Category Archives: Photo

Photo of the Week: Fat Tony

Posted on November 25, 2013 by | Leave a comment

Terry-Adams-2014-Flatland-BMX-Calendar-Cover-Shot

Long story short- this is one of the crazier BMX photos you will ever see. I always knew that flatland had the most potential for experimental shots because of its more stationary nature and no need for obstacles. Now until someone can float a handrail down a river, we only have this spectacular flatland shot.

“Terry Adams has always had a ton of crazy ideas, but the difference between him and most people is that he always seems to find a way to make his crazy ideas come to life. I learned this early on when I first started shooting with him, which led to an incredible friendship more than seven years ago. Terry and I have shot in more unique locations than we can even count, but this past April topped everything.

When I got a call from Terry asking if I wanted to fly to Florida to shoot him riding on water he didn’t even get a chance to finish his sentence before I screamed, “Yes!” The next thing I knew I was chest deep in a lake at 5:00am shooting photos of Terry playing Jesus as the sun was coming up behind him.

I got a handful of good shots from the morning, but this one where Terry is doing a plastic man and the sun is between his arms like he’s holding it on his shoulders quickly became my favorite BMX photo I’ve ever shot.

I have to give a huge thank you to Terry for inviting me to be a part of his special Red Bull project, and I also have to give him props for being able to do some really crazy shit where most riders wouldn’t be able to do anything at all.

This photo sat on my hard drive for seven months, but finally got to see the light of day when the 2014 Flatland Calendar was released, and I can’t think of a better photo for the cover this year! Calendars are free and come with every order you make on flatlandfuel.com while supplies last.

TECHNICAL INFO
Date Shot: April 20, 2013
Location: Orlando, Florida
Camera: Canon 5D Mark II
Lens: Canon EF 70-200mm f2.8
Focal Length: 80mm
Aperture: f5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/2000
ISO: 100
Lighting: Ambient”

Check out Tony’s portfolio here.

More of Terry’s riding can be seen here.

You can see a little more of how this shot happened from this video.

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My Friend Dean Watson by J. Mike Kuhn

Posted on November 22, 2013 by | Leave a comment

“Dean Watson is one person I’m always stoked to shoot. He is an aspiring stunt man, gymnast, musician, is saved as Dean Don Juan Watson in my phone and his style while riding any bike is a treat to watch. His sense of humor, fun loving attitude and creativity make him an awesome person to spend time with on and off bikes. I have been riding/shooting with him for 8 years and he has become one of my best friends in that time. Dean’s family is very musical and theatrical at times which explains why Dean is amazing with every instrument I’ve seen him play. He used to be an instructor at Shields Skatepark (until it recently closed forever) where he taught kids how to skate, scooter and ride. When not working at the skatepark he was also a gymnast instructor at Shields Gymnastics. He also is the guy who may scream BRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAPPPPPPPP as he does the meanest moto whip over a box jump moments after getting to the skate park, as well as the guy who lets a scooter kid ride his bike while Dean unexpectedly does a flair on the kid’s scooter before giving it back. He is currently in Arizona again finishing his part for Bobby Kanode’s video Mediocre At Best. The footage of the shots we have taken recently will not be in his part, but will be in a future edit.

Follow us at
@deanwatson103 and @JMikeKuhn”

 

dean playing drums in basement music studioDean Watson, jammin’

 

dean 270 rear tire jam270 tire jam

 

dean dam bar gap 1barspin gap

 

Dean ds handplantdownside handplant

 

dean gap to Vertical smithsmith stall

 

dean invert hiphip table

 

dean gap bonkchannel gap to bonk

 

dean tooth up pop overtooth up to over

 

Dean Watson Bump euro over fencebump euro

 

dean back tuck bike checkstuntin’

 

dean bumpjump 180 railhopbumpjump 180 railhop

Got a bunch of photos of one of your friends? Write up a short biography and send the images to thecomeupbmxnet@gmail.com for consideration to be on the site!

