On Sat, Dec 5, 2009 at 4:30 AM, David Mann <[email protected]> wrote: > The Long Bays Classic is one of the headline races of the Festival of Cycling > that we have every year. > > It's raced over a very scenic 80km ride from Christchurch City, heading > partway towards Akaroa then coming over Gebbies Pass and around the bays of > Lyttelton Harbour, then over Evans Pass and back into the city to complete > the loop. All the local road riders use this loop for their training. > > The elite racers do this in about two hours. The rest take about 2.5 to 3 > hours with stragglers taking closer to 4. > > My plan was to sit at the top of Evans Pass and take photos as the riders > came past but I exhausted my creative ideas fairly quickly so I headed over > the top and down the other side, bit by bit, until I'd run out of hill and > wandered off to meet my partner who was visiting her grandfather. > > I've split this into two galleries because the software preloads all the big > images in the background so I tend to limit myself to about 20 per gallery. > The photos are arranged in the order they were taken. > > <http://www.multisport.net.nz/photos/580-2009-12-05-armstrong-festival-of-cycling-photos-1.html> > <http://www.multisport.net.nz/photos/581-2009-12-05-armstrong-festival-of-cycling-photos-2.html> > > I think I broke some kind of personal record, taking 378 photos. I also > broke the hood on my FA24mm f/2 lens AGAIN. I'll have to use stronger glue > this time. My eyes are feeling a bit strained after all this time in Bridge > and Photoshop, and my lower leg muscles are sore from an unplanned run down > the hill without any kind of warmup. > > I ended up abandoning the use of both front and rear lens caps in my bag as I > was changing lenses so often. I need zoom lenses for this kind of thing. > Not that f/2.8 Pentax zooms come up for sale very often (do Pentax still make > f/2.8 zooms?). > > I'm going to try and make it to the criterium race in the city tomorrow > afternoon. > > I'm thinking about posting a short "outtakes" gallery as there were a handful > of photos that were *almost* the best of the day... but didn't work out, > mostly due to focus problems. This tends to frustrate me :) > > The one big lesson of the day is that I need to learn how to pan properly. > It's not easy when a bike is coming past at 90k within 2 or 3 feet of you. I > have a lot of photos of half a bike. > > Comments are appreciated, positive and negative. Many of the photos are not > critically sharp but they're good enough for the size they're presented at. > And you'll notice that the weather didn't exactly play ball so I tended to > crop most of the sky out.
Some wonderful shots there. In fact, most of them are wonderful. That the background scenery is beautiful helps a lot. I like them. cheers, frank -- "Sharpness is a bourgeois concept." -Henri Cartier-Bresson -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
