• Home
  • Galleries
  • – Cycling
  • – Silicon Valley Events
  • – Architecture & Design
  • – The World Outside
  • Prints
  • Blog
  • About
  • Contact
All images © 2008-2014, VeloDramatic Photography.
May not be used without permission and licensing.

9
Nov
2009

Velodramatic’s First Video – The Ride to Vegas



Specialized Susan G. Komen Ride for the Cure from velodramatic on Vimeo.

Here it is, the first Velodramatic video. Shot over six days on the Specialized Ride to Vegas with Canon's 5D MKII and the Zacuto Marksman DSLR rig. My friend and Rapha videographer Dave Christenson made the best of my footage and gets the film editing credit. Thanks Dave. The music is a track called Smoke by Lanterna, the solo project of guitarist Henry Frayne. Lanterna recordings are available on iTunes, highly recommended. The extended behind-the-scenes post documenting the challenges of a video virgin follows below. It's not your typical velodramatic fare but I hope other still photographers contemplating their own video initiation have a go.

Finally my thanks to Steve at Zacuto for letting me test drive the Marksman DSLR rig and Z-Finder; they made a world of difference to the shoot.




18 Comments

Jerry Schaaf
November 9, 2009, 6:49 pm

Congratulations on a brilliant first video! I’m no video or photography expert, but the video quality seems just as good as your stills. Props to Dave and Lanterna as well.

Heidi Swift
November 9, 2009, 7:28 pm

Fantastic work as usual. A great track and stellar footage.
Bravo!

Jon Moss
November 10, 2009, 11:55 am

Super job Michael! Specialized should be very pleased – really captures the ride and the journey.

randomactsofcycling
November 10, 2009, 12:38 pm

this is great to watch and really makes me want to go out and ride! Well done!

Dad
November 10, 2009, 1:19 pm

Hi Mike: As a still photographer I envy the pace video provides. Particularly love the long shots. If this is the quality a first-ever video provides, keep it going. It is exciting. Dad.

Velodramatic
November 10, 2009, 2:01 pm

Thanks everyone.

I’m looking forward to my next “shoot” and it better be soon or I’ll forget all the things I learned on this first attempt.

::M

James
November 11, 2009, 1:12 am

Great stuff..

Makes me want to come to America. But its a bit cold there now yes? Nice and warm here in Melbourne Australia!!

    Velodramatic
    November 11, 2009, 8:09 am

    HI James,

    Most of the U.S. is well on its way to winter, but out here in California the weather is still in the 60s and 70s. Summer and the Tour Down Under is on its way.

Paul
November 11, 2009, 11:23 am

Very good first rodeo with video, love the shot with the chap sprinting with the all white and black kit on. Keep up the great work and hope to see some more videos in the future.

Cheers!

    Velodramatic
    November 12, 2009, 1:07 pm

    thanks Paul, I’m anxious to take my next crack at video

Steve Weiss
November 12, 2009, 11:14 am

Absolutely wonderful Michael. You are a master of your craft and nobody does biking like you. Love the shots, the editing, the music. Great screen direction.
Steve

kurt
November 12, 2009, 4:25 pm

Nice work Velo,
The landscape is beautiful yet haunting.
The shot towards the end of the two riders cruising down with the grey backdrop of a gravel slide was intriguing. This black dot traveling along a black line with a grey background. It looked more graphic than real. Sublime.

I am not sure we the readership really understand how much work it really was to produce those few minutes of wonder. You probably don’t believe it yourself.

It is alarming how prevelent breast cancer is in our female population. I hope your efforts improve awareness.

They say you can’t teach an old dog new tricks…maybe that is because they teach themselves.

Good luck with your new aspirations.

Ride on.

Gem Atkinson
November 14, 2009, 2:45 am

The quality of the ride footage is superb. A lovely cinematic feel to it.

I really do hope there are more video edits from myou to come!

Powerful Pete
November 14, 2009, 6:09 am

Just came across your site. Congrats on the video, quite impressive, IMHO. Bravo.

Chris
November 17, 2009, 10:10 am

As a fellow photographer and a fan of cycling, I’ve been following your website. Now I’m really tuned in to your video venture. I’m too in the discovery of shooting HD video with the D5Mk2. It’s really a pain to do video but love the video quality I have became a slave to the process. I’m looking forward to see if you come up with a better solution than I in capturing audio. I have been Juicelink combination with the Magiclantern hackware with some success. It’s been kind of hit or miss because as a photographer, I’m doing 2 duties. I don’t always have time to record sound separately and sync it later. Reading how you missed the audio during a interview just bring back some of the many mistakes I made. Anyhow, great stuff so far and thanks for sharing.

Jeff
December 15, 2009, 3:29 pm

Hey,

I found your site thru the Jan/Feb issue of ROAD. I was wondering what jersey that is on page64? it looks like the back of the bottom of a jersey with a camera strap hanging out of it. I like what the words say and want to try to find one. Great pics and I love your site.

    Velodramatic
    January 18, 2010, 9:53 pm

    Hi Jeff,

    Sorry it’s taken a while to get you an answer, I was waiting till the jersey became available from Specialized. Here it is. It’s a nice looking bit of kit I’d like to get myself.

    ::M