Digital Field Notes
Updated: Jul 20
I used to keep a sketchbook every day. Not for anyone, not for a portfolio — just somewhere to dump whatever was in my head before it got lost. I miss that. This is me bringing it back, in a different format. I still have years worth of old sketchbooks, old "blackbooks" when I really thought of myself as a writer, not the Hemingway writer mind you. I stopped for ages, partly letting life and all of its weaving intricacies get in the way as we tend to do. Partly and not fully to blame but allowing digital devices to steal away any of those actions I had, instead being comfortable and satiated merely using a thumb on a glass like screen endlessly swiping or scrolling or tapping.
It wasn't until we took a trip out to Palm Springs and the desert a few years ago where the spark landed in my hands. We were getting a coffee, at cafe la jefa in palm springs, excellent woman (immgirant as well) run shop. Great coffee, vibe and design, a place you want to drive to just to hang out at. In the building area a few little shops were scattered about, a great idea next to a coffee shop where you can get a drink and snack and then all of a sudden find yourself wandering in seas of trinkets, aesthetic goods, art, homewares you name it. And I saw it, a olive journal with a cactus on it. Simple, pretty, I wanted it but really hadn't picked up a journal or sketch book in years who was I kidding. Instead we got the kids some stickers, including a very cool insert coin here and random prize exits here type gimmick, the ones we loved as kids, the ones I used to sprint to at the end of grocery store trip. We left for our Airbnb and our first hike in the desert. I was content, great coffee, kids were stoked about the surprise stickers, and we were back in a place I had long found a magic to, the desert. I left the journal behind, not like I'd use it either way.
Months later, back at home, in LA, real life is back on repeat, kids, work, chores, etc. Sprinkle in a few days and moments of adventure where you can but really operating as well as you can to keep the family and life rhythm afloat and moving. My birthday comes, wife and kids make a great deal out of it in the morning, I pretend to be nonchalant funny dad about it but inside my heart swells. We get older and lose our sense of birthday importance, we shrug it off, just another day we tell ourselves. But in that moment seeing the joy of people wanting to celebrate you I felt that importance, and then my wife, the sly devil she is pulls out the cactus journal.
Simple, olive green, gold cactus stamp in the middle, one simple journal, one simple gift, that ended up carrying more meaning than she probably could even guess on that morning.
And here we are today, maybe 6 journals completed, fistfuls of field notes mini journals either done or all in various states of chaoticly being filled. A new sketchbook, dedicated to art (admittedly that one has been a bit harder for me to find my groove). Therapy? probably, creativity? most definitely. Organization? much better than before, the absolute winning feeling of writing down a list and checking them off physically is a throwback I didn't think I would need in my life but more than glad its here again. Life changing, yes, or more precise, brining me back to a place I used to be, opening space in my head and filling it with more signal and less noise. Which now brings me to the website. Along the way of thinking how I would go ahead and update my portfolio, be a profesional working adult etc, I thought can I exercise more on this than just a random website page of photos? In my digital career i've been through the ranks of live journal, tumblr blogs ( I think at one point I had three), blogspot on my old sites, I had it all. There was enjoyment in sharing at the time, and creativity to what people were posting and doing. Not to say its not there now, but I think and personal opinion of the author its harder to find in the torrential storms of social media, and often times tainted by what is supposed to be posted due to "insert algorithm, trend, challenge etc here". So I'm going old school, or at least internet old school and re opening the blog.
Call it a digital field notes dump. Thoughts, scribbles, behind-the-scenes, whatever doesn't fit anywhere else on the site.
Everyone's optimized for quick right now. Quick posts, quick reactions, quick everything. There's something that feels good about going the other way — sitting down and actually writing a paragraph instead of a caption.
So stick around for the process, not just the finished frame. The shoots that worked and the ones that didn't. The days I wondered why I'm doing any of this. The wins too, when they show up. All of it, as the site keeps growing. And you know what, apologies for the errors, the run ons, the grammar and the mistakes. But really, stick around for it all, that's the fun and the growth. That's how we all start to pursue something greater and end up in places we didn't know were there for us, I'm excited for the journey.
-P
Some of the new ones one box of maybe three old sketch and black books The simple one that started it all
PS. For the time being I'm gonna treat this as I treat my photo editing, simple quick passes, and not much sticking around for perfection. So you can treat it like that piece of apparel you buy that has the disclaimer, each one is a little different due to the process of being made, imperfections are
expected ;)
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