Month: July 2020

Sooner or later your RICOH GR II or Ricoh GR III is gonna break. They’re not reliable cameras, although they are very good cameras. Ricoh has one of the worst durability of cameras in terms of longevity. They all sooner or later break. My RICOH GR II called it quits after around 3-4 years, and this new RICOH GR III is already giving me lens problems after 2 years.

Takeaway: RICOH GR camera as the best everyday shooter, but don’t take (only) one on some epic world wide journey. Or if you’re gonna shoot something super important and reliability is essential, don’t use RICOH GR for it.

More faith in powerlifting, weight lifting and human physiology over ‘mental‘ things.

Simple ideas:

“All is gut!” (German)

Good exists, evil doesn’t. Thus instead of calling something bad or evil, let us just say “not good”.

Good, “gut” (German) means God, or godlike.

Why I powerlift: for me, mental and bodily zen mental training:

If you never shared your opinion, humanity and society could never progress.

You cannot fake substance:

If you live long enough, sooner or later you’re going to contradict yourself. Thus, don’t get too caught up on being consistent and predictable. Better to just follow your own gut and go with the flow!

Not content, substance is king!

Let us be very very very wary of notions of ‘minimalism’. Simplicity is good, minimalism is bad. Minimalism as capitalism or consumerism 2.0, for us ‘Millennial’ generation (we are rich, and apparently more ‘woke’ than our “hoarder” parents), but we are just getting suckered into buying a FEW really really really expensive stuff (this is just consumerism, but made more sexy and interesting).

Or how minimalism is bad. Or don’t be too quick to give away your stuff or lend it out. Or towards an anti “Marie Kando” approach:

Roger Williams (founder of Providence Rhode Island) first got me into the notion of the ‘rape of the soul’. Interestingly enough, Roger Williams came nearly 100 years BEFORE Thomas Jefferson (Jefferson’s “We the People” notion was inspired by Roger Williams). But anyways this got me thinking:

We talk about physical (sexual rape) much, but how come we never talk bout mental or spiritual or soul-rape?

“Class bending”.

For example:

1. Eat “poor people” food — like cheap meats, at the “ghetto” grocery stores. In praise of canned foods and frozen greens.
2. Drive a shittier car or own a shittier phone.
3. With clothes, buy uber-expensive stuff like black merino wool Outllier.NYC $110 t shirts and wear it everyday, and pride yourself in the holes and fade. Look like a homeless person.

When I blog, I think better. I improve my thinking and thoughts. As I blog, I flesh out my ideas.

Instead, ask what they do. Ask what stocks they currently own or what they’re personally invested in. Ask them what they’ve purchased or done with their own money. This will reveal their “true preferences”— action is always more truthful than just basic “words”.

Simple approach to life, and simple heuristic:

Be very very very skeptical when others (especially strangers) tell you to do this or don’t do that.. because it is ‘bad’ for you.

What is often ‘bad’ for you is what is best for you. And when others say that is ‘good’ for you, it is often good for THEM and THEIR self-esteem and THEIR ego, but not good for you.

Some people like to watch Netflix or shows or whatever… I prefer to watch my own videos; to see my own personal real reality videos!

There ain’t a right or wrong way to blog. This is how I do it:

Also, WHY I cook:

I am very very grateful I never went to art school, nor did I go to ‘video school’ or ‘photo school’. I am glad I am all self-taught. Why? I am far more practical and I got more freedom.

For example with video … why do we think we need a massive budget, and all these extra camera people? Seems silly. Just shoot yourself — the beauty of GoPro, or even these new vlogging cameras (tilt screen towards yourself) like Lumix G9.

The best view is your view. Your own POV!

Lumix-Panasonic powers (much) or inspires much for Leica digital cameras. For example, the Leica SL-line seems just like a variant of Lumix SR-series cameras.

Ricoh-Pentax is superior to Canon, Nikon, and Fujifilm. Ricoh GR III as the ultimate compact camera (10x better than even iPhone Pro). Lumix as making the best vlogging or video cameras. Pentax 645z digital medium format as the supreme DSLR camera. Lumix G9 as best compact video or vlogging camera.

