Do It Yourself | Excellence in Philanthropy | The Philanthropy Roundtable: “The skilled tradesman brings his intelligence and his discipline to his work. His job is to take ownership of a project. He creates something that wasn’t there before—something new, something better, something more valuable. And in that, the skilled tradesman is the kindred spirit of every entrepreneur.”
December 1, 2011
November 30, 2011
November 29, 2011
November 27, 2011
Where the Jobs Are
A very interesting (and short) post over at Insty about the current job market. It only reinforces my guess that the future belongs to those with “skills”. What used to be (and are still somewhat) looked-down-upon trade skills are actually in very high demand as an entire generation bought into the assumption that the “knowledge economy” wasn’t going to need tradesmen, plumbers, welders, or other hands-on workers. Read the whole thing (and the linked article).
What I found interesting was this:
“I would hire 5 more guys right now if I could. However, it is virtually impossible to find anyone with skills anymore. The number one skill we are missing as a society is a work ethic. I speak to employers all the time and we all are looking for the same potential employee–someone who is honest, hard working, and who has reasonable intelligence. In other words someone who willing and able to learn new things and admit it when they screw up. Notice education is not on the list.”
Education is good, though I’m still on the fence about whether or not everyone needs a full 4 years of college. I’m grateful for my 3 degrees, though I still maintain that I’ve learned more in the 20 years since graduation than I ever learned in school. After all, 8 years of undergrad and post-grad is a lot less than 20 years of post college. If you’re not constantly learning, what have you done with the time since school? Reminds me of several people I’ve talked to who consider it a badge of honor that the last full book they read was in formal schooling. It’s just my opinion, but that seems like a real waste to me. Surely there’s something to be passionate about after formal schooling?
Some of the greatest minds of human history have been attached to autodidactic brains (and yes, I meant to write it that way). I think the #1 thing we could teach isn’t math or science or even logic. It’s curiosity. Teach a generation to be curious about everything and then watch out.
November 21, 2011
Good for Revenue Enhancement
Yeah, you know that invoice you think you sent two months ago? The one that covered all that work you did for us in a big hurry? The one you’ve been eagerly going to the mailbox every day for six weeks waiting for so that you can replenish some of the money you floated us in materials to make that thing you made for us (which we love, by the way)? Yeah… turns out we never got that invoice. Or it got misdirected. Or we just don’t understand it. Or we lost it. But thanks for the six weeks of interest on your money. Go ahead and resubmit it and we’ll put it on the bottom of the pile.
Maybe we can lose it again! Talk to you in another two months!
This would be only slightly distressing if it hadn’t happened to me twice. On two different invoices.
Sigh.
To those of you who envy my self-employed, freewheeling ways: witness the downside. At this point, some of my major clients have proven themselves to actually be less responsible than 20 year old college students.
November 13, 2011
Project Done
After 10 months of work on a giant project I’ve just sent off the final song. Last February I was contacted by a major Texas university. They hired me to write 30 songs for their science and teaching curriculum. Over the past 10 months what started as me writing some simple music to already existing lyrics slowly evolved into me writing or rewriting all of the lyrics, writing the music, recording and producing the vocal tracks, and doing final mixing. Today, the final song (and one of my favorites) went out to the client.
It’s been an absolute, unconditional blast to be involved in this project. Not only have I gotten to write music, but it was science based, for pete’s sake. How perfect is that? I got to really utilize the vocal booth I built a few years ago as well as really dig into vocal editing and mixing. Through this whole thing the client has been ecstatic with what I’ve done. They expected rinky-dinky piano and some cheesy Midi instruments but I was able to give them some of my best stuff. I’m extremely proud of it.
I’ll try and get permission to post some excerpts. There are still contractual reasons why I can’t talk publicly about the who/what/where of the project since they’re still in the process of selling the final product. The good news, though, is that it’s virtually guaranteed at this point to be heard by several million K-12 students across the country. What fun!
