Wish you were here?

June 1st, 2009

Ever since I picked up a Canon 5D Mark 2 camera I’ve been thinking of putting together little videos on shoots as a behind-the-scenes look at what goes on at a shoot.  Of course I almost always forget while it’s going on, so this is probably the first of what I’ll from now-on term the oh-shit-I-forgot-the-video-here’s-a-shot-of-empty-trail style of documentary - a fantastic singletrack view of Mount Hood in the Oregon backcountry:

In lieu of any real action here’s some numbers to crunch:

  • 2 - hours we waited for golden light
  • 1 - trailside beer consumed while doing so
  • 1 - wood tick removed from my leg, luckily before it bit me.  I hate ticks.
  • 5 - cotton buds required to clean my ears of all the dust

Jerry Blog

May 22nd, 2009
Jerry Willows

Jerry Willows hucks over a rock step down

Check out NSMB.com’s Jerry Willows’ blog about our shoot with legendary North Shore builder / filmer Digger last week:

North Shore Photo / Vid Jam

Kranked - Revolution & Evolution

May 14th, 2009

The next installment of the always awesome Kranked series is a mere two weeks away - Kranked 8: Revolve is slated for a June 1st release and from what I’ve seen already it’s destined to be the best yet.  Here’s the trailer for those of you who haven’t seen it yet - be sure to set your underpants to ’stun’:

For the second year running I’ve been lucky enough to work on stills for a section of the movie, and was yet again blown away by the level of riding, creativeness and craftsmanship that have been captured on film.  It’s truly awe-inspiring, and as usual the Coastal Crew were fantastic to work with; if any aspiring pros out there want pointers in work ethic they need look no further than Dylan, Curtis and the Kyles for how it should be done - relentless optimism, professionalism and just general awesomeness is all these guys know.

In lieu of the magazine-bound action shots, here’s a sneak peak taster of some of the behind-the-scenes images from my time with the crew:

A Night’s Entertainment

February 9th, 2009

Ever seen a grown man freak out before a few hundred people, stammer wildly then run off stage in tears? Well your lucky night could well be February 26th, when I present a slideshow of my images as part of the Vancouver International Mountain Film Festival.

Based loosely on the notion of me actually thinking most aspects of mountain biking are kinda cool, it’s a 4 minute slideshow with music followed by 5 minutes Q&A, where I desperately try to pretend I know what I’m talking about.  Chance of looking foolish I’m putting at a conservative 95%.

Details are here, if you’re in the area and can make it down, it’d be great to see you!

Hold the back page!

January 9th, 2009

Following up from my previous post about the Todmorden Cyclocross, here’s a couple of shots that race organiser, Singletrack magazine editor and all-round nice chap Chipps Chippendale sent of today’s local paper:

Todmorden News

Back page

Todmorden News

The heady heights of page 17

I don’t often see my shots in newspapers, so this one’s got quite a novelty right now.

Ah Yes, I Remember Now…

January 5th, 2009

Nothing says “welcome back to the UK” quite like standing in a field on a grey, overcast day, fingers and toes growing steadily more numb as the cold slowly takes over, waiting for a race to start and wondering if actually it would’ve been wiser to stay inside that day.

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Dedicated Follower of Fashion

January 5th, 2009

It’s as close to a New Year’s resolution that I’m going to make - a decision to work out what all the fuss around Twitter is by giving it a go (again).  I can’t promise it’ll be any more riveting than anyone else’s, but for those that are interested my profile’s here:

http://twitter.com/danbarham/

8 from ‘08 - The Rejects

December 28th, 2008

So a combination of last-minute jobs, a prolonged period of feeling under the weather and no doubt the usual dose of S.A.D. have meant that I’ve neglected to write anything here for a noticeably long time.  Here’s a bumper end-of-year post to hopefully make up for it, filled to the brim with a bunch of reject shots.

Hang on, before you disappear in disgust, hear me out;  these shots aren’t rejects in the out-of-focus, motion blurred or badly composed category (although I’ve got plenty of those too), but images that for one reason or another didn’t work out.  Here’s my eight favourites from the bunch that went nowhere; as normal you can click on ‘em to make ‘em bigger-er…

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Faking it. Again.

November 5th, 2008
Out now in Singletrack #45

Out now in Singletrack #45

The latest issue of Singletrack magazine just hit the shelves in the UK - once again it’s their yearly photo annual, and them being the nice chaps they are they ran a feature of mine, as part of the ‘Scenes’ theme for the issue.

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The End is the Beginning is the End

October 30th, 2008

For the last few weeks now I’ve been delaying the inevitable, going to great lengths to delay the onset of winter by spending most of my time in the desert pretending the days weren’t getting shorter.  It couldn’t last though, and I realised I was staring down the barrel of oncoming snow without much in the way of Fall / Autumn (delete as per your geographical location) shooting under my belt.

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