Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 Welcome to seeking focus, episode eight, all about bicycles, photography, and videography
Speaker 1 00:00:07 And cool people. Cool, cool.
Speaker 2 00:00:14 Welcome to seeking focus, a podcast that provides photographers and videographers with a place to critically compare technology, share ideas, and then hops best skills.
Speaker 0 00:00:29 So welcome back to another week. How are you?
Speaker 1 00:00:32 I'm going well, man, I'm going well. Just, um, everything is picked up again, which is a good thing. And I'm just flying my drones, getting lost at Melbourne, not the Melbourne electronic university. I picked up a new client. I'll try it. And I'm driving to that place. It's just amazing.
Speaker 0 00:00:49 It is my brother actually went to university there and it was a, it was amazing even back then and now they've expanded it as well. So, um,
Speaker 1 00:00:57 Yeah, you walk in and there's just buildings, car parks and just everything everywhere. Just pretty impressive. But, um, yeah. Other than that, yeah, same, same, same not much. I don't know. Uh what's how's your weekend?
Speaker 0 00:01:11 Um, yeah, not there. And I picked up a couple of new clients. One of the things that I love about photography and videography is every day, it's something different. Um, two days ago I was working on models and ears and jewelry. Um, today I was working with, uh, chemical plants. Uh, so it's from one day to the next. There's so much variety. It's amazing.
Speaker 1 00:01:29 You meet all different people and, you know, you sort of learn or sort of those different industries. And I think it's right. What we do is like, I enjoy it anyways. So, um, yeah, it's, uh, it's great to meet people and, you know, get out there and understand different things. Definitely. What have we got today, man?
Speaker 0 00:01:47 I tell you we've got a special guest in the studio office. Um, someone who I admire deeply, um, his name is Daniel Brooks. He is a photographer and he does a lot of stuff in the mountain-biking area, uh, which, uh, we're big fans of mountain biking, but, uh, welcome.
Speaker 3 00:02:02 How are ya? Great, man. Thank you for inviting
Speaker 0 00:02:05 Me in. Fabulous. Fabulous. Um, so just a little bit of background. Um, you do a lot of the mountain biking, photography around Melbourne and in Victoria generally. Um, do you do interstate stuff as well? Or just predominantly?
Speaker 3 00:02:18 Yeah, obviously when the, uh, you know, we, haven't got COVID happening and we're allowed to travel, um, I've been, you know, everywhere across Australia essentially. Um, I've shot a couple of events. Um, I think Cairns the world cup in 2014, um, and the well championships that were held there in 2017, um, Tasmania I've traveled to quite a bit. So, um, yeah, all across Australia.
Speaker 0 00:02:45 Fabulous. I, I actually, um, I met, uh, I met Dan, um, probably about four years ago. I officially, uh, when Marty and myself were doing, uh, photography walking Melbourne city, um, at the time he, Dan joined us and I didn't realize who he was, but I had actually sort of met him a couple of months earlier. Um, I was at a mountain biking event at the yangs here in Victoria and I was taking photos. I was walking along and I was walking up the track and I stumbled across this section, which was this big tree line sort of area. And as I looked up, I saw all these flashes hanging from the train of thought, what in the world is happening here? Um, it didn't really impress you that it, well, it caught my attention, definitely caught my attention. Um, and so basically I turned around and I saw this person there, but, um, I didn't know who he was and I just sat there and watched him for a while.
Speaker 0 00:03:32 And he had all these people around him and, you know, he was like the Fonz, the popular guy, the popular guy. Um, and you know, so I watched him for a while. I was very impressed. I got to see a lot of his photos afterwards and I was like, wow. But when he came on the photography walk, I actually didn't put two and two together until after it had finished. And, and then I went, oh my God, it was him. It was him. Um, and, and your work Daniels is it's amazing. I love the work, the work you do, you capture the moment, you know, all the action is there. It's, it's just fantastic. So, um, thank you very much for coming in today.
Speaker 3 00:04:04 Thanks for inviting me. Um, thanks for the kudos.
Speaker 0 00:04:08 So I want to ask how did you get into it in the first place?
Speaker 3 00:04:11 Um, well, I've been, I think mountain biking, pretty much my whole life. Um, but photography wise, um, really it started, um, surprisingly enough. Um, I was really into golf for quite a while. Um, and I had this obsession with essentially going around Australia and playing, you know, every golf course I could find. Um, and I just loved the environment that brought you into the, you know, the perfectly manicured courses and it just sort of lent itself perfectly to, you know, shooting in, you know, early light and, you know, really getting to know sort of the composition of leading lines and, you know, the environment and so forth. Um, and while I was playing golf, I thought, you know, why not take a whole bunch of photos? Um, and I started selling them back to the, uh, the golf clubs themselves. Um, and it was, it was around about the time sort of mid to late two thousands where golf courses were really starting to develop their websites and, and, uh, start putting in, um, sort of virtual tours if you like on the, on the websites.
Speaker 3 00:05:21 So that people that wanting to visit can go in there and just check out what the course is like. Um, so that was, you know, essentially enough to really, after I sold them, the videos back, the pictures back I'd, uh, end up making my money back from paying for the room. So, um, it, and then that sort of then took me into, um, landscape photography. Um, and that together with mountain biking, photography is really where I've become really passionate about, I think. Um, and now I'm blessed to have a job that, uh, my day job isn't photography. Um, my day job is a risk management consultant for an insurance company. Um, and that involves a lot of travel around Victoria and Tasmania, um, and
Speaker 0 00:06:06 Just, just happens to coincide with the race days. Right. Yeah.
Speaker 3 00:06:10 And of course, every trip I take an extra couple of days and, you know, find myself in the mountains of Tasmania or up in the Alpine ranges of Victoria or whatever it might be. Um, and, and that's, you know, that seems to compliment very well with, you know, the, the interest of mountain biking really, you know, I heard you talking about in one of your earlier episodes, you love the fact that, you know, the bites take you out into places that you wouldn't normally see. Um, and that's something I really get to get out of mountain biking as well. Um, it's a little bit hard to take a, you know, five kilo, five kilo camera and lens, and you know, all the rest of it out into riding, um, you know, into the rainforest. But, um, um, whenever I can, I I'll take my camera along and, um, you know, spend an extra couple of hours walking around the, the environment that I'm in and take photos at the same time.
Speaker 0 00:07:02 Did you take your bike with you when you're traveling for work? So you take a bike along
Speaker 3 00:07:06 Slightly? Yeah, pretty much every time I trapped traveled to Tasmania, I'll take the spirit of Tasmania and, and load the bike up and the camera gear and everything else. And that's impressive. Yeah. That's impressive.
Speaker 0 00:07:17 I love that living the life. I love
Speaker 3 00:07:20 It. Yeah. You can't complain about that. That's for sure.
Speaker 0 00:07:23 Work paying for the older extra gear pretty much.
Speaker 3 00:07:26 Yeah, yeah, yeah. They, they don't, they pay for the travel, um, you know, company car with fuel card. Um, you know,
Speaker 0 00:07:36 We're in, we're in the long, long, long one at work. So that's, that's, that's impressive. I don't think many people could probably both that and not advantageous enough. Um, all right. Um, back to that first time that I met you now, as I was walking up the hill, I noticed you had multiple flashes hanging I'm and to makes the tree. So can you explain to me the concept behind, I think it was like three flashes at different intervals, so they weren't all grouped together to get that nice, bright color in one spot they were staggered. So it gives a bit of a rundown of how you do your photography.