Thanks to Erin for putting up with me while I went through an entirely unusual period of several months of crazy music writing. She’s had to take care of everything non-musical around here (basically everything from keeping us fed to making sure I actually get up and move around once or twice a day). As of now I’m pretty much back to my normal busy November schedule (which I’ve also kept up with), but I wanted to write a post to mark this milestone. Hooray!
November 2, 2011
You Don’t Have to Suck At Stuff
Great little essay:
I Suck at Photoshop; Except I Don’t, and You Don’t Suck at That Thing You’re “Bad at” Either: “”
October 19, 2011
How to Be a Failure
Some of us get really successful at it.
“Less attention is devoted to failure, or even what failure is. There is financial failure — bankruptcy — professional failure — unemployment — and personal failure — divorce. But there are all kinds of failure — failing your parents, failing your faith, failing to live up to your own expectations of who you think you should be.
I fail all the time, so often that I am somewhat mystified when I get emails in which people perceive me as successful. Because most of the time, I think of myself as a failure. Which, I’ve come to think, is part of what makes me successful.”
via Forbes.
October 12, 2011
Freedom
I like how this places the burden of responsibility on government as a whole, not just on one particular political party.
Who Says Emotion and Logic Don’t Go Together?
I’ve been living with the music program Logic on a daily basis for about 18 months now and not a day goes by when I don’t yell out “I LOVE THIS PROGRAM!” Huge, huge thanks to the brilliant engineers and designers for all the little things. Is it perfect? Nope, but it’s so, so much better than I was using before. Incredibly flexible, massively powerful (I almost never stress it out), and I’m still discovering little things that make me fist pump the air and shout “YES!”. As fond as I am of Studio Vision Pro I could never go back.
So glad I made the switch.
September 26, 2011
Just Finish It Already
The finishing step in any woodworking project always makes me extremely nervous. No matter how much work I do in selecting the right wood, observing wood grain patterns and movement, joinery, design, or sanding, a bad finish can pretty much ruin everything. That’s why so many woodworkers opt for the beauty of a hand-rubbed oil finish. You literally can’t mess an oil finish up. You open a can of boiled linseed or other type of oil, pour it over the surface, and then rub it in until the wood won’t take any more. Then you wipe off the excess and repeat. Easy and beautiful.
I suppose I can finally spill the beans here since I haven’t been asked to keep it a secret. I’m not under NDA and the thing gets revealed this weekend: four weeks ago Baylor University asked me to build their new corporate logo prop. This is an extremely prestigious thing to be asked to build since it’s the prop that is replacing the 30 year old prop in public assemblies. It’ll be put onstage behind dignitaries, presidents, and other guests. It’s a 19′ long version of this:
Each letter stands about 30″ tall and all parts are 9″ thick. The second pic above shows the BAYLOR letters in a box, but in reality they’re independently built 3d letters. It’s fun to spell out crazy stuff by scrambling the giant letters. My neighbors just drive by and look confused. “Who is RAY LOB?” I just wish they spelled out JOHN GALT.
Anyway, I constructed the letters by painstakingly cutting 12 identical copies of each letter out of 3/4″ plywood and then gluing them together into a giant plywood sandwich. In total, I cut 72 letters and 12 layers on the symbol. I went through about 25 sheets of 3/4″ ply and 4 sheets of MDF (the top letter was also my MDF template for each following letter in the sandwich). I had to then hollow out the symbol so it didn’t weigh a ton. It’s a 9″ block of plywood after all and if I hadn’t hollowed it out it would have probably weighed 200+ pounds! As it is it’s about 40-50- bulky but moveable.
I needed to paint the letters the official Baylor Green and the symbol Baylor Green and Gold (the pic above has the letters in white but they’re going to be green to match the official logo). Luckily, Home Depot has a partnership with Glidden and Glidden paints have licensing deals with all of the pro and college sports teams across the U.S. (except for, oddly, U.T. which has a copyright on their specific burnt orange color). I visited HD yesterday and picked up a gallon of official Baylor Green and a quart of Baylor Yellow. But how to put them on? I wanted a better finish than a roller or a brush would provide. I’m really happy with the build but wanted the finish to be as perfect as possible.
