Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Our flight plans...

... are here. I went through this morning and translated all of them into some form of english. I hope this helps you all know where we are going and gives you a kind of time-table.

FLIGHT PLANS-

UNITED AIRLINES
MAY 30, 2010
Depart SLC UT- 5/30/10 4:33pm (1633)
Arrive Denver CO- 5/30/10 6:00pm (1800)

Depart Denver CO- 5/30/10 8:07pm (2007) overnight flight!
Arrive London GB- 5/31/10 12:15pm (1215)

KENYA AIRWAYS
Depart London GB- 5/31/10 8:00pm (2000)
Arrive Nairobi KE- 6/01/10 6:30am (0630)

Depart Nairobi KE- 6/01/10 8:30am (0830)
Arrive Mombasa KE- 6/01/10 9:30am (0930) we arrive right on time.

Good times with Komaza!

JUNE 17, 2010
Depart Mombassa KE- 6/17/10 10:30am (1030)
Arrive Nairobi KE- 6/17/10 11:30am (1130)

Depart Nairobi KE- 6/17/10 12:55pm (1255)
Arrive Entebbe UG- 6/17/10 2:10pm (1410) these are fast flights!

Good times with HELP International!

JUNE 27, 2010
Depart Entebbe UG- 6/27/10 5:10am (0510)
Arrive Nairobi KE- 6/27/10 6:20am (0620)

Depart Nairobi KE- 6/27/10 10:50am (1050)
Arrive London GB- 6/27/10 5:50pm (1750) church on an airplane

Good times in London!

JUNE 29, 2010
Depart London GB- 6/29/10 4:20pm (1620)
Arrive LAX CA- 6/30/10 12:42am (0042) I don't like this

Depart LAX CA- 6/30/10 7:32am (0732) good luck sleeping
Arrive SLC UT- 6/30/10 10:23am (1023)

Home again! JUNE 30, 2010

I am NOT looking forward to spending the night in LAX. I don't like LA that much and their airport isn't exactly the most comfortable place to sleep. I am looking forward to London. I am also looking forward to the fact that really we don't spend that much time in airports. I do like the overnight flights and how direct we are flying. I hope that I can negotiate some kind of sweet seating arrangement so I have legroom. If you have any tips for getting good seats, sleeping on planes or in airports or eating in the same, they would be appreciated.

Thanks!

Monday, April 26, 2010

Just a thought...

... and that was pretty much all that it was. I had this footage that I had been looking to use but couldn't find anywhere it fit in. This week, talking with some friends about the Slow Food movement, I started thinking about the pace of the world and I have to ask is it good to move fast? My short answer is that I don't really know. Sometimes it is good, and sometimes it is completely destructive. I feel that creatively it is good to move fast, but I don't know how possible or sustainable that is. This short and slow video is just a 'meditation' on moving fast. I love this footage anyway you think about it.

WalkOnWater from travispitcher on Vimeo.

Sunday, April 25, 2010

What I like to do...

... in my spare time. What spare time you might say? I don't know, but there is some time that I find. So Becky is always finding new shows to watch, most of which I think are a waste of time and a waste of brain. But I found what I thought was my own waste. A cartoon which I can enjoy much more than a teen drama.

I started watching "Avatar: The Last Airbender". I thought that it would be my own waste of time but it turned out being a complete favorite. Talk about a great cartoon. It reminded me of the cartoons that I used to watch when I was a kid, good basic story, didactic morals, and fun characters. It was an adventure. Avatar (way better than the actual movie "Avatar") was super fun to watch and it really taught some good morals that come from Asian theology, things like respect nature, have balance, do your duty, respect and listen to your elders, make time to search for spirituality and more. I found it very nice. Now I want to add it to our list of good shows for our kids to watch.

If you are looking for something great to watch then check it out. I think it is very worthy.

This time...

... victory was mine!

Thanks to a helpful comment (thanks Polly!) I was able to win the mic that Becky and I need in Africa and this time it came with all of the accessories that we needed (hand-boom, boom, cables, sweet windguard, etc). This deal was even better than the other one that I lost so I count my lucky I lost the first. Thanks to that we saved about $400. We are some lucky kids.

Thursday, April 15, 2010

I hate loosing...

... especially on eBay.

