1st camera jumps

[jsyslo 0]

All the pieces of the puzzle fell together this week, and I wound up doing my first camera jumps this weekend! First, I would like to thank all the participants of this forum for all the wicked good help. Searching and viewing this forum provided all the answers I needed to put togher a top notch setup, (and understand what Im doing:)). I would also like to thank Max from Royal Lens and Ram and the folks a 2KComposites. The 105 arrived Monday, and I took tuesday off to play with it. Wednesday the Diamond .3x lens arrived, and after showing it off to my skydiving friends at the safety meeting (read: skydiving party!) Thursday nite, my FF2 from 2KC got here on Friday. The timing was perfect, as I was rapidly approaching my 200th.

Viewing the 105 through the Diamond is amazing! The FF2 is freakin da BOMB!! It is very light, fits like a glove, the cutaway is killer, and the Cameye install is very nicely done. After a simple adjustment and tightening down on the cutaway side of the chincup, I simply mounted the camera, set the Cameye LED where I wanted it, trimmed the excess from the ratched side, and I was good to go! After putting on the helmet and running around the house for a few minutes while recording, I decided to angle the camera down a bit (there was plenty of adjustment available in the provided bracket) for a better Freefly camera angle. That worked great. I tell you what, I compared my setup to a friends, and it was a no brainer. His Hawkeye w/ PC120 and kenko .45 was freakin heavy in comparison! Even with my two Pro-Tracks. The D-box stuck out way further, and was no where near as snag proof as the incorperated covered box used by 2KC. After working with both setups to firewire all the footage around (three cameras on the jumps), mine was definatly the easiest to attach all the cables to and work the buttons on. The easy access to my camera was killer because the other two setups were so hard to get to the buttons, we had to use the remote. But with all three Sonys sitting there, one remote was controlling ALL the cameras, hehe.

I took my setup down to the dropzone on Saturday morning, and did the coffe jump with my old helmet. Then, on my 200th, switched over the dytters and jumped the FF2. the low profile side mount let me retain the majority of my "helmet proceedures" from before. I still put my helmet on and ratched so it would not become a projectile in a misshap, etc. The camera fits snug, but is easy to put on over goggles n stuff. The Cameye made it easy to tell what the camera was doing. I found it difficult to turn the camera on with the cameye and have it not start recording right away, but that was no huge deal. I just held the button a little longer, right when I wanted to start recording, and got the red LED immediatly. No problems whatsoever with the FF2, Diamond or the PC105. I flew inside video on a couple of three-way flower exits and medium distance HD freefalls. The setup seems to be perfect for it, with no video shake and no helmet in the view of the .3x. The sidemount felt a bit weird, untill you get out, then I never felt a thing, same ol' in freefall. Its obvious to me after viewing everyone elses video of the same jump, Ive got a lot to learn. There video was quite better,(FLEW better). That OK, Im eager to learn and these guys can teach me alot. Robert, Jarle, you guys rock, thanks!

More than happy to answer any questions about my setup, or first camera jumps. Wow was I nervous for some reason. Just tryin to keep it safe, keep it simple, and let the artistry grow over time. No finer subject matter than freefly. No desire to film proffessionaly or teams/tandems at this time. Just archiving and logging fun freefly jumps with my friends for review during Thursday night parties. Whew, got the first few under my belt. Feels great.

When I was a student, I thought they were gonna teach me to skydive. Really, they only teach you to jump out of an airplane. Its like they opened a very small door into a huge room. I really got that feeling again this weekend jumping camera for the first time. Like this was the start of something big! :)

Thanks for all here who helped, I think you know who you are. I hope to thank you guys in person at the Holiday Boogie here in the desert.

Blue Skies!

[jsyslo 0]

I have posted a couple of stills in the personal galleries under "jsyslo". Killer fun!

Blue Skies!