This blog is moving!
Update your bookmarks and RSS feeds and all that jazz!
The new address for this blog is: Overdirected.com
I’ve already copied all the content from this location over there, and from now on, only Overdirected.com will be updated with new posts and videos and photos. The original blog here will remain up for awhile, but ultimately be replaced with a one-page notice that the blog has moved.
Hey – it’s been awhile, and I’ve been busy living my life and trying to become the super awesome hairstylist I’ve always wanted to be.
I think I should either close this blog down and turn it into an archive, or some sort of condensed tome of beauty school experience… Or keep the blog going and talk about the hair industry some more.
But I don’t know what I should do, and I need you to help me decide! Does anyone still read this blog? Leave a comment on this and tell me what you think I should do. It’s much appreciated.
I’m a bit late posting these… But I took some pics at Hair-A-Palooza in Edmonton. My boss, and a girl I went to school with were competing. Here’s a whole ton of pics!
Click me to get the full effect!
Ok, maybe makeup madness would be a more accurate title. Some sort of madness. This is a super duper, mega-long post that details the entire process from start to finished pictures. Click to read the whole thing (with tons of behind the scenes pictures!)
Hey, internet savvy hairdresser types. Sorry it’s been so quite lately… Life, you know how it is. I’m moving, most of my energy goes into work, had a number of side projects eating up my free time – Been recording the audiobook version of a friend and salon owner’s ebook, I tried making my own scissor pouch (Out of leather I cut out of an old trashed leather sofa I saw in a junkyard!), bought a ukulele… all sorts of distractions.
But I wanted to give my official bump to an online shear/accessory store I’ve dealt with a few times now. Precision Shears. Check it out if you’re in the market for shears. I really don’t know what to write about the store, I tried thinking of stuff but it sounded like the stupid customer testimonials you see on other websites. Plain and simple, every time I’ve dealt with Guy at Precision Shears I’ve been impressed, he really stands behind his store and the service he provides. And they always have the best prices on the things I want, which helps too.
And for the record, I’m definitely not being paid or bribed to promote them, I’m giving them my seal of approval because they really did impress me, and whenever anyone asks me where they should order shears from, I always recommend Precision Shears.
How good are they? Well, I ordered my Kasho shears from them, in the States… When I live in the same city as the official Kasho importer for North America, because they have a better deal than I can get locally.
Anyways, there’s the second of my only two business endorsements. (The other being Hair Maven’s instructional DVD’s)
Hikari (the super badass shear company) uploaded a 43 minute dry cutting video on YouTube just scant moments ago. It’s always worth watching their videos, there are tons of little things you can get out of it. (Even if the subtitles are almost comically obscured by the Hikari website address…)
Click for Biggerness
Just need a bit of fixing up. You know, a little oil here and there…
I got them for a couple bucks at an antique show, along with some nifty old school shaving gear.
And there was this NIFTY old barbershop chair there, but at $5000, it was a bit out of my budget:
Click for Bigger
Here comes a review!
I got the Hairmaven Modern/Classic and Mens Werk dvds a litte bit ago, and I’ve been meaning to do a write up for awhile now. They’re great.
I’ve seen a lot of dvds (Sassoon ABC’s, several Sassoon collections, Tigi, Rusk, Toni & Guy, Aveda, Pivot Point) and Hairmaven’s stand out from the rest in how much useful knowledge I came away with. It’s easy to dismiss hair cutting dvd’s, because after you’ve seen a few, you’ve usually seen them all – most dvd’s are just walkthroughs of a few haircuts, and the ones that try to teach you something just don’t do a very good job of it. None of the “cutting system” type DVD’s I’ve watched have thrilled me.
But Hairmaven’s are an exception to the boring DVD rule! Watching his DVD’s, it’s almost as if he filmed a regular haircutting DVD (step by step taking you through various haircuts), and then decided to record a commentary that adds another ton of awesome info to the DVD. It’s not just some monotone, apathetic young british voice over girl describing the sections and partings he’s taking – it’s Russel describing what he’s doing, why he’s doing it, things that happened in the past when he tried different methods, anecdotes, and all sorts of good tidbits.