Speaker 3 00:08:11 Well, I, I use a Canon five D mark for, um, that's evolved over time. I've sort of gone from a re originally, went on a shooting mountain bike. So worked my way up from a 600 D um, into a 60, and now the five D mark for, um, it's not ideal for, for mountain biking or sport photography, but it does the job. Um, certainly, you know, it works. Um, but I like to have that avenue to do landscape as well. So, um, um, uh, with the off-camera flash stuff, that was really an early influence, I suppose. Um, one of my early influences for mountain bike photography was a guy by the name of Jason Stephens. Um, he used to shoot a lot around Victoria, but also travel, um, internationally to shoot wild cups. Um, and he did a lot of that off-camera flash work, um, and essentially it involves, um, at least two flashes.
Speaker 3 00:09:09 Um, you need to have, um, you know, speed lights, um, and some transponders to control them. Um, and what you're looking to do in most cases is have a, have a light that lights up the front of the rider. And I'd liked that that sort of provides you with that sort of sharp edge from behind the writer. Um, so the, the, the real light sort of provides a little bit of fill light around the environment, the immediate environment around the rider itself. Um, these days I don't do that much of the off-camera flash work. It can be quite tricky to set up and you've got to carry a lot more gear when you, when you're walking around the mountain side. Um, and there are, uh, some writers out there that don't like having, you know, a flash golf in their faces, they're riding past 60 Ks. And
Speaker 2 00:09:59 Why will that happen?
Speaker 3 00:10:01 Um, despite the fact that, you know, you take as much care as possible to, to make sure that you're setting the flash up side, that it's not directly in their line of sight, if you like, um, like he wouldn't set it up on the inside of a corner, um, as they're riding through one of those big, massive drops.
Speaker 2 00:10:16 Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3 00:10:20 In some cases off-camera flash work is, is almost, you know, compulsory, if you like. Um, for example, if you're in the deep rain forest of, um, Cairns, for example, you're just not going to get that ambient light to get a really quick shutter speed. So you get that blurred picture exactly. Unless you're taking pan shots, which, you know, you can, you can go down to one 20th of a second, um, you to get, you know, most of the, sort of real, still action shots that you're taking it, you know, a thousands of a second or 1200, so it's seconds, something like that. Um, so you, you're very reliant on having a lot of flesh to get a clear shot. Yeah. Um, so yeah, that's, um, you know, that's, I spent probably two or three years, um, experimenting using that a lot, um, at race events and, and also, you know, the odd, um, you know, client that would come out and want me to do promotional shots of their writers. Um, and then nowadays the, you know, having moved across to the Canon five D mark four, um, it's such a better camera, um, and you know, with great lenses, you spend $3,000 on a lens. Um, you're getting so much more light into the camera anyway, so there's no, there's not as much need to use artificial light, I guess the other side of it as well is you, don't using artificial light. I've found it's great to create a really sharp image, but it's very difficult to get a natural looking, definitely light. Um, um,
Speaker 0 00:11:55 And they're very excelled at using flashes. So I've tried to stay away from them. So I always get that unnatural look, which I can't deal with afterwards. Yeah. Um, there's a lot of people who are really good at actually editing those afterwards, but I'm not one of those people. So I've everything that I've ever done has been without flesh. Um, yeah, unless of course it's a function that, you know, some closed a wedding or a party or something like that, where you have no choice, but for that type of thing that you're doing, um, and then that day that actually came across you for the first time I was, I was actually doing all my shots without a flash. I was doing panning shots and stuff like that. Um, and I'd say a large proportion of them were blurry. Um, so I can understand where you're using those, but sorry, I cut you off. So you're, you're talking about not using those anymore nowadays.
Speaker 3 00:12:34 That's right. I think, um, you know, my current influences, um, very few of them use off-camera flash work. Um, you know, off-camera flashes. Um, and I think you get, you get more of the environment in your shot, um, with a flashlight, you, you light up the rider really well, that you don't tend to get, you know, the background that welded up. Um, I follow a guy by the name of, uh, mad dog virus on Instagram. Um, he's probably one of the most renowned mountain bike photographers in the world. I think, um, he follows around the Enduro world series and the world cups and another guy by the name of Kevin Martin. Um, both of them, you know, very well-renowned mountain bike photographers. Um, and they're more, you know, they're more inclined to sort of get a natural looking exposure and use, you know, the real world light, I mean their shots.
Speaker 3 00:13:32 Um, and it's, it's just so much more convenient as well. Not having to carry around flashes, set up truckloads on the side of the track, or, you know, like you saw me sometimes you're having to strap a flesh speed light to a tree branch somewhere. And, um, yeah. But yeah, you still, it still leaves you with the odd challenge when you're in a very dark forest or something. Um, but most of the time I'll just sort of, uh, try to change my composure these days to, to make up for that. Um, so like I said earlier, you, you working generally at around 1200 for the second shot, which is hard to achieve, um, in a very dark environment. Um, that's when the riders are traveling at full speed, if they're traveling, you know, through, uh, a tight corner or over some very technical obstacles, often they'll slow down quite a bit. So you can reduce your shutter speed quite a bit. Um, you won't go down, I don't find myself going down below sort of eight hundreds of a second. Um, if, you know, if necessary, you can always boost your ISL up to a thousand or something like that. I don't really like to go over that because you start to get a lot of green, but mark four should be able to handle that ISO a little bit higher,
Speaker 1 00:14:51 So yeah,
Speaker 0 00:14:52 It should handle it, but then it does produce a bit of for, so, um, it's great for landscapes and stuff, but, um, it does create a bit of a graininess, which I tend to knock over a thousand as well. I occasionally we'll drop it to a thousand, but I try and avoid that as well. Um, but yeah, so it's,
Speaker 1 00:15:09 I don't have that problem with sinus Daniel. Can I just ask you a question? Um, you mentioned that you sort of, you walk into the track and whatever else, just walk me through your train of thought, if you can. Eh, how would you say, you know, where would you set up? Like, would you sort of, would, you know, the track and then you go and you set up that sort of in the speed light or in a specific location?
Speaker 3 00:15:35 Um, well, most tracks these days I've been there. God knows how many times before, so it's fairly unusual that I'll go to a venue and I don't know the track. Um, but even then most of the time, um, I'll walk along and just see whether they've created any new features or, you know, um, whether there's anything where there's anything interesting that, you know, I want to actually capture. Um, but most of the time what I'm looking for is, um, some something where you're going to capture the writers where they're sort of, I like to think of it as in a dynamic body position. Um, so when they're either just going, starting to go off a drop or, you know, jumps or a classic one, um, but you know, even simple turn into a berm if they're, if you can capture them at the right moment, just as they're sort of just as they're turning in, um, that is typically where you get the best sort of, you know, the most appealing body position on a bike.
Speaker 3 00:16:38 The other thing I'd like to look for is, um, you know, probably the last, I didn't do it when I started, I'd admit that, you know, I'd just go onto a shot and take, come onto a track and take a million photos and hope that some of them turn out, but I put a lot more thought into composition these days. Um, I'll look for leading lines. Um, I think about, um, the rule of thirds, obviously, um, where, um, a lot of the time I'm trying to capture the bike in the front of the frame and then with the, with the tracks sort of disappearing off into the background, um, or I might say there's a, you know, use, use a tree in the background to, to fill out the rest of the shot with, with the rider in the foreground. Um, all the other option is, um, you know, you can, obviously, the rider is obviously your, your subject, but you're taking more of the shot of the environment around it. So you sort of step back and the rider might take up just a third of the photo or even less,
Speaker 1 00:17:37 It's obviously different track. We'll give you a better, different obviously perspective of that component. So, you know, there'll be some obviously cases where you just try to capture the environment more than anything else with the rider in the environment. And then nother section will be obviously just trying to fill the frame with it. Write itself. Yeah.
