baglunch

The Skateboard Mag - issue 13

Wed, 02 Mar 2005 03:20:04 GMT

The East Coast Issue..

* Rodney got a sick photo in it.

* And look who got another cameo, I swear I get more coverage than my whole team does, haha. I hate the photo it makes me look fat, not that i'm not fat, i just hate that it shows.

Official Update..

Tue, 08 Feb 2005 07:02:33 GMT

So it's been really hectic since I last posted. I'll try to keep it brief and to the point:

- Launched the board company website : OfficialSkateboards.com
- The logo tshirts just came in.
- I'm currently working on graphics for the spring/summer boards, and clothing.
- The guys have photos coming up in the next issues of "The Skateboard Mag (13)", and "Skateboarder magazines. With another possible photo dropping later this year in Slap magazine.
- Some of the guys went on a filming/photo trip to Miami to escape the winter in new york, a lot of sick photos were taken, hopefully a few of them will be picked up by the mags.
- We were invited to a Tsunami Relief benifit for the red cross by the shelter skatepark, we raised $1400 in donations. The guys are also due to appear at the same skatepark's skatecamp put on a demo and serve as guest instructors.
- Rodney has been asked to film some stuff for the upcoming Static 3 video this year.
- Slap magazine asked if they could do a product review on our boards once the new ones come in.
- Planning a north east tour this summer, and possibly a south east tour in the winter.
- Planning for the full length video, set to release in 2006.

Hello Toasty

Tue, 08 Feb 2005 06:44:47 GMT

No matter how many pieces of toast I make with this thing i can't get over the cat face looking back at me through the butter.

All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a thousand enemies

Thu, 07 Oct 2004 14:19:05 GMT

"All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a thousand enemies, and whenever they catch you they will kill you. But first they must catch you, digger, listener, runner, prince with the swift warning. Be cunning and full of tricks and your people will never be destroyed."

So last night i introduced look to the greatest rabbit movie ever made, Watership Down. ok ok, it's the only rabbit movie ever made but it's still one of my favorites none the less, so artfully done it makes me want to cry.

Official update: making moves.

Wed, 06 Oct 2004 19:40:42 GMT

October is quite the exciting month for the new board company. We've completed the 4 man team, all of which are well on their way into filming for the promo/trailer.

All but one of the new boards are in. Supreme, Autumn, and Rival skateshops are all carrying our goods. We're currently in talks to make a french connection and get our product out there, speaking of which I need to wrap up the new shirt designs soon.

The stickers are hot like the new crack.

We got two nifty name drops, and a website review in two magazines; the new issue of transworld (issue 22) has a news blurb about officialnewyork.com, and the skateboard mag (issue 8) has a news blurb about official skateboards and the team (boo, they forgot Luis' name and spelt mine wrong) and a quarter page review on officialnewyork.com both are out on store shelves now (Oct 6).

oh yeah, because i like clapping for myself..

Sat, 14 Aug 2004 23:04:41 GMT

happy birthday to me.

update..

Sat, 14 Aug 2004 13:35:02 GMT

A lot has happened since i last updated..

official skateboards
- Picked up a business partner/friend
- Made some new boards
- Added 3 new people to the team (1 pro, 2 ams)
- premiered the vicious cycle video on the website, got 7000 uniques in 3 days.

work
- Half the people at work were laid off
- i'm going quadruple the amount of work i had to before, and i was already doing triple back then.

life
- this happened, and this is how it happened. this last thing makes everything else i listed look stupid.

Mobile Geek..

Thu, 22 Apr 2004 13:50:00 GMT

I just finished writing a script/program that will post photos I email from my camera phone to the web, i just have to finish it up and have it make the subject of the email the caption to the photo.. "Today is a great day for science"

just one of them days

Fri, 02 Apr 2004 17:48:41 GMT

You know it's not a good start to a day when you go out to get coffee and while you're pouring sugar, the lid pops off showering your empty cup with an avalanche of white.. or after that when you check to find there's no half n half, or while you're waiting for the half n half to be refilled another employee bumps into you spilling your hot coffee (not tempered by cream) onto your hand.

Ni!

Thu, 01 Apr 2004 21:32:24 GMT

I have just grasped the holy grail of geekdom!

I recently got a new cellphone (nokia 6600), and I just configured it to get my email from my website, connect to AIM, sync contact/calendar/photos with my powerbook and allow me to connect to the internet via my powerbook wirelessly through bluetooth!

kill me.

Valentine's day..

Thu, 12 Feb 2004 19:51:55 GMT

Who the heck decided to put the day of love in winter?

What to do if there is a sick passanger on the train..

Wed, 21 Jan 2004 15:01:57 GMT

Why is it that every train I get on there's a sick passenger who makes me a half hour later than i already am? I think the MTA should install "sick passenger ejection seats", not only would this expedite the removal of sick passengers, but it would save everyone else time and deter people who aren't really all that sick from pulling the emergency break.