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Photo of the Week: Luis Pinzon

Posted on November 18, 2013 by | Leave a comment

IMG_5679

“This photo is special to me because its a reminder of one of the best pool sessions I’ve ever had. I’ve been riding for 17 years as of now and this is one of the best pools I’ve ever ridden. I’m no @deanshralp when it comes to pool riding, but I’ve ridden my fair share of great pools. The fact that we were able to shred this pool all day, with 8 dudes and 2 pitbulls, in a completely inhabited apartment complex is unreal. I think it was the perfect storm of its location in a quiet city with a southern mentality. This combined with the salsa music we were blasting put us in good favor with the local maintenance man.

Everyone was killing it this session. We knew that this was the first and last session we would likely have in this pool, so everyone had something they wanted to get done. Zachery Rogers was on another level though. Somehow this behemoth of a man has the ability to blast completely vertical obstacles with ease and style. His airs were complete beast mode this particular day.

I resisted the temptation to just ride and my camera actually left the bag. My primary interest is nature and party/drunk photography, so most sessions I never take the camera out. I shot this photo using a Canon 60D with the Canon 17-55 f/2.8. This lens is JB welded to my camera body; I love it. Photo was shot at 17mm with shutter at 1/800 and aperture at f/7.1 and an iso of 500. I didn’t have the patience to take my flash out because I wanted to ride so bad.”

Check out more of Luis’ work here.

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$kapegoat Blog

Posted on November 13, 2013 by | Leave a comment

clarky bars by scerbo

Veteran lensman Bob Scerbo recently setup a Tumblr page for his archived work- skapegoat256. Lots of unseen/classic stuff on there now and it seems to be getting updated everyday. Bookmark that.

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Photo of the Week: Paul Turns

Posted on November 12, 2013 by | Leave a comment

IMG_8423 - Copy

“This shot came about due to the shitty UK weather. I had called Matti that morning and said I was free, but the weather was pretty damn bad so after some discussions as to where we could go, I made a call to Motion skatepark the owner Tom is a damn cool guy.

We arrived at Motion and I guess i’m lucky insofar as it’s a place I know really well so I knew what and where may look ok. I really enjoy shooting with Matti as due to him being a flatland rider it makes me think more about composition, we never really went with any sort of plan or trick in mind it was just chilled.

Matti was trying a few things and I was playing around with lighting when I found this angle, at first I was using just two flashes one to the right and slightly behind which you can make out and one to the left, I decided to use another to fill just to my right and low down. I was using my Canon 60D with the 10-22 @ 10mm which for me works if I get really close to the ground. I ended up setting the shutter at 1/250 f8 and the ISO at 500, the flashes were as above, the one right, slightly behind and high on the stand @ 1/2 power and 80mm, the flash left, @ 1/4 power and 50mm, the one to my right and below @1/4 and 50mm (I think) and fired with Elinchrom Skyports.”

Check out more of Paul’s work here.

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Malta Rock Park by George Marshall

Posted on November 5, 2013 by | Leave a comment

RedBull Rock Park

“On the small island of Gozo exists an ancient landscape of quarter pipes, banks and hips all carved into the rock by the forces of erosion over thousands of years…”

Check out the photos here.

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Photo of the Week: Joshua Lucero

Posted on October 28, 2013 by | Leave a comment

LI2A1353_SM2

This photo immediately struck me as soon as I saw it. The lighting is wonderful, with a beautiful rimlight to the far right and a perfectly exposed and warmed fill light from the left. The composition is good- but almost centered. No big deal. I love the subdued yellow of the rail, the muted red in the sign and the deep blue gradient in the sky. The timing is on. More than anything, I love the shallow depth-of-field here. It really gives the rider an extra pop out of the background.

“Since breaking my ankle a couple of months ago I was stoked to go by the skatepark in my small hometown of Portales, New Mexico to hang out and pedal around a bit with Jaron Turnbow and Michael Sanchez for the afternoon. Feeling good with walking around this past Sunday, I asked if they wanted to go check out this spot that had been left by the road construction crews working in town.

We showed up to the spot as the sun began to set and they went to work moving the sign into different areas of this small parking lot trying to get a feel for it. I set up one light at first and gelled it to compensate for the warm sunlight and we shot a table and a few other tricks to flat before they moved the kicker close to the yellow rail that enclosed the parking lot.

