Shutter Speeds

Sorry about the break and the no updates. A few things have happened in the last few months. I went up to Liverpool to work for Be-mag and shoot Slamm Jamm. I turned 30 at the start of the month and got really drunk in the centre of London and I’ve been shooting a lot late at night due to work and skater commitments. So i decided to put a right-up about one of the shots i did the other night at around 1am in the morning.Enjoy.

Skating is all about speed and capturing the moment. With photography, it’s always good to experiment to see what changing different settings on your camera will do and checking out the results. I personally love shooting at nights cause i love experimenting with all those flashes i paid soo much for. Even though it’s really cold in London, Jamie Stenner works at his skateshop all saturday and drove 2 hrs to come shoot some photos till the early morning. Glad it was him skating and not me. It was cold enough just sitting on the ground getting photos.

Ok, slow shutter speed means the shutter on the camera stays open letting in more light and colour. This works the best at night cause you use slow shutter speeds to make a scene more colourful and you can create effects that you can’t see with your eye. Using flash also allows you to capture fast moving objects as the camera only picks up light, so your flash hits the skater and the scene and using longer shutter speeds, you can create a blurring effect to whatever the flash doesn’t touch.
Number 1. We set up a piece of wood to use as a launch over the rail into the bank. not the hardest trick but it was 1am and Jamie needed to warm up.
Exposure was set at 1/8s at F2.8. It’s not that fast but Jamie was very solid and there’s no blur in the backround and not much colour in the scene.

Here’s number 2.
Exposure was set at 1.0s at F2.8. Longer shutter speed let in a lot more light and i slowly rotated the camera with the shutter open to get a swurling effect i was looking for. The only thing that is lacking, the skater is too “see through” and not very solid. Still i like the effect and almost a cool shot. The London sky is very bright and yellow and it shows a lot in this photo. A little too much.

Number 3.
Exposure was set at 0.8s at F2.8. Slightly slower shutter but as you can see, it made all the difference. The colour is still strong,now the skater is strong too. I moved the camera a little less this time to get some blur. The light from the flashes hit the launch, bank, rail and skater. The backround is pretty blurred and just as we hit this shot, 2 security guards walked by to make the backround more interesting.
So the finished shot. A combination of slow shutter speeds, flash placement and slight movement of the camera let in lots of light, some blur and sharpening of the important things in the photo.

Hope you liked this little write-up. Here’s a few other photos with the same concept i shot along time ago.

This one is a really long shutter speed we shot for Be-mag back in Aus. Thats Richie Eisler painting the Be-mag, Mike Choley hiddin in the letters and Aussie photographer Hayden Golder, Richie again next to me when the flash went off.

Joe Coyne-Kingdom Magazine Interview

Joe Coyne, Oli Short and Adam Kola are all the from the UK. They started Kingdom Magazine and are now up issue 7. I thought it was time for poeple to know who is behind the mag and understand what goes in behind the scenes to bring Kingdom to print every issue. It’s now distributed world wide and if you don’t get it where you are, email or tell your local shop to get in touch with them here www.kingdom-mag.co.uk  Even if your not from the UK, open your mind and look at what goes in the UK. Maybe someday you’ll want to visit or even live here like me.

Dale: Where are you located and how many years have you been rolling?
Joe: I live in Brighton, the unofficial retirement capital of rollerblading. Been skating since 1993, not roller hockey, not reccy skating, grinding since 1993, so 15 years.

Joe MC ing NASS 2008

D: What role do you play in bringing Kingdom Magazine to our eyes?
J: I am co-editor of the mag and my time is split between chasing various contributors and advertisers, writing content for the mag and proofing every last page before we print. I also look after our website, Myface and Spacebook pages and of course run all the events and parties you know and love.

D: Who else is part of the team and can you briefly explain their role?
J: We’re fortunate to have some very talented and dedicated people in our team. Oli Short who along with Adam Kola helped found the magazine. Oli’s vision and ideas are what makes us tick and Adams photos are arguably the best in the industry. Ed Inglis came on board after the 1st web issue and is now our features editor, looking after everything from the video reviews to the interviews you read in the mag.
There’s also an army of contributors including Sam Butt and yourself taking snaps, Rupert Morgan and Lil Tom on design and all kinds of peeps writing content for us.
I almost forgot our publishing team at 328 media who have helped us realise our dream of bringing the magazine to print. They take care of advertising, distribution and all the admin that goes into running a mag. Without them, we’d be fucked!

