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This is the recording of our October 20th CAVEMODE meeting.

Saturday I traded in the trusty F-150 for a 1998 Suburban. We needed a larger family car and found this vehicle. More details to come.

The Carolina Hot Rod, originally uploaded by doltman7.

I would like to take a moment to salute the amazing Carolina Hot Rod. It is a 1990 Geo Prism, which is basically the same car as a Toyota Corolla but with GM branding. I like to say that they accidently made this car reliable. The Geo brand is not a premium brand and I’m sure the auto makers would prefer it die 10 years ago so I will buy a new car. The odometer stopped working in 2002 at 146,000 miles. Since then, I have no idea how far I’ve driven it or how fast I’m going. This car belonged to my wife before we were married and I inherited it when she got a VW Passat. At the time, we thought the car “was on its last legs”. My good friend Joe Barach took it and fixed a simple problem with an oil gasket. Since then it has had very minimal maintenance. Now, mind you, it drives like a shopping cart and many things aren’t working so well.

Here’s a list of it’s problems:

• The paint is so oxidized, it is now a pink car. (Pink is punk right?)
• The ceiling fabric is held up with about 100 straight pins.
• 3 out of four door handles aren’t working well or completely broken.
• The radio only picks up 1110AM. I prefer that station so that’s not a huge issue.
• The suspension has been in dire need of replacement since circa 2004. So speed bumps and hard corners are a big deal.
• Don’t ever roll down the passenger window.
• The windshield washer reservoir is broken so there is no hope for a clean windshield.
• No odometer or speedometer. I’ve learned to estimate speed very well.

Now onto the positive points:

• It still runs, shaking it’s fist in glory over all the fancy newer cars that are hard to maintain. (I’m looking at you Volkswagen!)
• I have a sweet airbrushed license plate from Myrtle Beach.
• The AC still runs.
• It gets good gas mileage for my commute to work.

Lessons Learned
This car has taught me the importance of finding a vehicle that needs as little repairs as possible. People spend so much money on vehicles and worry about such silly things like the brand and color. My car transports me to work just as well as the $50,000 car next to me but I doubt I would ever spend half that buying, running, and repairing this car in its entire lifetime. Find a car and run it into the ground, not until you get tired of it. Not until it seems like it’s done, but actually when it leaves it’s guts on the highway. If a car runs and needs $300-400 worth of work, it might be worth fixing. Some people pay $400 a month on their car payments.

I live with the understanding that my car could break down at any moment. I have AAA to help with a tow but I’ve never used it on this car. When it does decide to leave this world. I’ll find another really cheap car to carry the torch. Happy Driving!

Here’s a photo of the family in the back of my brother in law’s truck. We were driving around a cow pasture looking at cows. Gideon was growling at them. It was pretty cute.

We attended the kickoff 6pm service for the new Matthews campus of Elevation Church. It was really great. We got there over 30min early and the parking lot was almost full. Everyone was really excited. The band played some great worship songs and Pastor gave an inspriring and convicting message from Daniel 3. They had to set up 3 overflow rooms and turn away 100 cars due to the lack of spots to put the cars and people. The new auditorium seats 900 and I wonder if around 1500 or 1600 people tried to come. There will be 4 more services at that location tomorrow and a total of 11 worship times across all three campuses of Elevation Church. God has really blessed this church body.

I got a chance to do some more VFX Supervision this week. The shoot was outside in the direct sun so it was hot and sticky. I rented a Sigma 4.5mm fisheye lens to take HDR panographic images with. The lens is cool. I’m still learning how to get them properly stitched together. The spot will be fun and challenging to complete. I will post something when it’s finished.

Me, delivering the announcements (photo by Brooke Glaze)

We put on our second CAVEMODE(Charlotte Animation Visual Effects + Motion Design) meeting last night. The room was packed again and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. Thom Blackburn gave an interesting talk on using the Red Camera in a low budget commercial. Brian Pace delivered a presentation on Organizing Your Workflow that sparked some good discussion on how to manage and streamline projects. I am very excited to see CAVEMODE taking off and I look forward to seeing it mature and grow. Charlotte has needed a community like this for a long time.

God Bless the USA!