the predatory bird

Tag: Photography

A Bunch of Amateurs

Fate recently returned me to the Skatepark of Tampa. On this occasion I would be attending the 2013 Tampa Am contest.
The night before the trip I became filled with a desire to capture some of the action so I stood in the front room with my camera and tossed a wild thing up towards the ceiling. If the built in flash on the little Lumix could freeze the motion of this fierce stuffed beast then photographing a back nose blunt in a dimly lit Florida warehouse would be child’s play, or at least an approximation thereof.

Nailed it!

Upon arriving at the Skatepark of Tampa I found Kevin Wilkins of The Skateboard Mag reflecting on the absurd injustice of it all.

And Colin Kennedy, Nike SB Europe’s dream manager, remaining stoic.

It didn’t take too long to track down a back nose blunt. Aha! See! The onboard flash can do it! On closer inspection you’ll find that if your ISO is maxed out it gives it that sand-sculpture look. Perfect for Instagram.
Then Jon lent me an external flash unit.
I sought out fresh meat. One of the most gifted technical street skaters of our time.
Kickflip light test looks okay.
Back lip skewered by a pillar? It’ll do.

I decided to head outside into the gentle late afternoon Tampa light and mingle. Much nicer.
Dare I say gorgeous?
I found Big News being discussed.

Revelers.
Chillers.

True professionals,

Wu afficionados.

T-Funk

And even more dream management.

Brief, beautiful, sordid moments of clarity and oblivion swirled all around me like some strange visual poem.

A Floridian poem.

Full of strange characters and tall Englishmen.
Tyshawn remained in a New York state of mind.
And as the dice battle raged round the back…

…things took a turn for the worse round the front.

More and more bills got thrown into the mix…

As carnage ensued.

Dice were rolled.

Eggs were hurled.

Dice. Rolling.

Eggs. Flying.

Fortunes were won and lost.

As a few brave souls charged for the finish line.

And to the victors go the spoils.
Skateboarding is safe and well.

December 17, 2013
Tetherball: The Sport Behind the Sportsmen

The release of A Place in the Sun proved that Russell Houghten can paint a compelling and pristine picture of skateboarding in Los Angeles. But, when something is all shiny there’s some part of each one of us that wants to reach out and start scratching it up a little. Questions can do that and critics might ask; Has Houghten become a slave to color depth? Is his equipment slowing him down? As stunning as his work is, has Russell Houghten’s drive to become the greatest action sports documentarian of our time imposed some limiting factors on his agility as a filmmaker? The answers are subjective. What we now know for a fact is that there was another camera eye on location during the making of New Balance Numeric’s first video. That eye was watching, thinking and planning before swooping in all like,
“Yo, Tyler. It would be tight if we filmed a line here real quick while Russell’s all wrapped up with that time-lapse.”
The result is part behind-the-scenes documentary, part alternative-angle compilation and part investigation into a new and troubling urban sport that’s sweeping the empty school yards of LA.
This video contains many layers: Alternative angles; rare and exclusive new footage; still photography pasted in with a stock camera-shutter sound-effect; jump-cuts, titling, split-audio edits, cross fades, fade-ins and fade-outs; BGPs from Mike O Meally, Atiba Jefferson, Russell Houghten and possibly even Suge Knight strolling past Talib Kweli’s temporary parking lot. It is basically the Inception of skateboard videos. It is the dream within the dream and the thing I love more than anything else is that what happens behind the scenes of a Hollywood skate production is, simply, more skating.

Annonymous asked: “How do you get these robust taught-chested sportsmen to perform these breathtaking moves?”
Answer: “By refining my hang ten technique at any available opportunity and toning my camera arm on the Tetherball court. Judging from the shakycam of some of these clips it needs more work.”

August 28, 2013
A Forest in a Land filled with Trees
The Last of the Jigsaw Decks
and
And Ambitious Photo Essay with a Loose Data Aggregation Theme: Part One

When you spend time staring at all the small fiddly bits of a project – the individual trees – you can often lose sight of the bigger picture you’re building – the spooky woods, the deep forests and the vast, dense, jungles.

This is an old problem resulting from our only possessing two eyes and them being rooted in sockets located strictly on the front of our skulls. Luckily we have invented tools that allow us to see the forest as a whole; or at least get a decent impression of it.

So, what am I going on about? (more…)

May 21, 2013
Everything Goes

A photographer waltzes with hydrants while following a loose board around a city block.

Shot and edited by Joe Pease

April 23, 2013