2009
- 70-200mm f/2.8L IS
- 10-22mm Ultrawide
- 14mm Fisheye
- 17-85mm IS
- 580EX SpeedLite with ST-E2 Wireless Transmitter
- Gary Fong Dome
Registered for RAGBRAI!
I first heard of RAGBRAI several years ago when I was riding like a crazy man doing centuries nearly every weekend. RAGBRAI (pronounced rag-br-eye) is the Register’s Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa. RAGBRAI is a 7-day ride, starting on a Sunday and ending on Saturday from the western edge of Iowa to the eastern edge. The route changes every year, but this year starts in Council Bluffs, IA and ends 442.3 miles later in Burlington, IA. Tammy and I are signed up to take part in RAGBRAI 37!
RAGBRAI is an event unlike no other. It is the largest organized bike ride in the United States. You camp each night in small towns in Iowa. It’s too big to be defined by one thing. Some call it a party on wheels, others like to hammer the miles away. I’m looking forward to finally riding it.
We will have a lot of training to do before July 19th. It is suggested you get 1,000 miles on your bike before you show up. Additionally, I’m going to work harder than I have at dropping weight faster so that I’m carrying less heft across Iowa. I’m sure there will be much to say about this adventure in the future. More to come, and wish us luck! :-)
See also: RAGBRAI Wikipedia Page.
Chase's Mug Shot
Chase was being a very good dog as my model for some test shots while I was getting my camera setup to do some shooting. I just love this one. It’s really hard to photograph black dogs. The white muslin background really helps to allow the exposure to come up enough.
It needs a caption. Ideas?
Baked Ziti from April 2009 Cooks Illustrated. Looks great!
Photos from Overnight Website Challenge
Last weekend I made three trips to the Sierra Bravo Overnight Website Challenge to get some photos of the start, middle and end. I lugged a decent bit of gear and tried my first attempt at event photography.
The event wasn’t simple to capture. The room wasn’t very interesting so it was hard to get a decent backdrop on people. The podium where people presented had natural light behind it which made it nearly impossible to photograph. I tried some long exposure stuff and it was a little interesting. All in all, a tough room. I think my favorite shot is the one I took of the Ruby.MN 2.2 Team right before the event started.
I thought there would be more opportunities for pictures of people sleeping but there were surprising few that actually caught any sleep. I tried, unsuccessfully, to get one of the teams to do a human pyramid.
Nice night for a fire.
Graffletopia ← Using OmniGraffle? Need stencils? Stop your search, here they are. Wow.
Elizabeth Kreutz ← Really good professional photographer that is covering Lance Armstrong’s return to cycling.
OmniGraffle Scripts
OmniGraffle Scripts ← Several scripts by Peter McMaster that help do some nice things, like drawing arcs, in OmniGraffle.
Vicky Cristina Barcelona
Okay movie. Interesting. Perhaps a little slow. No big revelation in the plot.
IndieBound
IndieBound ← Saw a poster for this while we were at Wild Rumpus in Linden Hills. It’s a cool resource to find independent bookstores and help express the value that those places bring to communities.
Photographing the Overnight Website Challenge
I spent this morning shooting the first of three sessions at the Sierra Bravo Overnight Website Challenge. The guys at Sierra Bravo were nice enough to let me do the event photography. So this morning I strapped on all my gear and shot for a couple of hours as things got underway. I’m going to return late tonight and again very early tomorrow morning to get more of the event.
For the photographically curious I’m shooting with my Canon 40D body. I thought about bringing the Canon 20D for a 2nd body, but the low-light performance on the 20D would limit it’s usefulness. It also highlights that the 20D is probably not a very good second body. I loaded up my Think Tank Speed Belt with a bunch of pouches, packing along:
This morning I shot mostly wide. I did a lot with the 10-22mm as well as the Fisheye. I did some work with the 70-200mm as well for close-ups. The room is difficult to shoot. It’s just a big open space and what little light there is is rough fluorescent stuff.
Tonight I’m hoping the teams will be a bit punchy and get some more interesting shots with people. We’ll see if I can get a team to do a human pyramid.
After I’m done with all three shoots I’ll edit down and put a photo set up on Flickr.
Leaving to go shoot the 24 Hour Web Challenge. Full kit-belt geared up.
I love the smell of this Coffee & Tea Ltd.
Bottle Shock
Fun and happy movie about the beginnings of the California wine valley. Not a great script. Fine snowy evening rental.
20 Corporate Brand Logo Evolution ← Cool overview of brand logo evolution. Interesting to see how some have changed, and how some haven’t.
Fired up the Big Green Egg and did a 3 lb. grass-fed beef tenderloin on it tonight. Basic preparation with a little salt and pepper. Turned out really nice, but I still have much to learn. Controlling the heat on the Egg at 400 °F was harder than it should have. I could have done a better job building the fire.
Family Ski Weekend
Earlier this month we went “up north” and spent the weekend at Giant’s Ridge with our friends the Tangen’s. A fun time was had by all but Tammy was the only one that really knew how to ski. Kent and I did a morning in ski lessons and then worked up the courage to go down the real hills. The kids had a great time going down the bunny hill and back up on the “magic carpet”. The whole weekend felt a bit retro, and that was the inspiration for the video I put together.
Add video.
Had to dig out a smaller suit. Yeah for weight loss.
Enough Twitter already!
Driving at night.
