Sa Pa: Rice Paddies & Happy Water

Misty rice paddies

It was eight weeks into our trip and we’d seen rice paddies up and down mainland Indochina. Rice paddies in flat squares and those that climbed up mountains. Paddies with little budding plants and those full to the brim.  But it’s fair to say we hadn’t really seen rice paddies until we visited misty Sa Pa, a Northern Vietnamese town near the border of China.  These are like lush carpeted steps leading to another world, the vast expanse of which is only revealed in the fleeting moments when the mist lifts.

A view of the Sapa valley

The town and surrounding countryside of Sa Pa is populated by ethnic minorities, including the Black Hmong and Red Dzao, who have capitalized on the tide of tourists descending on Sa Pa every year.  Unlike the more aggressive tactics of their Vietnamese urban counterparts, these sellers of trinkets and handicrafts (all of whom are women), will silently follow you all day with the hope that at the end of your day’s trek, you’ll purchase a woven bag or whistle.  You cannot fault them for wanting to add to their meager farming income. And while tourism has profoundly impacted the way of life for these people, it’s also evident that it has elevated their standard of living.  The women who led us on our two day trek through the valley say the most beneficial change has been that they have noa been able to send their children to school.

Two children play in the hills of Sapa

Perhaps one wouldn’t think of rice farmers as elegant, but I cannot think of any better word to describe the women of Sa Pa.  For miles they will walk through the valley dressed from head to toe in beautiful embroidered clothes and silver jewelery, delicately balancing on the edge of each terraced paddy without muddying themselves.  They are hard workers but they speak little of their pains.  And despite not having much, they are incredibly generous and hospitable. By the end of the trip, my arm was laced with woven bracelets gifted to me by the women while my pockets where rimmed with little animals created from hand-folded reeds they’d made along the way. They invited us to their homes, where we were served delicious local food and got tipsy on rice wine, or “happy water” as they called it.  My heart was brimming with the realization of the human capacity to be kind and connect with one another despite great differences.  Below are more photos of our lovely trekking guides and the stunning other-worldly place they call home.

Our lovely trekking guides

The mother of one of our guides, a Red Dzao

"Happy water" flowed freely at our homestay

Weaving hemp thread

Black Hmong mill about the town of Sapa

Sunlight breaking through the clouds in Sapa

Crossing a rickety bridge

The terraces are works of art

Life in Hanoi

As tourists we’re drawn to the historical sites, museums, and natural wonders; all the places the guidebooks say we should go. But my favorite moments while traveling are those in which I witness the everyday played out in new and interesting ways.  We arrived early in Hanoi off a night train, so we spent time wandering the city and soon found ourselves at Hoan Kiem lake where hundreds if not thousands of Vietnamese were exercising.  Actions such as rubbing the belly or poking fingers in the ears derive from traditions of Chinese medicine, which many Vietnamese practice.

Lining up for some morning exercise

After 8 weeks of travel, we were a bit fatigued by historical sites and museums so we spent our time in Hanoi instead wandering, eating, drinking 25 cent beers and doing lots and lots of shopping.  Enjoy the photos below:

Street corner breakfast in Hanoi

Typical Hanoi traffic

Amazing what you can carry on a scooter

Pour me another please

Bia Hoi - $.25 beers!

Shade from the morning sun

Old friends

Temple of Literature: okay, so we did fit in one site!

Merchants & Emperors: Traveling in time in Hoi An & Hue

Hue's Citadel

The shopkeepers and emperors of old Vietnam had it made. A pharmaceutical salesman resided in a intricately carved wooden storefront with a lush atrium and lacquered inlay furniture while his emperor had an entire landscape of temples built for his final resting place, with room to spare for his wives. Such elegant use of space is on display in both Hoi An and Hue, two stops along our journey from South to North Vietnam.

Wooden chairs at a Chinese assembly hall

Exquisite courtyard of a merchant's house in Hoi An

Hoi An is so quaint and so fittingly “Asian”, it feels like a manufactured version of itself for the benefit of tourists.  But I was perfectly happy to live in the illusion of lit paper lanterns, swept streets, and excellent restaurants.  Days are spent eating, shopping and strolling through old merchant houses and Chinese assembly halls that make you feel so elegant you must dress the part.  So we visited one of the many tailor shops that have made Hoi An famous for the trade and Ben ordered two shirts and a pair of pants custom tailored to the tune of $50.

