NorCal and Shill
A podcast where NFT artists tell stories, hosted by NorCal Guy. https://twitter.com/GuyNorcal
https://twitter.com/norcalandshill
NorCal and Shill
Jeff Frost
Welcome to the next episode of NorCal and Shill today's guest is Jeff Frost. You can find him on Twitter @Jeff_Frost. His website is frostjeff.com and his Instagram is @frostjeff.
Jeff uses time and sound as his two primary mediums often expressed through a number of sub mediums, including painting photography, video and installation. Frost's work has been shown at Mana Contemporary, his own Desert X installation, California Museum of Photography, Museum of Art and History, Lancaster (MOAH), Museum of Sonoma County, the Palm Springs Art Museum, the Center for European Nuclear Research (CERN), in Los Angeles International Airport, among many others.
He has won numerous awards at international film festivals, including Clarmont-Ferrand, international film festival, and ECU, the European independent film festival.
He was both a producer and subject of the 2017 docu-series fire chasers. That same year, he contributed to the national geographic series One Strange Rock.
In 2015, he was commissioned to create art for U2's acclaimed international tour Innocence+Experience. He has been featured in numerous publications and TV interviews, such as the New York Times, Art Forum, Art Net, National Ggeographic, PBS News Hour, Time Magazine, and American Photo.
His work has been described as "celestial light paintings" by co-founder of Google earth, Chikai Ohazama.
You can find his work on SuperRare and Foundation.
Links:
Twitter Jeff Frost
Jeff Frost
[00:00:00]
Intro
[00:00:31] NorCal: Hey everyone. Welcome to the next episode of NorCal and Shill today's guest is Jeff Frost. You can find him on Twitter @Jeff_Frost. His website is frostjeff.com and his Instagram is @frostjeff.
[00:00:51] NorCal: Jeff uses time and sound as his two primary mediums often expressed through a number of sub mediums, including painting photography, video and installation. Frost's work has been shown at Mana Contemporary, his own Desert X installation, California Museum of Photography, Museum of Art and History, Lancaster (MOAH), Museum of Sonoma County, the Palm Springs Art Museum, the Center for European Nuclear Research (CERN), in Los Angeles International Airport, among many others.
[00:01:37] NorCal: He has won numerous awards at international film festivals, including Clarmont-Ferrand, international film festival, and ECU, the European independent film festival.
[00:01:53] NorCal: He was both a producer and subject of the 2017 docu-series fire chasers. That same year, he contributed to the national geographic series One Strange Rock.
[00:02:06] NorCal: In 2015, he was commissioned to create art for U2's acclaimed international tour Innocence+Experience. He has been featured in numerous publications and TV interviews, such as the New York Times, Art Forum, Art Net, National Geographic, PBS News Hour, Time Magazine, and American Photo.
[00:02:32] NorCal: His work has been described as "celestial light paintings" by co-founder of Google earth, Chikai Ohazama.
[00:02:42] NorCal: You can find his work on SuperRare and Foundation.
[00:02:46] NorCal: Everyone. Please welcome Jeff Frost.
Interview
[00:02:49] NorCal: Hey, Jeff. Welcome to the podcast. How are you doing today?
[00:02:53] Jeff: I'm doing pretty good. How are you doing?
[00:02:55] NorCal: Good. Good. It's a nice day.
[00:02:58] Jeff: It's a beautiful day.
[00:02:59] NorCal: warm out, right? Not too. Well, it's not cold out. So light jacket. Just chilling.
[00:03:07] Jeff: Yeah. You're in Northern California and I am in Southern California.
[00:03:11] NorCal: Yes. Yeah. And you're in a unique spot.
[00:03:16] Jeff: I am in a Bombay Beach, working on giant optical illusion paintings in an abandoned trailer for the Bombay Beach Biennale.
[00:03:25] Jeff: Ali.
[00:03:26] NorCal: Which is awesome. I had no idea. You also were a painter.
[00:03:32] Jeff: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. It's I do so many different things that it's very difficult to kind of. Wrap your head around like all these different areas, but the common thread between everything I do is time and sounds. So if I'm in an abandoned house, painting on the ceiling on a, on a ladder, a 12 foot ladder, I hear my camera beeping and I know, all right, I got to about 15 seconds to get off this ladder.
[00:03:56] Jeff: I'll pick it up. I'll pull it out of the frame. I have strobes on generators, the whole thing, fires. And then I take the ladder back into the frame, go back up at and start painting on the ceiling again for another 60 seconds before it happens again. So I make these crazy, I use those as building blocks for films and, you know, like I time-lapse the whole thing.
[00:04:21] Jeff: And, you know, it's, I'll make these films that combine like painting in abandoned houses and wildfires and riots and, you know, shots of the Milky way or whatever it is that I'm doing. And. The common thread between all these different areas of art that I do our time and sound.
[00:04:41] NorCal: That's awesome. It's it's it's cool to see. And. You know, see the diverseness that you have and are skilled at.
[00:04:52] Jeff: Yeah. Maybe if, if people want to see kind of the ultimate combination of that, they could watch Circle of Abstract Ritual. My film on Vimeo.
[00:05:03] NorCal: uh, I will definitely link that in the show notes.
[00:05:07] Jeff: That'd be great.
