View allAll Photos Tagged bbkk
There's an unfortunate amount of distortion in this panorama, but it does a good job of showing the view from up here. The Summit Ridge really is a beautiful vantage point for seeing the Island of Hawai`i.
Setup: Canon A650IS, Brooxes BBKK Rig, AuRiCo Rig Controller, Flowform 16, #200 Dacron, New Winder
Footprints walking hither and yon.
Unfortunately I decided to make this one after I'd stuck a graduated ND filter on the end of my lens to deal with the funky sky at the horizon. So the top part of this frame is under-exposed. I've tried to patch these kinds of things in Photoshop using a gradient, but invariably it blows the noise up in the "repaired" area. Bleah.
Arahurahu is the only marae -- an ancient temple or meeting place -- in all of Polynesia that has been fully restored, and it is maintained like a museum. Although not nearly as impressive as the great lagoonside marae on Huahine and Raiatea, this is Tahiti's best example of ancient Polynesian temples and meeting places, and its exhibit boards do a good job of explaining the significance of each part. For example, the stone pens near the entrance were used to keep the pigs to be sacrificed to the gods. Arahurahu is used for the reenactment of old Polynesian ceremonies during the July Heiva Nui celebrations.
==========
Maiden flight of the Helikite –Custom design AutoKAP rig and RC BBKK (BROOXES BASIC KAP KIT) by Brooks Leffler – Ricoh GX 100 and wide angle converter. This Marae is located in a valley and the winds are rare, hence the Helikite.
This is the first set of a personnal project to record most Archaelogical sites of Tahiti and Moorea. Most of these sites are located at the bottom of valleys and the only way to shoot them is to use a balloon or a helikite.
The helikite is not as spontaneous as a kite, as you need to carry a few cubic meters of helium, but it flies like a kite with an angle from 90° to 75°- 2 cubic meter of helium were plenty to lift the 1200 grams of the BBKK.
==========
Too bad the light was “flat”, a good pretext to come back!
This is one of the benefits of realizing you have a good idea, and taking measures to protect it. Earl Bakken is the inventor of the pacemaker. History doesn't always treat inventors well, but in this case Mr. Bakken did pretty well. That's his house.
Mr. Bakken literally invented the pacemaker in his garage. He's pretty keen on promoting the idea that anyone can invent new ideas and new things, so he started a program in Waimea called "Earl's Garage", which is aimed at kids with the goal of getting them to build things. Cool things. Among other things, every year Earl's Garage puts on a haunted house featuring automata built by the kids. It's cool stuff!
Earl Bakken is one of those truly rare people who can see past himself and his own needs. A list of his contributions to society and to life on the Island of Hawaii gets really long really fast. But you can learn more here:
And the view from the house ain't bad.
A vertical low altitude aerial photograph of four boys swimming in the ocean near a rocky shoreline. Visible in the photograph are the four swimmers in the upper half of the frame, and basalt lava rock in the lower half. The ocean is shallow, with a sandy bottom.
20+ knot winds made KAP difficult at best, but the wind across Kua Bay was steady enough to fly a Flowform 8 and lift my BBKK rig. At times, though, the rig was at risk of catching surf spray.
Number five in a series of wave abstracts.
I couldn't get a lot of height because of the high wind speed and the low line angle on my only high wind kite, my Flowform 8. So I spent time playing with the waves.
Equipment Used:
Kite - Flowform 8 + 15' Fuzzy Tail
Line - #200 Dacron
Rig - R/C BBKK
Camera - Canon A650IS
Built this new Kite Aerial Photography Rig to inspire me to get out there and do some aerial photography again.
Build the Pierre Lesage (PL) Rotating KAP Rig
This is my interpretation of Pierre’s KAP Rig design.
Parts:
Brooxes Compact Picavet Package $85
Brooxes Utility Frame $11
(3) Brooxes Better Camera Keeper (1/4-in screw,red knob) $2.50 each
www.brooxes.com/newsite/BBKK/BBKK-PARTS.html
Suptig electric tripod adapter
www.amazon.com/dp/B07DB6SK6R?ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_fed_asin_...