Speaker 3 00:17:56 Yep. Cool. I'm also known to, to go and put myself in some pretty stupid positions on the track to try and capture, you know, the real danger of, of, of, you know, particularly downhill now
Speaker 0 00:18:06 The shot. I mean, I used to do all wheel drive racing, you know, between the tree and the front wheel of the car flying past 80 kilometers an hour. And you're like, yeah, I got the shot, you know, and then you look back at it a few years later and you think I'm still, you know, still standing, I've still got my legs, it's a miracle. Um, you know, how many times did I almost get crushed between a car and a tree? Um, so I completely understand where you're coming from with that, but, uh, yeah. It's yeah,
Speaker 3 00:18:30 Yeah. You're young, you know, you put yourself on the outside of a corner where we're at, right as we're coming in at 60, 70 Ks an hour. Um, and one of the things that all mountain bikers are trying to get is what's known as the roost shot, where they sort of breaking into a corner and they're just creating this dust cloud behind them. And it makes for a great photo. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:18:49 I've, I've seen some of your work when you do that. An amazing, amazing, and it's capturing, especially now that you told me that you're not really using flashes that much anymore, capturing that, that, you know, that rooster is sort of hell. It's like, wow, that's amazing. So, um, I was actually thinking about the, the placement, um, you know, how you're talking about thirds earlier on, which is one of the big things that we've speak about here all the time, that the third, um, so would you be placing the boss' bike into the rear third and having the rider face, planting the F uh, forefoot, um, when you're doing those action shots with the person's crashing,
Speaker 3 00:19:23 I am one of the things that always seems to frustrate it frustrate me a bit when I, when I go to events is I always seem to miss the crashes. Um, they always seem to happen just slightly below me where I've just been five seconds ago. Um, but, um, and I do move around quite a bit. Um, you know, I see a lot of mountain bike photographers that sort of sit there and just take shot after shot, after shot of the same corner or the same feature, you know, they ended up with a thousand shots of, you know, the same
Speaker 0 00:19:53 One shot
Speaker 3 00:19:55 Cover. Whereas I like to move around and just keep moving and keep moving. And I find that if I pick up, you know, more unique angles and different different positions and so forth, you know, always experimenting, I suppose, how many
Speaker 1 00:20:10 Years have you done,
Speaker 3 00:20:12 Um, the mountain bike sort of photography? Um, I'd be getting on 10 years now.
Speaker 1 00:20:18 Okay. Yeah. What I was going to just say is it obviously comes with experience as well. Doesn't it? A lot of it. Um, when you sort of start off, you, you, you spray and pray in a way, you know what I mean? And having that knowledge over that amount of years, it gives you that much better understanding and where the writers are going to be, how it's going to happen and all sort of stuff as well. So, yeah.
Speaker 3 00:20:40 Yeah. And being a writer myself and I race a lot at these events, you know, quite often I'll go and do my, my race run and then quickly get back to the top and grabbed my camera and started walking down the fair
Speaker 0 00:20:54 That's determination,
Speaker 3 00:20:56 Um, at that helps a lot, just being able to know how a rider is likely to react before they actually hit a feature or go into a corner or divergent. Interesting. Um, and, and, you know, as you said over that course of time, I've, I've changed my approach from, you know, the off-camera flash work to more natural photography, you know, natural light. Um, I've changed the settings I use on my camera. Um, particularly my approach to, um, focusing on the rider as they go past, um, that can be, you know, a massive challenge, definitely moving targets and changing light conditions and all the rest of it. Um, and there's nothing worse than getting the rider in, in perfect position exactly what you had in mind, but then it's a soft focus. So just makes you to lose your mind.
Speaker 0 00:21:49 Yeah. So it's, how do you actually do the focusing on that? So know when I was doing some tripod work at a race, once I had the camera set up, the focus was in exactly the same place every time. And I'll just wait until the actual rider would actually be in front of the camera at that location. I knew it was really focused bang and take the photo. So you're guaranteed to focus the picture beforehand, but I mean, if something was happening before or after that focus area that you're in, um, you wouldn't get it. Yeah. So how do you doing,
Speaker 3 00:22:16 Um, well, I'll use that technique when I'm doing pan shots, because typically with a pen shot, you're taking it from side-on, um, and it quite a bit of a distance. Um, so even if they sort of move slightly forward or backwards in your frame, they're still going to be in reasonable focus, um, given the aperture that you're using with pear shots. Yeah. Um, whereas, um, most of the time I'll be using, um, AI servo, like tracking the actual rider itself, um, with a point focus. Um, so pick a point where within the composition of the frame, um, I'll move my focus point to that, that area of the frame. Um, and then as the riders coming in, I'm taking 4, 3, 4 or five shots. Um, and while you might frame the shot, intending them to catch them at the, at the, at a particular position or composition, um, at least that, you know, you're taking seven shots a second with the five D mark four.
Speaker 3 00:23:18 So you're going to get that, you know, th th the rider coming in or the frame just before, where you intended them and just after, and, you know, while the one that you intended might not, not turn out perfect. Um, you might find that you'll capture the one before or after, and it looks actually better than what you would thought think anyway. Um, so I use a tracking focus a bit other other photographers. I know, use more of the technique that you're talking about with taking a point and, you know, just focusing on capturing the rider right there. Now that takes some pretty amazing timing though, too, to actually get them right. Where you intended them to be. Yeah,
Speaker 0 00:23:55 Definitely a great thing. Are you using a tripod or using
Speaker 3 00:23:58 No handheld pretty much all the time. Um, sometimes I'll use a monopod for panning, um, because it's so much easier to sort of pen and keep it from going up and down while you're doing so, but, um, your handheld all the time, can I ask what lens, what we are choice? Um, I love my, uh, I've got a 16 to 35, um, if, if 2.8,
Speaker 0 00:24:27 Which is why choice of lens. Sorry, I love that lens. It's my favorite landscape photography on that. One's,
Speaker 3 00:24:34 It's unbelievable. And it's, it's just wide enough to capture the writers when they're really in close. Um, sometimes I sort of think I'd love to have a, uh, 14 or even 12 to get real fish high, but I don't think I would use it enough. You have to be pretty close to the subject. Would you would? Yeah. I mean, even with the 16 at 16 mill, you've got to get in real close. Um, as I said earlier, you, you would find yourself in some pretty dangerous positions with,
Speaker 0 00:25:01 I've actually got a few shine that, uh, I think it was a six foot, which was 16 or 15, something like that. Um, and I was trying to do some photography and I was trying to take a of cocaine and I had to get so close to the cocaine that actually didn't cause I was looking through the lens and it looked like it was still quite far away. And I actually hit the cocaine with all in front of the lens, cause it still looked like it was like half a meter or whatever, you know, so that would probably be suicide, uh, out on the bike tracks. Let's just get my face straight into that front wheel, you know? So, um,
Speaker 3 00:25:30 You've got a telephoto the 70 to 300, if four or 5.6, looking back, I think I'd probably prefer to have the 70 to 200, 2.8 just because it'd be a bit quicker. Um, and I, from what I've heard, the, the focus, um, is a little quicker. It doesn't hunt quite as much as soon as the 70 to 300 that I've got. I do find that, that it can be frustrating. You know, you, you know, I lose quite a lot of shots. I think using that lens,
Speaker 0 00:26:04 Especially in low light conditions, those lenses tend to go backwards and forwards when it's really tough. So, you know, um,
Speaker 3 00:26:10 That's unfortunate. Um, so they're the two lenses that I use almost all the time. Um, other than that, I sometimes I've got a, um, a hundred mil macro, um, which comes out every once in a while. It's afforded more, more sort of portrait, like work on the side of the track and down in the event space since and so forth. And there'll be like a 2.8 I'm guessing. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.
