DVDs ARE OVER PRICED

While I was out getting my Blu Ray player accessories I re-discovered something. DVD prices in retail stores are a total rip off on price and selection. Since when did America only want to buy the worst movies ever made? I was interested in purchasing a Blu Ray disc at Best Buy or Target to test out my new player but will be doing so on Amazon.com using the awesome $20 gift card my sister gave me instead.

Dec. 21st is the last day to get 2 day shipping for DVDs from Amazon. I recommend checking out Amazon's Criterion Collection Blu Ray Shop.

HDMI CABLES: DON'T GET RIPPED OFF

My early Brown family Christmas was this weekend and my parents gave Coralie and I an awesome new Blu-Ray DVD player. Today I went out to various stores doing some Christmas shopping/Blu-Ray accessory shopping and I ran into the wall known as RIP OFF CENTRAL aka Best Buy and Target's HDMI cable sections. The range of prices of HDMI cable available at those two stores are $30.00 to over $100 dollars. Before I made any decisions I sat down and googled "HDMI cables" on my iPhone and came up with CNET's Guide to HDMI Cables.

The CNET guide blew my mind. They explained that cheaper HDMI cables perform just as well and hold up just as long as those over prices Monster Cables and here's the craziest part... you can buy these cheaper HDMI cables online for as low as .15 cents, HDMI (2 meter) 6 foot cable HQ 1080P 1.3b , on Amazon! The most expensive HDMI cable on Amazon, AmazonBasics Ultra High Speed HDMI Cable Braided (9.8 Feet / 3.0 Meters), only $40.00!

To all of you receiving new gadgets, giving new gadgets, or buying new gadgets after the holidays don't make the mistake of handing your hard earned cash over to chain stores that are ripping people off with over priced cables. Read this article: CNET's Guide to HDMI Cables and save the extra dough.

VOTE FOR LAUREN BROWN

My younger sister Lauren Brown has entered a photograph into the PDN Student Photo Contest.

Go here and vote for her photo!

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Your Own Personal Ocean

Your Own Personal Ocean, originally uploaded by robindbrown.

I've entered one of my photos in a contest. The ultimate prizes will be handed out based upon a panel of judges but there is a "People's Choice" prize as well. That's where you come in. If enough of you follow the link and vote for my photo I could be the "People's Choice" winner in the Beach Life Category.

The title of my photo is "Your Own Personal Ocean" and it is of a couple who went sunbathing out on the water on a longboard at Crescent Beach in Laguna.

The contest uses email accounts to count your vote so if you're bored and you have more than one email account you can vote multiple times.

CLICK HERE TO VOTE

Thanks!

Monster House

A 'Friendly' House, originally uploaded by gb_packards.

Randomly came across this photo. It's a real deal monster house. Would be fun for a ghost hunter show to spend the night in.

FLEETING GETS A REVIEW FROM BIOSCOPE

Bioscope, a website that reports on the world of early and silent cinema, gave a shout out to my film Fleeting on Friday, April 17th. They have been following the Vimeo Weekend Project: Silent Film Contest and did a write up on not only the winner (not me) but also the entries they liked the most; one of which is Fleeting.

Check out the article featuring Fleeting HERE.

I LOVE STARWARS BUT COME ON... NERDS

NERDS

I DON'T WATCH TV... AND YOU WON'T SOMEDAY EITHER

...I'm getting a sneaking suspicion that there's a point where TV just... won't matter any more... As you can see below, erudite hipsters - driven by the confluence of BitTorrent, NPR, and a general distrust of the media - unsurprisingly lead the way.

Click here to see their super awesome chart that explains exactly why you may, just as I have done, no longer watch TV.

via Kawabunga.com

ITS THAT MUSIC THAT'S IN THAT STORE

Urban Outfitters releases 21 free tracks to download off their blog every so often. I bet if you work there, listening to this mix would drive you nuts because it is probably the same music they are playing on loop in their store. The last mix LSTN#3 was pretty nice. Currently listening to the latest one LSTN#4 and it's equally as nice. Probably not going to find your new favorite band but If nothing else you can just throw it on and tune out while doing work or whatever.

EXPLORED ON FLICKR

Tertulien at the Beach (#2), originally uploaded by rippo.

For several years now I've been trying to figure out how flickr's Explore feature on their website works. They explain that it's a magic donkey that picks the photos to feature in Explore. The photo above is one such photo that I found while browsing today's Explore page. Obviously super interesting and worthy of the highest flickr praise.

The mystery isn't so much how do your photos end up being Explored but rather how do you know when a photo of yours has been explored??? I've always been certain that at least ONE of my photos must have made it into the Explored system but never knew how to confirm it. Flickr does not send you any notices when a photo of yours is featured on Explore... no internal flickr mail, no email, no magic asterisk on your Explore worthy photo... nothing. It's up to you to figure it out.

Many flickr users have sets where they feature their Explored photos... how did they know??? Do they sit there and look at EVERY SINGLE Explored photo each day? I bet some people actually do that. No way, not everyone does that. There's too many people with sets showing their Explored photos. There must be a better way.