Loctite Threadlocker 242
Build Modification:
Brooxes Utility Frame:
Drill with a 1/4” bit at 4 points of the frame.
3 of the points are located in the center of each leg.
The fourth point is optional located at the end of the bottom leg.
Note; the points are existing pre-drilled holes.
Picavet:
Drill with a 1/4” bit at center point of the picavet.
Purpose:
These points allow attachment of your cameras and electric tripod adapter.
My Cameras:
Ricoh GR
Nikon Coolpix A
GoPro Hero 11
Insta360 Ace Pro II
Insta360 ONE RS 1-Inch 360 Edition Camera
Leica Q3 (A big maybe)?
Not sure how many degrees this is, but something past 180. The camera was a couple hundred feet inland of shore, and was vertical for this panorama. The original file is some 3,400 pixels high, and over 20,000 pixels wide. I'm not 100% satisfied with the noise or detail in the photo, but that's a function of the camera and ambient lighting as much as anything else.
The 4WD road leading into the valley is visible as a diagonal track across the cliff wall on the left side. The hiking trail leading to Waimanu Valley, a good eight hours away on foot, is visible as a switchback across the cliff wall on the right side.
The first time I did KAP at Mookini Heiau, I wasn't really satisfied with the results. But I was also flying a Flow Form 16 in weather more suitable for a Flow Form 8, and felt like I was wrestling a tiger the whole time.
This time the wind was much more cooperative (HUZZAH for wind models!) and let me make several composite images.
For the record, Mookini Heiau was at one time a luakini, or a place of human sacrifice. But today it is not. And yes, it is still an actively used heiau. The current Kahuna of Mookini Heiau, Momi Mookini Lum, rededicated it in 1978 to the children of Hawaii, and in 1994 rededicated it to the children of the world. Today it is a place of healing rather than human sacrifice.
I was glad to have a chance to re-visit this place and try to do a better job of photographing it.
I was actually pretty tense while doing this, but hey, my line had the proper slack attitude!
It's been a while since I've really gone out and just done some KAP at a pretty place. Anaehoomalu Bay qualifies as a pretty place.
This was also my first real outing with the new video gear. With the exception of one dodgy connector I plan to replace next week, I'm completely happy with this setup.
This is a front oblique view of the rig. The new metal geared servo is on the left, the camera is in the center, and the pan axis with its Brooxes Better Gear Guide is on top. Batteries sit to the right of the pan axis, and the 2.4GHz receiver sits below on the left. The cable snaking down to the camera is a GentLED-Focus with a 2.5mm connector.
The red band around the lens is NOT a case of my trying to ghetto tag my lens as L glass. It's a rubber band. In the past I've used the broad rubber bands that come around broccoli, asparagus, or other produce to lock a lens in a particular zoom setting. Unfortunately the growers here have stopped using those bands, so I had to improvise. It appears to work.
A low altitude aerial infrared photo of Kauhola Point and the monopole structure lighthouse at the north end of the Big Island of Hawaii, Hawaii, USA.
I did one NIR KAP session prior to this one, but because I hadn't really set up my gear beforehand, it was a mess. This was a MUCH better session. Winds were about 10-12kts and incredibly laminar. I flew a Flowform 16 and my Brooxes BBKK rig, alternating between my NIR converted A2200 and my unmodified A2200. This was from the NIR set.
This set is my first experience with Lightroom 5. I like the idea, but it's going to take some re-training on my part to get the most of it.
Arahurahu is the only marae -- an ancient temple or meeting place -- in all of Polynesia that has been fully restored, and it is maintained like a museum. Although not nearly as impressive as the great lagoonside marae on Huahine and Raiatea, this is Tahiti's best example of ancient Polynesian temples and meeting places, and its exhibit boards do a good job of explaining the significance of each part. For example, the stone pens near the entrance were used to keep the pigs to be sacrificed to the gods. Arahurahu is used for the reenactment of old Polynesian ceremonies during the July Heiva Nui celebrations.