Speaker 0 00:26:34 Interesting. That's a F 30, I believe. Um, that particular lens, is it 30 the ones?
Speaker 3 00:26:43 No, it's not the L series. It certainly is. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:26:48 Oh, sorry. Like I said, the one that I've got 30, which I had never actually come across an F 30 before, so it was quite unique. Um, but yeah, so it's, uh, to try using low on one side, take it out for a spin.
Speaker 1 00:27:00 Sorry, keep that thought. Um, if you go on the ship, would you just bring one body or would you bring multiple cameras?
Speaker 3 00:27:06 No, just bring one buddy. Yeah, it'd be great to, it would be great to have an extra body just as a backup. Um, but I found I've never had a problem with a five day mark for,
Speaker 1 00:27:19 I've got a mark three as well. And I mean, I find that as a workhorse in the mark, four is pretty much exactly the same. So yeah,
Speaker 3 00:27:25 Even in like I've shot in some pretty horrendous weather conditions, um, like up at Cairns, it was absolute torrential, downpour, monsoon. Um, you know, we've had snow up at freezing cold snow up at Mount Buller and Mount Bora, Bora and so forth. And it's just never missed
Speaker 1 00:27:44 Those cameras. Are those bodies, are I to totally agree with you? I mean, I've, I've been to Iceland and upshot in Iceland and minus 20 and I actually left the camera outside shooting. The Northern lights are time-lapse of it and yeah, it was out there for about two hours by itself, you know, so yeah. And it's still going, so no problems whatsoever. Yeah, totally agree. Totally. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:28:05 How does the certainly hold up diverse types of conditions?
Speaker 1 00:28:09 Um, I can't tell you that I haven't actually been to any extreme places where the sign, you don't get saying we'll be fine, but I don't clean
Speaker 0 00:28:16 The sensor every five seconds. Well, that's the
Speaker 1 00:28:18 Problem. Sorry with the signing Daniel, I found that, um, I'm getting a lot of dust on the sensor and I'm with a Canon, never had that problem, but with the Sony, I had to clean my center probably about three times in about a year because it kept on blowing it out and keep on getting sense of dust. And it's just so frustrating, especially when I'm doing my time lapses, where you know, where you've got a subject moving and then it's just a massive dust, but in the Moodle and it's just like, you can't
Speaker 3 00:28:48 Find a shot a hundred times as well.
Speaker 1 00:28:51 So, um, it gets, it gets frustrated. Yeah. So Evan loves to, um, point that out.
Speaker 0 00:28:57 I do not love pointing that out. Thank you very much. But, um, yeah. So, and how does, how does a person get into this type of photography? I mean, how did you get into the, you just rock up on over Canon start taking photos when someone asks you?
Speaker 3 00:29:10 No, I'm pretty much, um, yeah, just, uh, it sort of evolved from, um, just, you know, I had an interest in photography and I was at a mountain bike event and decided to keep taking photos and, um, people liked them. Um, I think, you know, you, if you're, like I said, if you're a rider, um, you know, it helps a lot, you, you know, you've got this innate knowledge of as to how, what forms a good shot, I suppose. Um, I'd also say that, um, you know, mountain bike is like, I guess a lot of sort of sport. Um, everyone, these days is into social media and they want a photo that's, you know, they can Chuck on their Instagram or whatever. It might be. A lot of my photos are sold through that way. Like the ones that I do actually sell, um, arises, sold for personal use on social media, or it might be the parents, you know, getting in touch with me and saying, oh, that was my kid's first race. Or they got first place or whatever, and they want a photo they can print up, um, for, for whatever purpose. Um, but, um, yeah, I'd say, you know, if, if you're interested in photography and you want to give mountain bike photography go, you know, the best way is to turn up to an event, take photos. No one's ever gonna bat an eyelid of you coming along and taking photos. You need special permission
Speaker 1 00:30:31 Or anything like that.
Speaker 3 00:30:32 No, actually, no. Um, I've, I've looked at BMX events, um, and they actually BMX Australia have, um, regulations to, in relation to obviously important matter protecting children and privacy and so forth. Um, and you have to actually get a permit through BMX Australia for that, um, mountain biking. It just never seems to have happened there. Um, I'm not sure why that is maybe mountain biking, Australia have been a little bit less the rules.
Speaker 1 00:31:06 Um, they do wear a full, full screen, well, full pace health in a way as well. So you can't really tell faces or you can't pinpoint specific that,
Speaker 3 00:31:14 And you do tend to, I'd say also you don't tend to get as young children doing
Speaker 1 00:31:23 Yeah. You think it's more dangerous mountain biking then than BMXs? Or do you think it's sort of, you know, on par?
Speaker 3 00:31:29 Uh, I'd say it's pretty much on par. I mean recently the, uh, we've had two Australians that have ended out with almost life changing injuries in BMX scene, um,
Speaker 1 00:31:45 Is the Olympic thing. Yeah.
Speaker 3 00:31:47 Um, I'm trying to think of his name. Um, one guy that got, uh, a metal in, in the most recent Olympics, um, not Tokyo ones, but, uh, Rio. Um, he's now, um, effectively a paraplegic of a broken neck. Um, and then, um, you probably saw if you watch the Olympics in Phoenix, um, there was a girl, uh, Saya Sakakibara don't know whether I pronounced that perfectly. Um, uh, she was representing Australia, she's representing Australia and her brother, um, had quite a severe crash a few months ago. Um, and he's, you know, months and months of recovery from that. Um, so I don't, I don't think you can really say that, that, you know, biking's more or less dangerous. I guess the, the advantage of mountain biking is you're not, you're not riding in a pack like in BMX racing. There's eight of them riding at the same time on the same track, uh, mountain biking you're on your own. And ultimately it comes down, I think, to the individual riders and how much risk they're willing to take themselves. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:32:58 I'm guessing they're wearing a full gear, like safety gear and all that sort of stuff.
Speaker 3 00:33:03 Yeah. Yeah. Quite often more and more. Now these days you're wearing a full face helmet. You're wearing body armor, um, you know, gloves, knee pads, um, all the rest of it. So you are pretty well protected, but every once in a while they get pretty severe injuries.
Speaker 1 00:33:21 Well, I mean, you know, I've done you yangs, um, which is people don't obviously not in Australia, Melbourne. Um, Ewing's is one of the, um, fairly large off-road, well, mountain biking, you know, courses that, you know, and, um, I've had a bit of, a bit of a stack there as well. And, um, yeah, and Evan remembers because we're actually, it was my own fault because we were riding at the same time chatting at the same time and we're not going slow. So I turned around and straight smack into a tree and, you know, I can still, one of my, um, my, my elbow is still sort of in a bit out of whack out of that. So, um, yeah, the interests, the, um, yeah, dangerous.
Speaker 3 00:34:04 Yeah. I've had, I've had my fair share of injuries. I've had, um, a number of broken collarbones. I've got one that I got a plate and 14 screws in my collarbone, um, and, uh, broken ribs, et cetera. So actually
Speaker 0 00:34:22 I'm not note, there was a post that you put up recently about a helmet that saved your life.