Nick Lomax, Chris Farmer with his new DVD and Joe repping a DirtBox shirt on tour

D: What was the main aim you set out to achieve with Kingdom Mag and
have you come close to achieving it this early in the game?
J: I guess our main aim was to represent rollerblading in a new light. It wasn’t just by publishing a magazine but by running events, tours and parties to show people that might not have seen us before what we do. We have a long way to go before we’re where we want to be but we’re enjoying the ride.
D: There was a bit of controversy about a first few issue’s with non-English pros on the covers, any words about that?
J: Every single image that we print in Kingdom has been shot in the UK, bar maybe two or three. If the best option for a cover image we get is a foreigner, well we’re
going to run with it.
D: Following on from that, some UK skaters are complaining about the amount of Non English skaters in the mag, any thoughts on that?
Kingdom Magazine covers rollerblading in the UK, that includes visiting pros from all over the world. We always mix it up with British skaters and will continue to do so. Skaters will always complain, it’s in our nature. Just some advice to those negative mother fuckers, try being supportive for a change, it will make you feel a whole lot happier.
D: The UK isn’t such a large country geographically, but large with talent. How do these skaters make it to the pages of the magazine?
J: They need to make themselves known. Whether that’s by traveling to events and competitions or by sending us edits and photos, we are not psychics.
D: You’re up to Issue 7, how are things shaping up for the future?
J: All good, we’ve got some exciting plans for the next issue and all sorts of ideas for events in 2009, watch this space!

Thanks very much for your time Joe, I know your a busy guy and i wish Kingdom all the best for the future

Joe on another tour out handing out product at Milton Keynes

Issue 7, GO GET IT!!!!!

Kingdom Magazine No.6 (UK) Printed Photo’s

Micah Simmang, Gap to Topsoul

With the release of Kingdom Mag Issue 7 out now, it’s time to see 2 of my photos that were printed in No.6 if you don’t get the magazine. These 2 photos went full page and looked really cool. First one is a skater from Texas. Micah Sammang, he traveled here with Josh Glowicki and Troy. They started there 30 day trip around Europe in London and were only here for 4 days. I had to work but on the Friday afternoon i finally got to catch up with them for only 2 hrs. We started off at some ledges then i took them to this kink. This kink is not far from the Famous Parliament building and Big Ben Clock Tower that everyone see’s when they see photos of London. A lot of skaters here and killed this kink in the past but Micah just had a look at it and decided something a little different. Gap over the flat to Topsoul. It’s pretty high and you have to look straight at the drop but it didn’t seem to phase him. Well this is what it turned out like. It was hard lighting it up just right. I hate fucking up photos when skaters are trying hammers. It’s basically just a big let down on my own talent if i don’t get it just right. Nice colorful clothes help against this dreary grey day and old stone and 3 flashes also help highlighting.

This is a really long kink, the stairs aren’t very steep so after the huck he had to regain his balance and ride it out. Fortunately for me the photographer, he had to do it a few times to get the clip for the video so I also had the chance to get the sequence of it. This doesn’t happen very often as every good skater knows, sometimes it takes a while to get different angles and photos and then a hammer becomes a mission more than just one off trick. Here’s the sequence in a gif. It wasen’t printed.
The boys left around Europe the next day hitting Summerclash a few weeks later.

Rob Nunn, Fishbrain to Fakie

This was such a gratifying photo for me to get printed. I met Rob and the Kent boys in my first week in the UK. There all real good but it took almost 9 months before i had the chance to get down and visit them for a weekend of shooting. This shot was the last shot i did before i left back up to London. We hit up so many places but he had planned this rail for a night shot as it would be bust during the day and i love shooting night photos the best. He already had stashed some ply in a garden to get over the blind bumps for the run up. It’s flat on top and pretty long. The other rail is pretty close so i had to stick my lens through the bars of it and hold that position. After a warm up, and i mean warm up cause it was pretty cold, He laced this perfect fishbrain to fakie. When i checked the photo, i was like “What the Fuck!! That looks sick”.

I captured this fishbrain to the best of my photography ability that I’ve learned up to now. With 4 flashes, i was really happy how it turned out and also how it got printed as a double page spread. Rob had never been in a magazine before, so he was stoked that it paid off and really happy he put in the effort for the photo. Although i spend all weekend there, i only got 2 photo’s for print due to some rain but I’ll definitely make the effort to get there again cause i know these guys always skate hard and are really nice guys.

