[ WindMill ]

 

 
This was a beautiful scene I captured with my iPhone during my very first attempt to accomplish a time lapse (a technique that I've been curious about for quite some time now), and that is just starting to show some results.

It was a magical atmosphere in Montalegre, in the north of Portugal, and although the time lapse didn't quite work out, I got to capture some photographs that I had envisioned about 4 years ago, in my last visit there.

Very soon, further details about all of this.

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Este foi um cenário magnífico que capturei com o meu iPhone durante a minha primeira tentativa de conseguir um time lapse (uma técnica que desperta a minha curiosidade já há algum tempo), e que começa agora a ter alguns resultados.

Esta uma atmosfera mágica em Montalegre, no Norte de Portugal, e apesar de time lapse não ter funcionado, consegui algumas fotografias que tinha visualizado há cerca de 4 anos, na minha última visita a esse local.

Muito em breve, detalhes adicionais acerca de tudo isto.

[ the sun and the sand ]

As últimas férias foram em Maio de 2009, e agora que reparo nos nove meses que decorreram desde a última publicação, percebo que já há muito tempo que esta pausa era devida.

Enquanto olhava para os pequenos montes de areia à minha frente, pensava nos últimos meses, e em como uma vida se altera de forma definitiva em tão pouco tempo... Os projectos profissionais começam e terminam, as amizades começam e terminam, mas há laços que ficam para sempre, que nunca poderão ser quebrados; laços como os que me unem ao meu bebé.

Hoje foi a primeira vez que viu a praia e o mar, que sentiu a brisa no seu rosto, que dormitou à sombra. Ainda é demasiado cedo para brincar na areia, mas o fascínio por aquela substância que escorregava por entre os dedos do pai foi mais do que evidente.

Vivemos os dias em que os clichés se tornam realidade, em que um sorriso ilumina o mundo, em que um soluçar despedaça um coração. Vivemos os dias de terror, em que percebemos o motivo pelo qual os pais dizem aos filhos para estarem em casa à meia noite, em que percebemos a frase "come a tua comida", em que nos levantamos a meio da noite só para ouvir a sua respiração tranquila no berço, em que percebemos que as noites nunca mais vão ser tranquilas como em tempos foram.

Vivemos os dias mais perfeitos que poderia imaginar, no meio de toda a sua imperfeição, descoberta e imprevisibilidade, mas cada um especial e extenuante.

Agora dorme meu bebé: amanhã é um novo dia, e temos um mundo inteiro para descobrir em conjunto.

______________________________

Last vacations were on May 2009, and now that I notice the nine months that went by since my last post, I realize that this break was long overdue.

While I was looking at the small piles of sand in front of me, I thought about the last months, and on how someone's life changes in a definitive way in so little time... Professional projects come and go, friendships come and go, but some bonds are forever, and they may never be broken; bonds like the ones between me and my baby.

Today was the first time seeing the beach and the sand, feeling the breeze, sleeping in the shade. It's still to early to play in the sand, but the fascination for that substance that slipped through my fingers was more than obvious.

We live the days when all cliches become true, when a smile lights up the world, when a sob breaks a heart. We live the days of terror, when we realize the motive way parents tell their kids to get home before midnight, when we understand the sentence "finish your meal", when we get up in the middle of the night just to hear the soft breathing in the crib, when we realize that no night will ever be peaceful like they once were.

We live the most perfect days that could be imagined, in the midst of their imperfection, discovery and unpredictability, but each one special and overwhelming,

Now sleep my baby: tomorrow is a brand new day, and we have the whole world to discover together.

[ The sky is the limit ]

 

[ Parlez plus fort ]

 

Sempre defendi que o "falar mais forte" nunca substituirá a força daquilo que se fala, mas adorei este graffiti a um passo do Vieux Port em Marselha. Tirada ontem de tarde num dia de descontracção depois de dois intensos dias de meeting da American Vintage.

I've always defended that "speaking stronger" will never replace the strength of what you say, but I loved this graffiti a step away from the Vieux Port in Marseille. Taken yesterday on a relaxation day after two intense days in the American Vintage meeting.

[ I Love ]

 

As life goes on, I've been noticing some really huge differences in what I love or not. Taste and experience take their toll, and all of a sudden your standards are so high that you find yourself hard to please.

This is a phenomenon widely adressed by people like Scott Schuman, or Garance Doré, that I didn't seem to believe in at first, but now, working more and more with fashion and design, I find myself being hugely critic regarding lot's of aspects of my work and the people that surround me.

A cruse or a gift? That's something I'll have to figure out as I go along...

Speaking about things I love, this is a photo taken in Paris last January in the Who's Next trade show. It's the logo of a brand called I love - Leon, turned in a magnificent way into a neon light.

[ Police ]

 

Straight from Paris, here's a scene from todays walk. It's a stick-on graffiti that's growing more and more popular here, taken in the Bastille monument.

