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Obviously I skipped an entry last week.
Just not enough interesting things to talk about. I had a trainer come in from DC to help us do a run through of our new sales system. It was two days riddled with technology issues and not very helpful teaching. Guess I'm gonna have to dig in myself.
One bit of good news. I hired a new assistant. His name is John and he is from England. He and his wife live about an hour from Austin, so I am hoping the drive won't discourage him from staying. He's a very talented designer, knows his way around java, javascript, ASP, as well as OS and hardware issues. He's real strong in areas that I am not, and not real interested in the areas that my strengths lie. Hopefully it will be a good match.
On Friday night, Aden showed up at my door to shoot a video. I had worked with him a couple weeks back, and both of us were pretty tired cuz of the late hour we got started. He has lots of great potential, and wanted to work with him again. My goal was to do some cool outdoor edgier shots, but once again with the late start we just kinda made do with what we had.
First we shot some photos for an article in Unzipped magazine. They are doing an article about guys who work around the house all nakie-like. Painting, cleaning, bartending. Not really a sex for hire thing, more like sexy for hire. We got some good stuff, but I still feel like they are a little dark.
We then moved over to the video.
Ok, so I am beginning to like doing the videos. I hope you all will stick with me as I learn this new craft.
I'm trying to do something different than the other leading players out there. Avoiding a formula. Not sure this is a good idea cuz it is a LOT of work and it is a lot tougher to control the quality.
It was about 10pm when we started shooting, and I wanted to do a video outside in the dark. Not in night vision mode, just enough light to show the body and really give a voyeuristic feel to it.
It went pretty good, except that I had a light in the back that would auto on and off every couple minutes. Eventually I brought a 1000 watt lamp out and set it far off. It worked, but the other auto light drove me crazy.
During the "money shot", the light gave out which basically put a major bummer on the ending. And it's not something you ask for a retake on. I think it is salvageable, and the reaction from the couple people I have shown it to think it's very cool.
Nathan Brooks also arrived late that night. He was in town to do a video and to perhaps work with another model. Nathan is a sweetheart. He spent a lot of time online looking for other models, while I tried real hard to get some work done. But the boy has lots of energy and I was up and out of my chair to "come see" who he had found so many times that I just never had a solid chunk of time to complete a task.
Nathan has a keen sense of managing other models, and I think he really should get an Agency license and start managing models full time. He is pretty much doing that anyway.
We also tried to get some shots of him "At Work" for the Unzipped magazine. We went out to Barbara's and it was a disaster. The weeds had grown back, there were wasps nest all over the place, giant spiders, and Nathan quickly got 4-5 very ANGRY looking mosquito bites. Thank goodness for the clone brush.
We gave up after only shooting 15 minutes. We did manage a few good shots, and Unzipped was pleased. Nathan's wants a cover of a magazine, but I think this is his first time in a major publication, and he seemed psyched by it.
We loaded up all the equipment we had brought and went home a little dejected.
One of the things I am missing in the videos are the multiple camera angles. I can shoot some video, run around the model, shoot some more, then do it all over again, then splice it together, but its not real smooth. Having a second camera will really help.
JBB volunteered to help out with the second camera I have. It's a very mini-mini digital camera. My main video camera is nice with 3 CCDs. This one only has one, and you can see the difference in the video quality. But I kinda like the second camera having a different look when I put the movie together.
He's doing it for free initially. Money is realllly tight on the ChaosInAustin side. I've been shooting the videos, plus a bunch more regular photoshoots. Membership hasn't taken a serious jump..yet. So right now I am spending a lot more than I am making in hopes that the video sales will do well.
I'm still not convinced the PPV payment method will work. You Pay Per View any movie you want, and you can watch it for a period of time. But after that, it no longer plays.
I think guys have been spoiled by the All You Can Eat buffet style of the other sites. I HAVE seen more PPV coming online on other sites, but if you join a site that has 200 videos and lets you capture them to your hard drive, you may not like the idea of paying a much smaller fee, and getting only what you want for a short period.
I just can't float the kind of traffic these sites are doing.
