I guess it's almost a sport... Worthing Birdman + Surprise guest

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Phal

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Etienne
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Popped to Worthing yesterday since the weather turned out better than predicted and caught the last little bit of their International Birdman competition. The wind speeds were quite high so they weren't allowed to try to fly with their usual contraptions. The only people making the leap were guys who'd left their flying machines at home and the 'Condor' class competitors which are basically Hang Gliders! One guy almost made it to the beach :)

The flying hoverboard guy was more fun to watch though!

Whole album is here - https://www.flickr.com/photos/phal44/sets/72157645668715064/



1

Longest distance covered by this guy and this is just as he's starting to crashland

Ruh Roh by Phal44, on Flickr

2

Crashland in progress

Sniffing the water by Phal44, on Flickr

3

Just after takeoff

Gliiiiide by Phal44, on Flickr

4

One of the Kingfisher class competitors... Basically these are guys in fancy dress (or not) that just jump off the end!

Weeeee by Phal44, on Flickr

5

This guy really went for his jump!

Rahhhhhhhhh by Phal44, on Flickr
 
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6

Hoverguy got some decent altitude!

Weeeeeeeeeee by Phal44, on Flickr

7

Dive x4 by Phal44, on Flickr

8

Definitely looks cool :)

Wooshy by Phal44, on Flickr

9

Going Down by Phal44, on Flickr

10

Just to show off, he used one of the safety patrol as an extra and did a Titanic impression

Titanic? by Phal44, on Flickr

11

The original shot was quite cool but I decided to play around with it a bit more and got this! Not exactly accurate colours but it definitely seems to pop more!

Twirly Swirly Flying re-edit by Phal44, on Flickr
 
Looks liek a fun day.. however.. the photogrpahs... all the subjects (people) are under exposed which is a shame
 
I've already highlighted the faces and bumped the exposure +1. I guess I could do a bit more but they'll get quite blotchy then! With the south facing beach, all of their faces were in the shade when facing the beach anyway :/ Would have been more convenient to have a slightly east facing beach so they'd have the sun in the face a bit more hehe

The last shot is definitely over-saturated but that's by design. The rest all received a little saturation and contrast boost in PP but not by much. The few monitors that I browse pictures from aren't calibrated though so perhaps they're a bit off?
 
Phal said:
I've already highlighted the faces and bumped the exposure +1. I guess I could do a bit more but they'll get quite blotchy then! With the south facing beach, all of their faces were in the shade when facing the beach anyway :/
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Its not the same in post processing.. if you know the pople are in the shade you should over expose when shooting.. especialy when sky in background... yes it blows the background out but your not having both.. the subjects more important... expose for the subject.. not the scene.... HTH :)
 
Interesting fun set ... those pier pillars look very close in #4!
 
KIPAX said:
Its not the same in post processing.. if you know the pople are in the shade you should over expose when shooting.. especialy when sky in background... yes it blows the background out but your not having both.. the subjects more important... expose for the subject.. not the scene.... HTH :)
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I was once told, hold your hand out, palm up, expose for that as a starting point, then adjust
 
Byker28i said:
I was once told, hold your hand out, palm up, expose for that as a starting point, then adjust
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You would need long arms for this shoot.......
 
I was there as well, it was great fun. I believe the first prize with shared between Mr Hughes and Mr Freeman as I think there was something like 0.2 seconds between them overall.

The conditions were challenging, I could hardly see straight there was so much glare, I was shooting with +2/3 EV most of the day, when facing from the beach towards the pier.
 
KIPAX said:
Its not the same in post processing.. if you know the pople are in the shade you should over expose when shooting.. especialy when sky in background... yes it blows the background out but your not having both.. the subjects more important... expose for the subject.. not the scene.... HTH :)
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Would you still say to expose for the subject even on the wider shots? Those are there to show the height he was getting and to show the other boats etc but exposing for the subject in those would be a bit bright on the eyes lol.

I'll have to have a play around later to see how much more I can tweak the shots. I'm not sure I like the idea of having blown bits all over the sky and in the reflections :(
 
Lindsay D said:
I was there as well, it was great fun. I believe the first prize with shared between Mr Hughes and Mr Freeman as I think there was something like 0.2 seconds between them overall.

The conditions were challenging, I could hardly see straight there was so much glare, I was shooting with +2/3 EV most of the day, when facing from the beach towards the pier.
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Yeah, I guess with all the sun around I didn't anticipate any issues with exposure but I forgot about their faces :( lol If I know i'm shooting stuff in the shade then I'll normally make sure the exposure and metering is set appropriately but in this case it never really crossed my mind hehe.

The crowd definitely liked it when Mr Hughes almost made it to the beach!
 
Phal said:
Yeah, I guess with all the sun around I didn't anticipate any issues with exposure but I forgot about their faces :( lol If I know i'm shooting stuff in the shade then I'll normally make sure the exposure and metering is set appropriately but in this case it never really crossed my mind hehe.

