Eliza Struthers-Jobin

Please accept my apologies for the total lack of presence on my lovely blog as of late. My absence hasn’t been without reason… I’ve got interesting projects coming at me from all directions, which is super exciting and always fun (no complaints, really!) but hasn’t been leaving me with much time to eat or sleep the past few weeks.

However, I will quickly share with you a short slice of life that my camera captured last weekend during Paris’ annual Béret Baguette ride. Each year hundreds take part in the bike ride around Paris. There a few rules that participants must adhere to, including dressing for the occasion. That means vintage 40′s inspired clothing, bikes, shoes…

I teamed up with the lovely Lucille of Dernier Cri Vintage to make a short mood video of the massive picnic that ensued post-ride. The 800 participants (apparently a record number this year!) enjoyed baguette, saucisson and copious amounts of red wine at Paris’ majestic Parc Vincennes.

(As always, best viewed in HD)

day 1 – 9 am bright and early at La Fondrie de l’image

 
I was finally able to get my hands a little dirty with some coding this weekend. While I’d briefly attempted to teach myself Processing when I started The Thesis last year, I only got as far as making a circle follow my mouse before having to give up all my free time to writing. Needless to say, my short progress was not very impressive. Hence my excitement about this year’s Processing Paris workshops. I’d missed out on Processing Paris 2011 by a meer two days so I’ve been anxiously awaiting for this third edition to happen. As the weekend would prove, I was excited for good reason.
 

day 1 – playing with x,y,z axes, adding noise to my sketch and of course, throwing in a little mouse interaction.

 
Organized by the very amazing Mark Webster, the weekend had Marius Watz teaching the Master Class, Julien Gachadoat keeping the intermediate level busy, and Andreas Gysin got the heady taks of teaching us beginners.

I admit I was a little nervous going in. I thought I’d be the only girl, that I’d spend the weekend in a dark room in front of my computer surrounded by anti-social über-nerds, that I wouldn’t understand a thing, that I would have to slink slowly and quietly out of the beginners class on the first day only to never show my face again… What can I say, the idea of drowning in a sea of cryptic algorithms reminds me way to much of the horrors I lived through in every high school math class I’ve taken, ever.
 

Day 2 – playing with layers, fog, camera angles and loops. Here I added Mike Mitchell‘s killer care bear illustration to my sketch. Check the video below to see the final project.

 
But unlike the uninterested teachers that plagued my youth (North American public education system… blech,) everyone that came out last weekend was there because they wanted to be. In fact we all wanted to be there so much that we barely left each others sides during the three day event. Classes ran over, only to be followed by so much drinking and merriment that I’m still recovering three days later.
 

day 3 – color blending and blobs. Really quite simple, so I was surprised (and a little proud) when someone from the Master Class asked me for the code I’d used.

 
While the boys did out-number the girls, there were actually a decent dozen of us which surprised me. Two were even in the Master Class. (I have some serious catching up to do… ) There were no über-nerds to seen, no dark rooms to lock ourselves away in, and thanks to Andreas’ unyielding patience, all of us noobs came out of the weekend with a solid foundation to continue to build on.
 
In the end pretty much every single one of my preconceptions turned out to be false, which is fine by me. It was so great to be around as many interested and interesting people. I’m already looking forward to next year.

For more information on Processing, see here.
For more information on Processing Paris, and the Processing Cities project, see here.

Photos by Mark Webster
 

In honor of get up and move month, I give you the whirlwind that was my very unplanned easter long weekend :

Saturday brought me to my first French sports center experience (three group classes, the machines and then pool and sauna,) followed by two days of stuffing my face and watching movies. Sunday afternoon I went on an easter egg hunt, then to korean bbq (my new favorite thing,) then to the last day of the Sound Pellegrino music festival. A friend was opening, so were the first people there at 10pm on the dot. We didn’t leave until 5 am, which means there was a lot of dancing and drinking. Luckily the 7 hours of boozing were canceled out by the copious amount of liquids seeping out of everyone’s pores. I’ve never been in a hotter club. That being said, I’d never been to that kind of music festival indoors. The best of Sunday’s lineup in my opinion: Myd, Surkin, Crookers, A-Track (montreal represent!) & Para One.

The moral of the story? Get up and just go out! You never know what might happen, where you might end up.

Lesson of the weekend? 7 hours worth of Burn and vodka is 7 hours too long. Blech.

Ok, well maybe not quite so deluxe, but an apartment in the sky nonetheless. As promised, a few snapshots from my new place of residence! Welcome to the little apartment in the sky as I’ve named it (it seemed more fitting… this is Paris people, space don’t come cheap.)

