Zee

I'd agree with you if it didn't affect total strangers in society in a very immediate and non-abstract way, but it does: not wearing helmets increases everyone's auto liability insurance rates. That's because an un-helmeted multi-vehicle motorcycle crash is more likely to cause death or serious injury to the rider than a helmeted one; which means greater potential for high-figure liability for the other driver; which means higher liability insurance rates for everyone to offset the higher shared risk. (If it were not for this factor, then I'd agree it would be no different than any other higher-risk activity a person might choose to engage in.) That's really a pretty lame argument considering that there are roughly 251,000,000 registered vehicles in this country and only 7,000,000 of them are motorcycles. In addition to that, roughly half of the 3,000 or so annual m/c related fatalities are single vehicle accidents involving collisions with fixed objects. And roughly half of those who die were wearing a helmet at the time. According to the NHTSB, wearing a helmet increases your chances of survival by about 30%...... In most states, medical/death & dismemberment coverage aren't even available on m/c insurance policies which mean we have to pay for additional insurance if we want to be protected. The total increase in your automobile liability insurance due to the risk of you accidentally killing a motorcyclist who's not wearing a helmet with your car would have to be extremely small. Action©Sports

I've ridden in Central Texas during bug season and it sucks even with a full face helmet. Not quite sure what you can do short of getting a visor for your half cover type lid... As for helmet laws....not my thing. I'm all for freedom of choice. If you feel like wearing a helmet fine, if not, who gives a shit, really? Personally, I wear mine every time out but, I've crashed at speed on the track and walked away with nothing more than a jacked up $500 lid, some scraped up leathers, and a sore shoulder. Had it been my bare head instead of my helmet that hit the pavement, I'd either be dead or eating my remaining meals through a straw. And that was on the track where there are no panel trucks, deer, or Oldmobuicks.... I'm not so worried about dying in a m/c crash myself. There are much worse fates than death imho. Action©Sports

No problem man Action©Sports

Here ya go - direct link to PDF file download http://gdlp01.c-wss.com/gds/0300000933/EOSRXSi-EOS450D_EN.pdf Action©Sports

When I started shooting tandem video in 2000, we just handed a roll of film to the customer. Once I switched to digital, I'd hand them a CD with about 25 shots from the jump on it. I mainly jump for fun at the moment but I might get back in to shooting tandems next summer. If I do, I'll probably just set it up so they can view the pictures from their jump online. It all depends how the DZ has their photo concession set up.... Action©Sports

It depends how it's set up. You can set it up so that the customer can pay for immediate downloads if you like. If you click on "Buy this photo" there will be an option for "Downloads" if the owner has set up that feature. Smugmug is a pretty cool site. Action©Sports

I sell both prints and downloads from my site. In addition to skydiving (which I can't do much where I live at the moment) I shoot quite a bit of motorcycle racing and track days as well. For m/c racing, I usually charge between $10-$15/download because that's pretty much all the market will bare. The track stuff I do both for fun and money but, nobody on a racer's budget is going to drop $100 for a digital picture. I usually make the guys a CD (non-commercial license) with all the shots of them from one day for about $75-$100 and that works out pretty well for both of us. I charge more for my skydiving stuff but, I don't go overboard with the pricing for every day stuff though. Action©Sports

Oops, thought you were looking for the 0637 - I have one of those. I know the lens you're talking about though as I used to have one as well. It was a nifty little thing Action©Sports

Why? Besides the obvious weight/size, what specs of the 5d make it "MUCH better"? Honestly, outside of the wanna-be-a-webcam stuff, I can't see where the 5d beats out the 30d, performance-wise. People put way too much stock in the camera - if you can't take a good picture with a 5D, a 5DM2 ain't gonna help much Action©Sports

The nikon D700 is great too, wish I could afford one I've been thinking about it while my D200 is in for repair. It'll happen sooner or later but, I've been very happy with the 200 so far so it's kind of hard to justify. The great high ISO performance would be fun to have while shooting m/c racing though Action©Sports

Man, you got lucky. My whole FTP came off and ended up in a swamp. Never found a single trace of the damned thing Action©Sports

Yeah, I've seen pictures of Jussi in action with that setup before lol. It's pretty impressive/crazy at the same time Action©Sports

I was playing around with a 50mm 1.8 and a 10.5mm Fisheye last week up at The Ranch. Man, you have to fly waaaay the hell up there to catch a 10 way in frame with a 50mm 6 way 9 way 50mm 1 50mm 2 Action©Sports

