billvon 2,400 #26 April 15, 2009 >you can backfly pretty slow . . . Yep. And with wings you can go even slower. To me it's about what your goals are. If your goal is to be the best video flyer you can, wings will help that happen by increasing your range. If you just want to screw around, then they're not that important. You'll still get the shot 90% of the time. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
lewmonst 0 #27 April 15, 2009 QuoteQuoteWhen I film a tandem that goes slow I just wear something baggier to adjust my fallrate When I had 600 jumps, that's how I did it too. Ditto. You can do tandem videos without them. How high do you set your standards? Your video can be better if you learn to use wings. If you just lay still in front of them, on level, and that's your standard, then no, you don't need wings. If you want to get better angles for better photos, especially getting very low and looking up at their face, get wings. Here's a few of my shots: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=31358&id=545871412&l=0271f5541bhttp://www.exitshot.com Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
DSE 3 #28 April 15, 2009 Karen, A couple of years back, Laszlo (who wears wings most of the time, I think) taught me how to get really low on tandems and stay, getting a similar shot to many of yours on your photo pages. I love that angle, looking up at the student and catching the drogue. I don't think I could sustain the position without wings. I know I can't carve/orbit as fast without them. I can always assure the student is in frame, but can't always assure the angle I want if I don't use wings. Several guys on the DZ have told me numerous times how un-cool wings are. Was it Mike McGowan that said "Until you can outfly Joe Jennings, you'll wear wings?" Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
lewmonst 0 #29 April 15, 2009 Quote Was it Mike McGowan that said "Until you can outfly Joe Jennings, you'll wear wings?" Yes... and Joe always wears wings. All the pros do. *except if you're shooting freeflying obviouslyhttp://www.exitshot.com Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
bdazel 0 #30 April 15, 2009 One of the biggest problems with skydiving is the ego. I think in many cases it's the ego that won't let a person wear wings. In my experience, it's the same ego that makes videographers think that an 8mm fisheye is a good lens for a student's photos. I'm perfectly content being "un-cool" with my wings and 14-18mm lens. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
vdschoor 0 #31 April 15, 2009 Quote I'm perfectly content being "un-cool" with my wings and 14-18mm lens. Yeah same here, with the huge wings on my camera suit.. I love the range I am getting with it, and I can film any tandem with it, a 160lbs tandem pair or a 400lbs tandem pair.. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
faulknerwn 36 #32 April 16, 2009 Is it only me who doesn't like the shots looking up from below? Sure you get the students faces, but the solid blue background makes me think they were taken in Sears. I much prefer shots with scenery in the background... My problem with wings (didn't use em for my first 500 video jumps and have for almost all of my last 200) is the faster fallrate. I'm pretty small, so I have small wings and a naturally slow fallrate. I get caught by surprise more with a faster fall rate than I do slow.. For example today - had a smaller TM and a student who didn't look that big (and claimed 180 or so on his waiver.) I don't feel comfortable sitflying with tandems so I'm on my belly. I was sitting there with every appendage folded in struggling to stay down. A year ago before I got my wings I would have worn my RW suit with that tandem and been fine. I can arch really deep and sit up well for a fast fallrate. I have a lot more range in the fast fall rate area with my RW suit than I do my camera wings (and my small wings are on a tight supplex suit.) I think if I got better at freeflying where I could just sitfly with em I'd be ok - but I struggle more with going fast than slow.. Wings help me for sure on the slow to medium fall rates, but I am seriously thinking about ditching em for the fast ones.. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
davelepka 4 #33 April 16, 2009 QuoteIs it only me who doesn't like the shots looking up from below? Sure you get the students faces, but the solid blue background makes me think they were taken in Sears. I much prefer shots with scenery in the background... It depends on how low you're talking about. With a wide angle camera lens, you have to be almost directly under a tandem to see only sky in the background. The wide lens can usually pick up a sliver of the horizon from some pretty low angles. You have to watch out for body position and type if you're going to go that low. Knees down, or a person who is 'less than fit' won't look that good from that angle. It's not flattering to the student. If you rotate up a few degrees, you end up viewing their body from an angle, and the exact 'hills and valleys' become harder to define. The case in favor of a low angle as compared to head on, is that head on is asking the student to look up. I don't mean not 'stare at the ground' type of look up, but physically to tilt their head back to look at you. When a jumper is belly to earth, looking horizontally is the same as looking straight up while on the ground. Not the most natural angle, and again, not always the most flattering to the student. A lower angle allows them to be in a more natural position with their head/neck, and this will produce a better picture of the student. One poster mentioned that he had a set routine for the freefall shots of his tandem videos. I personally only use a rough outline for my non-freefall shots, and no outline of any kind for freefall. Every jump and every student will present a different situation, and shooting that properly requires a different approach each time. The real goal is to record the dive for the student, so making them look good is really job #1. Don't sit tight and close to a student who won't open their eyes, focus on the bigger picture and go for the wide shots. Or if a student ends up with 'fluids' streaming up one side of their face, you need to stay on the other side so it doesn't appear on screen. Those are really the types of things that should dictate what sort of shots you'll get on a tandem video, not a set shot list, or even camera flyers preference (unless everything looks great, then the camera flyer can do whatever they want). Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
dragon2 0 #34 April 16, 2009 Had one tandempassenger once that had no arch and was scrunched up a bit, legs everywhere and potatochipping a bit, not pretty so I went up for wider view. She followed me with her head while I went up and back, voila, good arch! Which she kept when I went back down ciel bleu, Saskia Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
DSE 3 #35 April 16, 2009 Quote Is it only me who doesn't like the shots looking up from below? Sure you get the students faces, but the solid blue background makes me think they were taken in Sears. I much prefer shots with scenery in the background... If that angle makes up for the bulk of the shots, I agree. Boring. I shoot a 24mm lens, not a 15mm (my 15 took a 3k tumble), so I don't get a horizon. I've learned to love the 24 on an APSC camera, evn though the exit isn't QUITE as big as I'd like. That said, wings give me the range to go from very low to very high, very fast. I'm archable enough that I can drop from high back to level very fast too. Having a small built in weightbelt doesn't hurt. Because of my size, I tend to get a LOT of the 230 lb instructor/200lb student combos....but I love my wings even more for those, simply because of the angles I can get with greater stability due to the faster fallrate + wings. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
