“i think that everything you surround yourself with consciously and unconsciously goes into your work.”

- todd hido

couldn’t agree more. he elaborates via pdn’s march ‘end frame‘. i’m already saving for my 40 ft table.

in the meantime, we recently bought a 4 x 8 sheet of steel from our local steeler (pacific steel + recycling) and put it on the walls. they custom cut it – we opted for a 3×6, 2×4 + 1×6 pieces – and we picked it up. after an hour or so of sanding we found some studs and hung the pieces around the office for an easy display system. anything that grabs our attention, visual or otherwise, gets a spot on the boards now.

here’s a great way to start the week – a sweet mix of inspiration in the form of new hacks + variations and a discussion on crap.

one of public radio’s greatest features is no doubt, this american life, hosted by ira glass. a long time radio host/producer who’s now expanded into tv. you know that he knows his stuff by the way he puts his shows together. the topics are engaging and the edits are tight. was discussing my post “edit” + the idea of how to get to the best of your work lately and this came up. part of a larger series, here’s why we all have to deal with the crap.

in your quest to fight through all the ho-hum mediocre stuff, here’s some fascinating alternative firmware for canon point+shoots called CHDK. it unlocks a ton of hidden potential in your powershot camera – HDR bracketing, time lapse + my friend ross’ favorite, motion detection! supposedly fast enought to get lightning strikes… wtf! haven’t tried it yet but definitely worth a go. and if you’re wondering the G9 is compatible thank you very much. cheers for the connect ross.

the best way to find more info on CHDK or anything online for that matter is now here. google’s been great at searching + really can’t be beat there but for the new wave of information presentation, the future will look a lot like kosmix – the web organized for you. another well financed silicon valley start up it is but another search engine it is not. not only does it find what you’re after but it presents it an encyclopedic format – a wiki definition, images, blogs links, videos, related links – all right in front of you in a google second. hard to go back once you’ve given it a whirl.

more inspiration ala pdx’s own w|k with their latest for nike + king james. the candyman is back (which incidently is the only nickname i ever really had) is up on their blog.

and lastly a bit of bono, inline with the new release, on theft. in this case, music theft via the copyright alliance blog.

the latest in his assault on our wits of reasoning, new yorker writer malcolm gladwell has put together a red hot (#1 on nyt business booklist) tome on the story of success. a real eye opener it’s chock full of examples + evidence of his theories on what makes individuals rise above. essentially he comes up with the argument that those of us, in any field, that want to be on top 1) work much, much harder than everyone else + 2) employ a developed sense of practical intelligence along with a bit of luck + a few good opportunities. what follows are some of my favorite lines.

in discussing a study done in the early 1990′s by psychologist k anders ericsson with two colleagues at berlin’s elite academy of music….

the striking thing about ericsson’s study is that he + his colleagues couldn’t find any ‘naturals‘, musicians who floated effortlessly to the top while practicing a fraction of the time their peers did. nor could they find any ‘grinds,’ people who worked harder than everyone else, yet just didn’t have what it takes to break the top ranks. their research suggests that once a musician has enough ability to get into a top music school, the thing that distinguishes one performer from another is how hard he or she works. that’s it. and what’s more, the people at the very top don’t work just harder or even much harder than everyone else. they work much, much harder.

if that doesn’t summarize just about everything about success then i’m a donkey’s arse. the next bit is good though too and just as applicable.

the particular skill that allows you to talk your way out of a murder rap, or convince your professor to move you from the morning to afternoon sections is what the psychologist robert sternberg calls “practical intelligence.” to sternberg, practical intelligence includes things like “knowing what to say to whom, knowing when to say it, and knowing how to say it for maximum effect.” it is procedural: it is about knowing how to do something without necessarily knowing why you know it or being about to explain it. it’s practical in nature: that is, it’s not knowledge for its own sake. it’s knowledge that helps you read situations correctly and get what you want.

this idea is so prevalent in most successful people that it should be a skill mandated in school or whatever path you take to get to be a busy photographer though i’m sure there’s little way to teach it. in this vein, i think it’s the intangible “turns” be they skills, abilities, opportunities or whatever, that shape anyone’s success. use every asset at your disposal + use it as wisely as possible. with a pinch of timing + gold fortune everything just might work out.

back to our first subject of hard work, gladwell continues on a path of illustrating that work for work’s sake is not an end that most desire. it must have something behind it. he demonstrates how it’s not entirely about money + concludes that work with “complexity, autonomy and a relationship between effort + reward in doing creative work…. is worth more to most of us than money”. in other words, + i find this spot on with running your own creative business regardless of the size,

“hard work is a prison sentence only if it does not have meaning. once it does, it becomes the kind of thing that makes you grab your wife around the waist and dance a jig.”

and lastly, not giving up our theme du jour of the sheer amount of work involved with success is the chinese quote that gladwell uses towards the end of the book.

“no one who can rise before dawn three hundred sixty days a year fails to make his family rich.”

now if you’ll excuse me, i gotta get back to work …