Small detail, I've finally fully converted to raw imagery, which is a bit more time consuming in the post-processing of the photos, but gives a whole new range of possibilities in intensity, color balance and contrast. This is one of my first try outs.

It's amazing how much I've missed this gorgeous city, and how much pleasure it gives me just to walk around and capture all the small details. There are no words to describe the mood difference between Paris and Porto. Some of the Christmas lightings are still up, and you can feel the joy and positive attitude everywhere you go - a refreshing change from the ever growing crisis and weird political climate from Portugal...

[ Decisions ]

 

I suppose it's better if I start this one off with a warning: this post isn't for the faint hearted.

"Verhalte dich ruhig" was a sentence written in the walls of the bathrooms in Auschwitz - Birkenau concentration camp in Poland. It was a photo I decided a long time ago to keep out of the [ I will never forget ] post I made exactly one year ago today. That decision was simple: the scar that visit left in me was still too fresh to deal with some of the things I saw.

In an effort from the nazi troops to break the bodies of their prisoners, they soon realized that some of them appeared to have no breaking point. Starved, beaten, raped, humiliated, deprived of their identities, of their possessions, of their families, with all imaginable things lost, some of them kept proud. So, they turned to propaganda in an effort to find a breaking point in their minds since they failed to find it in their bodies.

"Verhalte dich ruhig" - "keep calm" was a part of that propaganda. "be honest", "be polite", "be obedient", "do you duties", and many many other sentences like this one were written in the walls of the complexes, in front of the 1,5m wide wooden racks where seven prisoners slept, inside the holes in the ground they called bathrooms, inside the gas chambers.

"Maybe that would break them", "maybe the beatings weren't enough to make them realize that their situation was actually their fault", "if we can't break their bodies, we can break their minds", "everybody has some sort of breaking point"... They finally learned that even then some prisoners have decided that their souls, their courage, their very heart were things that no aggression, physical or psychological torment was able to break, so they turned to the only solution left for these people that didn't have breaking points: death.

This photo was taken only nine days before my life changed. After that, 430 days of challenges, questions, riddles, mind games, pressures, issues, problems, things to solve, things to figure out, things to learn, having keep happy, keep smiling, keep everybody else smiling, keep strong, keep calm, "verhalte dich ruhig"...

Now, after the first battle, a big decision has to be made. Should I lower my arms, accept and find some comfort in the words those fucking quitters whisper in my ears saying "it could be much worse", or should I pick myself up, dust myself off, lick my wounds and embrace another 430 days just like the ones I left behind?

Simple decision for most guys, except... I don't have a breaking point.

[ 12 wishes ]

 

I look at new year wishes like I look at the lights of a chandelier. At first they're all bright and steady, and after a while some of them start flickering, some of them burn out, leaving only a few at the end of the year, sometimes hardly even enough to light the room, or in this case, your life, the way you intended it to.

I didn't make 12 wishes for 2010, I made three simple ones, and none of the lights were burned out on December 31st. Was it a good year? Well, it depends on the way you define 'good'.

I guess most people mix up a 'good' year with an 'easy' one, and that just doesn't work for me. Last year was probably the hardest year I ever lived through, but I survived. The challenges were enormous, but I survived. The sadness kept trying to creep in, but I still wake up with a smile on my face every single day. The worries surrounded me at all times, but I never lost a single moments sleep, so if I think carefully, it wasn't a bad year.

Although 2011 is still a big question mark to me, the direction is set, and I wont stop at anything. 2011 is going to be a year of great changes, another hard year, but, unlike 2010, it's not going to be a year of questions, it's going to be a year of answers.

I made 12 wishes for 2011, and I'm going to make sure the 12 of them come true.

[ Just breathe ]

 

"Yes I understand that every life must end, aw huh,..
As we sit alone, I know someday we must go, aw huh,..
I’m a lucky man to count on both hands
The ones I love,..

Some folks just have one,
Others they got none, aw huh,..

Stay with me,..
Let’s just breathe.

Practiced are my sins,
Never gonna let me win, aw huh,..
Under everything, just another human being, aw huh,..
Yeh, I don’t wanna hurt, there’s so much in this world
To make me bleed.

Stay with me,..
You’re all I see.

Did I say that I need you?
Did I say that I want you?
Oh, if I didn’t now I’m a fool you see,..
No one knows this more than me.
As I come clean.

I wonder everyday
as I look upon your face, aw huh,..
Everything you gave
And nothing you would take, aw huh,..
Nothing you would take,..
Everything you gave.

Did I say that I need you?
Oh, Did I say that I want you?
Oh, if I didn’t now I’m a fool you see,..
No one know this more than me.
As I come clean.

Nothing you would take,..
everything you gave.
Hold me till I die,..
Meet you on the other side."