So after a lot of research I decided to buy a professional paint sprayer. Those of you who read this and know my propensity for equipping my shop will now be rolling your eyes and saying “of course he bought a professional paint sprayer”. 
Well, the pay for the prop was easily enough to cover a few tools (and then some), so I just considered the new Graco Project Painter Plus sprayer the cost of doing business. In the past whenever I’ve had a commission I’ve rolled a percentage of the money back into tools for the shop so that I’ll have more capability for the next job. I’m pretty well outfitted now (okay, I did have to buy a $40 router bit for the letters), but a good quality airless sprayer wasn’t in my arsenal yet. It is now. Airless sprayers really deliver a good coat but you have to be careful. They pour out a lot of paint (you can stand and watch the level in the paint can drop when you hold the trigger). Getting a smooth coat with no runs takes some technique.
So last saturday I spent the day spraying coats of primer onto the letters and figuring out (unsuccessfully sometimes) how to avoid runs. I think I finally got it- lots of very light coats with a long wait time between each. As my friend Giles says, I’ve got more time than chances to get it right. So I wait. For the next four days I’ll be spraying two letters at a time in Baylor Green in my backyard with a four hour waiting period between coats (3 coats). I’ll have to babysit the letters for an hour to make sure no birds land on them, then after that the paint is dry to the touch with a 4 hour recoat time. I’ll hand-detail the yellow part of the symbol with a brush and small roller. I’d use my airbrush but I you can’t thin latex down enough to work in an airbrush.
It’s very stressful being at this stage as I’ve already spent about 40 hours building the rest of the prop, and if I screw up the finish by allowing the paint to run or letting the finish be marred by falling leaves or bird footprints then that’s all the client will notice. I really need a dedicated finishing room, but for now I’ll have to make do with a couple tables in the backyard and lots of praying for no wind.
I’m a perfectionist in an imperfect world.
I’ll take pics and do a step-by-step of the process after I deliver it to Baylor on Friday. If you happen to be at an event at good ol’ B.U. and see the giant BAYLOR on stage with the school symbol, you’ll know where it came from. Sic ‘em Bears!
September 23, 2011
September 20, 2011
Balance
“We need to see our criteria for achievement and success as something we create ourselves rather than having them foisted upon us by others.”
Thoughts on underemployment. I consider myself lucky that we have managed to carve out a very satisfying definition of what success means to us and feel like we’ve achieved that spectacularly in our lives. We’re not very tempted by more money if that means we’ll have to permanently give up what we’ve decided matters the most to us (time together, time to pursue other interests besides work, freedom and space to grow as a couple and as individuals).
Our society is very geared toward a very narrow definition of success: how much do you make? I’m glad to see different definitions gaining in acceptance.
August 27, 2011
I’ve Gone and Bought the Cherry Cabinets
We have some relatives who tell a funny story about remodeling their kitchen a few years ago. They went into it wanting new cabinets, so they got a local cabinet maker to build them some beautiful cherry cabinets. Once they started seeing the cabinets being constructed, they realized that their floor would have to be replaced. Then the old appliances started to look rather dull, and after this the countertops. They ended up changing out pretty much everything in their kitchen and it’s now a stunningly beautiful place. It’s a conundrum familiar to anyone who has done remodeling. The beauty of the new outshines the old so much that you just end up replacing everything.
Last year I purchased a rather large sample upgrade to my sound library. It was a significant investment and it’s paid dividends in much better sounding work. However, the brass sounds still were not up to par yet. So a few days ago I upgraded my brass sounds and ho-lee-cow, what a difference. The portamento french horn alone was worth the upgrade cost. I’m working on a rather huge orchestral project right now and the new brass sounds are getting a workout. Check out this example:
Keep in mind that there isn’t a bit of “live” orchestra in there. It’s all midi triggered samples. Based on the strength of these demos, as well as my experience with the sample library from the past year, I went ahead and bought the brass library.