Nathan and I went over to JBB's and we did a shower and bed scene. Nothing really original, but after our fiasco at Barbara's farm house, we were looking to keep it simple.
Sunday I watered and mowed the yard, did laundry, and even managed to get up on the roof to paint the trim that has been flaking off. It was driving me bonkers when I would pull into the driveway and see it like this.
Nathan did find one model who might eventually pose for me, but was not keen on doing nudes…which of course I really need. In this photo, Nathan has came to check on me to make sure I hadn't slid off the roof.
This last week I was swamped again. Filing quarterly taxes, paying bills, and doing several model interviews. One model potential who is 19 came over a couple times and I got the feeling he just wanted to talk to someone. He's not Out to his parents, who are real religious, and is struggling with being gay and all. Hadn't even kissed a boy. Painfully shy, but I think he has an actor/exhibitionist in him.
He's a great guy..now if I was only 20 years younger! I'd like to work with him, but I think posin nakie is just too big of a step for him. Might want to wait a couple months to see how he comes to terms with everything.
I worked on the movies and got them all encoded.
I then had to prepare for my trip to Chicago. Packed up all my lights, then Aaron stopped by to do a quick shoot of his abs. I've got him hooked up with P. Michael Perez and am hoping that he can get him some major work.
I also finally got my truck into the shop to have some audio equipment re-arranged.
I hate to show this kind of stuff off, cuz its bitching about pretentious things, but it is something I end up obssesing about for a couple days, and takes up huge chunks of a day.
When I got my truck I had XM Satellite installed. I LOVE THIS THING! But the truck has a special CD changer in it, and the standard in dash radio doesn't work. So I had to get the portable device. Despite the factory installed radio having a GIANT Auxiliary button on the face of the radio, there is apparently no actual auxiliary input in the back of it, so I had to resort to the FM broadcast option. The quality is not as good as it could be.
Intitially I thought I would listen to only a couple stations and wanted to mount it inside the console between the seats so it wouldn't be a theft temptation. What I didn't know was the XM receiver will manually turn off, but won't automatically turn back on. So I was constantly digging into the console, turning it on, and changing stations.
Then last week the signal kept going out. Faulting antenna I guess. Took it to Circuit City and they remounted it in a spot over a cup holder (which does still have room for a can of soda) and installed a new antenna. It's now almost perfect. The only two things that would make it perfect would be to have the feed go into the Auxiliary port (it will sound more CD like) and if it would turn back on automatically so I don't have to quickly get the power on to avoid having to to listen to static while it powers up.
I love the Dance station BPM, but I think I end up listening to the System most often. I dip on over to The Move but the music can be a lot more fringe and trancey. I prepaid for two years of service and it was like 7 bucks a month. What a deal!
I haven't had to listen to a local dj since February and all the music is awesome. I actually look forward to the drive.
Any of you XM fans yet?!
I flew into Chicago on Thursday night. Bill aka Intoon swung me by Wendy's for some nuggets and a soda- no real food on the plane…haha..like nuggets are real food.
We then came home and I hit the sack right away. Intoon had arranged for four models over the next 3 days in Chicago and we had a lot to do. What a lot of work for him that was.
Not all the models did a final confirmation on doing the shoot, so we suspected that we would have a few No Shows.
Sure enough, the first model scheduled for 9-10am-ish never called or showed up. We used the time to go have a great breakfast at Clarke's just down the street from Bill's place. We ate there on my last trip to Chicago and its good stuff. We did end up eating at Anne Sathers on Saturday morning, but we were back again at Clarke's on for Sunday breakfast. Good stuff!
Bill had rented a car to make sure I got from the airport with all my equipment safely. But he also had lots of his "toys" to pack up and ship at the UPS store. Duel purposes. Bill has gotten rid of all his collectibles on eBay. His house is practically barren, and you really get the sense he is starting fresh.
After running errands we dropped the car off at the rental place. Now faced with…gasp…public transportation I might have to actually learn how to do the train token system. The city was gorgeous this summer. We walked around to a variety of destinations.