==========
Maiden flight of the Helikite –Custom design AutoKAP rig and RC BBKK (BROOXES BASIC KAP KIT) by Brooks Leffler – Ricoh GX 100 and wide angle converter. This Marae is located in a valley and the winds are rare, hence the Helikite.
This is the first set of a personnal project to record most Archaelogical sites of Tahiti and Moorea. Most of these sites are located at the bottom of valleys and the only way to shoot them is to use a balloon or a helikite.
The helikite is not as spontaneous as a kite, as you need to carry a few cubic meters of helium, but it flies like a kite with an angle from 90° to 75°- 2 cubic meter of helium were plenty to lift the 1200 grams of the BBKK.
==========
Too bad the light was “flat”, a good pretext to come back!
I've been trying to get this angle on Waimea for well over a year now. The real difficulty with this shot is the prevailing wind and that stand of trees. Believe it or not, those are a huge stand of eucalyptus trees, upwards of 80-100' high. The wind finally cooperated, the weather was clear, I was actually in Waimea for a change, and the conditions held through lunchtime. Yaaaay!
This is a photo of St. James Circle (the building at the upper edge of the frame is St. James Episcopal Church). The building in the center foreground is a day care, and the building just above it is the Waimea Country School. Two of my kids go to WCS, so it's as near and dear to my heart as Waimea Elementary School, which I've photographed a lot in the past.
The shot is a little lop-sided. The real subject is St. James Circle. But I wanted to include the line of eucalyptus trees, and I wanted to include the field beyond. I'm also in that field. I've posted "Where's Waldo" shots in the past. This one's harder than most.
For the record, I launched in the field to the right, got the kite at least 2x the tree height (it was a rokkaku, so that's not hard), clipped on, and ran the rig up. Then I walked over to the trees until I had my line running through the nearest branches. FINALLY I got the angle I wanted. But boy did it make me nervous.
(That's a hint if you look for me in the shot.)
The original for this was over 5800 pixels high. I dumped it down to 2000 pixels for upload to Flickr. So by all means view large. There's a lot of detail you won't get from a small view.
Still loving the HoVer rig and the flexibility it gives me in the air. Thanks again for designing all these parts, Brooks, and for making them all play nicely with each other, no matter how you decide to put them together!
This is a cold spring near Kiholo Bay. Cold fresh water comes down from a lava tube system that stretches far upland, and just past this opening in the tube, it connects with the sea.
It's possible to swim out to the ocean from here, but it requires you to hold your breath and know where you're going. In the opposite direction you can swim up into the tube and into pitch black clear water.
The water really is quite cold. My son had a hard time deciding if he was going to jump in or not. In the end he asked me to lower him in by the hands. Chillyboy!
Folks here are VERY protective of this pool. The white things on the bottom are bits of coral and shell, not trash. Please, if you visit, take only photographs and leave only footprints.
Another angle on the cliff trail into Pololu Valley...I'm not sure which view I like better, this one or the one that captures some of the cliffs in the distance. This one shows more of the beach and less of the trail, but overall I like this composition better.
A low altitude aerial infrared photo of the monopole structure lighthouse at Kauhola Point at the north end of the Big Island of Hawaii, Hawaii, USA.
I did one NIR KAP session prior to this one, but because I hadn't really set up my gear beforehand, it was a mess. This was a MUCH better session. Winds were about 10-12kts and incredibly laminar. I flew a Flowform 16 and my Brooxes BBKK rig, alternating between my NIR converted A2200 and my unmodified A2200. This was from the NIR set.
This set is my first experience with Lightroom 5. I like the idea, but it's going to take some re-training on my part to get the most of it.
Midair photograph of my go-to KAP rig as of July, 2013, loaded with a Canon T2i. This rig will also accommodate my Canon A650 and my Gopro Hero3, complete with video down-link for each camera.
The companion image to Waipio Valley - Inside-Out, this one faces the other way, toward the water. (Yes, I'm in there somewhere. Think "small".)