Video and lyrics by Pearl Jam

[ Zurich ]

 

This time our trip to Cannes took us through Switzerland, in an eye catching airport. Maybe not as cool as [ Barajas ], but still, quite a masterpiece, running smooth as a clock.

Wednesday, with a few hours to spare, I got to enjoy the architecture of the terminal, the details, and also get some quiet work done on the vast and comfortable waiting rooms.

Zurich already had a funny story with me, being stopped in the x-ray control about two year ago, on my way to Ljubljana, because of a metal pen clip, used to secure a pen to the back of a Moleskine notebook, but more like a life threatening object on the x-ray machine... It made such a success with the airport security, I almost lost my flight, passing from hand to hand with a smile and a "this is really very clever!". Another one of those traveller stories...

[ Lace ]

 

The writing of this post was interrupted by a phone call, and with it came some reflections about human nature. I promise I'll keep it brief and simple: one of the most extraordinary features of the human being is the incredible capability to perform something that's called an assumption.

Please, don't mistake it for a deduction, it's a completely different thing. Deduction is defined as the inference of particular instances by reference to general law or principle, while an assumption is a thing that is accepted as true or as certain to happen, without proof.

Well, I suppose that the definition is sufficient to understand what I'm talking about. So, here's a word of the wise: think twice before you speak, and above all, don't assume. An assumption is the easiest of all judgments, it depends on perception instead of facts, on opinions instead of study, like the difference between a looking at photo or at a painting.

Even the greatest Paris paintings don't compare to the real thing, and if you didn't know better, you might assume that this photo is from a nice piece of vintage lace, if I told you it was made of steel and glass, you might infer it was a building, if I told you it is in Paris, you might deduct it's the dome from the Galleries Lafayette in Boulevard Haussman.

[ Tower of dreams II ]

 

Paris.

It's not that I don't respect those who don't love Paris, because I do. I swear I do! ... but don't ask me to understand the reasons, because I wont.

I mean, Paris has it's faults like every city in the world, for example, all the gorgeous monuments and architecture all around, the wonderful and original people you see everywhere on the street, on the subway, all the different cultures and identities... wait, those aren't faults.

Oh, I know! The traffic! The horrible traffic that I miss completely because of the outstanding Metro system... ops...

Who am I kidding?...

[ Tease ]

 

Tease is a beautiful little place in Lisbon where I found the most delicious cupcakes in a gorgeous ambiance. The model of Tease is "keep calm and eat a cupcake", and I couldn't agree more...

The decoration is fabulous, the employees are friendly and nice, but above all, the quality of the pastry they produce.

Don't miss it in Lisbon in Rua do Norte, 31-33, close to the Largo de Camões.

[ I miss you ]

 

 
I'm not a huge fan of stenciled graffiti's, but some of them work out pretty well. This one was taken in Paris last June and it illustrates perfectly how I feel about this gorgeous city: I miss you...

[ Sunlight III ]

 

 
This afternoon really had a shaky start... Just yesterday we were reviving these memories with a couple of friends over dinner. A really funny story, especially for us that were just spectators of the events.

It also brought up this photo, another example of my passion about sunsets, taken last April 10th in the Bar do Guincho, close to Cascais.

[ Paris, people and places ]

Someone asked me why in the world, of all places, should Paris be my favorite one. Just two simple reasons:

the people...

... and the places...

[ Art in the sky ]

If you could paint a graffiti anywhere, where would you put it? Well, probably in the sky where everyone could see it...

In Paris, they're not making them in the sky, but they're pretty close...

[ Liberty ]

Just to clear out any doubt about the "Made in France" tag in the big version in New York... Taken in the Jardin du Luxembourg, about one hundred meters away from our hotel.

[ Tower of dreams ]

I can't even tell how many times I've been to Paris, but being a truly a-tipical tourist, I don't make a point to walk around every monument every time. This one was taken after today's dinner at the first floor of the Eiffel Tower. Here it is, right off the camera.

Tower of dreams, signifying the fact that this wonderful city is more than the gorgeous scenery - it's home. Everybody has a place in the world where they know they fit, and this is the one for me... Maybe it's just a dream, but what's life without dreams that we fight every day to become a reality?

[ rue de Buci ]

We stopped by Paul in rue de Buci for a refreshment and a cup of coffee before heading off to the hotel. A typical Sunday afternoon in Paris, with all the open places packed with people hanging out with their friends, enjoying the nice weather and the spare time to catch up on the conversations...

It's what I love most in Paris. In the middle of the crazy city, always moving, always busy, there's still time to take a coffee and hang out. And the details we see around us are theme for endless conversations. Just try it: stop in a terrace, ask for a coffee and take a look at the small details in the buildings around you...

... the items for sale in the local shops...

... at the sometimes crazy, sometimes working, but always absolutely authentic people walking around the street...

... but above all, enjoy your company, and enjoy Paris. Once you do it, you'll never forget this wonderful city.