Chicago is BIG. When I flew in the city look nicely laid out on a grid, but this part of town sure seems to have streets going all whompyjaw-crooked. Bill also meanders and takes shortcuts and I get turned around in no time. By the end of the trip, I could kinda figure out how to get over to the EL train brown line. But don't spin me round cuz I would get lost real quick.
And sooooo many people. All the time! Everywhere! Walking, moving, jumping into traffic! Big city life isn't for me. My head gets all overloaded. I am sure I could get used to it. I lived in downtown Denver, but Denver was not even close to the density that I kept seeing. It really is a lovely city though.
We got back in time for my shoot with Roger. Roger is 44 and has a great build and a ready smile. He brought me about 10 CD's of music compilations that he likes to make. It sounded like his CD collecting was more than just a hobby. So I scored a great model AND a bunch of new music.
I did some shots of Roger painting a wall for the Unzipped article. Also got some fun pics of him around the house.
After the shoot we scrambled to go meet J (remember him from Costa Rica?) and Johnny aka "The Empress" for dinner and a movie. We ate at Noodles and Company cuz it was near the theatre.
We went and saw the latest Harry Potter movie, and well, I loved it. I loved the new effects, the grittier look and feel of the cinematography, great camera angles. I have heard that the kids look a bit too old these days, but I thought they were fine. I like the new abbreviated version of the plot, and the whole "which ones are the bad guys" twist was much more effective in the movie than in the book. Buckbeak the Hyppogryph was a technological wonder and flawlessly portrayed. Amazing how far they have come since the stop motion work of Jason and the Argonots movies.
Saturday morning we waited for another model that hadn't done the final confirmation, and sure enough he didn't show. No email. No phone call. Typical.
No loss. Money is so tight on the ChaosInAustin side, that I am may need to stop shooting for a month or two till I can get the current batch of guys online.
Bill and I decided to do a little shopping. I wanted to put all the music that Roger brought me on my iPod. I had seen some cool travel speakers made especially for the iPod, but didn't want to weight myself down. Turns out I was gonna ship somethings back, so I had plenty of room for more gadgets!
It was time to get on the scary train system. Bill walked me through all the steps, and snapped this picture as the train came swooping into the station.
I wish Austin had trains and subways and lightrail. You can get around so quickly and with my last fuel bill at $210, it would be great to not pay out all that money.
Can you tell the train makes me happy even though the turnstile process makes me nervous?
The city just slides by. Bill has a vast knowledge of the city, and just like the last time, I got a wonderful insight into the city's working, growth, and history.
We also stopped by Linens and things and got some white sheets in hopes that my last model, Ryan would actually show up.
We got back home and Bill and I got a bunch of work done. Bill's place is just gorgeous. I don't know how he is giving all this up…well..I understand the Winters being too much, and wanting to start fresh. But what a great place he has here.
Ryan arrived a little late so we shot super fast- Bill's going away party started at 7pm and we had to be there about 6ish. Ryan has an interesting look. He's looks a lot like Annie Lenox and is told that often. Adds to the feminine quality. Not sure how many will like the photos. VERY twinklike...but I guess by the amount of twink sites out there, they are somewhat popular.
Ryan asked if he could bring his boyfriend along. What is really strange, is there was this one guy that Bill and I were trying to get to pose for us. His handle was Cute Polish Boy or something. I think he initially said he would be interested, but we never heard back.
Turns out Ryan's boyfriend is Cute Polish Boy..named Sean. After already being stood up by two models, I was more than happy to try and talk Sean into a quick shoot.
Great face on this one and I hope will be very popular.
Even better, I got some sweet romantic shots of the two of them rolling around in bed together, and everyone seemed to like the shots of Alex and Steve together, so I hope that will make everyone happy too.
I also had found some cloth backdrop on eBay. This stuff really absorbs light, so I cant wait to get them home and try them in a more controlled setting.
Gotta get more members! Paying out all these models is killin me!
We hustled them out the door and got ready super quick for Bills's party at Mike's house.
Bill has a very diverse set of friends. He has maintained a close knit group of friends from college. They all seem to have entered creative fields, and are all quite successful. Because of this, the production values for the party were top notch. Mike offered up his amazing house for the party.