[00:05:08] NorCal: Um, so do you use a hardware wallet? You have one?.
[00:05:12] Jeff: I do, uh, ArtPleb actually sent me a Trezor.
[00:05:15] NorCal: Oh, nice. Trezor. It's a good one. I like it. It's when I use, well, I mean, I got all of them, but the one I, I enjoy the most.
[00:05:25] Jeff: That's the one you liked the most.
[00:05:26] NorCal: Yeah.
[00:05:27] Jeff: Oh, that's good.
[00:05:30] NorCal: I mean, I think it just makes sense to me. The user interface is touchscreen. If you have the model T uh, You know, I just never had any issues with it. Um, the ledger is a little quirky to me, at least from my mind.
[00:05:45] Jeff: I have, I only have the experience with this one, so that's good to know.
[00:05:49] NorCal: Yeah. So what were your first thoughts when you heard about NFTs?
[00:05:57] Jeff: Um, I have been making art for a long time. That's video art. And if, if, if anybody out there is like familiar with how contemporary art and selling video art went. I mean, like it it's just bonkers. I mean, it's like, it was ridiculous. It's the most hard thing to do in the world. Like, you know, it
[00:06:18] NorCal: By my DVD.
[00:06:20] Jeff: Yeah.
[00:06:20] Jeff: I mean, it's like, I'm going to sell you a limited edition DVD for X amount of dollars and like what sign the fucking DVD. Like it just, you know, it just it's sucked. Um, and NFTs came along and like a, you know, because I do so much time-lapse with high resolution photography, I make. Museum grade prints, like sometimes huge.
[00:06:43] Jeff: I had one in lax that was 40 by 60 inches. Right. I mean, at, cause I'm using like really good cameras to shoot this time-lapse and instead of, you know, choosing one photo and editioning it, 30 times and doing 30 different prints of this one photo, I would choose 30 different photos and only print them once ever, which is both great.
[00:07:07] Jeff: And also kind of tough because I'd have to educate the collectors that I had. Like, Hey, this is what I'm doing. But the people that stuck with me are like, absolutely love them because they're physically beautiful. But also they know I'm the only person with this photo. So NFTs. And I'm like, wait, one of ones is the whole deal and I can do video art loops and blah, blah, blah.
[00:07:29] Jeff: You know, like I was thrilled, you know, this is like, it, it felt like it was made for me to finally like show the world. And so, you know, when, when I got onto NFT Twitter and I'm like, Hey guys, I make light paintings with robots. And time-lapse people like just embraced it almost immediately because there's so many technologists in this space and they're just like, awesome.
[00:07:53] Jeff: And like, whereas the last 10 years had been that, me saying that same thing to people pretty much their response universally was what
[00:08:05] Jeff: it's hard to, you know? So it was really fun because I feel like I've found my crowd a lot. And, uh, and it's also really interesting because I still have like that terrestrial. Parallel contemporary art career. So I have like sort of multiple things going on where it's like museums and gallery world, and then also NFT Twitter on it.
[00:08:27] Jeff: It's all digital and all like web three new frontier type shit.
[00:08:31] NorCal: Right. It's awesome. Well, I'm glad you found the space. I'd be like, I can only imagine my SD card. Do you want me to sign it for you.
[00:08:45] Jeff: Yeah, no shit. And like when I started there weren't even SD cards, it was like, here, let me give you a VHS tape or some shit. I mean, it wasn't, I'm not actually, it wasn't that far
[00:08:57] NorCal: right, right, right,
[00:08:58] Jeff: but th I definitely sold limited edition DVD, like video art. And like I had a collector that was, uh, that really wanted that piece circle of abstract ritual actually.
[00:09:11] Jeff: And I was like, ah, I don't really even sell. I just sorta gave up on selling video or because it was such a, such a ridiculous farce. And and like I had a collector was like, look, they got frustrated with me. And they finally were like, look, we'll give you two grand. If you just give us a copy of the film on a DVD.
[00:09:29] Jeff: And I was like, oh, all right, sure, here you go. They probably going to gotten it from me for $10, but.
[00:09:39] NorCal: That's so funny.
[00:09:41] Jeff: Yeah, it was it's very, it was, it's traditionally been very difficult to sell video art. And it's also, so because, you know, like people had a hard time justifying it because they're like, listen, I can go buy a feature length movie for $15 and on a physical thing. And you want to sell me a five minute video art piece for thousands of dollars.
[00:10:03] Jeff: And it's so like, it just didn't, there's like an inherent conflict that. Which really sucked because you may have put literally years into making that video art piece and they still would want you to edition it and like make it like very low price and all of that stuff. So like, none of it made any sense until now.
[00:10:26] Jeff: So I have, like, I keep wondering like how much back catalog stuff I should even put out there on NFTs, or if I should just totally only do new.
[00:10:35] NorCal: Ooh. That is a question. That is a good question.
[00:10:39] Jeff: It's a tough one. I mean, I already have like my last one, like last, um, one that's sold on SuperRare Dyschronometria. Um, I actually shot it in 2015
[00:10:52] NorCal: Oh,
[00:10:52] Jeff: I, I reworked it for the NFT and made it into this perfect loop. And like, we did the color and all that, but, you know, it's, it's the, uh, the basic footage where I was still like doing light paintings with robots, way back then.