Autopano Pro doesn't deal well with fuzzy horizon lines. It won't identify a key point in uniform water (makes sense) so watery horizons tend to take a beating during stitching. This isn't my best job of fixing a funky horizon, but it's passable.
The valley itself only had one glaring stitch error. I'm not planning on printing this one, so I left the error in. In any case I'm still really pleased with how well Autopano Pro has been turning out.
After a year of planning and weeks of missing the weather I needed, I finally got the shot of Puu Huluhulu I was after.
"Puu Huluhulu" translates literally as "Hairy Hill". It is a kipuka, or a forested cindercone. Over time cindercones are overgrown with vegetation, and subsequent lava flows can isolate them, cutting off routes for invasive species to move into the kipuka's ecosystem. Because the name is descriptive, it is not unique. There are at least three kipukas named "Puu Huluhulu" on the Big Island, and are likely more that I'm not aware of. This one is located in the saddle between Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea (seen in the background) and is well worth visiting and hiking on the numerous trails that wind through the old growth forest that grows there.
This photo was made using a camera suspended from a kite line. Winds in the saddle between Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa are finicky, and most days have tradewinds coming in from the east, kona winds coming in from the west, and a lull where the two meet. Timing a shot like this is a careful mix of planning, watching the weather, and dumb luck.
The panorama was stitched from 21 photos using Autopano Pro.
The only bit of custom work on the rig, and indeed the only non-Brooxes part, is this little shelf I used to extend the utility frame.
Brooks offers other hardware that would make this unnecessary. The only reason it's there is I screwed up. I made the naive assumption that the center of gravity of the camera would place the tripod socket somewhere on the utility frame. That's not how it worked out, though.
The CG of the T2i with the 18-55mm kit lens is almost directly under the lens mount, and off to one side. This put the tripod socket more than a quarter inch off the back of the utility frame. I chopped out some 0.050" thick aluminum, match-drilled it to the frame, bolted it on, and drilled the holes in the right place. One of the big red thumbscrews from Brooxes holds the camera in place.
Not shown in this picture is another first for me: I cemented a strip of thin rubber to the top of the aluminum shelf. This SERIOUSLY holds the camera in place. No tendency to rotate, no ifs ands or buts on the camera staying put. I'm a convert.
One other thing not shown in this photo is the red Loctite I'm going to install on those two bolts! I do not want this thing coming apart in the air.
The beach at the Mauna Lani Beach Club is a really good place for kids. The deep reef makes for very little wave action: a plus when you're trying to convince small kids to get in the water. It's good for bigger kids and adults, too, because the snorkeling really is tough to beat.
Brooxes Deluxe KAP Kit (BDKK) with Canon S90. Triggered by TowerHobbies TS-11 Micro Servo. Tilt is (unnecessarily too heavy) Hitec HS-645MG. Pan gear is RobotZone 4:1 reduction.
Currently I AutoKAP using AuRiCo from Brooxes.
BDKK Weight (with 4x AAA batteries, AuRiCo) = 471 grams. (ouch!)
Canon S90 (with batteries, SD card) = 200 grams.
Total Weight = 671 grams.
First KAP of 2014!!
This was the only really good frame from a seriously turbulent session at Waialea Bay. We've had zero wind for almost a week, coupled with enough rain that our solar hot water system has run cold for the past two days. Finally! A break in the weather and a little wind.
"A little wind" started at 8-12kts and steadily climbed to over 15kts with gusts, eddies, lulls, and everything else that makes a KAPer go "Ew!"
Only a couple of the photos from this set were truly blurry, but most of them were soft to some degree. This was the only one really worth salvaging. It turned out ok. I was trying to photograph the beach. The two people standing there were a bonus.
This beach is commonly known as "Beach 69" because it's at the 69 mile marker. But the bay itself is properly known as Waialea Bay. It's a beautiful spot. Tough to KAP at, but well worth the effort when it works.
One of several panoramas that came out of a recent session in Waipio Valley.
The only way into Waipio is down a really steep road on the south side of the valley (visible in the left side of the image as a diagonal track across the cliffside.) You can go down in a 4WD, or you can walk.