Diners enjoy a riverside meal of Cao Lau in Hoi An

Chinese lantern in one of Hoi An's many assembly halls

Vietnamese flags hang from most shops in Hoi An

Perhaps one of the highlights of Vietnam is that its skinny width and long coastline means you are never far from a great beach. Just north of the Hoi An town center is An Bang beach, a poorly advertised getaway of white sands and pristine blue waters that was nearly empty when we stopped for a lunch of grilled squid and Larue beers. It was the perfect respite from the heat, which was nearly unbearable in mid-day.  We were sad to leave Hoi An, and in retrospect, would have gladly spent another day, but we had a tight schedule to meet. Our next stop was Hue.

An Bang beach outside of Hoi An

Hue, which lies smack dab in the center of Vietnam is just as known for its ill-fated location during the Vietnam War as it is for its imperial tombs which dot the outskirts of the city. We chose to see the latter and spent one day on a motorbike getting lost between them.  As usual, the motorbike ride was as interesting as the stops, as it granted us lovely views of the Perfume River and surrounding mountains.

Hue imperial tomb

For more pictures, click through the slideshow below:

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Cities in contrast: Phnom Penh & Saigon

Family on a motorbike

I’m quite behind on travel blog posts, but I’ve committed to catching up and so though I’m writing in Washington, DC, on the blog I’m still traveling between Cambodia and Vietnam’s largest cities: Phnom Penh and Saigon.

I first fell in love with Phnom Penh after a chance encounter with the crispiest tastiest grilled squid on earth during a bus stop between Siem Reap and Kep. Upon returning to Phnom Penh, we visited the central market again for the heavenly dish, served with cold cucumbers, herbs and a dash of homemade chili sauce.  This was a no frills spot; just a small roadside stand with food served on melamine dishes.  Yet the taste and the service was five star.  It’s a microcosm of Phnom Penh, a shabby city upon first glimpse yet one oozing with character. Despite being Cambodia’s capitol city, Phnom Penh’s demographic is decidedly rural in nature, in large part because of Pol Pot’s reign of terror over the wealthy and educated classes.  So scenes of life in rural Cambodia are often played out in city streets: people commuting by bicycle, carrying livestock, and selling fruit from bamboo baskets. PP feels more like a small town than a capitol city and in some ways, it seems as if time stands still.  One night we ventured to the local mall, where the top floor contained a roller rink packed with Khmer teens doing tricks and drinking soda pop from glass bottles.  It was as if we were transported back to 1950s America, when life seemed so simple and wholesome.

The Royal Palace of Phnom Penh

Monks flood the streets of Phnom Penh

The Russian Market in Phnom Penh

Man sharpening knives at the Russian Market

One of many street side barbershops

Despite its renewed character, Phnom Penh is still deeply haunted by the days of Khmer Rouge, when an estimated 2 million people were brutally killed.  We visited Tuol Sleng (S21), a former high-school turned prison and place of torture for the Khmer Rouge.  After the regime fell in 1979, 14 bodies were found.  Photographs of the bodies as they were left are hung on the walls of the cell in which they were found along with the bed and shackles to which they were chained.  The stark images are a sobering reminder of the capacity for human beings to be unapologetically inhuman.

S 21 cell block

Portraits of prisoners at S 21

S 21 cell

We continued our journey to Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, still regularly called Saigon today.  It never ceases to amaze me how different a place can be just a few miles across a land border.  A bustling sprawling behemoth of a city, Saigon is everything that Phnom Penh isn’t; It’s a city on a race for advancement.  Streets are nearly impassible due to waves of motorbikes speeding in every direction and construction is everpresent. But the most significant difference were the people, who on the outset were much more cold and aloof than the Khmer, Lao and Thai.  We had only a day in Saigon and it wasn’t an especially memorable one thanks to buckets of rain and a few attempts by locals to rip us off.  But we kept up our hopes high for better days in Vietnam, and fortunately there were many. Stay tuned!

The chaotic traffic of Saigon

I did not go tubing in Vang Vieng

Wherever we’ve gone, we’ve seen young European travelers wearing the same t-shirt emblazoned with the words: “Tubing in the Vang Vieng,” an activity travelers through Southeast Asia have deemed a right of passage.  But floating down a  river among drunk backpackers and stopping at riverside bars was not a passage I was interested in taking and so we had planned to skip Vang Vieng altogether.  I’m glad we decided not to.

“Highway” 13 in Laos, the main road connecting North to South, is extremely thin and winds through mountain passes which are prone to landslides. Consequently, buses barely go more than 40 km per hour. So the nearly 400 km journey to Vientiane can be a bit too long and tiring. We decided to break it up by taking a bus 7 hours to Vang Vieng then another 4 hours to Vientiane. The first leg was absolutely stunning. I was occupied for all 7 hours simply staring out the window of our mini-bus as we climbed higher and higher into the mountains and passed through hundreds of roadside villages. In the course of our ride, we witnessed an entire day in the life of a village. Families cooking lunch, men coming home from work in the fields with baskets over their back, and villagers soaping up and showering in the small waterfalls of water that stream down from the mountains.