[00:11:06] NorCal: Yeah, uh, man, it's a hard call. I mean, definitely would consider your best work. So, um, there's no reason to, uh, skip out on that. You know, the deprive us from that.
[00:11:17] Jeff: Yeah, well, I'm, I'm working on ways to try and NFTize the, the longer films.
[00:11:25] NorCal: Yeah.
[00:11:26] Jeff: And I'm thinking, maybe fractional some sort of thing. I figured out about five different ways that I could potentially do it. And if I can, uh, if I can run them all by people like Ben Strauss at transient labs or whatever, maybe we can come up with something really.
[00:11:41] NorCal: Yeah. I hope so. And I look forward to seeing that or whenever, uh, whenever that comes out, the here.
[00:11:48] Jeff: Yeah, well, I'll definitely be, uh, trying to get everybody to know about it as much as possible.
[00:11:57] NorCal: what, why did you choose art? What brought you to it?
[00:12:02] Jeff: Uh, well, I mean I'm life path in a, in a phrase. I would say that art doesn't, I don't know that I chose art. It's more like art chose me. So I spent decades trying to be a musician. Um, and I wrote and recorded like 500 songs where I did everything on all of them and this music. And then I was in bands as well.
[00:12:28] Jeff: And a music career is like just absolutely not something that was working out. But when I kind of got to art, I found that I had already this band here, I've always been able to draw really well. And I've always been artistically inclined. Um, but you know, when I was doing music, I had a bunch of adventures.
[00:12:48] Jeff: I played all up and down the sunset strip that the whiskey and did all these things. And, but not nothing really took off. And it like, it was long removed from the days of Jim Morrison and like, you know, like playing Whiskey is lame as Fuck. If I'm being honest, it's all paid a play. It's like, they'll put 15 bands on the bill.
[00:13:07] Jeff: I mean, it's just, it's a shit show. And so like, I would write these tales about our misadventures and the like stories were more well received than the, than the bands I was in. And, uh, ultimately though, like I was on the wrong path. So, you know, when I talk about this and I say it to people, they really are triggered by the word failure, but.
[00:13:33] Jeff: would say, just because you want something with all your heart doesn't necessarily mean it's the right thing for you. It's okay. To change paths. It's okay to fail. Failure is a gift. You know, when you, when you transmute it into a change or a strength, it becomes the embodiment of what doesn't kill you, makes you stronger.
[00:13:54] Jeff: You know, and, um, so I, there's not a ton of photographers out there that like can make soundtracks and films and do paintings and like all these things and, you know, so it it's turned into, it's made me kind of a pretty unique animal in that way.
[00:14:12] NorCal: Right, right. I mean, the only reason I found you is because someone else that does similar style to you well, similar in a way, but like Reuben
[00:14:24] Jeff: yeah. Yeah. Reuben's another one of those. And, um, you know, Reuben and I are, have been in real life friends for quite a long time. Um, and I saw them a million years ago on tour with nine inch nails before I knew.
[00:14:39] NorCal: Oh, wow.
[00:14:40] Jeff: I think he saw that film Circle of Abstract Ritual. It went viral and this would have been way back when like 2013, 2014, something like that.
[00:14:52] Jeff: And he actually tracked me down and messaged me
[00:14:54] NorCal: Oh, cool.
[00:14:55] Jeff: yeah. And, and. You know, so Reuben, uh, is really pretty amazing. And when he swings by the desert out here, uh, we try to go shooting or at least have lunch, you know, or something. And, um, you know, he's, he's been like, he's one of the most solid people I know, like just genuinely good person, but also a brilliant artist.
[00:15:16] Jeff: So I'm really happy to know Reuben.
[00:15:21] NorCal: Yeah. Good guy. Yeah, I hope to meet him one day. Hope to meet you. And they actually as well,
[00:15:28] Jeff: Yeah, that would be fun. I'm all about it. I I'm like definitely there are certain old world things that still are incredibly valuable, which is like, you know, go meet people in person like that. That's, you know, that's the NFT people I've met at like art basil or, or vellum LA or any like real life events.
[00:15:50] Jeff: Those connections are a lot stronger than just like having a Twitter DM exchange.
[00:15:55] NorCal: Right. And it it's crazy. The connection. You're just like, for me, it's been really positive. Like, especially like the one-on-one or small group, just like, just get along. Like we've had this extent, this DM exchange.
[00:16:10] NorCal: and then we just like hit it off in person.
[00:16:13] Jeff: Yeah. Yeah. It's nice to have that common background.
[00:16:18] NorCal: For sure. So What jobs have you done along the way?
[00:16:24] Jeff: What jobs have I done? Oh my God. I
[00:16:26] NorCal: love the good ones.
[00:16:27] Jeff: what jobs haven't I done? Okay. So here we, here we go. We got to go way back on
[00:16:32] NorCal: All right, let's do it.
[00:16:34] Jeff: I grew up on a farm in really the middle of nowhere in Utah. My dad and I farmed like 80,000 acres, I think at the peak.
[00:16:45] NorCal: Oh, shoot.
[00:16:46] Jeff: Yeah, it was like wheat and hay.
[00:16:49] Jeff: And so I was driving tractor by 12 years old.
