Action Self Portrait
By geoff waugh
8 Nov 2008
I must have had dog breath after a big beer and curry session the night before because I couldn't get my usual models/victims to come and strut their stuff in front of my lens that day. So, necessity being the mother of invention or, all needs, or mixed metaphors or jumbled up cliches, I decided to shoot myself. If you get my drift. And here is (one) of the results. I shot this using the Manfrotto (Bogen) Magic Arm, an ingenius piece of clamping wizardry that has a Superclamp at one end, a camera or strobe mount at the other and because of ball joints at each end and in the centre, can be angled almost anyway you desire and then clamped rigid with a lever. I put my old Nikon 801 body on the platform and clamped the other end to my handlebar. To get as much in the frame as possible I shot with a 16mm Fisheye (How I wish I hadn't sold that little beauty now Nikon has reneged on its word and launch full frame. But I digress). An SB-24 (this stuff is ancient now huh. But it still works) set to rear curtain added a little fill to my face. I shot on manual and rode trail a few times running various shutter speed and aperture combinations to achieve the right look. These ranged between about an 8th to 30 of a second. I chose a piece of track that had trees which I knew would add streaks to the final image to yield a 'ground rush' effect. I triggered the camera with a long cable release taped to the grip under my thumb. The weight of camera,lens and flash put a lot of leverage on the arm and I was forced to add a bungee cord for a bit of extra security! Still, I think it worked out pretty good even though the fish made my legs look weird (got to work on the tan;-) Until next time.
cheers me dears
Geoff
2 responses
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Paul Alexander Knox gave props (10 Nov 2008):
Great technique, thanks for sharing it.
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Heather Shimmin said (12 Nov 2008):
Nice shot. Could you provide a photo of your set up? It would be very helpful.
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