The Truth Behind Instagram

I came across this photographer last week, Chompoo Baritone from Thailand, who's taken these seriously relatable set of photos called The Truth Behind Instagram. Seriously how relatable are some of these photos? That Instagram worthy photo you posted yesterday, did it look something like this outside of the frame? If you've done this at least once raise your hand! I know my set ups sometimes look a tiny bit like this.

Okay so I know a few Instagrammers that might have that perfect life that they have on screen but I know most of us don't. It goes back to that saying 'you can't judge yourself against others when you only see their highlights reel and you're living the entire documentary'. A few days ago I was talking to Angela from astylecollector over Instagram in awe of the amazing food she's been posting lately comparing it to my regular boring food I'm eating when she replies saying 'only the pretty ones end up on Instagram'. It made me realise I did it again, I'm always comparing myself to everyone and everything and I shouldn't. That's what I like about this, Baritone expresses that every day people snap pictures in a way to reinvent themselves, to make themselves seem better, when in reality it's fake. Careful cropping and filtering can make mundane situations seem extraordinary. Since when did we need to see photos of other people's food before Instagram? Remember that time when people would post anything and everything on Instagram without considering how it was framed or if the lighting was good? Now our Instagrams are like a wall in an art gallery, perfect framing, cropping and editing. Some of us even theme our Instagrams and won't post a photo if it doesn't suit their theme!

I'm not dissing Instagram by any means, I love it, I spend hours scrolling my feed staring at the glorious photos, it inspires me! Also I know that most of you guys reading this aren't fake, creating new versions of yourselves to parade online. Sometimes I personally need to take a step back and realise that Instagram, Twitter, Facebook etc are all people's highlights reel, and I'm not seeing the whole movie so there's no way I can review and compare it to my own life. In real life too, I'm currently in the process of trying to get an internship for summer and boy is it harder than what they make it seem on The Internship. I'm constantly comparing myself to other people I've seen at the same meetings as me and I just can't help myself but think they're so much better and talented, why am I even bothering? But it's the same as Chompoo Baritone is trying to say, their just selling themselves with their best qualities and I should be too!

This was meant to be another artist loving post but hey it got a little deep, but it's what I needed to hear at this moment in time so maybe it's what someone else needs to hear too!

*All photos are from Chompoo Baritone's Facebook page, check out her other works on there too!

Contrast: Books vs Screen

So the #NZBloggers group and the #brunchclub group have this blog post inspiration challenge going this year called #bloggreatness where they are giving a topic for each week of the year to inspire bloggers to blog. Read more about it and the groups here. I've been wanting to do this for a while, especially the typography week, however I just haven't got around to it. This week however is Contrast and I thought it would be the perfect time to discuss my personal views on the endless debate: Books vs Screen. 

Now while I do love a good movie my personal favourites are books, I do have points where I just can't be bothered reading and it takes me over a month to finish one book. But if you couldn't tell from the increase of book posts over the past few months I've finally got my reading mojo back! Hope you don't mind about that by the way. 

My favourite book series of all time are the Harry Potter series. They never lose their magic no matter how many times you read them and I've read them a fair number of times. I remember when it took me an entire summer to read Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix when it first came out and now it takes me a few days. I wouldn't say the movies are a total let down, they're magical and I'd happily watch them again and again but there's just a few tiny details that would've made it so much better, even simply including Peeves the Poltergeist would have made it better. I know things like these have been mentioned time and again round the internet so I won't go on about it. But how magical would a tv series been? I don't know if it would be right to do it anymore as our recognisable Harry, Ron, and Hermione have grown up. I'm not sure if it would be right to have it recast even if we were to get something as magical as a tv series. Wouldn't it be cool though if they refilmed the 19 years later scene when they all got to that age? I'd accept that! 

I don't know if many of you have heard about the new thing coming to Netflix next year but I'm so bloody excited about it! A Series Of Unfortunate Events is going to be made into an actual series. Not a crappy movie that covers three books and then doesn't have any sequels... an actual series! I read this series when I was younger and having never owned them myself I would borrow them off my best friend one after the other until I caught up, we then went to different secondary schools so the newer ones I haven't actually read (but will get to in due time). The second one was always my favourite, followed closely by the third one which I now own after finding a copy in a charity shop a few years ago. I do admit I enjoyed the film, Jim Carrey was great and the story line was great for the fact they shoved 3 books into it but I just feel like a series like this would be done so much more justice from a TV series. I'm just in love with the fan cast of Lily Collins for Violet and pray it comes true really. 

Game of Thrones for example is a great example of this, I haven't actually read the books as I've never been able to get into them even after trying again and again - I will conquer them one day I promise. The series though just does works so well and tells all the different story lines in a way that isn't confusing and it's so good to a point where I don't feel like I really need to read the books. I know that there's so much more in the books and it's actually has some different story lines but it's just something that I'll get around to one day whereas I watch each episode as soon as I can obtain it! 

What are your thoughts towards this debate? I know some people just can't concentrate enough to read a book but only some on screen productions have been able to create magic equal to that in a book. Are there any books that you feel have been beaten by their on screen partners? Or is the pen always mightier than the um... tv? 

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas tag.