[00:16:52] NorCal: That's hard work, man.
[00:16:53] Jeff: oh my God. After that it seemed pretty easy by comparison, except for art, honestly, like, eh, you know, like art, I clock a hundred hour work weeks on the regular, and I'm trying to get better about balance on that. I used to wear that as a badge of honor, but it's more like, oh, this is more like a sickness.
[00:17:15] Jeff: Yeah. So it's like I've had all kinds of crazy jobs. I mean, I was a server at Olive Garden. Oh, wait, wait. I know I actually worked at McDonald's when I was a teenager. Um, I got my real estate license at one point and was a loan officer. Uh, I was a manager of guitar center for awhile. Um, and you know, in recent years I still do Hollywood gigs to finance art projects.
[00:17:41] Jeff: And I tell ya, I go about all kinds of crazy.
[00:17:46] NorCal: Yeah, that's awesome, man. That well, you know, so my cousin, my, my family mom's side, uh, they're farmers like wheat and corn and all that stuff. And then I'm like, man, I don't know how you guys. Like, it's a hard, it's a hard life. Like we used to go back every summer to see them. And I kudos
[00:18:09] Jeff: When I go home, my dad still somehow ropes me into. Doing physical labor for him. And I'm like, what the fuck? Like, dad, I'm a, I'm a grown ass man, but it still happens. And it's just the way that it did that. But then again, you know, like there's a lot of benefits to that. I can, I can work like crazy. Um, like to the point where it's like, my problem is like learning to be more balanced.
[00:18:36] NorCal: Yeah. So if you were an animal, what would you be and why?
[00:18:43] Jeff: Ooh, I would be, I would be a Raven because yeah, Raven crows are smaller than Ravens. Ravens are bigger and Ravens live longer. Um, Ravens, uh, are very, very, very intelligent. Uh, they're mischievous. They can live up to 70 years, um, and they're rumor to do drugs.
[00:19:11] NorCal: Oh,
[00:19:11] Jeff: I, yeah, I don't know if this is strictly true.
[00:19:14] Jeff: I mean, like, I'm not a big, huge drug user, but I'm an occasional hallucinogen user. So like, uh, the rumor is, and I don't want to look this up because I want it to be true, like, I'm like facts can take a back seat on this one, but it may, it might be true, but like, so Raymond's, if you, like, when I lived in the country, like out in the middle of nowhere, Ravens would fly straight down.
[00:19:41] Jeff: And you'd see them come back up and they do a bunch of loop d loos, and then they go straight back down. And supposedly what they're doing is eating these particular types of ants that make them hallucinate,
[00:19:53] NorCal: Oh,
[00:19:56] Jeff: which I would not be at all. Surprised Ravens are ridiculously smart. Uh, here's another weird fact. This is not, not relevant to anything, but I just love it. Um, they will, they love shiny things. So. Anybody I've ever known that had a pet Raven, like the Raven will like hang out on their shoulder, like with them, like they become their companion because Ravens can recognize individual human faces and they know whether you're a Dick or whether you're cool.
[00:20:23] Jeff: And they, they really will. And like, so, uh, but they love shiny things. And so anybody that has a pet Raven has to hide their car keys because the Raven will literally go take them out of the ignition and right. Go drop them in the forest somewhere.
[00:20:40] NorCal: Oh, shoot.
[00:20:41] Jeff: And, uh, I just, I dunno, I just love that fact.
[00:20:44] NorCal: That's hilarious. Uh, Yeah, no, I mean, they, I I've seen like, you know, the, like some videos of them like solving problems and all sorts of things. And you're like, what the heck? It's like the, it's an it's, uh, it's crazy to watch any, you know, growing up you're like, oh, it's just a Blackbird.
[00:21:06] Jeff: Yeah, right. They they're, they're very mysterious creatures. Uh, and they have, uh, they have lots of hidden qualities that you would not expect. So yeah, I would definitely choose Raven. Maybe my second choice would be coyote.
[00:21:19] NorCal: Oh coyote.
[00:21:21] Jeff: Coyotes are also highly, highly intelligent.
[00:21:25] NorCal: Yeah,
[00:21:27] Jeff: Yeah, I love both of those animals. And I grew up around them. I used to go outside and I would at dusk, I would start howling and, uh, coyotes would start howling with me. And then I realized how many coyotes were actually just out there at any given time. And I was like, oh shit. If the coyotes turned on us, we're fucked.
[00:21:50] NorCal: Do you have a favorite food?
[00:21:52] Jeff: Oh my God. Um, I like, I like all the foods from all the peoples. I, you know, I basically, I want to come to your country in each your best things. Um, but short of that, you know, I'll do it in LA because LA has got such great food. I mean, if I had to pick maybe one thing, it might. Vietnamese food pho is just such a good, like as long as I've got chili oil and pho so great.
[00:22:19] Jeff: Uh, and sushi probably too. Yeah, I'm a, I'm a big, you know,
[00:22:23] NorCal: Yeah.
[00:22:24] Jeff: you know, like those, both of those are our main mainstays of mind, but like, I really like everything.
[00:22:31] NorCal: I mean, food's just get, so, I mean, I love food. I love coming together with people to eat food. It's just, it's a good time to get to know someone and, and to have a , memorable experience.