The theme was of course Texas kitsch, and the poster for the party was only the beginning. Bill's other friend Mike, made a bunch of posters (see four of them hanging on the refrigerator?-yes that's a fridge!) that they hung up all over the house. They all had Texas or Southern type phrases in a Wanted poster type theme. Some poster had famous people's faces photoshop'd onto a cowboy, while other had members of his college core group photoshop'd on.
They went all out. Bandanas, chaps, spurs, shotgun bullet lights, cap guns with holsters and caps!
Another friend made this amazingly wonderful grotesque armadillo cake (yes I informed him that the legs never splay that way..always together and usually pointing up in the air.) The outside was made of some strange gumlike material (not tasty) while the inside was filled with chocolate cake and raspberry filling- for that bloody insides effect.(very tasty!)
And here are our sexy hosts. Mike and Jenn. Mike has an advertising agency, while Jenn lives in LA and works as an field reporter and part-time anchor person for the tv news there. Sweet gig!
These two are hot hot hot. Instant crush on both of them. Bill tells me everyone gets a crush on Mike. He's very genuine, engaging, and has tons energy. Jenn is much the same, and they seem to have a perfect fit despite the distance. Their work schedules are both crazy and that works for both of them.
Mike and a few of his friends went and looked at the ChaosInAustin site, and they were very enthusiastic about talking about it. I had LOTS of porn like questions to answer. I am hoping that between Mike, Bill, and another guy named Bernie, we can all work on some new projects Bill has thought up. Exciting stuff.
Jenn had found a red rose tattoo that she thought might look good on Mike's rippling arms, but I suggested a more trashy spot in the small of her back. VERY authentic! She was working it too!
Some of the guys that I had gone to go see Dame Edna with so looooong ago were there also. It was cool to see them again. Frank is on the left in this photo, and J is tucked in the back there. Jack is Frank's boyfriend, and on the very right is one of Bill's most dearest, charming and royal friends Johnny aka the Empress.
Kathy is another long-time friend. She was in charge of photos. The goals was to have everyone pop into a bedroom and take wild west shots with cowboy hats. Here she takes a picture as Sue blows out the candles on her Birfaday cake.
Sue, yet another long-time friend was celebrating her birfaday as well.. She was as gregarious and energetic as Bill always said she was. It was so cool to see this group stay together over the years. I feel bad like I am breaking up the team. Lots of true affection going between all these people. Here she is blowing out the candles on her birfaday cake.
I some how sensed that when Mike and his two gay buds (Karl and Jeff) would be taken their country pics that shirts would be removed. I stumbled in at juuuuuust the right time.
I werked all three of these guys to get them to pose for me. Mike (on the left) looks fantastic, and I am hoping I can eventually wear him down….but I doubt it. Karl and Jeff also have a great look. Karl seemed a little unhappy with his bod right now. Jeff especially scores points for that great body hair. The two are a Party every where they go, and they are talking about coming down for Last Splash. Maybe by then I can still convince them.
We got home from the party about 2am.
We didn't get up till 9ish and then went over to Clark's for a leisurely breakfast. We came back, worked for a while, went for a soda and a walk around the block (DAMN the weather was beautiful this weekend)
After a little more work and packing, we headed over the Halstead street and Bill got himself a new cell phone. I got a Contact High off the purchase. There is no hope for me.
I took a cab to the airport. I LOVE LOVE LOVE Chicago now, but ugh, so many people. Took a long time to get there.
As of typing this, my flight to Houston has been delayed, and I wont make a flight to out. Apparently it s weather problem, so they wont put me up for the night. I might go get a hotel room, or maybe Steve Henry will put me up for the evening. I'm gonna try to get an 8am flight, but it might be a later one. Will see if there are maybe some car rentals too. Would like to get home to my own bed. Sometimes its cheaper to just do the drive, rather than pay for a hotel and cab fares.
That's it for the last two weeks.
Bill moves in next Sunday, the following weekend I am hosting Alex (January 2004 Model) from Colorada again, and the following weekend we are flying in a gorgeous new model from Florida named Chris..
Busy busy!
See ya soon.
CYAIN7
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