Something to put my stuff in (revised)..

Tue, 20 Jan 2004 14:43:19 GMT

STILL looking for a new laptop bag for work, up til now I've been schlepping my gear back and forth in my backpack, which is neither convenient nor very work savvy.

I STILL haven't really found anything that says "THAT'S IT!" but I've narrowed my choices down to a few contenders:

there's the more conservative but less protective marware milano. more elegant style (IMO), but a lot less protection:

Booq puts out this slim, stylish bag but looks a bit cheap to me and the amount of protection is questionable:

The courier from tom bihn seems stylish, and roomy, maybe too bulky (i like black, but the yellow accents are pretty hot) but has the most protection:

macally seems sleek, but maybe too sleek where it sorta looks like a huge purse (translation: metro-sexual) with little to no protection:

The waterfield cargo bag, maybe too bulky, and i'm undecided if it's ugly or just so ugly that it might be cool:

brenthaven pro, seems way too bulky, and maybe a little too generic business style.. but it has the second most protection:

Gurgle Gurgle Gurgle..

Tue, 20 Jan 2004 14:27:12 GMT

What started to be a great sunday by visiting my grandmother for breakfast turned into me diving into waist high ice water to shut off the water to her house because her water meter froze and broke. With a visit from the DEP and a hundred buckets of water later, everything was back to normal.

Officially productive..

Fri, 02 Jan 2004 07:26:10 GMT

So the Official New York boards are here.. I'm really pleased with how they came out. The colors came out exactly how i wanted them, but then again that's what the pantone color system is for i suppose. There is a little smudging on some of the boards, but i'll attribute that to the rushed nature of my order.

Everyone's super psyched on the boards, i dropped a few off at the local shop, and they sold like hot cakes. I also opened my online store on new years, it's not exactly pretty but it works. I can always dress it up a bit later.

I also dropped a new clip on the website "we rep queens". I should really get moving on the next clip before i forget and have to rush one out again.

When disaster strikes..

Fri, 12 Dec 2003 03:54:40 GMT

Today without warning and to everyone's surprise, 30 people at work were laid off at 3pm.

The emotional response from the victims ranged from immense sadness to rage. The thing that makes me sad for them is that a lot of them have families, and having to enter into the holidays with this type of uncertainty can definitely be unnerving. The victims ranged in age from 22 to 53. It's hard enough for the 20-30 somethings in this job market, i can't imagine the struggle that faces the older guys.

The rest of us were just scared for our lives watching the live "leaving notice" board update dynamically, hoping that none of our names were on the list. Everyone would jump every time the phone rang thinking it might be HR calling them upstairs to fire them.

In the end out of my entire group, my protege and my boss (managing director) were terminated, leaving my manager, myself, and 3 other employees in my group. The layoffs made little to no sense and it seemed like they randomly picked who to lay off out of a hat. Although I wish there weren't any there were definitely several better choices to make than the ones they made.

With that said, I think I'm relatively safe, but I'm going to freshen up the resume just the same.

Official New Yorking

Fri, 12 Dec 2003 03:35:15 GMT

So the site finally launched, the launch went well, lots of visitors.

I'm holding off the "friend or foe" system until things start to slow down and get boring.

The boards are coming in next Saturday.

The logo tee shirts will be run soon (still haven't decided on the layout).

The "All City Skate Jam (2003)" event that I hosted this year got a full page article in the February 2003 Transworld Skateboarding magazine. Two seasons late, but still sick as hell. I'm in the center of the photo in the upper right hand corner shruging with my camera.

Welcome to the jungle..

Mon, 24 Nov 2003 07:04:43 GMT

Went out to the Animal New York gallery on Friday for a couple of friend's art show opening. Absorbed the art, lots of impressive and inspiring work, saw lots of people i haven't seen in a while.. but this joint was SO packed, the 50 foot radius outside the place was crowded. I saw what i need to see, saw some friends, drank some beer, and bounced. The crowd was mostly made up of friends of the artists, the max fish crowd, and every broke hipster in williamsburg looking to score free beer, and vodka/redbulls.

Official New York slacker..

Tue, 18 Nov 2003 04:28:34 GMT

Ok, so the site's basically done, the spot map and all basic functionality of the new site are complete but I may put a hold on the "friend or foe" system because it's still a little too insecure. There's funny little bugs such as being able to add a friend as a foe, etc etc.. easy to fix, just hard to get motivated.

I haven't started editing the video clip for the launch date, I figured with a year's worth of footage to work with it'd make life easier, *BZZZ* wrong.

The boards have been pushed back from thanksgiving to the 2nd or 3rd week of december due to the manufacturer's larger clients making deadline demands, thereby pushing us small order suckers to the bottom of the queue. I'm still looking to keep the price no more than $40, but it's hard. I'm having both 7.5" and 7.65" wide boards made. I'm having two colorways at a time produced seasonally, white on black, and dk brown on cream are the first pair.

http://www.officialnewyork.com/~bryan/official/boards/

Tshirts are just about there, the blanks have been selected, i'm just finalizing the layout of the logo onthe shirt itself, and the colorways.

http://www.officialnewyork.com/tshirts/layout/

Stickers are also underway, I just have to nail down a quote for the die cutting, they also can't do crack n peels.. oh well people won't suffer too much.