I’m more obsessed with the view from my little window as it allows me to peek out at a beautiful never ending postcard-perfect traditional Paris city street on one side, while on the other side I’m hit with the stark contrast of the Paris’ more, shall we say, “rundown aesthetic”. It’s a wonderful contrast.

Otherwise, the apartment came lovingly furnished by a very lovely, (and life saving) friend of mine, complete with the cushy leather chair, a huge desk where I can sprawl all my notebooks and paints out with enough room left over for my camera, my computer and my tablet! It’s a creative geek’s heaven I tells ya.

I know I promised pictures of my new chez moi but first, I’d like to take a moment to gush about the Tim Burton exhibit on at La Cinémathèque de Paris.

I was lucky enough to get a spot at the opening vernissage which means exhibit + champagne + snacks. Tim Burton is fun enough as it is. Add a little bubly and you’ve got yourself party. A very crowded party, but a party nonetheless.

I had never stopped to think of how many of Tim Burton’s movies had followed me through my childhood. As it turns out, there are a lot. In fact most of his biggest movies defined my under-12 years. Edward Scissor Hands, Pee Wee Herman, Batman Forever, Mars Attacks, Beetljuice, Nightmare Before Christmas… I could go on.

But what I was most impressed with were the sketchbooks on display. Dating back to Burton’s high school years we can see his evolution but more importantly his different drawing styles. Today his work can be spotted quite easily by his fans so it was really interesting to see different techniques he tried out before settling on his distinct approach.

Also, the creativity behind his work and all those crazy charachters he’s dreamed up really make you think twice about scrapping the “silly” sketch you just did. It certainly made me look at my notebook twice.

It was a last minute gig, so you’ll have to excuse the lack of quality of these photos.

There’s nothing like discovering a new space, especially when it’s going to be your living space. I had only seen the appartment once, and very quickly at that, so moving in has been an interesting experiment in finding hidden surprises (just found a cutting board wedged between my fridge and sink!) and welcome reprieve from that whole political mess.

Here’s to discovering India in Paris (tucked quietly behind Gare de l’Est if you’re wondering where you too can find some decently priced and very tasty chicken madras), 6 flights of stairs (no elevator = nicely rounded rear!!), a killer view and the first time I’ve lived alone in over a year.

Now you’ll have to excuse me while I go unpack. Regular geekery to resume shortly.

Can we just appreciate the irony of this situation:

Just as I get my rejection letter from the French Government (it’s election season! aka they’re sending all the strangers home…) the campaign I did with Le Coq Sportif – a decidedly French brand, we can all agree – goes up across Paris, and certain parts of Europe.

So basically France is using my face to sell a French heritage brand to French people, but because my ancestors left France 500+ years ago, I’m not French enough to live and work freely in the country.

Of course, it’s all much more complicated than that. Politics do come into play here and there are new laws that make it nearly impossible for anyone who isn’t European to get a workers permit here – if you want more information about the situation, check this out – but the irony remains.

To top it all off, while the online version of the add features a little blurb about how I’m Canadian along with a little Canadian flag next to my head, in the Paris metros, they opted for a French flag instead. Ha.

I know I usually steer clear of posting other people’s work on my blog, but I just couldn’t help myself. In the form of some Monday morning inspiration, I give you the Living with a Lion editorial. They just don’t make them like this anymore! I have no idea what the background is on these images (if anyone one does, please do share) but they appeared in an issue of Life Magazine in the 1970′s.

While I can’t vouch for the conditions the lion(s) were treated to during this shoot, I can at least be left with a sense of wonder upon seeing the pictures. Most of the time I feel a little gross looking at wild animals in editorials because of how they’re being portrayed and/or used.

But the idea of a giant animal – the king of the jungle! – taking up with your average american family, is just completely spellbinding to me, and it evokes more than a few of my own childhood fantasies. Blame it on C.S Lewis (or the t.v adaptation of his book The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe,) but at nine years old I could wholeheartedly imagine myself being bff’s with Aslan. Sharing secrets, having sleepovers… The whole deal.

What can I say. All kids are strange and weird in their own way. Happy Monday.

I spent a whirlwind 48 hours in London recently, rubbing shoulders with economic big wigs (Bridget Rosewell is one very smart woman,) and many an Olympic site planner/chair/manager. London’s 2012 Olympic Games are just around the corner, and this past week’s jaunt across the pond can be credited to a very interesting conference about the legacy that these games will leave on the city.