In terms of phone cameras, Google Pixel as superior to iPhone for photography. Why? Google has the best computer vision AI people, which means the Pixel night vision seems 10x more robust than the iPhone night vision.

One of the most effective ways to learn, inspire yourself, and self educate yourself on art and great design:

In praise of macro photography, or just looking deeply into things:

Simple approach to photography:

Focus on loving life first, to the maximum. Then the photos will come easy!

Meat is life:

How do we get “gains”, or how do we grow, become more, and grow bigger with bigger and stronger muscles?

Simple — we must increase our nutrition and we must expand.

A lot of guys don’t like to stretch, or do yoga, or become flexible because it seems like a ‘waste of time’, or it is only something that women do.

But facts:

Once upon a time, only men were allowed to do Yoga in India.

Also:

Once I started doing yoga-esque warmups before deadlift, my one rep max for my deadlift went up 50 pounds (from 405, to 455!)

Which makes me think:

Perhaps we should think about flexibility as ‘micro strength’, rather than this “sissy” superfluous thing.

ERIC

A realization:

Our lives are photography.

Let me explain:

YouTube as a platform to share your face and build trust, not to monetize.

Ignore people who tell you what ‘proper’ or ‘improper’ form is.

Better to think about efficient form and inefficient form.

For example in deadlift, sumo is more efficient. That is why it is easier to lift more weight — the movement is more efficient!

Simple idea:

In life, strive to achieve your ‘one rep max‘ in business, entrepreneurship, powerlifting, and life.

For example:

If you want to become happier, more productive, more muscular, more lean (less body fat), and more artistically/creatively motivated-inspired-productive, then intermittent fasting is for you:

Simple idea–

If you want to live a better life, don’t baby your gear.

No. Actually– pride yourself in using and ABUSING your gear!

For example:

1. Bang up your camera, phone, laptop, tablet, whatever. Have pride in the scratches, dents, marks, and cracks.
2. Patina: Wear and tear … wabi-sabi notions.
3. Either buy really cheap gear you don’t mind banging around, or just buy the expensive gear, and pride yourself in abusing your (expensive) gear! If your expensive stuff is scratched and banged up (imagine a scratched up Rolex), treat it as a matter of pride!

To baby your stuff (or even your children) or yourself is bad.

ERIC

Money as subtractive … to use money to REMOVE bullshit, stress, care and worry from your life. Not money as a means to “add” happiness, joy, and excitement to your life.

New sports cars … hyper cars — they add horsepower, muscle, elegance and form. Faster speeds. Stronger. Reduced weight and technological advancements.

But why not apply this notion to our own human body? To build a hyper body? More muscle, power, agility, speed. To REDUCE weight and fat!

Hyper body is the goal and future.

Instead of striving to buy a Lamborghini, Tesla, Porsche or whatever hyper car … isn’t it better to build it yourself? To take a skeleton frame from scratch and build your own hyper car, in your own ideal image?

Or better yet — better to design a hyper body, than to buy a hyper car.

I see life super-simple:

Just pursue your passion, and everything else will fall into place.

Einstein’s (alleged) quote. The gist:

Make things as simple as possible, but don’t make them SO simple that they actually lose functionality and practical use (the problem with people who take minimalism far too seriously).

1. Adopt a more spartan, simple, ascetic lifestyle.
2. Live like a poor person (simulated poverty), but in an elite and strong way
3. Don’t own any expensive possessions. Even for me, I’ve found having an expensive phone causes unnecessary anxiety to my life (fear of dropping it, breaking it, having it stolen, or the annoyance of baying it). Better to have a beater phone you can just throw around everywhere, and no fear of getting it scratched or fucked up, because it is already scratched, fucked up, and old/outdated!

A fun techno-zen approach to life:

Every day, uninstall one superfluous app from your life.

