keithmackay.com

Hello out there. I’m still here. For the last few months my life has been as chaotic as it can possibly be. My wife and I are separated and headed for a divorce. I’m not going to say much about that.

I did enjoy Phish at the Gorge in August. I went for both shows. Got there early so we were very close to the front. I discovered on the second night that I am too old for two nights in a row. My head was clear and willing but my body wasn’t. There were no incidents of very drunk people falling over on me or mine like there has been in past shows, so that was good.

Phish was great. I saw this. I was there:

Phish – 8/6/11 “Run Like An Antelope” from Phish on Vimeo.

Sorry about not having much to say here. I occasionally look at my site statistics and people are still finding this place, mostly with searches on fractal art and flower beds, with a little on Phish and kites, so I’ll talk about those things.

Recently someone e-mailed me a complement on summer day. I always appreciate complements.

When I created that image I wanted to create something that might look good as a print. Mathematically, those types of fractals can have infinite resolution. Physically, they are constrained by the processing power of the computer and the patients of the artist. A couple of weeks ago I fired up my old computer and rendered a 24 x 30 inch image at 180 dpi. That is barely print resolution, I know, but I think that it will do. If I end up printing it, I’ll snap a picture of the print and put it here.

The reason that I didn’t go with a higher resolution is because that style of coloring requires massive calculation time. It took over 60 hours to render it at that resolution. If I had one of the newer multi processor machines, the rendering time would have been greatly reduced, but I don’t. Since I am not fired up about fractals the way that I used to be, I don’t see myself getting a big fancy machine any time soon. I can surf the web from my phone and run my media through a game console. I don’t need a big computer.

That’s pretty much it as far as fractal art goes.

Last year I let nature have its way with my garden. This year I am paying attention to it. It’s been a long, cool spring in these parts and when the sun comes out I like to be in it, so I’ll plant stuff.

I bought a power kite a few months ago. It is powerful alright. It wants to pull my arms off. It’s a workout, but not that much fun to fly. Maybe if I had some sort of buggy or surfing device I would enjoy it more. I prefer the quad.

I am going to see Phish at the Gorge in August, both nights. I am looking forward to the drunkest guy in the place finding me and falling over on me. That happened last time and it happen again last year at the Mike Gordon (phish base player) show. I don’t drink or do other mind altering substances. Maybe my steady stance makes me some sort of a target for big drunk guys. I don’t know. I really wish people wouldn’t get that intoxicated. It makes it a little less pleasant for the rest of us. I don’t understand the point of it anyway. It’s not like they’re going to remember the show.

I’ve been focused on getting through the basics, so I haven’t had much to say here. I do hang out on facebook…

Keith Mackay

Create Your Badge

I went to Paradise last weekend. This time I hiked the Golden Gate Trail. On the way up I saw this bear off in the distance:

People coming down the trail said that there were two more bears farther up, so I went looking for them. They were eye level with the switchbacks on the trail (see the map):

These bears were a long way away and the scale is a little hard to pick up in these pictures, so I tried to place them in context with the mountain:

I also heard rumours about a bear with 2 cubs in the area. After lunch I drove down the Paradise valley road and found a bear jam (that’s lots of cars parked on the side of the road).

These bears were moving when I pulled up so I only got a few shots off. They were less than a 50 yards away from the road.

The cubs were messing with each other on their way out. Mom was out of the frame on the right.

The bears were focused on eating. They didn’t seem too interested in us.

It was a great trip. I think that I like Paradise in the fall the most. I was excited to see a bear a couple of years ago, but this trip topped that.

Lady Gaga is not Mozart.

Judge Judy is not on the supreme court.

Stephenie Meyer is not Jane Austen.

What they are is marketable.

Quoting myself from a few years ago:

Whether or not you or I like the style of the art in the calendar is irrelevant. The publisher runs the business of the calendar. They pay the artists and print, market and distribute the calendar. They also profit from it. The calendar is not a community, club or democracy. It is a business. The publishers have found something that works for them and they are sticking with it. In spite of what anyone thinks, they can do that. It’s their business.

George Lucas – “Stay on target” – pure poetry…

Yesterday I got an e-mail from my friend Cornelia Yoder. She explained that the original Fractal Universe Calendar, the one published by Avalanche Publishing that I edited for one year, is still alive. They just need to get it printed and in the stores for 2011. 

Apparently the bankruptcy has done whatever it did and the company is moving forward. Cool.

Cornelia is the only artist in the old / new Fractal Universe calendar. It makes sense that they would only have one artist. To survive, businesses are all about cutting costs and it probably costs more to deal with one contract than it does to deal with several.

I have no idea what the other Fractal Universe Calendar is about. That’s the one published by Mosely Road. All that I know is that I am not impressed it at all.

So, there are two fractal calendars with the same name being printed by different publishers. That’s messed up.

I’ll have more to say about marketing, art and the fractal calendars later.