The river cuts through Waipio Valley not too far from the south cliffside. Until recently that's the only side I'd done KAP from. This time I walked across the river and up to the north side of the valley, and was rewarded with cleaner wind, and a shallower beach. Thank goodness for high angle kites!
This was done with the HoVer rig I recently built. The wind was cleaner on this side, but still too messy for making two-stripe panoramas. This and the other panos I did that day were all done with the camera rotated sideways. The original file for this was 3800 pixels high. I'm pleased as punch with the new rig!
Arahurahu is the only marae -- an ancient temple or meeting place -- in all of Polynesia that has been fully restored, and it is maintained like a museum. Although not nearly as impressive as the great lagoonside marae on Huahine and Raiatea, this is Tahiti's best example of ancient Polynesian temples and meeting places, and its exhibit boards do a good job of explaining the significance of each part. For example, the stone pens near the entrance were used to keep the pigs to be sacrificed to the gods. Arahurahu is used for the reenactment of old Polynesian ceremonies during the July Heiva Nui celebrations.
==========
Maiden flight of the Helikite –Custom design AutoKAP rig and RC BBKK (BROOXES BASIC KAP KIT) by Brooks Leffler – Ricoh GX 100 and wide angle converter. This Marae is located in a valley and the winds are rare, hence the Helikite.
This is the first set of a personnal project to record most Archaelogical sites of Tahiti and Moorea. Most of these sites are located at the bottom of valleys and the only way to shoot them is to use a balloon or a helikite.
The helikite is not as spontaneous as a kite, as you need to carry a few cubic meters of helium, but it flies like a kite with an angle from 90° to 75°- 2 cubic meter of helium were plenty to lift the 1200 grams of the BBKK.
==========
Too bad the light was “flat”, a good pretext to come back!
This is the NOAA Atmospheric Observatory on Mauna Loa on the Big Island of Hawaii. This is also where the Keeling Curve, a continuous measurement of atmospheric CO2 since 1958, was (is) made. The NOAA station is right above 11,000' of elevation, and is where the trail to the summit of Mauna Loa starts.
The day started with the idea of hiking to the summit of Mauna Loa, but one of the hikers in our group ran into respiratory problems, so I bowed out to provide escort. (Altitude-related health issues are no joke. The cost of taking something lightly and being wrong is simply too high.) Once I was sure the hiker was recovering and didn't need to be taken to a lower altitude, I did a little KAP while we waited for the other hikers to finish the hike.
Mountain winds can be fickle, and this was no exception. Lots of vertical mixing, lots of gust/lull/gust/lull, but I got a solid enough set to do a stitched panorama of the NOAA station at the trailhead.
Enough people missed the hike that there are plans afoot for a second one this year. I hope I can make it, and have a better KAP session at the summit of Mauna Loa than I did last year.
Meanwhile all kinds of stuff stacked up during the past few weeks, and it's time to catch up!
It's not the image I was after, but I'm beginning to think the one I'm after isn't physically possible. Still, of the kite aerials I've done at Kua Bay, this is the closest to how I'd like to photograph Manini Owali Beach at Kua Bay.
As with my recent session at Kiholo Bay this one started life on Google Earth. I found the angles from which I wanted to photograph the bay, and translated that into a camera location and altitude. Using wind maps run by the local sailplane club, I knew where I had to stand in order to put the camera precisely where I needed it. This is the second time this technique has worked almost flawlessly. I'm sold on the idea.
From my second real (not at Hapuna Beach with the family) KAP session in ages...I finally worked out the last of the irritants with my video downlink system a few weeks ago (corroded connector). With a full charge on oll batteries, I grabbed my gear and took off for Pololu Valley...Pololu is the northernmost of the Kohala Mountain erosion valleys. All of them have black sand or rock beaches, but Pololu is the most benign by far. People swim and surf here regularly...Or they go for strolls along the shore, like these four people.
I never get tired of flying a camera at the Kiholo Bay Inlet. Of all of the bodies of water I've run across on the Big Island, it's easily one of the most photogenic.