I'm looking into having a die cut split logo sewn zipper hoodies made with my type logo.. this process is painfully slow and difficult.

Setup..

Mon, 20 Oct 2003 04:25:29 GMT

I hate being asked loaded questions that people never really wanted honest opinions to in the first place. If you wanted a certain answer, you should have asked your friggin self.

What a waste of time.

Shlub shlub..

Thu, 16 Oct 2003 17:59:00 GMT

So look's been telling me i dress shlubby when i goto work, I think if i replaced my backpack with one of these it'd be a step in the right direction:

http://www.zerohalliburton.com/ZH/StoreModules/ViewDetails.aspx?unitid=76&rurl=%2fZH%2fSiteDefault.aspx%3fpgid%3d77&rpgid=77&grpid=17

I'll probably buy it from here, since it's the cheapest price i could find:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=productlist&A=details&Q=&sku=114018&is=REG

geek report: Ipod, it's about friggin time...

Thu, 16 Oct 2003 17:44:48 GMT

I've been waiting since day 1 for these things to happen, but apple announced today:

- ipod mic for voice recording.
- ipod CF card reader to download photos off your digital camera cards for storage on the ipod for upload to your mac later, this allows you to shoot for a whole week (or more) without needing to go back to a computer. Perfect vacation accessory.
- windows version of itunes, i don't really care about this, but it is significant (to someone).

pop quiz..

Tue, 14 Oct 2003 14:34:51 GMT

So, what do you do when you have a free resource, media, news website that's outgrown itself? With over 1000 visitors a day, and 1.5 million hits a month. Yearly underground jams of 250+ people. Random name dropping in various industry magazines. Helping spark off the whole skateboard website movement, when there wasn't any. Having just been given full legal use of the name for commercial use? And is set to drop teeshirts, and boards?

Drop it of course!

Yeah, so after all that heartache of getting the rights to the name, i've decided to dead my site. It just never sat well with me that i had to ask someone else for permission to use the name for my site that i've been doing for the past 7-10 years.

In the long run it was a moral issue, not a legal one.

It's all about to change..

Sat, 20 Sep 2003 13:33:40 GMT

So now that i've gotten the skatejam out of the way, a lot of kids were psyched on the boards i had made and are wondering when and where they can get them. I've got a lot of bros who are pro skating and supporting the product, so that's really helping a lot. So all this in mind, i've decided to try to do some commercial products for the site- tee shirts, and boards for now. Everything's already in place, and i have all the resources i could need. On top of it all, one wrench that could have killed everything was the legal one over the trademark. I contacted the owner and he is more than cool with me using the name as long as they can still use it in their own capacity, which i'm more that cool with. They really appreciated the fact that i went to them for approval prior to starting my venture, so it only goes to show that a little courtesy goes a long way, even in business. At this point, i just have a lot of paperwork ahead of me, but luckily a friend of mine is willing to help me out on the books and taxes if i give him some product from each shipment, no problem. All the pieces are in place and all the players are ready it's time to play the game and see how it turns out.

All City Skate Jam 2003

Sat, 20 Sep 2003 13:25:15 GMT

So it's that time again, I hosted another All City Skate Jam. I made 10 boards and branded them to give out to the kids. 5boro came through, and killed it, also came through with two arm fulls of product for the kids.. Surprising a lot of the people i wanted to be there showed up and lurked, which is actually more than i expected. About 200-250 kids showed up like last year, we ended with about 150, like last year.. there was a high drop off ratio everytime we left a spot because people would stay behind to skate or were too tired to continue. Alex had me bring the jam over to Supreme it was nuts, they threw out like 10 boards for the kids. Vehicle skateboards also came through and give some product away. I think through out the day, 20+ boards were given out, that means almost 10% of the kids got a free boards, very sick. The only real issue we ran into was at Pace, which i nearly got arrested for, but came away unscathed. I think when i do it again next year, i have new insight as what i need to do.. time management, i need to avoid certain spots, and spent less time are other spots, on top of that i will NOT start this thing at the TF, no one ever wants to leave. Articles have been submitted to transworld, slap, and resolve, hopefully they get run. I think next year I won't be so afraid of a huge mob coming, this year i only advertised it for 3 days before the event through fliers and the website.. next year i'll give it 2 months warning like i did last year so the foreigners and weekend warriors can come out (probably be 500 people next time). It was amazing to see that many skaters rolling down the street, and restores my faith in new york skateboarding (again).

here's a rough edit of the footage I've gathered so far:

http://www.metrospective.com/clips/html/allcity-skatejam-roughedit-biggie.html