Today I finally got off my butt and typed into google "how do you find out if your photo has been Explored on flickr?" The best answer I found came from the Big Huge Labs website. They are a company makes all sorts of flickr integrated web apps. One such feature on their site is Scout.

With Scout all you do is type in your flickr username and it will tell you if you have any current or dropped Explore photos. I guess if your photo is added to Explore for a certain day there is no guarantee it will stay up. All the photos uploaded that day fluctuate in "interestingness" depending on how many people view the photo and comment on it and such.

It turns out ONE of my photos was featured at some point in the Explore set for September 15th, 2007. The photo has since dropped in popularity or "interestingness" so it is no longer on Explore... but for at least a brief moment in time it was there. Here is that photo...

THAT GUY THAT WANTS TO BE A MONSTER

Who is the creeper in your neighborhood that want's to be a monster?

TERRIBLE MUSIC VIDEO GREAT SONG MONDAY

Fleetwood Mac - Everywhere [1987]
Uploaded by newcanadian

You're about to leave work and what better way to kick off ending your crappy Monday than to fall in love with this killer love jam. If you've ever been totally in love with someone then this song is pretty kick ass... but this video, not so much. It's a period piece with unnecessary blue screen and a lot of fog juice flowing around. This budget could have produced something more creative than this. If "thriller" is the ultimate music video version of a zombie movie then consider this the ultimate music video version of a romantic period piece movie / romantic novel(gag).

FREE FOR ALL "RAM IT" FRIDAY

If you ram it just right you can ram it all night.
Watch the whole thing. There is a super awkward freestyle rap by a bearded white dude with long hair sitting on a Harley in the locker room.

MY URBAN LIGHT VIDEO

Doug and I made this video for LACMA's "Celebrating Urban Light" project. It was made by taking 4 gigs worth of still photographs with my Canon Rebel xti digital slr, sequencing the images in Quicktime, then editing them in Final Cut Pro.

View it, rate it, share it.

FRIDAY PEACE OUT A LITTLE EARLY LIKE A EUROPEAN JAM

Groove Armada - Superstylin'
Uploaded by hushhush112

Seems like whenever I visit Europe there's not a lot of people working going on... a whole lot of hanging out at coffee shops and partying. So here's a jam that will set the mood for when you peace out of the office a little early today. Go get em' it's FREE FOR ALL FRIDAY and you be superstylin'.

MATT LUNDSTROM IS A GENIUS

Inland Empire Music Awards from Matthew Lundstrom on Vimeo.

Matt's Comments on the video: Brian Ueda put the concept together with me on this one. Alot of fun trying to get the tape to work in After Effects. One of my first attempts at Shake; the most kick-ass piece of software ever invented, and Brian's the man by the way... the quintessential anti-Hollywood indy producing genius.

This is from a few years ago but Matt is still a genius. Some day he'll be blowing everyone's mind on the big screen.

THURSDAY'S LAST JAM OF THE DAY.. GO HOME!

The Primitives - Crash -
Uploaded by stephlaffont

Watch this as you put all your stuff away and get ready to jam out of work. Don't get too excited or you'll crash...

WEDNESDAY'S ALMOST DONE WITH WORK JAM

Good Life Video

It's 5 O on the west coast. Some of you are off right now. Some of you won't be for a few more... in any case jam out to this as you are almost there kiddos!

I just watched this for the first time. Seeing as I love excellent music video making and Kanye is EVERYWHERE all the time and its like 2 years old I don't know how this slipped past me.

GOODBYE OLD BLUE

Mask Reject 1, originally uploaded by robindbrown.

An older picture of my old mask. I'm going to take some more pics that will show the details of how dilapidated it had gotten.

CARBON FIBER MASK

New Red Mask 002, originally uploaded by robindbrown.

My old mask had to go... no more padding falling out, straps dangling, tape holding the mask together, rust flying in my eyes, cage cutting my eye... etc.

SPICY NACHO PRANKS IN HD

SPICY NACHO PRANKS from Robin Brown on Vimeo.

View it up kids. View it up.

ROLLERBLADING WITH A NORWEGIAN DOG

What if Rick Steves was a dog? Take a tour of Bergen, Norway with every rollerblader's best friend.

PUG MAKES GOOD

Now look who's wearing the pants!, originally uploaded by Angie J Geworsky.

After inventing a shrinking ray. Chester T. Puggington decided he would shoot his owner, steal his now shrunken clothes and assume the position as the man of the house by chillin' in some sweatpants on the couch.

PANTS FOR DOGS!!!

People... it's PANTS FOR DAWGS!!!

Cummerbunds and panties?

DOUG & THE GOLDEN CHALICE

Doug & The Golden Chalice, originally uploaded by robindbrown.

Been doing some wild stuff with Doug lately.

DAS IST NICHT EINE BOOBIE!

DAS IST NUMBERWANG!