[00:22:42] Jeff: It's one of my favorite things, even if I'm alone with people is even better.
[00:22:47] NorCal: For sure. What's, what's the best piece of advice you have been given?
[00:22:54] Jeff: You know, I was thinking about this the other day and I was like, What if I don't even remember the best piece of advice I ever got, you know, like what if I don't even remember it, or like, I wasn't able to hear it at the time. Like, I bet the best piece of advice I've ever gotten. Isn't accessible to me anymore.
[00:23:15] Jeff: Um, you know, and like I kind of, the older I get, the more I go along, the more, I feel like advice and explanations. No, not always, like, it's not, this isn't a universal thing, but I feel like they're kind of like a , you know, or let's like, maybe I could draw a parallel between those things and like someone's first mind-blowing acid trip where they think they've got life figured out.
[00:23:43] Jeff: Right. It's really revelatory in that timeframe. And, and it may have effects on their life moving forward, but it's still fleeting in the long run. I kind of wonder about that. I don't know that was, this is a long walk down a very simple question, but like, uh, yeah, I kind of feel like, well, okay, so I'll, I'll tell you like one really great piece of advice that I've gotten that I have done is stuck and that I've lived by.
[00:24:12] Jeff: It's very nuts and bolts practical, and that is. Um, your creativity should not be limited to your art. Use it on your invoices, use it on how you talk to people. Use it on you can, it's a tool. You can aim it at literally anything and it will make it better.
[00:24:30] NorCal: All right. That's true. Writing that down. All right. So that's pretty straightforward. I like it. It makes sense. You know,
[00:24:46] Jeff: a little less esoteric than my, uh, the first one,
[00:24:50] NorCal: don't stay in your box. Yeah. So, okay. So then we'll, we'll, we'll, we'll move on to advice to artists joining the NFT space.
[00:25:02] Jeff: advice to new NFT people's um, I would say, remember to go the fuck outside dummy, like, you know, a re you know, remember the quality of the art you make is ultimately more important than networking and sales, um, because that will nourish your actual being, you know, uh, your work needs to speak to much more than just your bank account or your follower count.
[00:25:32] Jeff: Um, you know, that, that would be my main advice. You know, like art is absolutely the passport. Eh, there's a good piece of advice. Art is the passport. Uh, you can use it to like, if you're making great art, it will open doors for you. It doesn't mean that you can stop networking. It doesn't mean you don't have to do anything or don't have to interface with people.
[00:25:52] Jeff: But if you have art, the people love, it makes a lot of things easier.
[00:25:59] NorCal: Right. And getting off the screen
[00:26:03] Jeff: Yeah, go
[00:26:05] NorCal: Go for a walk.
[00:26:06] Jeff: actual vitamin D from the actual sun.
[00:26:09] NorCal: There you go. No more. Don't just pop the supplement.
[00:26:14] Jeff: Yeah. Yeah. For the love of God, go, go. You know, like people have got to like, you know, I don't know. I, I feel very strongly that artists, if they don't go live a full life, They don't really have any business making art. I don't know if you've ever walked into a museum exhibition where all the art is about art.
[00:26:36] Jeff: And I just go for the love of God. This is like listening to Madonna singing songs about Madonna singing songs, know? Go like have some experiences go fall in love, go get your heartbroken, go do some drugs go like on adventures, go on road trips, like live a full life and it will enrich your art.
[00:26:59] NorCal: For sure. All those experiences.
[00:27:03] Jeff: Yeah, every single thing, every single thing relates to every single thing. Um, I learned this in a really interesting way. I took, uh, I was in school in a photography program, but because I also like to physically draw, I took a figure drawing class
[00:27:18] NorCal: Um,
[00:27:18] Jeff: and I remember being shocked that like my figure drawing teacher taught us this certain way to see light and shadows in the, in the drawings we were making.
[00:27:28] Jeff: And then next time I was in photo classes, I was like, well, shit, this is helping me make better photos. And of course it is, you know, all these things are all related.
[00:27:39] NorCal: For sure. It's interesting. You say that the play on light and dark has, I mean, looking at some of your work.
[00:27:46] Jeff: Oh yeah. I'm obsessed with light and lighting. And I learned studio lighting, you know, like where I had like nine strobes and I had to balance. Physical photo studio and all that. I love that kind of stuff, but I took it into this really weird realm where I figured out how to do it at night. And it's like, it's a fascinating process because the art of lighting at night is the art of finding low power lights instead of high power lights, like everything you would need in a photo studio
[00:28:14] NorCal: Oh, okay.
[00:28:16] Jeff: And so for that reason, it is far cheaper. you go. Here's a tip for like, like anybody that wants to light stuff at night. There's these very, very, very small led, um, professional lights on Amazon for like, I don't know, 20 bucks a pop and they ha they're dimmable and they're cheap and you can just get a whole bunch of them.
[00:28:39] Jeff: They take AAA batteries and you get them and you put them on their lowest. And they're still probably too bright for like Milky way photography. But if you, um, buy a gel, like a neutral density gel that you would put over a hot light and I will cut little squares out of it and put it over the light, and then you can put however many layers of that you want, and you can continue to knock the light down and get it to whatever level you need to like, say like the interior of a house or whatever else you want to night.