Speaker 3 00:34:26 Yeah, yeah. That was actually the yanks as well. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:34:30 It was like in two or three different pieces. Um, is there a story behind that that's not true?
Speaker 3 00:34:36 Oh, that was a, uh, it was one of the yangs race events, the clubs put on out there. And as you might've seen as you're riding around some of the trials out there, they've got, um, these sort of logs that have been just, just off the side of the tracks, they're sort of their intended intention, I think, is to keep people on the track cramps. So rather than cutting corners. Um, and I wasn't even that much of a, um, you know, an extreme part of the track. If you like now, I was just pedaling, really hard being a race run. Um, and all of a sudden the rear wheels gone out from underneath me and my heads just ended out smacking sideways onto the end of one of those logs. Yup. Um, and yeah, it's a walking, talking example of, to why you really needed to be wearing helmets when you're writing about
Speaker 1 00:35:33 It's very dangerous. I mean, not just the bike. I mean, I ride my one wheel, a ride, my skateboard and electric skateboard and tardy agree. I mean, the safety gear is people take for granted and, um, yeah, you might sometimes look dorky and whatever else, but you know, what, who cares if it's going to save your ass, it's definitely gonna work out. You know what I mean? I've, I've actually came off my one wheel at about 30 Ks an hour as well, and I've cracked my helmet to, and, um, I definitely was thankful that I was wearing anime. Um, I was out of action for about a week as well. And, you know, it's, it's very important to be able to get good gear and actually wear it and actually, you know yup. Yeah. Evan
Speaker 0 00:36:15 Interesting that you mentioned those logs, uh, on the tracks at Yang's because I've had a similar occurrence. I was doing a night run, um, the gazebo series, which was a cross country race, uh, that was happening on the cross countryside. Um, and I was flying through the FloTrac probably 38, 40 kilometers an hour. Um, and I came across one of those logs hit the front of it, clipped that, uh, back wheel clipped. I lost control of the bike, went straight into a tree, smashed my face into the tree. Ironically, my face was fine. Um, can you see that actually people would question that and they would say, no, your face is not fun. Um, but I actually ended up hitting my leg into the tree as well. And I told my leg open a blood was gushing out everywhere. Um, and I kept racing and I probably did another two to three laps, uh, before my lid completely froze up. Cause I had actually done some damage to the knee. Um, but yeah, it sounds like those, uh, there's pieces of wood, they're more trouble than they're worth
Speaker 3 00:37:07 Possibly. Yeah. There's been plenty of people that have commented on whether they should be there or not, but
Speaker 1 00:37:16 To set the environment rather than you,
Speaker 0 00:37:18 It definitely serves a purpose, but it is so easy to clip, especially if you are flying along on the flow tracks down there, um, you pick up some crazy speeds and that's not true.
Speaker 1 00:37:27 Um, for those people that are listening and don't know what's you yangs, can you guys just re explain what, what it is? I mean, you know, it's a fairly big, um,
Speaker 3 00:37:38 Yeah, it was a medium, I suppose, mountain range, um, situated just out to the west of Melbourne near Werribee. Um, it's quite a Rocky sort of granite environment. Um, you know, not so much, you know, your, your typical Australian, bullshit's more, you know, I guess you'd liken it to, I don't know, African Tundra or something maybe, but, um, yeah, the, the tracks are quite Sandy, um, gravelly, um, surface, um, a lot of rocks, as I said, um, a lot of the features of rocks. Um, and, um, yeah, there's probably, I'm just guessing a couple of hundred kilometers worth of trails out there. And totally,
Speaker 1 00:38:21 I don't think I will tell them we only down about, probably about 50 or 60 Ks, I've actually trial. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:38:25 There's heaps when you cross over to the other side, cause there's two sections to the evenings. You've got the cross country section. Yep. And then you've got the, the downhill sort of section. Um, and there's a, a divining track. I think it's check 14 ultra
Speaker 3 00:38:38 Junction tracker. I think it's
Speaker 0 00:38:39 Called. And that's actually a really interesting track because you've got your downhill slalom. Uh, you've got your rock ledges, you've got your, a massive climb up. I don't think I've taken you on that track. I'm just scared
Speaker 1 00:38:50 Of that
Speaker 0 00:38:51 Once you've done it the first time and you don't think about it and you just ride over everything. It's great fun. Uh, if you actually thinking about what you're doing, that's when things got very tragically wrong, like you see the Rocky, like I really died that usually happens. Um, so you've got to just basically ride those lock rock legends. We are thinking about it
Speaker 1 00:39:09 Often. How often do they, um, do events there? They're just sort of every couple of months or is it,
Speaker 3 00:39:14 Um, well I think typically you Young's clubbed themselves, I think might run, uh, maybe three, three to four events per year. Um, total
Speaker 0 00:39:26 That's the downhill side.
Speaker 3 00:39:27 Yeah. There was another, on the downhill side, primarily
Speaker 0 00:39:30 Countries actually run by another club. I believe the Jalong club, I think it is. Um, yeah,
Speaker 3 00:39:35 Yeah. Split it. So, um, say it as Evan's alluding to, there's sort of a more flatter mellower area.
Speaker 0 00:39:44 Yeah.
Speaker 3 00:39:46 I think it's called that side. Um, and then there's the stockyards area, um, which is, um, you know, where the yanks mountain bike club actually hold their events. Um, so they have one, one of the, probably the biggest one is Cressey's descent, which is coming up in September. Um, and that one normally attracts about 300 competitors I believe. Um, and then, you know, huge amount of spectators and so forth. Um, they generally will hold an Enduro race as well, which is sorta like a, um, you know, held on three or four tracks. Um, and they combine the time that you take to get down the tracks. Um, typically an Enduro event. You, um, you're timed on the way down, but you peddle back up again. Yeah. Um, the yangs one is a little bit different where they actually allow you to jump on a shuttle and get back up. It really is a type of training, um, type of racing. I love,
Speaker 0 00:40:42 I didn't realize I was doing shuttles. I know they do shuttles runs and stuff like that, but not as part of the competition. So,
Speaker 3 00:40:47 Yeah. Interesting. Um, and other than that, they do quite regular, like monthly ride days. So where they shuttle riders back to the top of the road out there. So
Speaker 1 00:41:00 Over the event, actually,
Speaker 3 00:41:02 It's a really great sort of club. I think the, you know, they've got great group of people, um, quite a large number of members, probably one of the bigger clubs member was around Melbourne. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:41:13 I guess with COVID and everything else now you can't really, we can't have so specifically tell you data, anything like that, but, um, is there like a specific time of the year that they actually make it in, in January?
Speaker 3 00:41:24 Um, typically they avoid the real hot months out of the yanks because it's really just not nice to ride out there anything higher than sort of 28 or 30 degrees. It just gets really harsh. Um, there's no shade. Um, so they, they typically will run their event either in, or their events either in the sort of early winter or, um, into spring. That's typically when they'll run the origins. Um, other than that, um, there's the Victorian downhill series which I travel around with and do photography of quite a bit. That's held more throughout the summer months from sort of October through to about may. Um, there's all sorts of other things going on, like, um, king of Ballarat, which is run by a club mud, um, in Ballarat. Um, that's sort of more of an introduction to downhill. That's the way I deal with this. Um, they have a lot of young kids that turn up to that. Um, that one's been a tricky one to run this year, um, because of COVID regulations. It was canceled last year and
Speaker 1 00:42:31 Threw everything out of there, here
Speaker 3 00:42:33 That's right. Um, and yeah, the red hill riders, which I, which is my club down on the Mornington peninsula, um, we've actually got the in Juro national championships on there. Um, later this year, I think it's in November and looking forward to that.
