Adobe just released this new AI-based noise reduction feature for their Lightroom program and it is just ridiculous in how good it works. This isn’t even an ad or anything, I just think it’s noteworthy to show you guys. Photos shot with mirror-less camera bodies tend to produce quite a bit of noise, from my experience, but the amount of megapixels nowadays create such large digital images that you don’t really see the noise when the photo is compressed for viewing on say, a smartphone…
With the fall season now here, it seems like we’re making great progress at the shop! Mosquitoes are still everywhere but it hasn’t stopped us from working on the cars. Der has been here on weekends working on his Civic and finally finished his 5-lug swap. That means we can finally get rid of those Watanabe wheels! He mocks-up the new set-up so everyone can get an idea of what’s coming. There was also a freshly-coated valve cover just sitting around for the longest time that he hadn’t bothered to install. While that was going on, Kristian came over with a couple of Bride XERO series seats to show us the differences between them before installing a XERO CS into the GR86! It’s nice to finally have a bucket seat inside the car to go with the roll bar and the car is starting to look pretty complete!
It’s been non-stop lately with all these Wekfest events happening every other week. Feels like we just came back from San Jose and it’s already time for the Los Angeles show. Before that though, we stopped by Cafe 86 on 8/6 Day to hang out with our friend Kam and I finally found time to put my new wheels on the IS300. I’ve had these wheels sitting in Japan for over a year now and they’re finally here in the States! A day after the install, it was time for Wekfest Los Angeles. This stop is always filled with interesting cars of all types but the special focus at this event for me was Alex Alfaro’s Integra Type R. He always collects the rarest of parts for his ITR and this year, he pulled-up with a newly-built JUN Auto B18C engine with TODA ITBs and some wheels you absolutely must see!…
Well, it’s that time! After collecting parts from Japan the last few months, we finally get to work on the Battlecraft x Exceed GR86 project! The original plan was to get the car done for the Wekfest San Jose event but we were a bit worried about getting the necessary parts from Japan in time. Not many people know this but the GR86 has also been gone for the last few months! Teardown on the car began as soon as we got it back and while that was going on, I was also looking to buy a new daily since my Honda Pilot has been giving me some problems…
Man, time is just FLYING by right now. I can’t believe it’s already mid-November. While I’m getting the rest of these photos up from Wekfest LA, we are just a few days removed from the return of the massive San Jose Wekfest event. It’s gonna be a good one this weekend. There are some cars that are going this year that you’ll definitely want to see if you haven’t been to a car show in awhile. San Jose is the big one, the Super Bowl if you will, of the Wekfest series so you should definitely attend if you were on the fence about being out and about this weekend. Today we take a look at the concluding portion of coverage I have of the Los Angeles stop. These are some stills that I took the morning of the event right before the show opened. I really wanted to shoot more but there is just so much going on and I’m running around all over the place before the show even opens its doors to the public…
Don’t worry guys, I got you. I fixed it already. Eat your heart out Jon Sibal! Acura send me one for SEMA next year I’ll take care of it… 🤷🏻♂️
It’s honestly been a very cathartic experience working on this new book. I feel like I should have started earlier in the year but it is what it is. Here is another batch of ‘throwaway’ photos that I don’t believe I ever used for anything because I was just randomly shooting in the moment.
The last few months I’ve been watching a lot of movies and studying color grading and tones from different movies throughout the world. I decided to play around with these random shots from various years during my stays in Japan and really like how they came out. I tried to keep them all similar so they flow into one another as you scroll through.
I think if there was a central theme to this set, it’d be ‘quiet’ or calmness, almost to the point of loneliness, which is a feeling you’ll experience often when in Japan. Maybe I’m overthinking it, lol.
If you’ve noticed I’m writing even more than usual lately, it’s because I’m in booking making mode and I am like DEEP inside my own head right now.
Suspend all disbelief. I don’t think I was ever after the idea of creating an actual game more so than actually creating a ‘feeling’. It’s simple, it’s plastic—but within it is imagination, a healthy dose of attention to detail, and well—a little piece of me. Here’s a little keepsake to remind us of when we were young and how to still be a kid even after we grow old…
Just when you thought it couldn’t get any more real—it’s definitely still NOT real, lol. When I randomly came up with the idea to create a SNES game box a few days ago, I had no idea it’d be so well-received. I honestly thought people would think it’s kinda corny but maybe that’s exactly what we need right now. A little bit of nostalgia to remind us of our childhoods never hurts, I guess. So I took it a step further and created the intro for this imaginary Chronicles video game that must actually exist somewhere in an alternate dimension. I took some old photos I shot from the past, did some cool 16-bit-style stuff to it, added some assets I found from around the web and turned on the game for the first time, haha. I’m currently in the process of producing more game boxes for those who want to have one as a keepsake. It makes for a cool collectible/art-piece for the enthusiasts who support The Chronicles. Hope you like it!!…
Anyone that knows me will tell you that I enjoy collecting things, especially if they are nostalgic and/or remind me of my childhood. I grew up in the ‘90s and a lot of my time was spent playing Super Nintendo. It was always so cool to go to the store and see new games come out and holding them in your hand after they were taken out from behind the display case. Just seeing all the boxes and the box art was so cool. Lately I’ve been trying to consistently be in a creative space so one day I decided to create something that had a mix of both my childhood and what I do as an adult now. I thought it’d be cool to imagine The Chronicles as an SNES Racing video game. It’s completely unrealistic because the eras don’t match-up, nor would a game ever have these types of features or graphics but the main thing I wanted to do was create the box art for this imaginary game.
