GR: that's rad, i can't wait to see it!! i still haven't seen mod fuck explosion yet! jon: that's coming out on video really soon! i'll let you know when it comes out. GR: when i was in some chat room recently on the internet called, "indie filmmakers," someone brought up gregg araki and i mentioned you and someone knew about mod fuck...then someone said that gregg and you are the same thing, making the same kind of movies...but what do you think about this? do you feel that people clump you 2 together just because you guys are asian? jon: yeh, that actually happens a lot...i get compared to him a lot and i think it's because of the asian thing...which is pretty weird, because it's like saying all black people make the same kind of music. it's pretty racist, i think...and we actually make our films at this point very differently..we're doing different things. he's much more bigger, closer to hollywood type of filmmaking than me...i'm doing like a very underground kinda style. GR: you work with 16mm? jon: yeh, 16.

GR: is there a reason you choose to? jon: i've been shooting on 16 because it's a lot cheaper than 35mm and 1/4 of the cost but it still looks good enough...the negative is big enough so that it can look good...and the equipment is really portable so you can have the camera and some person holding it and using it...whereas in 35mm, everything is so heavy and cumbersome and when yr using a bigger format like 35, it gets in the way of being spontaneous because the camera is just so big and you need a certain amount of people to run it because it's so complicated...when yr making a movie, if the equipment is slowing you down, it's hard to make any quick changes...like, let's set up the camera here instead of there! with a bigger camera, it'll take like 3 hours but with a small one, you can do it in 10 minutes. GR: what kind of 16mm camera do you use? jon: at this point, whatever i can get my hands on...i own a bolex but for fame whore, we used this really run down camera that was sitting in this garage covered in dust for about 2 years...i don't know, it just sorta gets down to my philosophy that it doesn't really matter what type of equipment you use...it's more like, yr attitude...it's like, do what you can do with what you have. GR: have you worked with super8 or video? jon: i did some super8 stuff in high school but it was pretty hard to work with because it's so small. the editing is hard and the sound quality is pretty low...so those are the 2 drawbacks i found...and i guess at this point, all of the super8 labs are closing down and kodak eliminated like half of their film stock.

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