The view on the journey from Luang Prabang to Vang Vieng

We would have liked to have the opportunity to stop and take pictures but I don’t think we could have managed the drive on our own. On several occasions, I was white-knuckled with fear that our minibus driver would hit a small child running in the street or careen over the edge of the mountain due to fog that appeared suddenly and blanketed sight of the road. But he drove carefully and attentively and everyone arrived safely, albeit late, in Vang Vieng.

The view from our sweaty mountain hike

We stayed at a cheap guest house across the river from Vang Vieng town center, which we were desperately trying to avoid because of its reputation for cushion-padded bars screening re-runs of Friends and drunk shirtless dudes stumbling down the street.  Life across the river was completely quiet and untouched by backpacker raunchiness. We woke up early and started to walk down the main dirt road that passes through the human and natural wonders of Vang Vieng: flat green rice paddies nestled below jungle-carpeted limestone cliffs, blue-green lagoons and buddha-filled caves. We hiked up one of the limestone mountains, which turned out to be a slippery steep scramble in unbearable humidity created by the tightly packed greenery.  The view was stunning but we were too exhausted and bothered by giant ants to really enjoy it so we came back down and recouped with bottles of water at a nearby stand. We proceeded to spend the day walking, stopping at roadside stands to have a bottle of water, a beer lao or a bowl of noodles. And we’d just watch life around us: a 5 year old child carrying his 1 year old sibling, a dumb cow being taunted by a pack of dogs, and naked toddlers jumping in the creek.  At the end of the long road was an amazing cave with dripping stalactites and containing a bronze reclining Buddha.  We were tired and daunted by the muddy walk back so we hitched a ride by tractor — really the only feasible way to pass through the slippery road.

Limestone cliffs and rice paddies, a stunning combination

Cave at the end of our walk.

A Buddha lies in the cool of the cave.

Typography: Telling Stories In Beautiful Letters

My AP History teacher in High School gave extra credit to students who passed in papers with multiple fonts and colors. I guess that was his way of making the class fun, though most of us used it as an opportunity to meet paper length requirements.  Even then, I didn’t think much about typography. There was Times New Roman for school papers, Comic Sans when you wanted to be cute, and maybe Arial for everything else.  I can’t quite recall whether my school newspaper used Courier New or not.  But now I notice typography.  As an indie filmmaker on a budget, I often find myself donning lots of hats, including that of designer. We’ve designed the DVD packaging and promotional design of all of our films.  And while we have hired designers for our logo and for help with our websites, they’ve been projects with which we’ve been strongly involved.  In every case, great typefaces have helped to communicate a message; played a critical role in telling a story.

Take our logo for example.  We were really drawn to the word Eidolon itself. It has lots of circular looking letters in it so we wanted to highlight that fact.  Our designer used the typeface Bauhaus and rotated the ‘e’.  She added a series of warm-colored concentric circles next to word to create a feeling of connectedness, which is part of our mission at Eidolon.  For “films’ we wanted something that would be clean, readable and professional, yet would provide some contrast to the word above it. Our designer selected Blair ITC Light.  Together, the fonts read artistic, professional, modern, friendly, accessible — all values we want to communicate about our business.

The Stories Behind Typefaces

Typography can be a medium through which to communicate and so it’s no surprise that there are varied and interesting stories behind each typeface design. For example, Tupelo, created by designer Philip Bouwsma, uses the handwriting of two influential men in US history: Elvis Presley and Abraham Lincoln. MyFonts.com calls this “the closest a typeface has ever come, in its timeliness and historic relevance, to making a statement about these modern days’ fusion of politics and popular culture.”

May’s MyFonts newsletter features an interview with Natalia Vasilyeva, a designer with Russia’s tyefoundry Paratype. I love the way she describes her artistic form: “In general, the art of type attracts me because aesthetics are so important to its proper form; the image does not refer to some graceful object or landscape, like painting does, but exercises an aesthetic effect of its own. A beautiful typeface is similar to a beautiful melody. It can be compared to music as much as architecture.”

Ballpoint pen sketches for Elina Decor, Nat Flight and Orbi Calligraphic typefaces by Natalia Vasilyeva.

TRIVIA: What is the most ubiquitous typeface?

