The backyard

A while back near the end of skiing thought id like to test the strobes a bit more. Back in the summer Miles holden and I raced a trampoline up The Remarkables to catch the end of the sunset which was great fun, So this time I thought I'd take it a little further.

'Ollie Troon and Jordan McInally'

The idea is to have a trampoline, which is usually in the backyard and to place it in remote locations. With the tramp we had sourced we were able to easily take apart and transport in the back of the car to locations. We found a process that we could put the tramp together in a matter of minutes to make the sunset or certain light. Some locations weren't the safest of locations like the barge shoot with the tramp on a lean and moving each jump, surrounded by metal poles or holes. No injuries apart from the quite frequent stubbed toe caused from looking through the viewfinder.

'Jonty Norton falling from the tree tops'

I had some ideas of the shots I'd like but I was more interested in finding a sweet location. So most of the shoots were all experimental of what could be achieved. My favourite shot is above where as if he's falling from above. This was using 2 speedlites set off by pocket wizards from each side illuminating his face. With the speed he was jumping at I wanted a crystal clear shot where no 'ghosting' would appear, luckily the trees shadows darkened him. That allowed a lower flash output/faster flash duration from the speedlites giving the clear edging around him.

'Jordan McInally'

While taking the shots I was able to sneak in the footage along with an assistant. Heres the equipment we used:
Canon 5d mark II
Canon 30D
Canon 7D
Sony HDR V1P
17-40mm f/4L
24-105mm f/4L
70-200mm f/2.8L IS
Sigma 20mm 2.8
3x Canon 580EXII
3x pocket wizard plus IIs
flash trigger for 3rd pocketwizard
Manfrotto monopod
fluid head tripod
2x lightstands

Was interesting how it turned from practicing skiing tricks-photos-movies.

Was surprised the boys put up with me so long asking to repeat over and over for each trick. In the end the shots were captured so was time to hit the computer to edit. The shot above I was in the water up to my waist where the water was fresh off the mountain's melting snow so wasn't keen to stay in there for long. 10 minutes of rearranging to find the angle I was keen to call it quits for the night.

Heres a lil behind the scenes clip showing some locations over the time. enjoy!

The Backyard from TappedNZ Photography on Vimeo.

Next project on its way.
Enjoy, Stefan Haworth