[00:29:14] NorCal: Tips and tricks.
[00:29:15] Jeff: Yeah, I got, I, I w I been known to be a flashlight hoarder slash kleptomaniac. I love, I love screwing around with lighting. It's it's one of them watching light is one of the greatest joys.
[00:29:32] NorCal: I like that. if you could live or move anywhere, where would you live?
[00:29:38] Jeff: Oh, man. That is a tough question. I feel like I'm not qualified to answer because I haven't been everywhere.
[00:29:44] NorCal: Ah,
[00:29:45] Jeff: Um, but right now with the experience that I have, I would have a network of apartments or houses across the world, and I would migrate with the seasons. Uh, I have a very elaborate plan here. It's very expensive to, uh, I would, uh, I would probably have an apartment.
[00:30:05] Jeff: Definitely. Absolutely. In Paris. I adore Paris. Um, I would for sure, still have some place in the desert here, uh, in Joshua tree maybe or wherever else. Um, I would probably want to place in Amsterdam. Um, and then like, I love major cities too. I mean, I love Los Angeles. It's such a crazy place. I don't like being there 24 7 all year.
[00:30:30] Jeff: It's it's too intense sometimes, but I like both the city and the country. I like going back and forth. I like the contrasts.
[00:30:39] NorCal: Right. Appreciate each going to both.
[00:30:43] Jeff: Yeah. I guess I'm a rambling man or some sort of shit like that.
[00:30:49] NorCal: Um, do you have any questions for me?
[00:30:53] Jeff: I mean, yeah. I'm like really curious about your background. I'm curious if you collect art outside of the crypto space, or if that started once, you know, the NFTs came along, um, I'm also like curious about like some of your influences, like who would your favorite director book or band be like these kinds of.
[00:31:15] NorCal: Um, I mean, as far as my background, I mean, yeah, I didn't, I went, I mean, I did go to art school like 20 years ago for like two and a half years. Um, that's some background and as far as collecting, we. My wife and I commissioned like, uh, a friend of ours who was really good artists to do a couple of paintings that we had in our house.
[00:31:38] NorCal: And then we had a couple of photographs that we have purchased, and that was the extent of it because I mean, we live in a small town. Um, I guess, you know, normally you would go to galleries and whatnot. Uh, So we, you know, once we had kids, we're not like traveling a lot. We're not going to these places that have all these art galleries and whatnot.
[00:32:00] NorCal: So yeah, it was a limited collection beforehand.
[00:32:07] Jeff: Right. And so like once kind of crypto and NFT stuff came along, that's when it really blossomed for you as a collector.
[00:32:15] NorCal: Yes, for sure. And now I have. A lot of art in my house,
[00:32:22] Jeff: bet. So have you made like physical prints of NFTs now?
[00:32:26] NorCal: I I've actually never made any prints myself. Uh, I've been sent a ton of prints and, um, I have a lot hanging on the wall and a lot in their box.
[00:32:37] Jeff: Oh, I know. Like, let me ask you about that because I've thought a lot of. Combining a physical print with an NFT. Is that something that, do you get those things more as bonuses or, or is that like something that you like, like, what are you, how do you feel about that?
[00:32:53] NorCal: You know, I like it a lot. I would always like, if I was the creator, I would always offer the like, Hey, if you want a physical, I'll give you a physical.
[00:33:04] Jeff: Um,
[00:33:04] NorCal: Um, I think it's a nice option. Not all create, uh, not all collectors want a physical cause they have, you know, limited space. And so do I, but sometimes I'm like, yeah, I would love a physical that
[00:33:17] Jeff: There's nothing quite like it
[00:33:19] NorCal: yeah.
[00:33:20] Jeff: yeah. It's and plus if it's a time-lapse on my end and I, I print a physical it's because there's some unique part of that individual photograph. That you probably wouldn't be able to catch running along it.
[00:33:35] NorCal: Oh, right, right, right.
[00:33:37] Jeff: Yeah. And so I like, I like having different tiers of dimensions of things, but that's really, that's really amazing.
[00:33:45] Jeff: That's really cool that people are sending you those. Like I thought about, like I bought some of those dead ringers from Dimitri and I, I thought about like, man, I would love to do it giant print of this.
[00:33:56] NorCal: Right. Well, he did make some prints too.
[00:33:59] Jeff: Yeah, there, there, none of them, I saw them and none of them are big enough for me. I'm like this thing needs to be enormous. It should just be fucking insanely huge.
[00:34:09] NorCal: But he said, uh, he said like a message. Get a high res image and then the, make it yourself.
[00:34:14] Jeff: I definitely could. I definitely could. It could be like, you know, wheat pasted on an abandoned house. Go like Shepard Fairey on it, you know?
[00:34:25] NorCal: That'd be like the ultimate dead ringer. Cause you,
[00:34:28] Jeff: Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yup. Dead ringer.
[00:34:34] NorCal: because no one can see it. No one would know where it was or could see it. It's like. Random people driving by, like, why are those? I don't even understand what's on that building there, but it's a dead
[00:34:46] Jeff: There's ways you can. Take down the coordinates and put it into those things. Like there's hikers out there that will search out
[00:34:53] NorCal: Oh yeah,
[00:34:54] Jeff: network of that stuff and they could find it, which would be pretty fun.
