Ethan Pringle – Hasta la Vista
For a while now, climber Ethan Pringle and I have been talking about doing a photoshoot out in Las Vegas on a certain climb that needs to see a repeat. The weather didn’t really coopperate with us for that specific thing, but I had already booked my tickets, so I decided to head out anyway and see if we could get some shots. I figured it’d be fun to at least get to explore Vegas and see what it has to offer. I quickly found out there’s tons of rock there and there’s still plenty of room for development potential. I definitely need to get back and spend some more time on the rock.
I have only dabbled with shooting video a few times, so I don’t really consider myself that great at it, and the more I play with it, the more respect I have for the people over at Big Ups, Camp4Collective, LT11, 3Strings Media etc. It’s rough, and there’s a lot of things to consider in order to make a great video, and the vision you have to have before you even get started…. The point here is, I shot a video of Ethan on a climb called Hasta la Vista 5.14b/c originally bolted by Tony Yaniro at Mt. Charleston, and although it’s not the best, I had a blast shooting it, editing and going through the whole process. There’s no story line here. Just a rock climber. Climbing on a piece of rock. Which I guess could be considered a story. Hope you enjoy.
Raven at the Grand Canyon
I have a bunch of great images that I am still editing through from our trip that we did at the end of July which I will be posting here soon, but I came across an image today that stopped me. Generally while culling through images, I am excited at what I see, but to me, this image really caught my attention so I wanted to share with everyone sooner than later. I captured this image at the Grand Canyon during sunset. Hope you enjoy!
Click on the thumbnail below to view the image:
Happy Friday Video
Hey Everyone. The weekend is here! As you know, I mainly shoot stills, but every now and then I like to dabble a bit in video. Here’s a video that I put together of a couple of friends climbing at a local spot here in Texas. This video was shot with the D7000 on a 4ft crane or hand held. I just recently got the D800 which does video as well, and will be doing some more filming this weekend for Climbtech Gear. This video doesn’t have a story line to it… It’s just good,solid, fun, roof climbing with some good beats… aka – climbing porn. I hope you enjoy!
Climbers, climbs and grades:
Andrew Oliver on Mothership Connection – right – v8
Chris Vinson – Sub T low start – v10
NIkon D800
I got my D800 about a couple weeks ago and I was super psyched to be able to use it on my up and coming road trip. I was pretty busy wrapping up a few jobs before we left, so I didn’t really even get the chance to get out and test shoot before we left. But I knew I wanted the first images to come out of it to be something kinda cool. We left for our babymoon trip on Sunday 06/17 and our first stop was Hueco. Not to climb, only to stop through. We stayed at a friends place and I met up with another photographer Sam Davis. Sam and I stayed up kinda late and shot some star and milky way images. They came out pretty cool. Although this isn’t shot #1 from the D800, it’s shot #13, so I’d have to say that we are off to a pretty good start. Enjoy!
Click on the thumbs and use your <- -> arrow keys, or mouse to view images:
Count to Six and Die
When I first started climbing with Jason Kehl in Hueco Tanks, he showed me this crazy project that he had found on West Mtn just above The Bathtub. I looked at it, and thought it was nuts! This project kind of got sidelined as he spent the next few seasons working on The Seventh Circle project on South Mountain. After 3 years of efforts he finally sent that rig and decided to reaquaint himself with this one as it’s such a great line. It starts low in this HUGE prow and for a while the rock follows the climb which makes it “safe” for the beginning, but, right at the crux of the climb, the following rock stops and drops off into this hole. He had worked out all the moves, so the rest was just the head game of putting it together. Before I was able to make it out to Hueco this season, he told me that he had sent the climb. Super psyched for him! But I also knew I really wanted to photograph it. The sun set just behind this climb so I was really hoping for a sunset shot. Unfortunately, the park closes about an hour before the sun drops, so timing was against us. We stayed pretty much as late as you can in the park, got the shot, and were running out before it closed. For this one, I had forgot my radio poppers, but I was able to trigger one flash in a softbox with Nikon CLS and I set the other flash to trigger via slave. It worked out great, and we ended up with this image, which was published in the lastest Rock and Ice issue July2012 #203 as the parting shot (pg. 83) . You’ll know it when you see it.
Click on the thumbnail to view image:
You can watch the trailer for Jason’s video (which I helped film (backdoor brag)) at Dead Point Magazine HERE, or if you’re subscribed to The Stash, you can watch the whole thing.