Both literal (from your phone) and also metaphorical (uninstall negative people folks or things from your life).

Not social media. Your own self hosted blog via wordpress.org

It isn’t a matter of “right” vs “wrong”, or “smart” vs “dumb”— it is a matter of you sharing your own opinion without fear, without censoring yourself, and without diluting yourself or your message.

If you don’t outpress your art, then you get creative constipation, and who likes constipation?

New thing I’ve been having a ton of fun doing:

Shooting high contrast black and white video.

Why? It is like my joy of shooting high contrast black and white monochrome, but applied to moving images. I’ve enjoyed doing it on my Lumix G9 at 4K at 60FPS, and also on RICOH GR III on 1080p at 60fps.

Contrary to popular belief, I don’t eat meat because it “tastes good”. No. For me, it is because I believe it will give me maximal physical power, vigor, augment my muscular growth, and minimize my fat gain.

It doesn’t matter how good or bad your bodily physiology theory is, we know … our theories are fragile, biology is king.

A simple look:

Yes, human grandeur is possible. Better question:

How bad do you care?

Care, courage — same word (‘cor‘ which is Latin for “heart”). Proto-Indo-European ‘*ker‘ — the root of everything, your heart.

Every person, being and thing desires dominance. If we disregard this fact, we are seriously deluding ourselves.

When thinking about almost everything in life… let us consider your core values, and your own ‘ground truths’ — truths you consider self-evident, and what you deem as great, worthy, and important. To determine what you truly care for.

It ain’t a matter of hard work, laziness, or whatever. The better question:

How much do you care?

Simple ideas:

1. Wonderment — wondering why things are this way, or why nature or physics works a certain way.
2. Google as anti-wonderment. If we just ‘Google’ something, we will kill our ability to wonder and think critically for ourselves. Simple rule — if you’re curious about something, think deeply on it first, then Google the answer a day later.
3. Walk more. More long walks with ZERO technology on you. No phone. No music. No AirPods or headphones.

Some simple principles and foundations for my ideal school:

Good, not great.

I hate editing video footage. I just shoot ‘one take’, and just upload them. I love to shoot videos, because it is augmented communication. Communication of ideas, but also another form of artistic self-outpression.

A simple life goal:

Structure your life which maximizes your creative and artistic flourishing!

It don’t matter how many Lambo’s we got, how many Rolexs’ we got, how many Tesla’s we got, how many ones and zeros we got in our bank account, what our net worth is, how many new Apple devices we own, blah blah blah … our human physiology will always reign king.

Theory:

If you are actually really really happy in life, perhaps uber-high contrast extreme monochrome is the best aesthetic to display your joy for life?

My thought:

If you are doing photography from an artistic perspective, to exaggerate and distort is good.

But if your goal is more some sort of documentary, then perhaps the more ‘real to life’, the better.

The new luxury:

What you decide NOT to worry about or what you decide NOT to own in life.

Funny enough, the best place it seems to shoot street photography is the mall:

You only got one body; why strive for someone else’s body?

You can buy a fancy car, or a fast car, or a car with tons of horsepower or impressive 0-60 speed, but you cannot buy a good body:

Too much of our society is currently run by nerds. All these big tech companies; the nerd-ification of society:

Photograph yourself, your workouts, shoot videos, etc. Use your camera as a tool to self-document and record your fitness, food, and life!

Yesterday I had the very unpleasant experience of driving from my beloved Providence Rhode Island to Boston. Unpleasant because I forgot … just how bad, tiring, and exhausting driving is.

We want security and freedom … but for what, and from what? And what do we want to do with our own personal security and freedom anyways?

I am a huuuuuge fan of smartphone cameras and all the empowerment and all the new opportunities it affords us in a very democratic way. But the thing and what I believe my honest truth is:

A stand-alone camera, dedicated camera, focused on only making photos or video will always be 10x superior. 

My thoughts:

It seems we are all hungry for and thirsty for a “better life”. But what is a “better life” anyways? And once we achieve and obtain this “better life”, then what?