I’m giving the Hairmaven DVD’s my unsolicited endorsement. 2 thumbs up! Check Hairmaven.com and click on the link at the top that says Store (Just, you know, in case you couldn’t figure that out) to browse. I really particularly recommend the Modern/Classic DVD if you can get it.
This is a reply of mine to a thread over on Hairbrained.
Most just have one or two of those qualities (a great hairdresser but being unprofessional crosses you off the list, being professional but a crappy hairdresser crosses you off the list, etc…)
You have to plan it, find models, or take the time to write something, either find a website up to your standards to publish on, or make your own – and that is like having a part time job. And the people who pass point #1 will get stuck here because of point #2.
In one of the seminars I attended at NAHA last year, the speaker asked the crowd (of about 300) how many people knew about a bunch of popular hair websites (including hairbrained) – myself and 2 others raised their hand. That’s it.
There aren’t any good trade publications because hairdressers keep supporting heavily endorsed magazines, or magazines published by salon supply companies.
They have this mentality that if they break a sweat doing anything, boy they better get big bucks for it! If it takes actual effort to make something, they ain’t just giving it away – but they will give away vacuous crap dressed up as good material. Look at any other trade. Any one, and you’ll see websites and forums where the level of information being passed back and forth is at a much higher level than in our trade – and in those other trades, it’s done seemingly for the love of the trade.
The way a photographer lit that shot that he took for a magazine cover is an integral part of his ability to make money – but he’ll draw a diagram and explain in detail how he conceived and executed the shot, and share that information with other photographers freely. And that behavior results in a higher level of conversation within the trade, and elevates the skill of the trade as a whole.
When’s the last time you saw something really well put together, really useful, that you didn’t already know, that improved your skill as a hairstylist, given away for free?
Now ask yourself this: When’s the last time you saw something kind of ramshackle and poorly put together, moderately-to-not-very useful, that you did already know, that didn’t effect your skill as a hairstylist, given away for free? Or that you actually had to pay for?
That’s just about every hair related video I have ever seen on the internet, anywhere. In fact, Josh Flowers, DJ Muldoon are the only ones I can say have given away real content for love of the craft.
We’re outsiders – all the publications that are supposed to be “inside” the industry treat us like marks. There is no difference between how companies and publications treat Joe Schmoe on the street, and Joe the Hairstylist. They’re just selling their wares, but at least they’re honest about it when they’re selling to the hair muggles – when they’re selling to people within the industry, it’s more like a con game. They con hairdressers be telling them that they’re getting special information, treatment, recognition, etc.
And hairdressers eat it up for some reason. We aren’t going to get good magazines or websites until we stop feeding the ones that are just cleverly disguised merchandise catalogs.
I think this is the final nail in the coffin. Do you know how many people I’ve met that have ever bothered to look up anything hair related? (on the net, in a magazine, in a library, anything at all)
I can count the number on one hand. I’ve yet to meet a single stylist who has ever participated in the culture of hairstyling – by that I mean been active on a website like this one, read anything hair related, watched a dvd, read a book, or hell, even googled for hair stylist stuff. What does that say?
And it’s not because they don’t know it’s out there. On the contrary, anyone who’s met me most definitely knows it’s out there. They just don’t care. They’re satisfied with only being exposed to the limited range of things they see daily in their own salon, and maybe once a year doing a class taught by someone who’s from the same city they are in.
It’s a sad state of affairs.
Last night I witnessed a bona-fied event in the new world of hairdressing – DJ Muldoon, with two other stylists, doing a live class/demo/presentation and streaming it over the internet, Josh XO style!
I found it from a link a friend posted on Facebook, they found it from a link their friend posted on Facebook, and so on. I started watching immediately, told all my friends, and within 30 minutes everyone was watching – and 30 minutes after that Hairbrained.me had found out about it and put it on their front page.
Now that is some real social networking at play. It was very cool, and really made me feel like I’ve come to this industry at the perfect time. It’s all shifting, adjusting, and redefining – and it’s fun to be involved while it’s reconfiguring itself to what the industry will be in the future!
But all my blabbing aside, go here and click on archived videos to watch what they were broadcasting live last night.
DJ said at the end that they’re doing another class on the 27′th – hopefully it will be broadcast too!