[00:34:58] NorCal: Right. Uh,
[00:35:03] Jeff: really cool. So, okay. So what's your, what's your favorite band
[00:35:07] NorCal: oh man. I, you know,
[00:35:09] Jeff: or like top three, maybe.
[00:35:11] NorCal: Oh, man. That's so hard. Like,
[00:35:15] Jeff: I know, right.
[00:35:17] NorCal: uh, cause I like feel like I jump around on my music. Like,
[00:35:21] Jeff: That's all right.
[00:35:23] NorCal: like I have like a Kanye west radio have a nine inch nails, radio,
[00:35:27] Jeff: Ooh, that's one of my favorites.
[00:35:30] NorCal: uh, Queens of the stone age, Mack mill.
[00:35:34] Jeff: one. They're desert people.
[00:35:36] NorCal: So like, it's like, I don't know. I feel like I got this like crazy, very, but you know, I have the, you know, the right time for the Right.
[00:35:47] NorCal: song, I guess, or, you know, sometimes I'm just like listening to like Queens of the stone age for a week or other times I'm like, I'm just going to put on a Kanye west radio for like a couple of weeks.
[00:35:59] Jeff: Yeah. I, I do the same thing. I'm like this week it's Beastie boys. Cause I need a pickup. Or what, or whatever it might be, or, but a lot of times it's like, are you into any of the electronic music, like apex twin, or Autechre any of these like weird things that are like basically collaborating with a.
[00:36:19] NorCal: I know, I, you know, I haven't gotten into any of that. Um, I do like Some of that. old, uh, older EDM type stuff or a techno type. But, uh, or, or a synth wave some, but, uh,
[00:36:35] Jeff: Stuff's really cool.
[00:36:37] NorCal: not, that's not like a regular thing for me. I'm more like some of the rock that I grew up with.
[00:36:43] Jeff: Right? Uh, well, nine inch nails is like one of my absolutely. They like a lot of the stuff that I grew up with, I actually don't listen to anymore, but they're one of them that I still do.
[00:36:55] NorCal: Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, I guess there, Yeah. I guess there are some of those bands from back then that I be like, oh yeah, I forgot about them.
[00:37:03] Jeff: Yeah. Right. Yeah. Well, Reuben posted that new order Republic album on his Instagram stories the other day. And I was like, oh yeah. I wonder if that held up. I listened to that album so many times.
[00:37:19] NorCal: Oh, Yeah, I, you know, it, music is such a, it's a funny thing for me. It's just, cause I'm like all over the place with it. I F I, at least I feel like I am by definitely like those genres of like, kind of a rock type and then kind of a hip hop rap ish.
[00:37:35] Jeff: well, yeah. Well, my beautiful dark twisted fantasy I think is like such a fucking master. That's my favorite Kanye album. Although he's
[00:37:44] NorCal: Oh yeah.
[00:37:44] Jeff: God, that guy is hard to take sometimes, but he used to, I always used to be like, look, just listen to the music and ignore the guy. And, but like he's made himself impossible to,
[00:38:01] Jeff: but I kinda tend to like the older Kanye, well, or maybe middle Kanye. Cause that's my favorite one. But that album is so brilliant.
[00:38:08] NorCal: Yeah. Yeah, no, I mean, yeah. You know, the music it's the music, but Yeah. no, I know what you're saying.
[00:38:18] Jeff: Yeah. I just try not to sweat the, uh, so what the interviews or whatever, just listen to the music.
[00:38:28] NorCal: Um, man. So you have, uh, any, any shout outs yet? Any projects you're working on?
[00:38:35] Jeff: Um, yeah, I've got, I've got plenty of shout outs and projects. Um, I have been working on a environmental benefit with super rare behind the scenes for quite a while now. Um, it's, uh, it's, uh, surrounded about by benefiting the giant Sequoia trees. So all the money from it's going to go to the Sequoia parks Conservancy and, um, I've got an artist lineup that.
[00:39:01] Jeff: Like pretty ridiculous, actually Rubens in there, uh, and, uh, Ayla and Swopes and Ben Strauss and like, it's a great lineup. Um, and I would shoot, I'm forgetting some people I'm sure, but like, um, we're working on, uh, making it into an actual, in real life exhibition in New York as well.
[00:39:21] NorCal: um,
[00:39:21] Jeff: um, it's, it's, I'm super excited about it because when I shot those trees, like burning from the top down.
[00:39:29] Jeff: Uh, there's this one image I captured, uh, when I was shooting for Nat geo last September during the windy fire, uh, Stuart Paley. And I had to change our way both into and out of those Sequoia groves, because there were so many down trees across the road. There were boulders across the road. I mean, we.
[00:39:49] Jeff: Worked our asses off to get in there and out of there. And it was scary as fuck because every time we had to stop and move a tree or cut it in half and pull it aside, uh, you know, we're really worried about those trees falling on us. And, um, it was just really strange because, you know, When they hit the road because they're falling off a very steep hill when they hit the road.
[00:40:11] Jeff: Um, a lot of the, because they're starved, uh, from drought, a lot of the, uh, they, it, they would just shatter like porcelain, And it was strange. So you just saw these like tree fragments everywhere. Um, a lot of branches, but like the main trunks wouldn't shatter like that, but, uh, lots and lots of huge thick branches.