Ar kan sas
We brought in the new years at Horseshoe Canyon Ranch (yeah, I know… a long time ago…. got some catchin up to do). We mainly stayed at the Ranch most of the days, but got to venture out to scope a new area that had just started being developed which was really nice. So much potential there, it’s crazy. A couple days before we left, I somehow convinced a few people to get up for sunrise to catch an image of this climb along the road that I had scoped a couple days previous. Psyched climbers, check. Now all we need is a good sunrise. I think I got more than what I expected. The sky lit up and it was amazing. I had one strobe camera right on a light stand triggered via radio poppers so I could adjust my power setting straight from my camera with out having to run back and forth to adjust it manually. This worked especially well because the light stand was balancing on a stack of rocks and had to be extended all the way (had a person standing there to make sure it didn’t fall). The precious time saved being able to dial in my lighting ratios quickly and with out having to stress, allows me to be able to focus on what’s more important, the image. It’s great when everything all comes together.
Psyched that DPM ran this image in their March-May2012 issue as a full page spread. Scope that HERE – page 36-37
Click on the thumb to view the image:
Hueco Tanks in February 2012
Lots and lots of stuff has been going on. I spent a couple weeks out in Hueco last February. Meet some really awesome new people, met back up with a lot of great friends, and got to witness many great things happening out there. It was super awesome as always… As soon as I got back (two days after) I hit the ground running hard with SXSW stuff, and as soon as that ended, I picked up a new client that has had me running in-between Austin, San Antonio and Houston. These have been super busy times, but are really worth every moment. I hope to be able to catch you guys up with everything that has been going on lately, because everything has been really great, and there are some announcements that need to be made. But for now, let’s hit you guys up with imagery from Hueco.
Incase you hadn’t noticed, there’s a new gallery here! **Thanks Gus!!** Just click on the thumb nail and scroll through with your mouse, or use the keyboard ‹— or —› arrow keys. I hope this makes viewing for you more pleasurable.
Gleather
I’ve known Glenn and Heather for quite some time now, but for the past three years, they have allowed me to pull my trailer onto their land, and stay at their place. Even though I end up giving a monetary donation, they have never really asked for it. I try to contribute my time as what I would like to call “ranch hand” even though most of my time is spent either rock climbing, or taking photos. Glenn is a bit of a renaissance man. Makes anything from kneepads and dog collars, and builds anything from truck storage boxes to straw bale houses and yurts… It always reminds me of the old SNL skit with Paul Simon and Victoria Jackson where she smelted copper to make him a watch while they were stuck on a deserted island. “Oh that, I made it…” Heather is equally as great. Keeping Gleatherland (their ranch name) maintained, helping out with all of the work, and super strong on the rocks easily bagging really hard hueco lines every season. During a recent stay, they asked me to grab a couple of head shots of them for their use, which I was happy to do.
Click on the below image to view larger:
Glenn and Heather Johnson
If you are planning to head out to Hueco anytime soon, and you are looking for something quieter, and away from the crowds, Gleatherland is offering a couple of options of places to stay. They have The Bomber Inn (an old RV painted like a bomber) and The Mongoli Inn (314 sq ft yurt), both pictured below. Contact Heather Johnson via Facebook for more info:
The Bomber Inn and The Mongoli Inn
30,529
Just in-case anybody was curious, that is how many photographs I took in 2011. Or at least how many actually made it into Lightroom. That includes all jobs, all climbing trips, all events, all shooting just for fun, all test shots, all location scouting etc etc, as well as some of the throw-a-ways too. I wonder how many I actually deleted in camera? This number is 2037 less images than I took in 2010. I’d have to say that 2011 has been one of the best years for me and my business. It was super fun and I feel fortunate and blessed to be able to be doing what I am doing. Thanks to everyone for the word of mouth, thanks to all my clients, thanks to my photo mentors, and thanks to everyone who stepped in front of my lens to let me take their photo, even if you didn’t know it… I couldn’t be doing what I am doing with out you.
My very first image of 2011 was taken :18 min after midnight. I guess I was to busy celebrating and wishing everyone a Happy New Year to be taking photos of the actual drop, but you can tell the people are still partying!
First Image of 2011
My very last image of 2011, although will definitely not ever win me an award, will always be a great memory of the time I got spend with really great friends (new and old ones) wrapping up a wonderful year, and bringing in a new one. This one was taken at 3:59 pm after a day of some great bouldering and just before we headed back to Horseshoe Canyon Ranch in the Ozarks of Arkansas for the night festivities:
Last image of 2011
I should probably save my first image of 2012 for next years blog post, but I’m to excited about it and I feel that it’s a great image to start of 2012.
First image of 2012
Thanks again to everyone, and I am looking forward to 2012 being a great year!
Merry Christmas…
..and Happy Holidays to all!!! Hope everyone is having a wonderful and relaxing time off. Love this time of year! Click on the image below to view it larger:
Zilker Park Christmas Tree