So i hope you like my little write up and if you want the full high res versions, you’ll have to track down a copy of Kingdom Mag No.6 or subscribe from here  www.kingdom-mag.co.uk

Dale

South East Weekend

South East Coast

I got a call mid week from Sim Warren telling me to pack my camera gear and head out to his area for the weekend because the weather was going to be hot and they were all keen to skate some big shit. The area in question is on the South East Coast of the UK with places such as Ramsgate, Herne Bay, Folkstone and they had planned a trip to Hastings. It’s only an hour and half train ride from London and we started the weekend at Whitstable train station were I met up with Sim, Andrew Halls, Ian and a surprise visitor Mike Welland. Sim was keen on a bank to grind right in the station car park so we ended up getting this shot.

Bank to ally-oop makio
Next spot to meet everyone was at Swalecliff skate park, right near the beach. The bowl was amazing and small street course was planned out really well packing a lot of grind blocks. Sorry, no photo’s I was skating a lot.

Lunch- Fish and Chips
After a short stop off in Herne bay for some fish and chips we headed to Ramsgate for a few spots. Ellington park has a rail that curves, its square and is on both sides. The infamous Farzad joined our crew at the skatepark and was keen to hit these rails starting the session off with a bunch of warm up tricks, topside and ally-oop tricks,

Farzad, Sweaty on Ellington Park square rail
Hallsy also joining the session with loads of topside tricks including christgrinds, topsouls and fishbrains.
Welland was eyeing off the other one with a nice backslide and Farzad also lacing sweatstance and topsmistrials.

Mike Welland, Backslide
The sea front has a ledge that is waxed really nice and was long enough for some lines.
 
Sim Warren, Truespin Topside Soul with steeze
The sun was dropping behind the huge seafront wall so a nice chill ledge session ensued for the next hr or so. Here are some tricks that went down.

Sim Warren, Ally-oop Fish to Soul
Nandos was calling for dinner so a feast went down then off to Westgate-on-sea to check out some old school spots that Ian suggested. A wall ride over a 10 set was sick but too dark to skate so the natural launch sounded sick just down the road. Sim Warren stepped up for the last trick of the day boosting this dodgy launch for a nice 180 that grab to finish the day around 11pm.
 Sunday, Hasting’s was calling but not before we checked out the wall ride from the night before. The Sun was blazing around midday so this was the warm-up spot. Hallsy really wanted the wall ride 180 out but not really feeling it as he’s never tried anything like it before. He took a few falls and some skin off his back but he landed it sweet and really happy with his efforts, unfortunately bruising his heal and taking him out for the rest of the day. This was really what Sim liked doing so he stepped cabbing into the wall ride and 180’ing out to finish the trick so nice with smooth style.

Farzad really wanted to hit a kink next to a Viking ship so we headed there after a sweet breakfast at Moe’s Diner. The nicest guy on the planet with huge burgers. The Kink is steep and fast and Farzad wanted to warm up but having not skated in a while he ended up taking a hard fall on his already damaged hip putting him out for the rest of the day. Off to Hastings

Breakfast at Moe’s
With huge industrial estates in the mountains around hasting, it offered a lot of rails, kinks and gaps and had been skated a lot before. Farzad just picking up new skates off Sim’s floor hit the rail with speed and trying all the tricks that wouldn’t smash his damaged hip. Hallsy trying to skate around but couldn’t, Sim was the only one left hitting a really nice Savannah with style.

Farzad showing me how big the fish is he caught while back mistrialing the rail
One last spot was a sweet rail and Sim wanted one trick on it before headed off. Back, backslide first try for a bet with Hallsy and winning 5 pounds.

Sim Warren, 5 Pound Back Backslide first go. So smooth. Hastings Rail
Getting pumped up by Hallsy and Farzad, Sim wanted to step up for a photo so then he laced a True-topside soyal to finish a really sick weekend of skating from all the boys. A long drive back then a long train back for me to London getting home around 11:30pm followed. The guys stepped up and skated hard for 2 days. It was an awesome weekend with good mates. Well worth traveling down there.. For more sick photo’s, make sure you get a copy of Kingdom Magazine Issue 7 and check them out here www.kingdom-mag.co.uk

The Beach

Rampworx Video

Here’s the Podcast of the whole week i spent in Liverpool at the Clinic