The crowd definitely liked it when Mr Hughes almost made it to the beach!
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I wouldn't worry about it, it's virtually impossible to get nicely balanced exposures in those conditions - it was savage.

Apparently on the Saturday there were quite a lot of injuries including a broken jaw, dislocated shoulder, and two back injuries!

Don't forget about Worthing Festival in August, there should be some nice picture opportunities then.
 
Phal said:
Would you still say to expose for the subject even on the wider shots? Those are there to show the height he was getting and to show the other boats etc but exposing for the subject in those would be a bit bright on the eyes lol.

I'll have to have a play around later to see how much more I can tweak the shots. I'm not sure I like the idea of having blown bits all over the sky and in the reflections :(
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I normally just do a quick visual assessment of the scene taking into account overall brightness and how significant my subject is within the frame. So on a day like that, exposing just for the subject isn't going to give a good result. I'll take a more balanced exposure which will allow me to tweak things a bit afterwards if I need to, this approach will avoid blown highlights and too many blocked shadows. During processing a minor curves tweak is always necessary. The main thing is not to murder the exposure at the time of capture. In some of the shots (the distant ones) you're also going to lose some clarity and contrast due to environmental interference which is of course worse if you are on the coast.
 
Lindsay D said:
I wouldn't worry about it, it's virtually impossible to get nicely balanced exposures in those conditions - it was savage.

Apparently on the Saturday there were quite a lot of injuries including a broken jaw, dislocated shoulder, and two back injuries!

Don't forget about Worthing Festival in August, there should be some nice picture opportunities then.
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I didn't see any of the Saturday as I was otherwise engaged and I wasn't planning on going Sunday but when the weather brightened up, it seemed rude not to! :) One guy on the Sunday kinda flopped in on his back which looked like it might sting a bit but other than that it didn't seem too bad.

Worthing Festival? Never heard of it so I guess I'll Google! Been living in Shoreham for 6-7 years now so maybe I should know? heh
 
I didn't see the Saturday event either, but I was talking to someone who helps out with the organisation and apparently they were fishing quite a few injured bodies out of the water!

Worthing festival/carnival is 25th August.

I've lived in the area for over 30 years (on and off) and I didn't find out about these things until very recently - often it's the attractions closest to home which get overlooked.
 
Lindsay D said:
I wouldn't worry about it, .
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yeagh why worry about getting exposure right in your pictures.. waste of time eh....

yes its harder with the wider shots as the subject si the scene. but most of what you ahve posted could absoloutly be better exposed.. everyhting else is right bar that.. you can take Lindsays advice and not worry about it or next time try exposing for the subject as IMHO the pics would work better that way... my advice is based on what to do next time to improve rather than what you can do to these pictures..

Anyways good luck with it :)
 
KIPAX said:
yeagh why worry about getting exposure right in your pictures.. waste of time eh....

. you can take Lindsays advice and not worry about it or next time try exposing for the subject as IMHO the pics would work better that way... my advice is based on what to do next time to improve rather than what you can do to these pictures..

Anyways good luck with it :)
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Crumbs. I meant not worry about in the sense that it was a recreational outing and lessons can be learned for next time. I also didn't want to be harsh on the OP for getting some exposures wrong - since I was giving him valid advice for next time. Actually, in those conditions if you exposed solely for a small subject in a black wetsuit you're likely to be looking at a lot of blown areas in the rest of your frame.

To suggest I have a sloppy approach to photography is a bit strange.
 
Ooh thread drama :D lol

Anyway, I've checked a few of the shots and I seem to need to go +1 or even +2 to get the dude in the black wetsuit to be reasonable well exposed and I'm left with a rather white looking sea :\ Obviously it looks worse here than it would be if I had exposed correctly whilst I was out there but I'm still scared I'll burn out my retinas by looking at shots like that lol

I guess I can always go practise on some kite surfers or wind surfers sometime! It was my first proper use with my new Sigma 120-300 so I was trying to get used to that too! All good fun and a break from my usual type of pics
 
Phal said:
... to get the dude in the black wetsuit to be reasonable well exposed and I'm left with a rather white looking sea :\ Obviously it looks worse here than it would be if I had exposed correctly whilst I was out there but I'm still scared I'll burn out my retinas by looking at shots like that lol

I guess I can always go practise on some kite surfers or wind surfers sometime! It was my first proper use with my new Sigma 120-300 so I was trying to get used to that too! All good fun and a break from my usual type of pics
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Yep, that's exactly what I meant. This is why exposures are going to be a compromise when you have to shoot in these conditions, from that direction, with that kind of light. There's not a lot you can do about it, hence my other comment about not worrying too much. I think you made a good effort under the circumstances.
 
Well thanks for that :) I think there's definitely a bit more wiggle room with the exposure before I start getting blown bits but I guess that's just something I'll need to remember for next time!
 
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