[00:40:33] Jeff: And so we got all the way in there after a week of being denied access. Um, and we shot the giant Sequoia trees and, um, I dunno, man, there's just something like, I, like, I'm not religious in the slightest. Uh, When I stand in front of those ancient trees like that, that's about as close as I come to religious experience, or even like, you know, besides my own little self invented rituals.
[00:41:01] Jeff: And, um, I stood literally in the burned out cavern heart of one of those giant sequoias, which was 30 feet tall, the cavern, the burn, the burn area.
[00:41:13] NorCal: Oh, shoot.
[00:41:14] Jeff: And it just like it broke my heart and those trees have, you know, we've lost about 20% of the population of those trees in the last two years to wildfires and.
[00:41:27] Jeff: I just want to like shovel as much money as I can towards that, that Conservancy. And so the goal of the benefit is like ridiculously high. I have no reason to believe we can actually accomplish it, but you know, I've seen stuff like this happen. So maybe, uh, but like the goal of it is to like, you know, hand a million dollars to the Sequoia parks Conservancy and.
[00:41:49] Jeff: Um, so I wrote up a proposal and I, and I took it to super rare and the Poloma helped expand it. And David Feinstein helped expand it. And then it became bigger and bigger to where it wasn't just me, but it's like, Onboard these artists and, um, you know, we got some really cool people and another one is Mona Kuhn, who did that bushes and succulents drop, um,
[00:42:12] NorCal: Okay.
[00:42:13] Jeff: quantum.
[00:42:14] Jeff: And she also curates those billboards for Obscura. So like, I mean, we just have like a killer lineup and, um, yeah, I really have been working hard on that. And then I working like nonstop on all kinds of things. Individual projects like this, painting, this painting is kind of a detour actually, but, um, I have at least five projects going at any given time.
[00:42:37] Jeff: So I have to say like, you know, you collecting a piece for me and these other collectors. I've got like ArtPleb and Punk6529, Chikai, and Freddy and Pixel Pete. And you know, like they like being able to sell this work. Really supercharged my motivation to do these new experiments and projects, because it's, as much as I would like to think things are like, self-contained when you work your ass off and the world kind of is like shrugs or like, you know, you're barely just scraping by.
[00:43:13] Jeff: really discouraging. And so being able to be encouraged in this way and, and know that like the work is appreciated is incredibly profound. It's a lot more than just a bank account thing. It's, it's a, I can keep making art thing.
[00:43:30] NorCal: Yeah. Yeah. Keep on, keep on doing the hobby, but it's not a hobby anymore.
[00:43:37] Jeff: Yeah. Sometimes you kind of almost wish it was because, you know,
[00:43:41] NorCal: A
[00:43:42] Jeff: up in it and you're like, is this still fun? And so I find that like, as I go along, I have continually have to very intentionally find my way back to the joy of creating things. And that's really, uh, uh, an intense thing. But it's so incredibly important because your artwork itself will suffer.
[00:44:04] Jeff: If you're just making art to make money, then it's, then it really is just a job.
[00:44:09] NorCal: that's true.
[00:44:12] Jeff: and then, you know, I just have like, Pretty grateful to my grandfather, Alfred. We called him grandpa Alf, grandpa Alfa. And I would go off on adventures when I was very young. And you know, this religious town I grew up in my family was this religion. You know, he was, everybody was, but he never said a word about any of it to me, even when I quit.
[00:44:36] Jeff: And, um, he. Would we would go, we would do just the most insane things. Like we, we would even go camping on literally the actual peak of a mountain. Like I grew up at the base of a mountain it's called blue mountain and it's 13,000 feet high. We went up there once and we camped at the peak and it was a rain storm with lightning and, and it was like kind of miserable, but it was also unbelievably epic.
[00:45:03] Jeff: And then on the way home. He just floors it on his little red S 10 pickup. And he's like catching air from all, all four tires on this little mountain road going back home. And, you know, so he, you know, he, he was kind of a crazy. Crazy motherfucker, my grandpa Alf. And, uh, and he would just, he was so mischievous and funny.
[00:45:25] Jeff: Like we would have these like 4th of July parades and he would hand out candy to all the grandkids before the parade. And he would tell them. That we had to throw candy at the floats instead of the other way. And he just like, infused me with this, a sense of wonder and adventure. And he was just such a positive, amazing person.
[00:45:47] Jeff: And like, we were constantly like going down the Colorado river on his raft and like, just so yeah, he's like, uh, such a formative person. Uh, and to me that, yeah, that's, that's who I would want to give my final shout out to is, is my grandpa.
[00:46:02] NorCal: Oh, man, that's a solid shout out. I love
[00:46:06] Jeff: I lucked out with, with my L out of my family, even though we disagree about a lot of stuff. Like my parents too, are incredible people and I lucked out.
[00:46:14] NorCal: Right. That's awesome. Thank you. so much for this podcast. It was awesome. Interview.
[00:46:22] Jeff: Thank you. I really appreciate it.
[00:46:25] NorCal: All right. well, we'll talk soon.
[00:46:26] Jeff: All right. Take care.
[00:46:28] NorCal: Bye.
[00:46:29]