The water in the inlet is highly stratified, with each layer having a different salinity. The color of the water is not because the bottom is sandy. It's rocky, in fact. The color comes from organisms and dissolved solids that preferentially inhabit a particular salinity of water.
The inlet has a surface connection to the sea, so it is not an anchialine pond. But because the surface connection is so shallow, tidal flow doesn't cause significant mixing in the water's strata.
Kiholo Bay Inlet is also an excellent place to see honu, or Pacific green sea turtles both in the water and on land. The upper strata of the water are extremely clear, so the honu are very easy to see when they're near the surface. And the finer rocks on the seaward side of the pond makes for easy exit and entry from the water, so honu are often found sunning themselves there.
If you visit Kiholo Bay and the inlet there, please remember the honu are protected, and should not be disturbed. And bring plenty of water to drink!
(Note: I have been calling the Kiholo Bay Inlet by the wrong name: Wainanali`i Pond. This is how it is commonly labeled on maps, hence my mistake. But during a conversation with Bobby Camara, he pointed out that the village of Wainanali`i is a two hour canoe ride to the north of Kiholo Bay, and that it was destroyed by the same lava flow that created the inlet.)
A composite from my first outing since the most recent round of rebuilds on my KAP rig.
This is a composite of orthogonal images taken while walking down the beach. The wind was blowing from the upper right to the lower left in this image, so the camera was slightly inland from where I was walking.
I had my camera set on continuous shutter mode, and triggered it through a GentLED-CHDK, so it was taking images as fast as the camera could save them. For this composite, though, I pulled out every third image simply because there was so much overlap between images. All in all almost two hundred images were taken along this stretch of coastline.
The reason for the high density of photos was so that I could pull out stereo pairs with a wide choice in baselines. I haven't done any of the stereos yet, but already I'm pleased with how the ortho composite worked out.
In addition to the beach and anchialine pond in the upper left, there's some neat stuff going on in the lava in the lower left corner as well. I've never ventured beyond the line of vegetation, so I really had no idea what the lava behind the greenery looked like. It's pretty cool!
The final image size for this was roughly 9kx11k pixels. I've uploaded it 5000 pixels high, or a little less than half linear scale. By all means view large.
KAP over Marina Taina Tahiti, May 24, 2008
Mari-Cha III, Shenandoah, and other great SY vessels, more to come later this month according to Philippe, the head of the Marina
Dan Leigh Delta R8 - Ricoh GX 100 -BBKK by Brooks Leffler
Traditionnal Polynesian sailing outrigger canoe regatta at Venus Point, Tahiti.
Images shot from a kite
Kiwi Delta fishing kite – Ricoh GX 100 with wide angle converter – Wind 12 knots East – Cousin Dyneema Ultimate line – BBKK radio controled rig.
The light was very bright and the whites are a bit “burned’. Will change exposure settings next session.
This is a re-crop of an earlier photograph I did last weekend. Thanks, hanselpedia for the idea on the crop. It does look a lot better this way.
If you compare this against other photos I've done here, you can see a lot of the sand is gone. This happened during a storm surge that came in and promised waves high enough to hold the Eddy. Unfortunately the waves that did show up were enough to take the beach away, but not enough for the Eddy to happen.
It used to be my wife and I could fly our two line kites here without getting our feet wet. I did fly a two line this day, but I was a good 30+ feet out in the water.
Low altitude aeral panorama of Hapuna Beach State Park with winter waves and overcast skies...Hapuna Beach State Park, Island of Hawaii, Hawaii, USA
The reef at the Mauna Lani makes it a great place for snorkeling, and makes it a great place for kids to swim, too. The reef damps a lot of the energy out of the incoming waves, so by the time the waves make it to the beach they're small and easy for kids to handle.
20+ knot winds made KAP difficult at best, but the wind across Kua Bay was steady enough to fly a Flowform 8 and lift my BBKK rig. At times, though, the rig was at risk of catching surf spray.
