Madonna concert at the Madison Square Garden, NYC

Yesterday I went to a Madonna concert at the Madison Square Garden, NYC. It was the first time at the stadium and also for her show. I was pretty stunned. The place is incredible and the stage is right in the middle of it. I got an amazing floor ticket thanks to my friend Ludmila and I was able to get pretty close to the stage. I must say I’m not the biggest Madonna fan (Carol, my friend who flew from Brazil to see this show probably beats me by miles – get it?!), but the size and complexity of the production can definitely make anyone happy and excited to be there.

I just came back from a weekend retreat at the Catskills, NY, where I attended the World Summit for the organization Images and Voices of Hope (http://www.ivofhope.org/). I must say I had a few regards in the beginning because of my skepticism for the choice of wording in the description of the event. Even though I’m a spiritual person, I’m not very fond of self-help books, specially when it comes down to media.

However, I was blown away. The people who attended – jornalists, independent filmmakers, producers, photographers, multimedia and publishing entrepreneurs, etc – had fascinating lives and ideas on how to productively improve the use of the media as an agent of positive change in the world. In the upcoming posts, I’ll try to share with you some of the projects I’ve seen.

It’s my belief that we can really do this. We can really believe that change is possible, if we have the courage to implement our ideas. Sustainable development is possible. Ethical behavior in the marketplace is possible. Environmental consciousness is possible. If we think we’re alone in this, of course we won’t see the larger picture and therefore be scared to move forward. What I was strucken by in this Summit is the passion and belief of some many individuals. If we can share and heighten those beliefs among our friends and co-workers, little by little we can change the mindset of the workplace and the ideals we sustain.

This is greater than us. I believe we have a responsability, as media professionals, to strive for those principles we so much care for. I’m in it.

I just got to know that I won 5 Honorable Mentions at the International Photography Awards 2008! It was pretty cool to see that happening, 3rd year in a row. Especially when the winner in your categories is Nadav Kander. I’ll get there one day, though.

I won 3 in People/Portrait (Vik Muniz, Ricardo Amorim, Carnival series) 1 in People/Personality (Vik Muniz) and 1 with People/Other (Karol Meier).

Thanks to everybody for helped me achieve these results!

Check out this video made by photographer Chase Jarvis on how he tricked out his Laptop Case for photo shoots on locations. If you’re a professional photographer who shoots tethered or use a laptop for reviewing images on the spot, you want to follow Chases’s steps:

Point of View has been used as a way to tell stories from the perspective of the narrator, and in this tv commercial, it couldn’t be better made. Can you tell who the player is?

Take a look at this. Hilarious. My friend Nina sent the link to me. It’s the ultimate mobile bathroom solution. Click here.

Have you guys seen this? It’s a great idea on how to sell original art or at least numbered copies (with a certificate of authenticity) made by the artist and not some crappy poster-copy of the original bought at your local shopping mall. You can buy 8,5×11 prints for 20 bucks (series of 200 copies) which becomes cheap enough for more general users to buy good art a fair price and have something unique at their walls. Or you can shell out 2,000 dollars for one copy (edition of 2) in a 30”x40” print. That’s when art collectors come in and buy it

I’ve looked into ways of selling art that could be democratic (20 bucks – just like buying something at Union Square) but also be praised enough by art collectors (2,000 – a good art gallery) and never found something that works so well and so dynamic. This website definitely did the trick to me. Check it out: http://www.20×200.com/

For those who wish to do something about the environment/energy crisis, here’s a very simple solution that won’t take any time, effort or money from you. You just use this version of Google for searching (http://www.blackooogle.com/us/).

I don’t know if you guys already know about him or his work, but I thought it would be great to share this video, when he won the Ted Prize 2005. His work is a document of humanity’s impact on the world. It’s a great lecture on sustainability and compassion. Check it out.

Check this website out (http://photoshopdisasters.blogspot.com/). It’s a blog on the failures of digital postproduction. There you’ll see current commercial pieces (print ads, magazines, catalogues, etc) where retouching flaws can be seeing. It’s amazing how much artificiality has been brought up into the conventional wisdom of what our reality shows. It’s getting harder and harder to convince people of truthfulness and true representation of products when obviously “perfect is better than honest”.