You may have seen it on New York City’s MTA signs or on big brands like American Airlines, Toyota and Apple. It’s none other than Helvetica, the sans-serif font designed in 1957 by Swiss typeface designer Max Miedinger with Eduard Hoffman.  In 2007, the 50th anniversary of the font, filmmaker Gary Hustwit released a documentary aptly named Helvetica. Not only is it a great documentary on design and typography, but it inspires one to be aware of the intentional creations that surround us, even on the often overlooked Subway sign.

Collecting Sound: thoughts on sound design in documentary

When we ventured out to make our first film, we didn’t think much about sound. At the time it seemed superfluous as we believed that story and visual were most important.  So we focused on those aspects of film-making and relegated our sound efforts to nothing more than a shotgun mic affixed to the camera and a wireless lav crudely clipped to our subject. Our feelings have since changed and sound has become as important to our film-making process as story and visuals; you cannot have one without the other. And so when we think of a telling a story, we think in terms of visuals and sound working in tandem to create a texture that informs the viewer/listener of setting, character, and tone. Below is an elegant example of the use of sound design by Henrik Hanson.

Listen to the way that Everynone used sound to describe moments.

http://vimeo.com/8189067

The thing about great sound design is that it isn’t obvious. It doesn’t pronounce itself to you; rather it becomes a part of the larger picture, like a brushstroke.  If you think about it, films can only touch two of the five sensations: sight and sound.  Until technology finds a way to let us taste, smell and touch film, we’re pretty much stuck with using our eyes and ears exclusively. And so that sensation has to be so vivid as to transport us to that place, letting us feel and understand what the characters are experiencing. Great sound design in motion pictures does that. What I love about “collecting sound”, as I like to call it, is that I’m discovering things my senses have never paid attention to before. Like when we were documenting a struggling local Men’s clothing store and listening to how the hangers scraped across the racks. Or when the window dresser folded and hammered the pants and shirts onto the mannequins with such exactitude.  We’ve played around with a bit of purposeful sound design in some of our client work too. Watch the first 30 seconds of the following video, in which we used sound design to evoke the memory of a Georgetown professor’s first day on the job 20 years ago.  Listen for the bells, the planes that fly overhead, the sound of driving through Georgetown streets, walking down the hall, entering an old classroom, writing on the blackboard.  They’re all part of the texture of the Georgetown experience and so we tried to integrate that into an introduction that would stimulate that feeling of being there for the first time.

Three-point lighting for interviews

Natural light, depth, cool lights and keeping it simple. It’s our go-to formula for setting up consistently good lighting for traditional sit-down interviews.  Here’s a snapshot of a lighting set-up we did recently for a client shoot.  It wasn’t an ideal location but it was the only one available so we made it work.  Below I explain how:

1. Key Light: The key light should be positioned on the side of the face that is looking toward the interviewer.  So if the subject is facing toward the right, the key light should be on the right side.

2. Reflector: The reflector is positioned opposite the key, bouncing soft light on the other side of the face. If the topic of the interview is heavy and dramatic, consider using less reflector so that the lighting on the face is similarly dramatic. Use more if the subject of the film is a bit lighter in nature.  But for most people, some level of molding is flattering, so avoid evenly lighting the face.

3. Back Light: We use a back light to light hair and shoulder so that the subject is outlined and distinct from the background.  This is especially helpful if the subject is wearing clothing or has hair color that matches the background.  Be careful with folks that are bald as you don’t want to highlight a shiny head!

4. Pepper: A pepper spotlight can be used to provide some shaft of light to offer drama to the background or light an otherwise dark corner. Sometimes we use a filter to play with a warmer tone, somewhere between daylight and tungsten just to offer some contrast.

A still shot from the final interview

Using Natural Light – OR discovering interest in the uncontrolled.

Many filmmakers set-up traditional interviews by closing all the blinds in the room then setting up the lighting they can control. We do the opposite.  The first thing we do when we enter a room is look for the natural light. Can it be controlled using blinds, shades or curtains? How does it fall across the room and what will it look like at the time we plan to do the interview? The Sunseeker App  on the Iphone is particularly useful in determining where the sun will be at a specific hour.  If it’s a bright day, we’re okay with the window looking blown out although we prefer some sort of patterning, whether that’s blinds, a flowering tree or the panes on a window.  Natural light offers interest to the setting, helps the interview not look overly produced and it tends to keep the tone of the interview, well, light…. no pun intended.  The risk with using natural light is that it cannot be controlled. The clouds can clear and the sun can get brighter in a matter of moments. So you have to be conscious of these changes, stopping the interview if necessary to adjust the blinds, change the aperature, and increase the key light.  For us, the payoff of using natural light is worth the frustrations.

Depth – Establishing a foreground, midground and background.

