Action

10 03 2017

 

 

Lately, I’ve been feeling like I don’t play enough with my photography. My style of shooting has predominantly been influenced by the jobs I’ve been shooting which usually entails multiple angles and a daunting shot list. It’s meant that using flash at events would slow me down and I wouldn’t meet my requirements.

 

In February the opportunity to experiment with flashes presented itself so I jumped at it. DARK FEST, Sam Reynolds’ contribution to the FEST Series calender, saw eight of the best MTB Freeriders in the world gather at the Garden Route Trail Park where Sam Reynolds and co had built some of the biggest jumps in the world. Imagine rolling in from a 70ft tower and hitting a jump at around 80km/h and you have an idea of how these guys are pushing the limits.

 

I really need to take this opportunity to thank Pieter Badenhorst of Photo Hire. He gave me the warmest and most encouraging welcome when I arrived in Cape Town and has gone out of his way to let me experiment with the Broncolor lights he distributes. The original plan was to shoot with two Broncolor Siros 800w lights however they weren’t available on the day, so instead he let me take the Broncolor Move 1200w pack with Air Sync so I could shoot at faster speeds. I’m usually a two lights kind of guy so it was refreshing figuring out how best to use one head. I’m still trying to get my head around the Hi-Sync physics but after a while I started to figure what works and what doesn’t.

Below is the result. Not my finest work but a great lesson and experience. Shout out to Ryan Franklin and the rest of the crew for putting on such a great event.

 

 

 

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Red Bull X-Fighters returned to the Union Buildings this past weekend for the fourth stop on the 2015 World Tour. I arrived a few days early, met the course builders and shot portraits of the international sculptors. The rest of the images are pretty much an assortment of action from the weekend. Congratulations to Tom Pagés of France for putting together flawless runs all day and making himself untouchable. Check out these links for all the real info written by those in the know – I’m just about the eye candy 😉

http://www.redbullxfighters.com/en_ZA
www.redbull.co.za
http://www.redbull.com/za/en/motorsports/offroad/stories/1331746842726/red-bull-x-fighters-south-africa-2015-track-build

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Life

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Taka Higashino (JAP)

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Crowd

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XF_ZA_PAGE_TB_0246 Tom Pages (FRA)  XF_ZA_PAGE_TB_0248   Maikel Melero (ESP) 

Tom Pages (FRA)

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A few weeks back the awesome folks at Sunshine Company (The distributors and rental agents for Hasselblad, ProFoto, Sirui and Black Rapid) offered me the chance to shoot some skateboarding with all of this:

Hasselblad and ProFoto gear for Cape Town secret bowl skateboarding session

So I gathered up these scoundrels: (FLTR: Justus Kotze, Wong, Ryder Nel, Yann Horowitz and Chris Cab)

Justus Kotze, Chris Cab, Yann Horowitz, Ryder Nel, Jimmy Watts

And took them to this secret bowl…

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Now comes the part where I share the images even though I’m not entirely happy with them. I mean, I really feel we got great shots but I really wanted this shoot to produce some of my finest work. I thought I had the perfect location, the perfect crew and the perfect equipment but it didn’t work out that way. This was my second time shooting with the Hasselblad H4D-50 and first time shooting with the Profoto B1’s. It was also my first time shooting at this location and I totally misjudged the sun’s trajectory so we ended up having the harshest light throwing mottled shadows all over the bowl for most of the afternoon. Essentially, everything was different and difficult and I couldn’t rely on anything I normally would. I didn’t know what power I could push the lights to and still freeze motion. I couldn’t find the angles in the bowl because the sun was limiting us and more than anything shooting with a Hasselblad is nothing like shooting with a DSLR.

Chris Cab grinds the cradle as only a mad man would

Chris Cab grinds the cradle as only a madman can.

When shooting with DSLRs I don’t think we realise how reliant we are on the LCD screens. That little LCD screen on our DSLRs makes our workflow so much quicker than you know and with the Hasselblad that speed comes to an abrupt halt. At 75mb per image the images take what feels like a lifetime to display on the screen. What makes things worse is the resolution on the Hasselblad screen is not ideal. You really want to shoot tethered to a computer using this camera as only then can you really see what’s happening. That or know how to read your histograms accurately. I was just unprepared. I know what this camera is capable of and I plan to get even with it. Right now we sit with a score of Hasselblad 1 – Tyrone nil but there will be a rematch!

The resolution of the Hasselblad is insane. Check the uncropped image of Justus Kotze with an oh so stylish crail slide, followed by a 100% zoom of the image. Impressive, no?

Justus Kotze crail slides the deep end

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The Profoto B1 lights were really great. I want to do some more tests to see if I can get them to hyper sync with my pocket wizards but their ability to freeze motion with decent power output is awesome and with everything being built into the head itself you don’t have cables. They’re basically speedlights on steroids. So here are the remaining shots from the day. I am already planning my revenge on that Hasselblad. It won’t get the better of me next time!!!

Justus Kotze Crail Slide Yann Horowitz Yann Horowitz Chris Cab cradle of filth

Thanks to all the skateboarders, the secret bowl amigo, Michael North, Willem Foster and Hendre Louw for making this happen.


When I was shooting Red Bull X-Fighters there was talk of swell hitting that left in Namibia.. you know the one I’m talking about! The chances of going seemed stacked against us but thankfully Red Bull, being the fine company they are, made magic happen. Two days later, flights were booked, accommodation sorted, a moersa lens rented and passports were packed.

The main focus was to get images of Slade Prestwich. Check out the the interview Red Bull did on his pre and post expectations / experience. If you’ve heard rumours of this wave being heavy… believe it! That spitting chocolate mouth of death will eat you alive however it’ll most likely give you the barrel of your life. Its gamble you just can’t walk away from.

As for Namibia, it’s a bizarre place. Your mind keeps changing its mind on where it thinks you are. One minute you think you’re in South Africa, next transported back to “puzzle box” era Germany / Europe. Puzzle box as in those old 1000 piece German architecture landscape puzzles you used to sit for hours with you mom trying to figure out. Then the dessert and vast amounts of sand settle your mind back into reality.

What a great trip. I live for opportunities like these. Quick shout out to Sunshine Company for hooking me up with the carbon fibre Sirui tripod you see me operating in the last photo.

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I have one of the best jobs in the world and believe me I appreciate it. Working with a client like Red Bull I’m constantly put into the most stimulating environments with the most inspiring of people. A double whammy of awesomeness sets the stage on which I work. It’s a team effort when it comes to Red Bull. I can only shoot what is in front of me and for that I give a huge shout out to the team that makes it all happen.

That brings us to Red Bull X-Fighters. The Union Buildings in Pretoria played host to the final round of the 2014 X-Fighters season with a closely contested race for the title between Josh Sheehan of Australia and Levi Sherwood of New Zealand. Due to a hard crash and a seriously tweaked ankle during the qualifiers, Levi Sherwood was unable to compete properly and it was Josh Sheehan who took both the stage and series win.

For the full report check out:
http://www.redbullxfighters.com/en_ZA
http://www.redbull.com/za/en

Here are some of my shots from the event….

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On Thursday myself and a few others headed out to Dungeons in the hopes that the surf would turn on during the three hour window that was spotted for the morning. A 5.5m swell at 16s was predicted and there were hopes for some solid surf following the previous Friday’s perfect conditions. This was my first time out there. Unfortunately the swell direction was just off but that didn’t stop the core group of charges from surfing. Just goes to show how much work and dedication these guys have. They’re warriors not athletes in my book.

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