Because of the windy weather, there weren't many people at the beach. (Beach + wind = sandblaster). But there were a handful of boogieboarders, body surfers, and swimmers enjoying the waves. This was a lucky catch.
Equipment Used:
Kite - Flowform 8 + 15' Fuzzy Tail
Line - #200 Dacron
Rig - R/C BBKK
Camera - Canon A650IS
This is my KAP bag with everything unpacked. Left to right, top to bottom are: Charger; Packet of KAP photos to show to curious onlookers; Tension scale; Kite line (#90 and #200); Camera bag full of spare batteries; More spare batteries; Tool bag with screwdriver, hex wrench, hemostats, spare swivel clips, spare rubber bands; Granola bar; First aid kit; FF16; Transmitter; KAP rig; Two fuzzy tails; FF8.
Not pictured, but of equal or greater importance than much of my other gear are: Gloves; a hat; sunscreen.
The Kiholo Bay Inlet is always a good place to see honu, or Pacific green sea turtles, swimming.
(Note: I have been calling the Kiholo Bay Inlet by the wrong name: Wainanali`i Pond. This is how it is commonly labeled on maps, hence my mistake. But during a conversation with Bobby Camara, he pointed out that the village of Wainanali`i is a two hour canoe ride to the north of Kiholo Bay, and that it was destroyed by the same lava flow that created the inlet.)
My main KAP rig, post August 2009 rebuild.
Four major changes this time:
1 - The tilt servo was flipped over, raising the camera inside the frame by almost an inch. When the camera is horizontal this puts the bottom of the camera bracket level with the bottom of the frame on the side that holds the servo. One more thing to hit the ground before the camera in case of a crash.
2 - The Brooxes Better Gear Guide on the pan axle was lowered. Prior to this I had some spacers to raise the BBGG by about 0.75". Removing the spacers lowered things considerably.
3 - I re-ran most of the wiring on the rig, and chopped wires to length wherever possible. The only ugly wire remaining is the one coming from my battery pack. I've got a crimp tool and servo connectors on order, and as soon as they show up my battery pack will get a newer, prettier, and shorter cable.
4 - The thing that started it all: All the carbon steel screws have been replaced with stainless. Yaaaay! No more rust on my rig!
One more subtle change is that I really haven't been using a polarizer much in recent flights. The image degredation is visible to my eye when I'm processing pictures, so it really started to dig at me. I left the polarizer off for this picture as well.
I'm still hugely pleased with my camera, my radio, my shutter trigger, and above all my rig. To ALL the folks around the globe who design and manufacture KAP gear so folks like me can fly our cameras, my hat is off to you. All of you.
Donated by Brandt Brinkerhoff & Katherine Walker for the benefit auction / holiday party to raise money for the Hamilton Wood Type & Printing Museum.
Brandt Brinkerhoff & Katherine Walker collaborated on this poster series which features the complete original text and etchings from the timeless children's classics, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Peter & Wendy and The Tale of Peter Rabbit. Printed offset with florescent ink on Sappi McCoy.
This was one of those one-shot outings. I didn't put the level of planning into it that I did with some of my other shots, but luckily what I did get provided me with what I need to photograph this the way I want. I'll take advantage of this on a future trip, and hopefully photograph Puu Huluhulu the way I intended.
Regardless, I was really pleased with how well the stitching went on this: two rows of about six shots each. All done in burst mode. It's not perfect, but since this isn't really the composition I'm after, I didn't fix the stitching errors I did get. They're all still in there.
Unfortunately where I did well in stitching, I did horribly in exposure. The minor problem was that I was running with -1/3EV rather than my usual -2/3EV. But the real issue was metering. Most of the sets were metered off the ground, which is quite dark. So most of the sets were massively over-exposed.
The sets that went into this image were metered off the sky rather than the ground, so they were closer to correct metering.
So what's the plan for the future trip? Move two parking spots closer to the puu. This will make Puu Huluhulu much larger in the frame, while keeping Mauna Kea, seen here in the background, about the same size. It should also move Puu Huluhulu down and to the left in the frame, which would be a more pleasing composition.
But only time will tell.