A few warm up runs over the rail and Jaron started throwing tuck no-handers over it and seemed like he was getting pretty comfortable with the set-up so I called out a barspin. I still had the strobe left of Jaron gelled with a ¼ CTO about 15 feet away zoomed to 35mm and the strobe to the right of him I left bare 15 feet away zoomed to 85mm (would have had both strobes gelled but I was a bit absent minded and only had one ¼ CTO on hand). After one dead sailor over it Jaron nailed it second try.

I really liked the back of the College Cleaners building for this shot because of the old maroon sign and accidentally lucked out and realized after the fact that this composition had the sign lined up with our kicker set-up.

My set-up for this shot was my 5D markIII with a Sigma 50mm f/1.4 as well as two 580ex strobes set at ¼ power triggered with pocket wizards. I rarely take my 50mm out and I decided I needed to start using it more recently. I shot it almost wide open at 1.8 to get a shallow depth of field and kept the background a little under exposed with an ISO of 50 and my shutter synced at 1/200th.”

Check out more of Joshua’s work here.

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Image

Nokia Lumia Gallery by Hadrien Picard

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Posted on October 25, 2013 by in BMX, Gear, Photo

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Photo of the Week: Charlie Quigley

Posted on October 22, 2013 by | Leave a comment

cqpotw

“So the day started off with me leaving 5050 Skatepark after getting a call from John (Bosco) Santorelli. He asked me to shoot this photo of him doing this wallride I had never heard about. So around 3 o clock I pull up to a couple of stores and park in the back where the spot is. A huge man made cliff overlooks the wallride. I joke around saying i should shoot it from up there. 5 minutes later I am up there setting up everything. It took him a couple of tries to get the perfect wallride but the end result was amazing. I also shot this in black and white but the natural colors of the sky and railing stand out way better

Shot with:
Canon T3i
18mm-55mm 3.5/5.6
ISO 400
1/800”

Check out more of Charlie’s work here.

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Photo of the Week: Mario Alciati

Posted on October 14, 2013 by | Leave a comment

Stuntbike_Fire_jump

It doesn’t get much more bizarre than this week’s photo. When I first saw it I laughed out loud. What the fuck is going on??? Let’s break it down. A guy (Jack Hartje) is boosting a large launch ramp to flat over a semi-circle of fire and a guy on a motorcycle doing a burnout. There’s another guy on a motorcycle who is chugging a beer and also looks to be doing a burnout. There’s another motorcycle rider in the far background for reasons unknown. A guy is standing next to a tank of gas and filming with a cellphone. Seated next to him is a guy shooting a photo on an SLR who presumably had placed the flashes (looks to be 2 Sunpak 555‘s and a Vivitar 285) around the subject. We see the back of another man is crouching directly in front of the camera and looks to be also filming on a cellphone. The very best piece of this Xtreme puzzle is the GoPro on a jib arm creeping into frame from the right. Too fucking funny. I love that Mario realized that the whole scene was pretty wild and decided to take a few steps back to really show what’s going on, instead of just shooting the action.

“Jack Hartje is from Buffalo, NY. One morning he called my friend/roommate Korey and said something along the lines of

“Hey, a bunch of stunt riders are coming to an abandoned parking lot in Syracuse. I’m coming through with my ramp and I want to jump some shit. Oh yeah and bring gasoline if you have some.”

I threw my camera in my bag like I always do and without hesitation Korey and I set out (with gasoline) and met up with these guys. That day we proceeded to witness some of the craziest stunt riding we had ever seen.

While the riders were taking a break and having a beer, Jack got a couple of them in on the idea of sitting in front of the ramp and doing burnouts while getting jumped over.

They rode over and parked in front of the ramp while Korey poured some gasoline in front of them.

Jack peddled to the end of the parking lot and I ran over to a spot about 25 feet away hoping to get the photo I pictured in my head. I had to focus on the building in the background. I set the camera at 500 or 1000 shutter speed since I figured jack was going to be hauling ass as usual, and clicked the aperture a couple notches lower since I knew jack would be darker than the building I was focusing my camera’s light meter on.

Korey lit the gasoline, Jack peddled full speed at the ramp, engines redlined as the stunt riders did burnouts (and one chugged his beer), I snapped my shutter, and the rest is history.

Gear: Canon AE-1p on (400) and all manual, (I either use this or my Pentax K1000)
Film: Cheap Kodak B&W 400 film”

Check out more of Mario’s work here and more of Jack’s riding here.

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