Speaker 1 00:42:49 So how many, um, how many locations I know there's was less the field and then you yanks, is there any others or is it
Speaker 3 00:42:57 They're probably the closest to Melbourne and then red hill red Hills quite popular. Now they've had a lot of, um, trials that have been formalized in recent years. Um, other than that, uh, there's plenty of venues around is Buxton
Speaker 0 00:43:15 Towards
Speaker 3 00:43:15 Bendigo. There's a couple little like mountain Harcourt. It's quite popular now. Um,
Speaker 1 00:43:21 Yeah, because I mean, some are Mount Buller organizes something downhill.
Speaker 3 00:43:26 Yeah. Mount Buller. Um, they've how they went. They're not running the lifts recently. Um, but during the summer months, again, obviously they can't run mountain bikes up here at the moment we interpret, um, in the summer that's again, sort of been one of the old school places to go if you like for, particularly for downhill riding, but they've got, you know, a whole bunch of other sort of more cross-country orientated riding up there as well. Um, you can ride all the way down from the top of Mount Buller to the base and then up to the top of Mount Sterling. And then back again, if you want, yeah.
Speaker 1 00:44:04 I've never done it before and I'm hoping Evan's gonna one day organize it. Maybe all three of us can make it, you know, but, um, yeah, looking at me like
Speaker 0 00:44:12 I'll bring the camera. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:44:14 Um, but look, I think
Speaker 3 00:44:16 The way to go,
Speaker 0 00:44:18 I've actually, I've written Bulla um, not the downhill section, cause I'm not a downhill rider. I've tried it a few times, just not my forte. Um, I know where to draw the line, you know, like I've done it. I've said, you know, I've, I've managed to do it without killing myself and that's probably the best I'll ever ask for, you know? Um, I do a lot of the cross country stuff and a lot of the bull of things that I've done. Um, there's one which is like 45 K straight down, well, it's not straight down. There's a, but there's a few river crossings and stuff. Um, very picturesque. I've actually done a whole bunch of GoPro footage, um, which I put into a little video, created a little video.
Speaker 1 00:44:49 I think the high country Oliver all is. It's amazing as well. Yeah.
Speaker 3 00:44:53 And Tasmania as well. Like I cannot, I cannot praise Tasmania enough. Um, every time in normal years I'd traveled down there three or four times a year. Um, and they've got places like Derby, um, St Helens, Madina, um, you know, just even Mount Wellington, which is like literally on the outskirts of Hobart. Um, and yeah, just, you know, the trials and the environment that you go through down there almost makes our little trail networks that we have in Victoria look pretty bad.
Speaker 1 00:45:29 Yeah. I was going to say it Tasmania is pretty much in the sort of the wilderness part of Australia. That was not, it, it is. Yeah. It's like, there's so much, um, national parks and just amazing, amazing locations. And I mean, you know, I mean to hiking as well and, you know, hopefully, um, I can do the Overland track as well there. And, um, you know, that's not a mountain biking track, but, um, you know, nevertheless, you know, it's, it's amazing locations. Definitely. Totally agree.
Speaker 0 00:45:56 Yeah. That's beautiful. Quick question for you a list of field, which we touched on before, when you haven't really mentioned too much about list to fill that used to be a place to go to and actually ran the Olympic games there. Um, Commonwealth, sorry, I guess. Um, and they built the track and they put Matt or the people who built the track there at the time for, for the games, uh, put these massive gravel, like train gravel pieces across the track and just before the games that actually remove all of them. But if you go down there nowadays, you still find pieces of it here and there scattered everywhere. Um, so that was an interesting one. But did I do races there at all or is it,
Speaker 3 00:46:30 Uh, yeah, yeah. Um, they've got, um, there is a particular cross country race event they have there, um, annually most years. Um, I can't remember the name of it. It's something to do with a goat because it was named after a goat, a wild goat that was walking around and Alyssa field, um, reserve there. Um, I don't think that, I think the Paul goat passed away a few years ago, but, uh, um, yeah, there th is, cross-country mainly, I mean, you just don't have the elevation there to, to hold a, you know, a descending tight race, but, um, yeah, it's, it's, it's a great spot because it's, it's, you know, smack bang right in the middle of the suburbs. Um, and the only problem that, that then raises is the fact that it gets overused. Um, you know, you go there on a weekend, particularly, you know, during COVID recently. Um, it's just so overrun with people. Um, and the tracks get worn out, especially
Speaker 0 00:47:29 During the wet season.
Speaker 3 00:47:30 Yeah. It just doesn't, it doesn't cope that well with rain,
Speaker 0 00:47:34 As opposed to the yangs where just the rains and it just drains strength, each set. It's actually funny. Cause in this side of the Melbourne, um, like the west and sort of south area I'll know about Victoria, um, the, the conditions are a lot different. They're like more dry and accurate. You go on the other side, like the east side. Um, and it's, it's a lot more rainforesty and list the fuel is, is pretty much like that. It's, it's always where there's a lot of shade. Uh, it's, it's a beautiful place to be. Um, you get to the earrings and it's like bone dry and uh, so it's a very different environment. I think Hardcourt is also, um, it's also very dry as well.
Speaker 3 00:48:11 It's similar to the Yang's. Um, it's um, yeah, granite rock, um, Sandy soil and it copes very well with, with weather. Um, and that's, you know, one of the beautiful things about mountain biking, as I alluded to earlier, you, it takes you into some just it's huge, vast, different areas that you know, that you otherwise wouldn't get to. Um, I've even written right smack in the middle of the Flinders ranges. Um, there's actually some trails out there. You want to go there in the colder months cause he can't ride when it's 40 plus out there. Um, and you know, written all across, you know, the Alpine ranges and Tasmania. Um, and yeah, one day I'll, uh, I'll be allowed to go somewhere else outside of Australia, but, um, we're not lacking in those environments around Australia.
Speaker 0 00:49:07 Definitely. Now I'm breaking away from the sports photography. You also do landscape photography and much to Marty's satisfaction. You also do drone photography. So a bit of everything. Um, what got you into landscape stuff? Cause I've seen you posting a lot more landscape lately.
Speaker 3 00:49:23 Um, probably primarily because of the, uh, there's no events on I suppose. Um, but that landscape I've always like even when I was sort of a fairly young kid, I've been an outdoors. So kid of, um, I spent, I actually grew up in Mount Masterton, um, and spent, uh, I'd say most of my youth from, from the age of about 10 through to 18, 19, um, actually rock climbing. Um, so I spent a lot of time up in the Grampians and Mount of rallies up there and blue mountains near Sydney. Um, and I've just always loved that, that sort of nature and, you know, just landscapes in general. Um, and even more so now when, you know, you've, I've got lucky enough to have a job that takes me to places like Tasmania and, um, and uh, you know, allows me to just experience whatever it is that's out there.