Absolutely beautiful work Action©Sports

I got one of Kenny bouncin' around as well. Poor guy is so light it was hard for him to keep up with the Tandem Action©Sports

That jump sucked! At least the shots turned out to be pretty wild. I still have little bruises all over the place I posted an exit shot from the hail jump and a few others of you in the other thread here Action©Sports

Nope. Just flyin' on my belly/knees. Poor girl - I'm pretty sure she wasn't a student though. I think she was doing a rodeo dive on that jump. Oddly enough, she didn't get blasted as bad as most of us did. I had little bruises on my face, arms, legs, and stomach. Still do, actually Action©Sports

I made a little trip up to New York last week and got a chance to make a few jumps with none other than Laszlo Andacs. We took my girlfriend's brother, Ted, on a tandem and Laszlo shot the video. I flew outside video and snapped a few shots of him in action. Pretty interesting to watch him sitfly - he's rather talented in case you guys haven't noticed Laszlo Laszlo 2 On our last jump we managed to hit a nice hail storm on exit. Not rain, HAIL. Hurt like a mofo. Hail Thanks for the jumps and the pics, Laci. I have a few good shots of you from the tandem I'll be sending along once I get a chance to go through them all.[url] Action©Sports

Isn't Lamborginni primarily a tractor company, with a few bicycles mixed in along with the supercars? Hardley Davidson is primarily a tractory company. Of course, your average bean farmer can ride better than this Landscaping Action©Sports

I use the Auto Focus Illuminator on my DSLR to center my cameras. If you turn it on and walk in to a poorly lit room and press the shutter half way down, you'll see a nice round grid pattern that is perfectly centered for your still camera. I've been using that method for years and it works very well. You'll definitely need some sort of reference like a sight or paper asshole as these guys have already suggested. One thing about using a sight though; don't close one eye and concentrate on keeping your subject dead center - you'll end up with very, very, shaky video that way. Instead, keep both eyes open and take an occasional glance through your sight - this will give you a reference point that you can use to correct yourself if you’re off. Eventually, you’ll end up with a very good idea where “center” really is and you’ll find yourself checking your sight picture less often. Moving your whole head/body instead of just your eyes will take some time to learn. Much like skydiving in general, your body goes where your eyes go. So practice making nice slow movements with your head and your body will follow naturally. You’ll know you’ve got it when you can successfully move your eyes and check your altimeter while still keeping your cameras centered on the subject. That takes a little while though Hope it helps, z Action©Sports

You can try something like the Oregon Scientific ATC-2K or the GoPro Hero3 for a POV cam to mount on your foot or belly but, neither will work well at all as a main camera unless you really aren't concerend with quality. I have and use both of them to record time on the track and for that use, they work pretty well. The ATC-2K is sensitve to vibration though so it stops recording once the lap times begin to drop. The GoPro works great and can take the vibrations without issue but, it has a wide angle lens so it doesn't display actual speed that well. I've never used either one in freefall but, I'm pretty sure they'd both work ok as POV cam since they both record to SD cards. Here's a clip of some warm up laps with the ATC-2K Action©Sports

We just had a photographer at the race track bust himself up pretty good. I was shooting across the track with one of the corner marshal's while this guy was standing on a concrete wall by pit out. A piece of air fence (just huge inflatable cushions that they wrap around hard objects in case of a collision) broke loose in a dust devil, flew across the track, and knocked the guy to the pavement. It's been over two weeks and the guy is still in the hospital with a "demolished knee and upper tibia" according to the doc. Strange things happen - it's just best to be somewhere else when they do Action©Sports

#1 is a sweet shot! Action©Sports

There is a right way and a wrong way to warn an officer that you have a weapon in the car. Done incorrectly, shouting out the window "I have a gun" can ruin your whole day. A good video to watch on how to do this can be seen here. http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid1329233575/bclid1347878402/bctid1394648212 Sorry, I forgot that there is no such thing as common sense in this country any more. I just hand the officer my CHL along with my DL and take it from there. They should cover that with you when you take your CHL class. Good video in any case. Action©Sports

In Florida you have to show your permit upon request from an LEO. You don't have to inform the officer of anything unless he asks. IME it's a good thing to tell them though. They always appreciate the fact that you warn them ahead of time that you have a gun in the car and they often start talking guns and forget about the citation. Action©Sports