In this Green Home Remedies video, I tried to introduce some of the basic principles of Traditional Chinese Medicine with some good old fashioned common sense.

One of the reasons that people suffer from sickness for so long is that they refuse to acknowledge the sickness. This is admirable, but it can also prolong sickness and expose everyone around you. When people simply lay down and rest, their bodies can divert resources to fighting the pathogen and healing completely.

I also wanted to introduce people to the concept of taking herbs that balance your system. If you're hot, feed yourself something cooling (mint). If you're cold, feed yourself something that will warm you up (ginger). Too often people are set in their eating habits and don't include variety, even when their body is out of balance. Examples would be a raw food enthusiast who's always cold or a sweaty guy who's always dousing his food in hot sauce.

I've tossed around this idea in my head for a while - writing a reference book about green home remedies - but haven't been motivated enough to fix my butt in the chair and outline, research and write the book without a contract. So I decided to put my video production skills to use and start producing instructional videos on various green home remedies. The actual construction of these videos is fun for me, plus I'm learning a lot about the Sony Vegas editing system, and after about 20 videos I might even have some editing chops. :)

So what makes a green home remedy? For me, it's a remedy that is natural, good for the body and puts minimal stress on the earth. Many people call these types of remedies "kitchen medicine." As a licensed acupuncturist, I have a deep knowledge of Chinese herbs and herbal formulas, but herbs that are shipped on a barge or pane from China couldn't be considered green.

By the same token, if a certain vitamin would be beneficial for a patient, I'm going to recommend a food rich in that vitamin instead of a pill that's chemically extracted and processed in a factory.

I chose to open up with hangover video not because I'm a sloppy drunk, but because it was a clear and straightforward script. Plus, this video is targeted at the general public, not just folks who are maximizing their healthy lifestyle. I want to show average folks that it's cheap and easy to treat yourself well.

I've known Heidi Van Horne for years and have witnessed first-hand her prowess at acting, assistant directing, directing and producing; but until this non-fiction shoot I had never been on set to see her work as a model. As predicted, she was a total pro - involved in every level of image creation on a shoot that went so smoothly by the time you realized you were working, everything was in the can.

The shoot was an adventure for me. When I first arrived at Martinez Custom Upholstery, I wa a little intimidated by the chain link fence, tough guys and boxer dogs, but Dave Martinez, owner and artist-in-residence, put me at ease right away and the pups - Cassie and Cisco - became fast friends. While taking a tour of the shop, Dave M showed me a piece of metal that looked so old it could be some sort of abstract sculpture. "That's a Model A," he said. "It should be finished in about three months." After seeing the work he did on the Atomic Punk, I'm certain that it will look brand-new, straight off the line.

The photgrapher was Dave DeLuxe (a.k.a. Dave Wiltgen). Dave is the strong, silent Steve McQueen type of guy - when he's not making art on his own terms, he's driving something way too fast or drinking something that would put hair on even my chest. Don't let that rough exterior fool you - he's also the kind of guy that stays cool as a cucumber with a camera crew crawling all over his set and donates art to charity auctions.

Dave and Heidi came up with two seperate photoshoots. The first was a simple girl-meets-car set-up with Heidi posing with the Atomic Punk. The second shoot (video for this segment coming soon!) was for Heidi's upcoming "To Lowbrow with Love" calendar, featuring images inspired by different lowbrow artists. The second shoot was inspired by artist Sara Ray, and was a spot-on 1950s bad girl noir look, complete with switchblade.

My biggest regret of the shoot is that the audio of the interviews with hair and make-up artist Rebecca Schillinger ended up being so crappy as to be unusable. Suffice to say, this lady is smart and so well-spoken about art and culture one might assume she has a Ph.D. Every decision about color, shape and style that she made had a reason and a reference. 

This shoot would not have been possible without my partner in crime, Jonathan Taylor, production superstar. Respect to Botto. :)

 This music video is for another track from the 2009 Karl records release of Lapis Luzuli from Prince Charming. I love the hypnotic, calming quality of this track.

All of this footage was shot in NYC and upstate Vermont in the summer of 2001. I had been working with a producer in NYC on a documentary about alcoholics, and the experience turned from being a frustrating perversion of what I wanted to capture (Frat guy producer shoving drinks down a friend's throat) to a power-play wedge-out (he found these German financers and pitched the product without me attached.). For me, I guess you could say it was Business 101.

Anyhoo, frustrated by that experience I set out to find what I loved about filmmaking by myself. I wrote a bizarre script that no sane producer would ever fund and I shot it myself using friends as actors (some are pros using "porn names"), my video camera and a tripod.

It's amazing what a person can do with a handheld. People think you're a tourist, you're free to do whatever you want. No one looked twice at us in Times Square or the MOMA sculpture garden in Astoria, Queens. The truly bomb location, though, was the Fairlee Drive-in and Hotel in Fairlee, Vermont. 

Time permitting, I will cut a new and improved version of the short film, Prince of Mercy, that this footage is taken from. It's a piece about language, paranoia and communication. Dr. Eric Reymond, the lead, translated his voice-overs into Ancient Syriac. He spoke English in the dialogue scenes, but all the other characters spoke to him in different languages with dubbed English. Sounds complicated, but it created an interesting audio/visual expression of mental illness.

This video was so much fun to make. We shot the whole thing in one yard in Silver Lake (a neighborhood in Los Angeles for all you non-Angelinos). It was thick with cool vegetation and sculptures, as you'll see in the video.

The track is a blend of dub, 60s psychadelia and 1920s New Orleans jazz, so I decided to create a silent film look for the piece. This allowed me to also do a tongue-and-cheek treatment of the artist's name - Prince Charming. On the surface, the piece might seem to have an antiquated gender theme - The Damsel in Distress saved by Prince Charming - but the intention was to show that it's a thing of the past with the vintage look and old film treatment.

The shoot was easy and fun - it always is when you're working with great people! Heidi was a dream to work with, as always. She asked what I wanted as far as costumes, and all I had to say was "Old-timey. Something between the 20s and the 40s." Every time she did a costume change, she nailed it completely. Seb wore his Day of the Dead costume - a Mexican rancher ala Charleton Heston in Touch of Evil. Even though she's not a pro, Sarita brought a pretty face and a fierce attitude and rocker the role of the Fortune Teller. Zak T kept people laughing all day long. :)