Speaker 3 00:50:22 Um, and you know, it's also one of those sorts of genres of photography, I suppose, unlike mountain biking, where you can really take your time and, you know, you might go to a waterfall or a Creek or somewhere and, you know, just spend an hour or so just thinking about what do you want to capture in your photo? Um, you know, what does this place mean to you? What are you feeling and really soaking it all in? Um, so that's, yeah, one of the things I love about the landscape photography is it's, it's an, it's an escape and, you know, stress relief and, um, I,
Speaker 1 00:51:02 I totally agree. And I think, you know, with, with landscape, you sort of, you can just relax and look at the actual environment and just enjoy the environment it does itself. And I mean, when I set up my camera and just take a couple of images, it just, you look at it and then you can capture what you see on that camera. And if you get a chance to print it large or whatever else, it's just an extra, you know, like a wild factor. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3 00:51:29 Yeah, absolutely. Now that you, you know, you got access to things like, you know, 30 or 50 megapixel sensors, the size of the print that you can get out of them and the detail is incredible. Um, and one of the things I like to do with landscape photography as well, I see a lot of people going to the same spots, like the 12 apostles, um, you know, um, is it cradle mountain, um, those sorts of things and just getting that. So almost copying what they've seen on Instagram or whatever it is, if it's shot. Um, I'd like to put that little bit of extra effort in to try and find something unique, even if it's the same sort of subject that you're shooting, try and shoot it from a different angle, his perspective, um, for instance, um, creative mountain. Um, I, when I went there fairly recently, um, it was pretty much right in the middle of winter.
Speaker 3 00:52:22 And let me tell you, you don't want to drive up there in the middle of winter. It's, it's very sketchy. The road was like ice. Um, and, but I just thought this is going to be something that's totally different. And a lot, a lot of people shoot, um, climbed all the way up to pretty much the summit of cradle mountain in almost white out conditions, um, and shot those sort of Bluffs from the rocks and looking upwards at the clouds and then, you know, disappearing into the clouds. And, um, I just love going, trying to go to that extra mile and trying to capture something that nobody's actually ever shot before. Um, the other thing that does as well, is it sort of, uh, you know, there's a bit of an opinion, I suppose, online at the moment that, you know, if you post a photo of a particularly beautiful spot, then you're almost encouraging 50 other people to go there and trample all over the landscape and, you know, ruin it. Um, and I've seen that happen myself. Um, there's, there's this great spot just outside of Hobart called secret falls, not so secret. It's not so secret anymore. Um, and now when the first time I went there, um, all of the earth and the rocks and everything was just covered in this beautiful green loss. Um, and you go there now and it has just gone. There's no, not a trace of it. It's just, uh, it's not that bad yet, but hopefully it doesn't get that fair.
Speaker 0 00:53:53 That's, that's one of the things that happens with, um, things like Instagram and, you know, a lot of people go off and they take these photos and everyone's like, oh, what are you the same one? And they go off and do exactly the same thing. And then, you know, 50 people rock up on the step and everything, and it's okay if you go over and do exactly the same shot, but you know, yeah. You don't have to destroy everything while you're there. Exactly. Um, and that's why we come Molly. And I are both Falwell drivers as well. Um, and one of the things we used to adhere to was tread lightly, you know, um, you go out there to enjoy the environment, not a destroyed and not leave it for anyone else. Um, unfortunately not everyone thinks the same way and you know, that there is a lot of destruction out there, unfortunately, but yeah, drones. So, uh, you're doing drone stuff as well. What type of drone have you got?
Speaker 3 00:54:35 I've got a Maverick too, so yeah, yeah, too. Sorry. I'm thinking the two S just came out. So yeah, it's a hair too. Um, I get a little bit confused about all the different models out there, but, um, uh, yeah, I did have previously, um, the medic spark, um, managed to crash it into a tree and then it fell down into a ravine, so that died.
Speaker 0 00:54:56 So that's, I'm not the only person story.
Speaker 3 00:54:59 I think it's a Rite of passage when you get into drones that you're going to lose one once in a while. Um, but, um, uh, the spark was okay for a beginner drone, um, but the image quality was never that great. Um, the battery life, wasn't that great either. Um, the air too is great. I think, you know, for what I use it for, it's small enough to carry around, um, um, you know, carrying, uh, you know, all the extra attachments and, and whatnot. Um,
Speaker 1 00:55:27 Yeah, it's pretty impressive at the moment, the technology sort of which so far that you can sort of even just control that drone with your phone and, you know, you do have actually a fair bit of distance to be able to control to.
Speaker 3 00:55:39 Yeah. I still get a little bit nervous flying over water, but not, you know, you just spent $1,700 on a train, you know, in a splash it somewhere, but, um, it's the, the technology has improved dramatically. It just seems to the connection so much more reliable. Um, you know, just where is the spark used to be wirelessly connected from your phone to the remote control within the remote control to the drone? This is actually plugged the phone is plugged into the remote control control.
Speaker 1 00:56:14 Yeah.
Speaker 3 00:56:15 So I found that far, far a massive improvement compared to the spark, um, and you know, the responsiveness, the distance at which this sinking go and the speed and what a 48 megapixel sensor on it. So it's pretty amazing.
Speaker 1 00:56:33 Um, no, I totally agree. And the thing is, well with those drawings, you can take long exposures to, um, so it's got a, like a tripod mode. Um, I know my mother has got it, but, um, yeah, he's got a tripod mode and the whole camp, the whole camera you can take what, two, three second explosions.
Speaker 3 00:56:49 Yeah. I haven't quite gotten around to trying to launch, but I have always sort of wanted to fly it over like a waterfall and take a shot of, you know, a long exposure of the waterfall from above. It's pretty cool. Um, that just haven't really gotten around to it. Um, and the location is always tricky to find one where you can actually do that. Um, but, um, yeah, it's, it's, it's also, you know, it just adds that just a totally different perspective from what you can capture on the ground. Um, often where, you know, for instance, on a recent trip out to central Australia, you know, you go to all the places that you, you know, keep a PD and Alice Springs and his rock and all the ruin, all the ruin is rock, same thing, um, Kings canyon. Um, and, you know, while, while an environment out there might just look like a plain desert from, from the ground level, if you fly a drone up and look back down, you just see all these patterns that you would never see. Yeah. Um, so that's just something that, you know, I'm just being more and more intrigued about, I suppose, finding what I can do with that,
Speaker 1 00:57:56 Using the technology to advantage with yeah. Nice
Speaker 0 00:57:59 Unique perspectives. Now I love your photos. Um, I think they're fantastic. Uh, I think everyone should go off and buy your photos when they're doing races and stuff that you've taken their photos. So go out and buy as first, but where can people see your artwork? Um,
Speaker 3 00:58:13 I put all of my artwork on Facebook. Um, I haven't gotten around to completing my website yet. Um, just out of pure laziness really. Um, as I said, it's not my day job, so it's sort of, it's always one of those things that I've been to get around to doing and never quite get there. Um, so what, what
Speaker 0 00:58:31 Would people type in to find John Daniel Brooks
Speaker 3 00:58:33 Photography, um, on both Facebook and Instagram, um, and, um, yeah, I do sell all of my photos that you can find on there. Um, they're obviously reasonably low resolution on Facebook. Um, but, um, you know, I've obviously archived all of the photos that I take. Um, I'm sure you'd all agree with me. Most photographers sort of, um, OCD with deleting anything. So you end up with, um, you know, thousands of dollars worth of hard drives and all the rest of it to keep them all on. Um, but, um, I've, I've managed over the years to develop a process whereby um, you know, somebody, for instance, at a mountain bike event can just tell me their race plate number from that event. And I'll just type it into the light and pop up bangs all the photos of that. Or
Speaker 0 00:59:24 Did you label
Speaker 3 00:59:25 Them now? I've gone through manually and labeled them. I'd love to find some process that can, can, uh, automatically identify race plate numbers, but I haven't been able to
Speaker 0 00:59:36 OCR software would be able to do that, but, um, yeah,
Speaker 1 00:59:39 There is software I've actually used software in the past. Um, I can't remember how much I paid for it, but yeah, you can just sort of scan the part of the image and it actually comes up with the numbers. So you just have to highlight the N in the image and then it will basically transport that into actual numbers or letters, or,
Speaker 0 00:59:56 Yeah, that'd be grace events, uh, you know, the, uh, around the bay, that sort of thing. They have photographers every so often and they have a system where they just download the photos and the computer actually generates the photo based on your plate, or there's a tag in the back. So, um, you know, I've gone back sometimes to have a look at photos of myself and there's this other person there for long hair and, you know, and breasts. And I'm thinking that that's a woman, I'm pretty sure that's a woman and not a woman. Um, so it's not always 100% successful, but it is, it is software that is available. It makes you laugh a little bit easier.