So with Christmas songs blasting and just having finished packing for the holiday I shall be on when you read this I checked out a few of my favourite blogs and came across the Christmas Tag on Megan's blog Moonbeamwishes (check it out here) and I thought I'd have a go.

1. What is your favorite Christmas movie?

I am quite the ironic Christmas movie person with some of my favourites being Elf and The Grinch however I do really like Rise Of The Guardians which although isn't hugely Christmas related it has got Santa in it and came out before Christmas so I class it as one. Although I take this as I can watch it all year round... unlike other Christmas movies which are strictly December movies only. 

2. Do you open your presents on Christmas eve or Christmas morning?

Definitely Christmas morning, apologies to all who do but I find it a really weird concept to open them on Christmas eve... Santa hasn't even been then? When I was a kid we always used to go to either one of my grandparents house on Christmas day and do presents and dinner and then the other grandparents house on Boxing day and do presents and dinner so I used to kind of have two Christmas days a year! 

3. Do you have a favorite Christmas memory?

I don't really have a favourite Christmas memory I just have a lot of nice ones with my family and friends throughout the years. But I do like how my boyfriend asked me out on Christmas eve last year that was cute. 

4. Favorite festive food?

Probably the huge amount of chocolate that goes on sale, of course Chocolate Oranges. 

5. Favorite Christmas gift?

When I was 2 I got one of those giant toy kitchens that were so massive compared to a 2 year old that it was just the most magical thing in the world. I was probably shorter than the washing basket in the photo below it was just that great. I've gotten loads of more flash and expensive presents since but this was always the one present I remember clearly. 

6. Favorite Christmas scent?

Cinnamon or baking scents. 

7. Do you have any Christmas eve traditions?

My family and I always go to the movies on Christmas Eve to watch the latest Christmas movie that came out and that would always be in the Christmas movie box next December. 

8. What tops your tree?

An angel on our family one and a light up star on my personal one. 

9. As a kid what was the one (crazy, wild, extravagant) gift you always asked for but never received?

We always asked for a puppy and every time my mum said no.  

10. What's the best part about Christmas for you?

I love all the cheesiness and festivities, even though it's hardly festive in New Zealand at Christmas, my family and I all are Christmas fanatics so have a great time together. 

Review: The Maze Runner

Hiya blogisphere it's been a couple of days but look what I finally did! After my friends decided they wanted to go to watch The Maze Runner this week I decided as I love to read the books before watching the movie it would be the perfect time to finally get my arse in gear and read the book. I've been wanting to read it for so long and have actually started it a few times before and ended up being too busy to finish it. But I finally did it! I managed to read it the fastest I've ever read a book of it's size so I was pretty proud. Although after watching the movie I saw it wasn't really necessary reading it before hand as it's hardly even the same at all, based on the book is a very loose term.
I really liked both the movie and the book but I felt that the movie held a lot of questions as I was having to fill my friends in on the reasons behind certain things on the walk home from the movie as they didn't understand. When I think about it this was the same for The Hunger Games when I watched it with my Dad, I guess big actiony books are hard to siphon down to an hour and a half so some background information is left out. It's understandable but then it's also annoying having to let your non book friends know the reason why they all have weird names and Thomas is just Thomas.
The casting in this movie however is great, there's only a few characters where I was like "oh what how is that Gally I thought it was Chuck", "how is that Newt I thought it was Chuck", "oh that's Chuck now I get it", or "oh wow Alby's black". But saying that I really enjoyed it and I'm glad they managed to get it down to about an hour and a half as those actiony movies that are like 3 hours get a bit meh to me. I recommend both the movie and the book so whatever you like to do go get this story! (BUT WHY DID IT RAIN THE WEATHER WAS A HUGE PART OF THE STORY WHY) 

The Scorch Trials currently halfway through reading, stay tuned. 

Book Review: Charlie StCloud

Hiya so sometimes very rarely I do the thing where I don't realise movies have come from books and randomly discover them in the library. This is one of those cases having watched the movie Charlie StCloud with mister wildcat Zefron himself years and years ago it was weird to see him chilling in the fiction section on a book cover. Of course being Zac I investigated and realised there was a book! Now luckily as I hadn't seen the movie for quite a long time I couldn't for the life (and death) of me remember what happened so it came home with me. Of course reading through things started to click into place and halfway through I started to remember what happens. 

I would recommend this as even though I'd watched the movie it's still written perfectly in that it's very hard to as my Dad would say "write the script" and guess what's going to happen. Of course the whole girl falls for the guy part is obvious but other than that there are some great jaw dropping moments. Have a read! 

HELVETICA - The Movie

  

Last night my flatmate kindly allowed me to hack into his Netflix account and watch the documentary Helvetica (mainly because I wanted to watch it before class today and I couldn't be arsed walking to the library at 7pm at night). But my tutor recommended it to me in passing after discussing my project on typography and my love for it and well I thought I should take a gander. It was actually really good, I'm not really one for documentaries unless they're on cute little animals and things but it was really interesting. Apart from now I have added another font to my long list of type that I can recognise on the street on posters and things sigh I'm turning into such a design geek my god. I thought the quote that's on the right poster above is really nice summation of what they were talking about. Really recommend the movie if you're into this type of thing x