It’s wonderful. The horn makes you weep, the trumpets are declamatory, and the low brass is big and bombastic the way low brass should be, without a hint of “midi-ness” that often accompanies these libraries sometimes. The problem? Now my strings sound mushy by comparison.
The company has issued a single “orchestra-wide” sample set, which I purchased last year, and which is very good. But then they’ve gone in and started focussing on each of the individual sections (strings, brass, woodwinds, perc, etc) and started issuing whole libraries of just these sections, with much more depth and realism to their sound sets. I have the new brass set, but, like the new cherry cabinets, the spectacularness of the new sounds is making me crave the Wolf fridge… I mean the string sounds:
So now I’m listening to the online examples and thinking well, with this job I could easily pay for them… and they make my stuff sound so much better.
Curse you, cherry cabinets.
August 21, 2011
June 9, 2011
Big Brassy Ones
Hooray! EastWest Sounds is finally introducing a Play-enabled brass sound kit. Hollywood Brass is coming out on July 10th. Really great brass sounds have been the one missing piece of my sonic puzzle since updating to Logic a year ago. Can’t wait to see what these things sound like!
May 31, 2011
SpaceX
Now this is how you run a railroad (or a space program).
Key quote:
“The average price of a full-up NASA Dragon cargo mission to the International Space Station is $133 million including inflation, or roughly $115m in today’s dollars, and we have a firm, fixed price contract with NASA for 12 missions. This price includes the costs of the Falcon 9 launch, the Dragon spacecraft, all operations, maintenance and overhead, and all of the work required to integrate with the Space Station. If there are cost overruns, SpaceX will cover the difference. (This concept may be foreign to some traditional government space contractors that seem to believe that cost overruns should be the responsibility of the taxpayer.)”
Open market FTW.
May 1, 2011
Self Promotion
Bleep Bleep, Yeah! Don’t miss my interview in this month’s BLEEP magazine.
April 11, 2011
Education Bubble
But Thiel’s issues with education run even deeper. He thinks it’s fundamentally wrong for a society to pin people’s best hope for a better life on something that is by definition exclusionary. “If Harvard were really the best education, if it makes that much of a difference, why not franchise it so more people can attend? Why not create 100 Harvard affiliates?” he says. “It’s something about the scarcity and the status. In education your value depends on other people failing. Whenever Darwinism is invoked it’s usually a justification for doing something mean. It’s a way to ignore that people are falling through the cracks, because you pretend that if they could just go to Harvard, they’d be fine. Maybe that’s not true.”
Thiel’s solution to opening the minds of those who can’t easily go to Harvard? Poke a small but solid hole in this Ivy League bubble by convincing some of the most talented kids to drop out of school and try another path. The idea of the successful drop out has been well documented in technology entrepreneurship circles. But Thiel and Founders Fund managing partner Luke Nosek wanted to fund something less one-off, so they came up with the idea of the “20 Under 20″ program last September, announcing it just days later at San Francisco Disrupt. The idea was simple: Pick the best twenty kids he could find under 20 years of age and pay them $100,000 over two years to leave school and start a company instead…
…While a controversial program for many in the press, plenty of students, their parents and people in tech have been wildly supportive. Thiel received more than 400 applications and most were from very high-end schools, including about seventeen applicants from Stanford. And more than 100 people in his network have signed up to be mentors to them.
Thiel thinks there’s been a sea-change in the last three years, as debt has mounted and the economy has faltered. “This wouldn’t have been feasible in 2007,” he says. “Parents see kids moving back home after college and they’re thinking, ‘Something is not working. This was not part of the deal.’ We got surprisingly little pushback from parents.”
Peter Thiel: We’re in a Bubble and It’s Not the Internet. It’s Higher Education.: “”
very interesting thoughts.