Speaker 3 01:00:29 That's labeling all the photos is one of the most tedious jobs of any photographer. I'd say it's horrible. You take 3000 photos on a weekend or something at a race event. Um, and just going through them all, um, you know, particularly if it's a very muddy event, um, you know, the right flights are covered in mud. You're not going to read very many of them and there'll still be a lot in there that, you know, uh, pan shots, for example. And you've got no idea what, who, who the writer is. Um, but, um, yeah, th 90% of my, I'd say of my photos have been labeled from those rates events. Um, I've also got the geo coding now with the GPS, um, on phones, on cameras. Yeah. Um, so that's helpful. Um, and, um, yeah, they, you know, I sell my photos from the events I sell all my landscape shots, um, obviously digital files, or if somebody is in need of it, I can arrange for a, you know, a print to suit their needs.
Speaker 1 01:01:32 Yes. It's amazing to see images printed. I mean, you can see come up from the images that I've got in my studio, but, um, when you see that extra on paper, it makes a huge difference that doesn't really,
Speaker 0 01:01:43 Yeah, it does. It, it's amazing how different it at you. The screens are great, but having them in print, there's nothing quite like,
Speaker 1 01:01:51 What does, what does, um, last is it? We have time. I don't know how we're going with, um, what does the future, hopefully, Daniel, what are you thinking of? Um, you know, short long-term, I guess, you know,
Speaker 3 01:02:03 I don't think there's, I've always been interested to getting to a bit more of the, sort of behind the scenes teaching, uh, photography. Um, I've done a couple of workshops, um, just as an experiment, I suppose, race events, um, just sort of educating on, you know, my thought process behind when I'm shooting, what I'm thinking about. Um, more so not so much the technical aspects of, you know, get this lens or shoot at this particular f-stop or whatever it might be. Yeah, exactly. Um, you can Google that sort of those settings up quite easily. Um, it's more about, um, you know, how to compose an image and, um, also the, uh, I suppose the post-processing side of things as well, it's something that, um, you know, intrigues me. I, we sort of find it quite meditative in some aspects. Um, what do you use? Can I ask, um, Lightroom and Photoshop? Yeah. Most of my mountain biker shots are just in light room. Um, cause he really just doing basic edits to them. Um, whereas, um, more and more so now with my landscape and even like some macro photography that I'm experimenting with. Um, I recently got a, I forgive me, I don't know how to pronounce it. A layover Lauer
Speaker 1 01:03:24 It's Maddie's brand.
Speaker 3 01:03:25 Yeah, absolutely magnificent.
Speaker 1 01:03:28 I've got the probe lens, I've got the pro lens and it's just the stuff that you can get with it.
Speaker 3 01:03:32 The nominal very well-priced as well. Yeah, look,
Speaker 1 01:03:36 Yeah. I wouldn't, yeah. It's not a cheap, cheap land. It's reasonable for what you get. Yeah.
Speaker 3 01:03:41 Yeah. I've got the hundred mil to buy macro and I've just sort of really started experimenting in focus, stacking bugs and all sorts of tiny stuff. Um, and that's amazing. I just find that incredible that like how much you can actually see, um, you know, getting an image that you just would never see with the human eyes. Um, and you discover stuff like, yeah, it looks like a cute little bug. You take photos of it and then you get it onto your PC. And you're like, oh my God, this thing's incredible.
Speaker 1 01:04:16 I don't know if you know about the Lauer 24 mil pro blends. Have you heard about that then? Yeah. It's like
Speaker 3 01:04:22 A little thin.
Speaker 1 01:04:23 Yeah. It's a very thin tube. It's about 400, 450 mil or whatever it is. Yeah. But the funny thing is, um, I've actually shot a few things and I mean, it's next to impossible, but I've actually shot a flight with it. You know what I mean? Yeah. Um, where the good thing about that lens is, is non-invasive invasive in a way because you don't get that close to the subject itself. Yep. So that's why, you know, it is a manual focus unfortunately, but you know, you can sort of still, you know, focus pool and whatever else with the hope, you know, with the whole camera, I guess, but yeah. Looking at, if you are into that sort of stuff, it's the allow, um, 24 mil or macro, you know, any of this stuff, it's just phenomenal. Yeah.
Speaker 3 01:05:02 It'd be really cool for doing close up video work as well.
Speaker 1 01:05:06 Yeah. Oh, it's impressive. Yeah, because you can actually put it on a slider and actually get that macro sliding shot as well, which is really, really impressive. So, yeah. Sorry, just one quick
Speaker 0 01:05:17 Question with your tuition that you're talking about. Um, if someone's interested in learning about, uh, what you do and basically following in your footsteps, um, how can they contact you obviously Facebook, Instagram, but is there a phone number? Um, yeah, (041) 792-1025. So people can just give you a call and do something with them. Yep. Fabulous. That that's that's fantastic. Yeah. It's good. Yeah. Look Daniel, thank you very much for coming in tonight. It's it's been a treat. It has been, I love your work. Uh, and it's, you know, basically being able to, um, have you in the studio today was a huge pleasure for us. Um, excellent. Thank you.
Speaker 1 01:05:50 Yeah, that was good. Fun. I think we, uh, we talk about these things and, um, just educate people as well from our end, you know, what can be achieved and how it can't be achieved. So having professionals like yourself, it definitely is a big, big plus for us to say thank you.
Speaker 0 01:06:05 Well, that's come to the end of another session. Uh, so thank you very much for tuning in. Don't forget if you'd like to subscribe, hit the subscribe button and you'll be notified, seek seeking focus.
Speaker 1 01:06:17 I can focus Podcasts on Facebook. I think seeking focus on Instagram. I can't remember. Now
Speaker 0 01:06:23 We are we're on there. We're everywhere. Um, uh, we're also on the apple store. We're on the apple, Google, Spotify, Spotify
Speaker 1 01:06:37 Listening to
Speaker 0 01:06:37 From, yeah. I love driving in the car, listening to a Podcasts. That's fantastic. How many are there?
Speaker 1 01:06:42 I think once all the COVID and everything is over and I was going to do a long trip and maybe go to Malibu or something about biking.
Speaker 0 01:06:48 I can use the, uh, the road go tos that we spoke about in the previous session is recorded. So we can do interviews while we're riding next to people. A lot of wind pump
Speaker 1 01:06:59 My leg,
Speaker 0 01:07:00 My leg. If you want to get in contact with us, you can reach out to, uh, myself, uh, even@pixelwatchstudio.com. Did I? You um, and money,
Speaker 1 01:07:10 Uh, he had Melbourne images that I use as well. All the best ciao, ciao.