The second thing we look for when scouting or setting up a location is if the room is large enough to give the interview some visual depth. Is there a mid-ground that can help provide interest and draw the eye across the frame?  The setting we used this day wasn’t particularly interesting nor relational to the subject of the interview, so we wanted to keep the background pretty blurred. The risk with using a shallow depth of field is that if the interview subject is in sharp focus and the background is blurred, it can look as if you’re using a green screen and digitally inserting the background. Let’s face it, that looks just plain cheesy.  So having a mid-ground can help further separate the subject from the background so they don’t look so pasted in.  In this room we had a long shiny table, which served as a perfect mid-ground and also reflected some of the window light, which helped to add visual interest to an otherwise dull space.

Cool LED Lights– Keeping your interview subjects comfortable, non-sweaty and happy!

We use LED lights by the small US-based company Cool Lights USA.  As both individuals and business owners, we like to be conscious consumers. So when a small business comes along with a great affordable and environmentally-friendly product, we jump at the opportunity.  These products are light in weight, never blow a fuse, are low on energy, don’t require expensive and highly breakable bulbs, and best of all, they are cool!  That means that they don’t warm up the room, causing the subject to sweat. And you don’t have to use gloves to touch them for fear of burning your hands as you do with Tungsten lights. Another benefit is that they are daylight balanced. Since we use natural light so often, this helps to keep the tone of the light in the interview balanced.

Keeping It Simple – The benefits of portability are huge!

For many reasons (the environment, lack of parking in the city, gas prices, insurance, etc.), we don’t own a car. And as much as people tout the benefits of owning a car and are shocked that we don’t use a van for work, we feel that being carless has actually improved the quality of our personal and business life.  We also do a lot of our shooting in the city, where parking is limited, walking is usually mandatory, and spaces are tight. Oh, and I’d like to use my back for another 60 years. For these reasons, we have kept our lighting, sound and shooting kit highly compact and portable.  For example, we looked specifically for light stands that would snap together and save room and bags with inserts that we could custom-arrange. After a lot of planning and maneuvering, we have condensed all of our sound, lighting and tripods in three bags that sit on a small cart that can fit in the trunk of a Crown Victoria Taxicab.  We simply roll the set out the door, pop it in the trunk and roll into the shoot location. No hassle, no back-breaking lifting, no extra hands needed, and little to no hassle with security. And a reduction of these types of stressors makes a big difference throughout a shooting day.

Art Tuesdays: Colorful ‘Hoods

Colorful favela of Santa Marta, Rio de Janiero

Imagine waking up to a rainbow every day outside your window.  It might help to color your perspective for the better, don’t you think? After filming a documentary in 2005 about Hip Hop in Rio and Sao Paulo, Dutch artists Jeroen Koolhaas and Dre Urhahn, known as the artistic duo Haas&Hahn, worked with local youth to bring art to the favelas of Brazil.  Now they have plans to bring the this kind of colorful work to New York’s public housing. Their work in Brazil is currently on exhibit at the Storefront for Art and Architecture in New York City, in part to persuade the bureaucratic powers that be to bring such colorful inspiration to the Big Apple. I can’t help but be drawn to this type of work. To me, it demonstrates that art can work in powerful ways to bring communities together, to draw attention to those often ignored and to show that beauty can be found and made in the most unsuspecting places.

*P.S. I know that today is Wednesday but Eidolon has been keeping me so busy that I missed posting on Art Tuesday. When I came across this work, I couldn’t help to share, so I’m posting Art Tuesday on Wednesday 😉

Iphone Photography: The best camera is the one you have with you.

Professionals and amateurs around the world have taken stunning photos with the iphone reminding that great photography comes from spontaneous moments in unique locations with unexpected light.  In those moments, it’s unlikely that you have your DSLR slung from your neck and shutter-ready. But there’s a good chance you’ll have your iphone. A good motto is that the best camera is the one you have with you. And with all sorts of new processing apps available, it’s not just an iphone. It’s a polaroid, a Holga, or film SLR. These shots were taken at dusk on Capitol Hill after a long film shoot, a rainy windy day in New York City, at sunset on a flight back from Chicago, on a walk on 16th street, a Spring day in the kibbutz in Israel, and on a perfect San Diego afternoon. They were processed with the Camerabag App, but there are many more apps available and even entire how-to books on the subject. The fact that there’s an Iphone photography for Dummies book means that it’s become a mainstream hobby.  Check out this blog for more updates on the “iphoneography” world, as it’s now dubbed. Oh and keep snapping photos of the world you see around you. Luckily new technology means there’s no excuse not to.

*photos above taken by Ben Crosbie. More shots found on Flickr.