Hosted by the Vinci’s City Factory, speakers reiterated one after another that the games would not leave behind desolated sports arenas once the crowds dissipate and all the fanfair is over. China boasted on of the best Games ever, but now the various sites that were built (to the detriment of a number of historic Beijing communities lest we forget,) just sit there gathering dust…

London plans to avoid this by turning to what many would call the more sketchy part of the city, East London, into the official Olympic grounds. But what’s interesting here isn’t that they’re setting up major sports infrastructure in an area that looked like a wasteland until quite recently. It’s that an olympic comitee has finally considered that once the Games are over, crowds the size of the ones drawn to the Games do not manifest themselves again, ever.

Designs for the arenas and sports locales include modifiable buildings. Parts of the infrastructure – entire seating sections, walls and portions of buildings – will be taken down post-Games and shipped off (the comitee hopes,) to Barcelona for the next Summer Games. Landscapes will change too, with bridges becoming narrower once the masses leave, for example.

In some cases, entire arenas will dissapear. In others, sports complexes will be modified so that everyone can enjoy the facility, and not just the pros (the BMX center for instance… Jumps and circuits will be modified and made more accessible).

A few interesting ideas about the social impact to be felt post-Games were also thrown around. I for one have my fingers crossed that the analysts are right, and that the reinvigoration of East London will raise the “life chance” (aka social status) of those living around the grounds (Hackney area for example…) giving the kids growing up around there the infrastructure they need to be on par with the rest of the London crowd.

I don’t know if East London will become “London’s new center”, but it was certainly interesting to hear some intelligent reflexion about money, infrastructure, power and development an how each pertains to an area completely modified for the games. Let’s hope that London’s Olympic legacy is a good one, because their logo certainly isn’t (zing!)

Stellar Distance whosawhat?

Now that my intelligent-but-curious sounding title has got your attention, I hereby give you a recap of the last few days of my life! Don’t feel cheated now, there are free goodies to be had if you read all the way through.

*Ahem*

The last few days have been a weird amalgamations of time, the kind where hours flow into one another but moments pass at a snails pace. It being a Sunday, and me being in France, (thus everything being closed,) today seemed the perfect day to take a moment and get some ideas – of which I have a tone these days – down on paper.

For those of you who follow my tweets, a proper recap of my recent 48 hours in London was part of my Sunday “moment of reflection,” and should be going up later this week.

Otherwise, I’ve been itching to try a little animation. Besides a quickie stop motion video I did a few weeks ago, further experiments in that realm will no doubt start as soon as I can get my hands on a tripod and jot down the semblance of a storyline. To be continued… (excited!)

Gathering my thoughts at La Bellette in Montmartre

I’ve also been coming across a slew of really free resources online lately. No really. (See?? Goodies!!) So if you’re into the whole “self-teaching” thing, or are just curious about random topics like say… Quadratic Inequalities, or perhaps you’ve been wondering about Stellar Distance Using Parallax hmm? Khan Academy is worth a peak. There are slightly more accessible topics to check out too: art history, geography, current economics, chemistry, and world history for example.

If you’re itiching to easily learn code, I highly recommend loosing a few hours to CodeAcademy, where computer-speak becomes just easy enough that it’s fun! For budding web designers, there’s also Don’t Fear The Internet, which provides a great overview of what all the HTML and CSS jargon people keep talking about is.

My other go-to favorite is Method & Craft, which I’m sure many of you are already familiar with. But just in case you’re not, it’s a site devoted to the method and craft (duh…) behind graphic design. Interviews, videos and tutorials abound, there are hours of Photoshop secrets and InDesign shortcuts to learn on here.

Last but not least, the most recent addition to my rss feed : A List Apart which features articles and anlysis that will prove interesting to anyone who has ever designed a website.

The multifaceted nerd: Wired, Elle Collections and Monocle.

Reading material for the Eurostar home last week.

Sunday morning in Paris: a pancake breakfast in Montmartre. All the fixens were present – orange juice, coffee, tea, fruit, bacon, pancakes of course, and a can (the kind you have to pierce to make a spout) of Quebec maple syrup. We showed a couple of Frenchies what brunch is all about.

Sunday afternoon in Paris: big, blue, empty skies, freezing cold, humid air, and four riders crazy enough to head over to Bercy and ride on the elevated cement blocks that circle the stadium. We chassed the sun for a bit and finally decided to just ride off the cold. Three and a half hours later no one could feel their toes, so we called it a day. In the midst of it all, I landed my first barspin of 2012 (I’d only landed my first barsping of 2011 aka ever (!!!) in november!) Thanks to Stefano for the great shots!