Rice.

This is Rebecca. The other half of A College Project. Those of you who know me know her and those of you that don't, here she is. When I'm not making her sit around and look cute, she works as a graphic designer, web developer, graphic artist for an ad agency in Maryland. Fresh out of school and making bank her first year. I'm talkin' buku money! Anyways, we're celebrating her birthday this weekend so you can see me riding bitch on her Ducati. Peace.

Huzzah!

On the past NY trip we hung out with Exquire. Nicest dude you'll ever meet who raps about anal.

For the past year or so the west coast has clenched its five fingers into a very tight grasp on hip-hop music. There seems to be something for every party: blunt-enlightening social righteousness on the couch, ass rape swag speeches from the skateboard soapboxes of Fairfax, and wherever stream of consciousness verses are rapped and repeated. But emerging out the wood work, for rap geography’s sake, is a new class of New York hip-hop including the likes of ASAP Rocky, Action Bronson, Matthew Ragazino, and twenty-six year old Crown Heights native Mr. Muthafuckin’ Exquire.

Nathan Mills Guitar.

Be sure to check out my good friend Nathan Mills' new website. He recently moved out of my luxurious mansion and got himself a full graduate assistantship at East Carolina University where he's going to get his masters in playing the guitar or something. Anyways he's got a new website up, designed by the very own Rebecca Rice of ACP, so check it out if you have kids that want to learn how to play some guitar or like neutral colors.

Jonathan Mannion.

It was a surreal moment cramming into that little elevator with five other grown men. The awkward ride up gave me time to reflect and come to terms that in a few seconds, if this thing doesn’t break and kill us all, I’m going to meet the dude of hip hop photography. Doors open and we step into Jonathan Mannion’s studio in Manhattan.

His passion for his craft and hunger and drive to achieve the next step in any goal makes him a quintessential artist. New York City is known for talent but also to chew up fakes and lames. It’s always good to see a hard working individual rise up and take what’s his.

After the interview and the stories, I quietly walked up to him with my little camera strapped around my shoulder and from one photographer to another, we shook hands. No words exchanged, none needed. With that said here’s the last video of the Mannion series, as well as the last video from that New York trip.

Part II and III after the break.

Let It Grow: Mel D. Cole.

If you're familiar with the NY nightlife scene I'm sure you've run into this guy one time or another. We met up with photographer Mel D. Cole of Village Slum to give you this segment of the Let It Grow series.

Edited by Forrest Pando.

Let It Grow: Rob Stone.

We sat down with the man in charge of Cornerstone and The Fader magazine to talk about success and my 401k.

Let It Grow: Dru Ha.

Gensler.

Here's the write up from Neil and the SHHO on our visit to David Gensler and the KDU's office in Brooklyn. Click here for more.

Great Britain.

First off, I would just like to apologize for my horrible semi-pun titles that I have made and will continue to do. Now that we have all recognized that. This is Britt Sebastien's studio. I feel like I'm probably one of the last people in Richmond that know Britt to blog about him, but honestly I only met him the other day. Britt is days away from being a graduate of VCU and is already running a successful screen printing shop, but what most people know him for is his Hollywood Cemetery clothing line.

Gensler Says.

Koyunbaba!

Here's the proof that I have some classy friends. At least some trained in classical guitar. This is Nathan Mills rocking out to Koyunbaba by some fancy old guitar dude.

Trinhity.

This is Kevin. See what I did with the title there? Anyways, if I had to bet money on who would become the fastest self-made millionaire out of VCU in this decade, I'd choose him. Just imagine The Social Network minus all of the dramatizations and replace facebook with something more productive towards advancing human society. Kevin helps run ConcernTrak, an online application that allows clients to track and monitor the performance of a wide variety of products. So in case a company needs to recall all the shipments of their cyanide ridden baby food, they can do that with only a few number of causalities. Useful huh? Did I mention he's the one that built theshho.com?

But in the meantime, him and I alike are just two Asian dudes too smart for school yet too ashamed to drop out. What a dilemma.

Shaolin vs Wu-Tang: Final Round

Shaolin vs Wu-Tang: Round 2

Shaolin vs Wu-Tang: Round 1

Raekwon Visits.

Nothing brings together professional filmmakers, hip hop heads, those dirty, filthy Richmond kids (just kidding), and me better then Raekwon the Chef. Being a hip hop loving, filmmaker that skips the occasional shower, I asked my friend/boss Lucas over at The Branching if we could possibly have Rae show up in his currently constructed studio for a short shoot, he gladly answered yes, gave me some lights and opened the doors for me and all of my hoodlum friends.

So I gathered a couple of my good friends to help out with the lavalier mics and to yell out "Quiet on the set for first rehearsal!", and in no time, we were looking like a nice little rag tag film crew. 

Keep checking back for everything we shot and peep more pics after the jump.

Rae Says.

Rotting Soil.

My friend Ben Hethcoat has been working recently on a film project called Gary's Garden. It's a black comedy of sorts that has a pretty good independent production behind it. Ben is one of the producers, the writer and plays Brady, a member of the Latter Day Saints, currently searching for his dead friend. Did I spoil it for you? Well its a series so there'll be plenty of more opportunities for more of that. You can check out more of it on the website Rotting Soil.

In the meantime, watch the trailer after the jump.

Tone Says.

Tone.

Last but not least on the NY to do list was to meet up with photographer Tone. So we hopped on the PATH train and headed over to Jersey to be humbled one last time before we headed back to Fist City. We had a conversation about the usual. Aspirations, recent events, basically we spoke to a friend that we hadn't seen in years when in reality we caught up with someone who we never met before.