyl records or cassette tapes or playing old arcade style video games (Galaga!). A long time ago I posted a small set of pictures from the old phone when it was still new to me. Now I’ve added a bunch more to that Flickr set. Take a look.

My new phone (Nokia 6300) looks a lot like the T-610. I admit that I bought it mainly on the strength of that resemblance… but… I find its new interface a little too slick, its memory bigger than necessary, its photos are bigger but not better, etc., etc… already I’m missing the relative clunkiness of the old phone knowing full well I’ll have the same nostalgic feelings for the new one in five years time.

TCAF 2007

Daniel Libeskind's Royal Ontario Museum Expansion in Toronto
 Daniel Libeskind's Royal Ontario Museum Expansion in Toronto
Daniel Libeskind’s Royal Ontario Museum Expansion in Toronto

Here’s another event I failed to write about after it was over: TCAF. Hard to believe it’s been almost a year…! I was excited to visit Toronto, the city of Seth, Chester Brown & Joe Matt! Sadly, I missed their appearance together. Still the show and the city were amazing… and as usual I managed to take very few pictures at the actual show. Instead, during brief moments away from the table, I filled the camera with images of unbuilt luxury condos, monumental residential building and deconstructed museum sharkitecture. You know… the usual stuff. All this was just blocks from the show! Someday, I would like to go back and see the rest of the city.

Lutefisk Sushi 3

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From Ransom Strange: Voodoo Economics

Here’s another event I participated in, but failed to mention on the blog. Lutefisk Sushi 3 is an (almost) annual comics event in Minneapolis. Practically every able-bodied cartoonist in town makes a mini-comic, makes 150 copies of it and they all end up packaged together in a fancy box. This year the box was designed by Kevin Cannon of Big Time Attic. On top of that there is also a nice exhibition of some of the art held at the Altered Aesthetics gallery. My slice of sushi is a short 8 page Ransom Strange story titled Voodoo Economics. Check out the excerpt above. The Ransom Strange character first appeared in Swindle Magazine No. 12 (and he may appear in some future comics…). The original art from that story is now available for sale and viewing at the art show. The exhibition is open until the end of May. Anyway, click on the pic to see some blurry pictures from the opening event:

lutefisk sushi
Mike Toft of Brainfood checking out the art.

Stumptown 2008

Portland, OR Grain Silo

Stumptown is at this point gone from most people’s minds… but I just uploaded all these pictures I took while attending the show to Flickr… only I neglected to take pictures of the Stumptown Comics Festival itself so instead you get bunch of pictures of the Willamette river front, the Red Lion Hotel and the Stumptown after-party held at the excellent Pony Club gallery.

Cartoon Dialectics Vol 1 – New Edition

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I’ve finally had a chance to put together a new edition of Cartoon Dialectics Vol 1. This new edition debuted at Stumptown a few weeks ago, but I didn’t manage to make enough copies to offer online… until now. The cover is brand new and was silkscreened by the talented Squad 19. This is a good time to mention a not-full-on review of the book that appeared quite some time ago on the excellent ComicsComics site. I don’t think I’ve linked it before, now I have. Get your copy here.

Mome Volume 11

Mome Vol 11 Million Year Boom p1
Click to see bigger.

I suppose I should update this blog… It’s been a while!

I already wrote a little bit about this here, but this time the new issue of Mome is actually on the stands. My contribution is a 12 page story called “Million Year Boom.” Check out page 1 above.

A few reviews have appeared already: Sequart (as part of a monster of a review of Momes 6-11), Jog, ADD, Copacetic (scroll all the way down), and ComicMix. Get a copy at your local comic-book store, or direct from Fantagraphics.