Leaping in Dreams

Last night, I dreamt. I awoke with the dream on my tongue. I was an observer of myself in the dream - as if I were being filmed inadvertently by a video camera. I could see half of my face in profile up close in the screen - like I was standing right beside the filmer. We were both watching the action unfold on a snow-capped peak before us. A spotted, shaggy mountain goat entered the screen and leapt from the cliff's edge! Why? Why? Why? It fell out of range of the camera as a snow leopard entered the shot. The leopard leapt after the goat, but realizing its peril, twisted in the air to land safely back on the ledge again licking its lips. No! I don't want this.

The scene rewound. This time I see the goat running and leaping, but, this time, the goat realized its predicament and twisted in the air to land safely back on the ledge again. The snow leopard leapt full-force after the goat and fell. The camera panned down to follow the leopard where it landed on all fours on a ledge far below, without injury.

The entire dream feels paused in my mind, surreal and realistic. The scene of the mountain definitely derives from the album cover, depicting a mountain, for a band called Painted Palms that will be couch surfing at my house tomorrow night. http://paintedpalms.bandcamp.com/

And, strangely, their ethereal music played in the background of this dream filled with snow leopards, mountains, goats and leaping into the abyss.

AIGA Webinar: Reinventing the Magazine Experience for the Digital Era

With Callie Neylon, Colin Fleming, Lindsay Powell.

My Notes:

Digital Publishing. How does digital change books and the authorship process? From scroll to screen, the book is shedding its corpus. Digital is changing the process - making it more liberating and approachable. The shift to the new medium isn't scary, its just managing the workflow that is probably the biggest challenge.

Pre-artifact: writer + ideas + readers
Artifact: dynamic screens, maybe codex
Post-artifact: social media, global

You can now publish without the middleman - the publisher

Integrating, sharing + content. Not adding interactivity unless it enhances the story on another, more personal level. The new medium allows us to reach new audience members. Publishers really want to be on tablets.
- huge consideration about workflow
- also the opportunity to review how we do things!
- the conversation is now about what else do we add to headline + copy? Bringing the idea of User Experience. What is your communication about navigation of where your content is?
- All of these base design skills of telling the story need to be retained and translated to the new technology.

DPS - Digital Publishing Suite, using InDesign CS5.5 to design the layout. But with a single click, you can add video, movement, a slide show, cross-fades with no programming needed. Building these types of interactions is really easy in InDesign. Using the new DPS tools in InDesign creates beautiful, interactive digital publications! So Exciting!!

- designing a visual language with consistent icons for tapping and navigation, etc. The translation to digital is more tightly related to the horizontal spreads in a magazine. The ability to tell the story through motion as well!

InCopy is a sister application to InDesign, which allows editors to edit copy, but not the layout.

Tools: Image-sequence tool. There is a tool called folio builder in InDesign to build/construct layouts and assemble the files into folios for publishing digitally online. Go to AIGA website and look at resources for posts and writeup to questions from prior webinars to learn more of the tools/technology.

What is right now like?

What is right now like?
The walls are yellow
Like lemon merengue pie.
The house sounds quiet,
Most room mates are camping.
My lips feel dry.
My throat seems scratchy,
as if tickled by grass.
My mom says to imagine
My throat coated by matted
Soft, green, enzyme-giving grass.
So I do, and I wash the image down
With honeyed chai rooibos tea.
Right now is peaceful.
I am right where I would like to be.
Right now is happening to me.

I Won't Find Myself When I'm Looking

I won't find myself
when I'm looking for who I am.
My mind is not the place
from which to understand
what number represents me
on the enneagram.
When I pick my head up
When I become present again,
When I stop the search,
My self will be silently observing,
Lying still on a dock between water and sky,
The pylons locked down into earth for support.
The purple-fringed clouds passing by,
Bringing apple-smell and fall forth,
Soon darkness telling stars to light,
And owl calling some of me to flight,
While part of me is always resting, smiling,
On that dock, planted, between water and sky.