ONE Staff / January 26th, 2009 / Uncategorized
PHOTO JOURNAL: Adam Morris #3

Greg Schlosser

Adam Morris checks in from Wisconsin with a new PHOTO JOURNAL that not only spells out the technical steps of capturing these pictures (yeah, there’s a blade shot inside!), but also shares a lesson learned in never passing up an opportunity to shoot a photo. That’s good advice! — ONE

Tommy Schultz — Launch to Backside

I read somewhere that you should never pass up an opportunity to shoot a photo. The point being that, for unforeseen reasons, you may never again be able to capture that image in the same way. In my experience, that’s true.

When I found this spot, I wasn’t sure the asphalt bump would offer enough ups. Two weeks later, when we showed up to test it, there was a new concern: stability. The L-shaped pipe’s vertical portion remained anchored to the wall, but the grindable part wasn’t. To our surprise, someone had unwittingly made it safe for skating by leaving a support beam. The support beam was better than nothing, sort of. Sure, it made the spot skateable, but if you didn’t land “just so” on top of the pipe, or if you missed and a skate jarred the support bar, down came you AND the pipe.

While Tommy Schultz, Greg Schlosser and a few others warmed up, I scoped out camera angles and configured my flashes. The hard part was to avoid too many shadows on the wall, and to keep the white wall from losing any more detail than necessary. I shot with the short end of my Canon 70-200 f2.8. I used two strobes. One stands outside the right edge of the frame to light Tommy’s chest and face. The second is next to the wall, just beyond the left edge of the frame, to make up the difference.

The lighting is no great art, but I figured I’d be back in the spring. I wanted to shoot a topside trick. Rocket fishbrain? Alleyoop top porn? In December the property had a fence around it. No big deal, I thought. Last week the site was reduced to piles of rubble. — Adam Morris

Photos © 2009 Adam Morris

Discussion / PHOTO JOURNAL: Adam Morris #3

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  • Brian Krans - January 27th, 2009

    Morris, you trickster! As always, great shooting. Nice job highlighting a skater so close to a white wall without blowing all the detail out.

    Miss ya’ buddy. Come visit. Bring cheese and beer. My stock is getting low.

  • Psykoesis - January 27th, 2009

    Morris, yet another great shot for the portfolio, that is a tradegy of sorts to have the place deomolished, but alas, there are a trillion fish in the sea left to shoot. Nice work, and what kind of cheese are you bringing to Krans’.?

  • KILLHYPE - January 27th, 2009

    I love the geometry of these shots! Posted over on KILL HYPE… -B

    http://killhype.ning.com/profiles/blogs/adam-morris-photo-journal-from

  • wesdriver - January 29th, 2009

    Great advice! Never put off a good spot… might as well make it happen while your there. Don’t even get me started on spots that couldn’t be found again, much less destroyed! ha ha ha

  • BJBales - February 2nd, 2009

    Great little story here, and of course, very nice shots.

  • heber - February 2nd, 2009

    🙁

    FREE BOSCHI POPE!!!

  • Tommy's Mom - February 22nd, 2009

    Great pic and great point Adam! Thanks for catching my boy in this great shot so I can share the link!

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