I am trying to buy a professional grade microphone, the Sennheiser ME-66/7 K6 system, but they are great and expensive and when one goes up on eBay, it is cut-throat and it quickly goes beyond my budget. I was so close on one. I lost by $1. How could that happen? I am the eBay pro! I had never lost until I got into this crazy battle for audio equipment, now I am undone by people with more money and seemingly faster internet connections, though I don't know if that is possible really. It is eBay and should be pretty much the same for everybody with broadband right? Not too complicated... None-the-less, I loose. But someday I will win and I will be able to hear the people across the street whispering under their breath from 200ft away. Someday I will win...

To let you know how great this mic is here is something shot on another DSLR (like the one I have but a bit different, the Mark ii 5D) with the Mic that I would like to get.

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Africa, news, shots, gardens...

... and so on, etc.

It is official. Becky and I are going to Uganda with financial help via HELP International. We are planning on being there about a week to help document material for two short docs; one about the eye clinic that will take place (check this video out for our preps) and the other about the other activities that the volunteers participate in like building adobe stoves, helping build schools etc. We are very happy to have this extra experience without having to dig into our own pocket to pay for it. We won't make any money, but we will establish a great relationship with HELP and I will have more to add to my portfolio.

We are shooting stuff (finally) for my senior project about conservation and sustainability. We are headed to the community gardens up in SLC this afternoon and are excited to have a few hours to explore the area and hopefully meet some people. We are also planning on shooting the recycling doc and biking doc within the next month or so. Moving right along.

Now that we are going to Africa and we know exactly what is happening (more or less) we are finally ready to start pushing along with our flight plans. HELP gave us their contact who books the cheapest flights available and I talked with her yesterday. We should have flights booked by the end of the week. That being said, we are also planning on getting shots (malaria, yellow fever, the hepatitis', etc). Lucky for us (sarcasm) BYU insurance does not cover any shots, even for BYU stuff. I love their plan (heavy sarcasm). We can get cheaper shots at our county health office here in Provo and we will schedule those today for ASAP. I can tell Becky is stoked for that (I am being rather sarcastic, aren't I?).

We will keep you posted on dates and more as they come out. We feel very blessed and hope that those blessings also include a long layover in London so Becky can fulfill a childhood dream of going there. I want to help her but we both know that we can't stay long because it is expensive there and we won't be working for almost the whole month of June. We should be fine financially, but we won't have room for much excess.

Thanks for your support!

Friday, April 9, 2010

So I haven't been on in a while...

... but I hope that this will help you.

Astoria Scum River Bridge from Jason Eppink on Vimeo.

Probably the neatest thing that I have seen all week!

In other news, I am working on putting together a documentary for the J. Rueben Clark Law School about some of the professors that are retiring this year that were there when the school started. It is fun and interesting to see how much progress the law school has made from meeting in the basement of a Catholic private school to having one of the best law libraries in the world and being a top 50 law school. Neat.

I have been working a ton on Tipping Bucket stuff this week. I am really enjoying my work with them. This week we did a short video in one day. On Wed we woke up nice and early, went to the Eye Clinic where Dr. Monson had generously gave us permission to use his office for the video. The lighting was terrible and we had the AC or some air filter going the whole time so the sound was shot, but we worked with what we were given and made a video out of it. You can check out the latest project, an eye clinic in Uganda, at tippingbucket.org.

Speaking of Uganda, after the video Ryan and I were talking about my going to Kenya and they were like, "Hey, we are going to be right next door in Uganda. Why don't you come over there after Kenya and we can do a short doc there too?" I was stoked on the idea of being able to develop my portfolio more and get a free trip to Uganda, so this next week Becky and I are meeting with HELP International to see if we can work something out so we can go to Uganda for about a week. Apparently Becky's old roommates, Paige and Nichole, will be there on internships so Becky will have company and a mini internship experience. How neat is that!? We will be working out the details this next week, but we hope that it works out.

Other than that, I am looking forward to the end of finals, starting my internship officially, starting a steady 20hr/week job at BYUTV again starting in May and that is about it. Good times ahead. I am also planning on sticking with my original plan of graduating in December. Graduating in Aug would be SO much work and I would really like to take a few more development classes. That way Becky and I can save more money and I will have more time to figure out what the next step is going to be.

Loves etc.