Bike Boys of the Wack

[spyglass]

A friend of mine called me up the other day and said "you have to come see what my son and his buddies have been up to..... bring your camera". The boys have spend hours upon hours clearing the side of a local mountain and building bike jumps. They have dug an enormous amount of dirt and piled it up to make jumps and banked approaches.

So after work one day my friend and I headed up the mountain. Lighting under the tree canopy is always a challenge when you need both DOF and a reasonable high shutter speed. So I strapped a lead acid battery and a 2000 watt pure sine wave inverter to a dolly and we hauled it up to the site. It took two of us to fight that power means up the hill side (I ordered the Vagabond Mini the very next day c/w spare battery as it is a fraction of the weight of my former power means)

I used my Pentax K20 and Sigma 10-20mm lens. I used an Alienbees 1600 strobe w/ 11" reflector for illumination.







































I had no idea that the boys would get the height they did, do back flips, 360's, etc. We ran out of time (both ambient light and the boys energy) and went away knowing that we would have to plan for another session when we had more time.


Thanks for looking,

Spyglass

[Marko]

Great photos. #1 my fav

Marko

[Mike Pearson]

Great captures Tim - the boys not only built super set of jumps they really performed for the camera 

Mike

[calsan]

Recently playing with my AF360 in High Speed Sync mode and checking out how much range I could get outdoors for bird shots in low light.  Which was about 2m - so barely past the minimum focal length of my lens.
So, I'm thinking that the lighting here is pretty powerful and I understand it a bit better for having tried this on a much smaller scale.
BTW: How do you learn how to flip your bike over your head and not break your neck?  You must have to get it right first shot!

[spyglass]

Hey Calsan,

A few years back when my oldest son was into this style of biking I ventured up on the same mountain. I had two AF360FGZ flash units with me. It was simply just not enough power. The strobe unit I took up for these shots was a single Alienbees B1600 (which is a 640 watt second mono strobe).  I took up an 11" reflector (30 deg) in my hast thinking bigger is better. In reality the 7" reflector (45 deg) would have been an better choice.

Thankfully my son never really got into the extreme biking (he was into soccer and lacrosse). These kids are really into it. They went to a camp to learn how to do back flips and other stunts. They started off by taking a bike and modifying it (took the wheels off and bolted heavily padded wood where the wheels were). Then they took it on a trampoline. Next they went to a camp and used a huge foam pit and cable harness (where they jumped their bike into a big pit of foam pieces). Instructors give them pointers and they eventually remove the harness. These kids have no fear.

On the second shot I was situated between the wooden launch ramp and the dirt landing ramp. I fired the shot quickly and had to roll in quickly toward the wooden ramp (protecting my camera) as the kid bailed in mid air. He rolled down the ramp but the bike "cased" on the top edge of the dirt ramp and fell downwards toward me (missed me by 300mm / 1 foot) and showered dirt on my back and in my hair. We all had a good laugh about it. The kid was unhurt and phased. Other than one slide out landing by the least experienced rider these kids nailed everything they tried. They are always heading up to Whistler to some camp or to ride downhill. The work they did on that hill side was incredible.


Spyglass

[Jocoan]

hi spyglass
great work there what shutter speeds are we talking about
i would imagine 1/1000 plus i particually like 3&4
just super cool shots
thank you for sharing

[spyglass]

Thanks Jocoan,

I shot all of these manual. The shutter speed was 1/125th sec. (normal flash sync speed for pentax cameras). It is amazing what you can freeze at that shutter speed with a good flash.

On an ironic note, I was going to go up and have another go but one of the boys cracked a bone in his foot. You would think it would be from this or some other high risk activity. Nope.... basically walking and chewing gum. 

I will take a different reflector next time to allow for a tad more light spread. I had underexposed the sky and surroundings by 1 1/2 stops and set my flash to fill. This helps give the subject a main presence in the shots. When viewing a single photo it can be effective. When viewing a collection it can start to be too detected, and like anything can wear out its welcome.

Thanks for looking,

Spyglass