Jan 29: Grab Bag

The skiing is warm and wet this week, so a couple of the guys are practicing some new grabs.

This super poppy booter is cleaned up to look nice.

Justin is working on a truck driver.

It's getting closer.

But it's still in the developmental phase.

A few more tries...

Much better.

Timmy is locked in.

It looks effortless.

Ariel joins later. Is this the running man?

Rad base graphics.

Jan 27: Big Time

4:30 wake up.
5:15 rendezvous.
6:00 trailhead, skins on.

7:30 first saddle, 1500 gain, 1.7 miles up. sunrise.

8:15 aspen glades and long shadows.

9:00 recon base, under the face.

10:15 final ridge. big exposure. a slip left would be bad (fatal?), running on hard steep crust.

10:30 final summit in view.

11:45 standing on the summit (left), 3100 gain, 3.5 miles. the line is rather implied by this angle, but i won't give away exactly how we sent it.

12:00 the entrance proves a bit tricky. (sorry Kate, can't resist)

12:05 Kate recovers and skis it to perfection. (this one is soft and I'm blaming it on the lens. the auto-focus totally bounced this time. I shouldn't have trusted it. I was shooting two cameras simultaneously at varied focal length, but it's a shame I didn't get this right.)

12:05 flying through the runout.

12:35 regroup at the bottom. Justin Sarah Kate Hazen. note the lines.

1:15 back at the saddle, we admire the tracks. Sarah put in the left line, super stylish, and earned photo of the day (not shown). Kate put in the upper-right chute (in shade). Justin's creeps into the bottom corner, direct from the summit.

1:30 back to the car.

7:45 bedtime??

Jan 26: Near Miss

We explored some different lines today, but I didn't quite get things right.

Making the most of the conditions, Sarah skis this line like a racer. But it doesn't....pop. I missed the angle.

I found a better angle for the second shot. Kalen puts in a sweet line. But I somehow missed focus. Slipped a button, or something. It's still usable, but it's not as sharp as it should be. The rocks are soft at full scale. Bummer.

The last line was a stretch. It was impossible to get the composition I wanted. In the end, I just put in in the middle and let it go. Sometimes I can fault the skier for missing the perfect line, but Sarah put this in precisely as I asked. I just couldn't make the shot.

We'll get it next time.
Big plans tomorrow. The images need to be better.

Jan 24: Tree Time

Sun on the South.
Wind on the N-W.
Good time for some tree skiing.

Low-angle fun in the protected zone. (Kate, loving it.)

Would you call this a high-low-angle? (Kate, working it.)

We hit this high-low twice, and the other version turned out way better. But it's still in the processing room.

This is how we GTS. (Get The Shot)

Not a clean dismount. 2 tenths deduction. I'm just glad I didn't fall on my head.

She is all about GTS. (Kate, crushing it.)

The strongest images are still in the works. We did well today.
More tomorrow.

Jan 22: Be Flexible

We set out today with big plans.
The wind was supposed to calm, the sky was supposed to clear, the snow was supposed to be good.
But it didn't play out that way.
Low visibility, high wind, graupel, ice, and crud.

Someone mentioned hot cocoa and a sauna.
The team disintegrated.

Kate and I took one extra lap.
We had to ski close to trees to get any contrast in the flat light.

We found some interesting spots.

This tree was nice. (The smaller one on the left is distracting though.)

Each of the images is missing something. The compositions are just a little off. It was tricky out there today, but I should've done better with depth and direction.

Jan 21: New Ideas

It's fun skiing new terrain, finding new features, meeting new athletes, and trying new ideas.

Snowbird was pretty tracked out, but we found a few small lines with clean snow. This one got hit just before we arrived, but Becky still makes it look good.

It's impossible to ignore that slash down the middle, so we looked for other isolated features.
Alan found this, but the rock and ice entrance was too sketchy to ski it well.

Becky found a few turns on the other side.

I can't help but put in a photo tip....
Check these two images, taken from opposite sides of the same line.
The first one, shot as a landscape (wide), stretches the terrain horizontally, diminishing the height of the drop. It makes it look small and flat.

The second one, shot as a portrait (tall), stretches the terrain vertically, increasing the height of the drop. It makes it look tall(er) and steep.

Include a chairlift in the background, (and a blue sky), and the second image is much more interesting.
Neither is very special, but it's good to compare images to see what works and what doesn't.

To get something special, we found one open patch and hit it two ways.
(Consider this a teaser for a concept I am working on.)

Another good day of skiing and shooting.
More tomorrow.

Jan 20: Best Day

Today was the best day of 2011, for me.
The weather was great, the snow was great, the skiing was great, etc etc.
We had a ton of fun.

In reverse chronological order:

Justin shot a few frames of me at the end of the day.
I am sporting an 8-week beard. It helps keep the snow out of my face (and encourages other skiers to keep their distance).

My telemark form is a little out of practice, but I managed a few decent turns.

Justin gets waaaaay low.

This was taken 1/10 second earlier. Watch out for the buried ice layer.

We did shoot some good images though, earlier.

We mixed it up with a few big-mountain lines too. What a day!
More tomorrow.

Jan 19: Sled Hill

In CA, we took the kids (my nephews) sledding.

Dominic, gettin' after it in the blue saucer.

Justin, gearing up the red rocket.

Then, flying.

Crash 'n' burn. (Note Dom with the ice chunk ready to finish him off.)

Everybody put their faces in the snow.

But nobody did it better than Jared.

Pretty solid face shots there.

So much snow in the face. Kevin, and the camera, both lose focus due to snow in the eyes (lens).

Dominic, thrilled.

Then shocked.

(5 seconds later, he wasn't too happy about the frozen face.)
Daniel stepped up for a tandem ride.. you know.. so that Dom would be more comfortable.

Because dads don't really enjoy sledding...

But, they'll do it if they have  to.