Ansel who?

Been playing with a Panasonic G6 camera over the winter. Not bad considering the size. Here is my landscape attempt ( with some Photoshop help ).

Shot taken a couple of days after Christmas at the might Crummock Water in the Lake District. Check out the original and other shots from the camera in my Flickr feed here.

More Muddy Musings - Tough Mudder on Dogtag Blog

Yes those are my Bull Horns...

Yes I've been blogging elsewhere again ( click the image above to read it ).

Bruntwood Park BMX Track - Get Involved

Yesterday I popped along to my local park in Cheadle to check on the progress of a project to re-build a derelict BMX track back up to a serious standard. I've ridden this bit of gravel loads of times and was going to be taking the girls there in the summer ( especially after Immy enjoyed the Strider Sessions at the British Cycling Track ), but it has certainly seen much better days.

It was a low key affair with a very keen council representative selling the idea to the locals and a rather impressive representative from North West Mountain Bikes, none-other than Rick 'Ricky Bobby' Clarkson ( him of Steve Peat's mechanic fame ). There was even a random appearance by Syndicate rider ( and local hero ) Josh 'Ratboy' Bryceland , who gave the plans his (unofficial) approval. To be honest the support from the local riders was rather thin on the ground, but big things grow from small starts and hopefully as word spreads the riders will come out of the woodwork ( and those chaps at NWMTB are perfectly placed to get people involved )

So what is planned? Well from the drawings it looks pretty impressive, a proper race ready BMX track, with plenty of whoops, bumps, berms and whippy tops. I'm a little concerned that due to those lovely Local Government cuts there is no money for a warden, but if built correctly it should be relatively easy to keep clean and tidy ( and hopefully the local skids will realise it is better to have a track which you can ride, rather than something you trash because you haven't got the latest XBox game )

This is before:

And this is what is proposed:

Whilst I am not the biggest BMX race fan, two wheels is still two wheels and look at how much fun this track could be!

So I signed up to be a volunteer. Not sure what that means yet ( and the organising team/person doesn't yet either! ), but I am one of the many guilty bikers out there who have ridden trails all over the UK and not spent enough time building/maintaining them.

Oh and if it does go ahead then I think I can justify another bike?

NB: It was raining/snowing so used Polaroin for the images....just 'cos they look like token retro shots.The originals and some panoramics are up on my Flickr.

72 Hours in France

Also trying a new Flickr Slideshow app.

Lens Baby Spark Review / Test / First Look

Ok, so I admit it, the title of the post is written just to get some traffic ( I'm cheeky like that, but then again I am a marketing guru....errrr ).
Anyway, a rather nice Aussie chap called Paul, who has been in the photography industry for a fair few years, hooked me up last week with one of these new 'Spark' gizmos from those purveyors of photography fun Lens Baby.

Looks pretty weird doesn't it? Well it's pretty lo-tech, with a couple of lenses and a plastic bendy tunnel of joy between them. It mounts straight onto my old Nikon D90 pretty easily and to quote Lens Baby, it is pretty straight forward to use

1. Replace your normal lens with a Spark
2. Set your camera to "M" mode
3. Squeeze to focus
4. Shoot away

I suppose it gives a Lomo/tiltshifty/instagram/messy/retro/thingy look? Yes, you could do it in Photoshop ( or run one of those funky lightroom pre-sets ), but where is the fun in that?
Anyway, with a bit of Autumnal sunshine I wacked it on the camera this morning and snapped away at Marple Festival.
Going to need to play with it a lot more, but pretty happy with first set out of the camera ( only some minor curve tweakage...no cropping rule in effect ).
Here is my favorite one from today ( ok, I did drop this one to grayscale, but you can see the effects ).

Oh and this one is pretty cool too...

Check out the rest of the snaps here...more to come, as this is proving to be really fun!

Connected?

So I currently have the following Social Media connections:

 

 

 

Now is this too many to manage? Add in Flickr ( which is in theory a social media site as well ) along with this Blog and I am pretty much attached to the Internet in every possible sense.

Does it mean anything? Not really, it's easier than keeping a scrapbook.

Am I am better person for doing it? Not sure, ask me in 10 years time.

Do I control the content? Yes, and I always have ( and that is were most people go wrong )

Shouldn't I have buttons on this blog so you can follow and re-post articles? Errrr yes, but that would mean I would have to start the rebuild of the site and I've been putting that off for ages.

Should I follow you? Why not?

Camping with the Sproglets

Back from another crazy little camping trip down to the Forest of Dean with the Sproglets. Randomly we were actually staying at Doward Park which for those of you who learnt to kayak with H.A.W.K.S. is the campsite at the top of the Biblins track. It's a great little campsite hidden in the forest. Not that many pitches, a relaxed atmosphere and an awesome tyre swing!

Anyway, here are 5 shots to sum up the trip ( also submitted to my 365 project )

Strike Camp - This seasons colour is obviously blue.

Keep Falling - Yes it rained every day. ( but this is England/Wales? )

Forever Blowing - Immy got a bubble machine. It was great!

Faster - This tyre swing went big, really big.

Burns - An old friend came out of the woodwork and made us feel welcome in his manor.

Photosynthesis - Green fields are better than carpeted offices.

We are now planning our next trips, hopefully get away a couple more times this summer at least. So if you know us and want to get away, drop me an email and we can carve somes dates in the diary!

Check out the rest of the Gallery of shots here ( or click the image above )

The Daddy of Biking Magazines...

Managed to blag a copy of the new Privateer Biking magazine courtesy of top photographer ( and work colleague ) Geoff Waugh.

I've been reading biking mags for what must be 20 years or something ( flipping eck that is scary ), and this is truely the Daddy of mags. Then again what else would you expect from the stable that came up with Rouleur ?

Cover price is 9 squids, which may seem a little steep, but this is set to be a collectors item already ( should have got Geoff to sign mine seeing as he has lots of shots in it! ).

If I were you, I would buy it...

Hale Superbole - Suck it and Huck it.

I'm getting a little too used to these dry and dusty conditions and you couldn't get more bone dry then yesterday when Matt and I headed down to an old stomping ground to check out the newly opened 'MTB Pursuits at Hales Superbole'. That is a bit of a mouthfull for what is actually a managed Mountain Bike park.


So what is going on over there? Well it was first set up as a Mountain Board park ( yep the pretend snowboarder types ), but now it is definately more aimed at the 4X and Freeride fraternity.

The hill isn't that big, so a short walk to the top and you have a fair few choices. Look right and you can either jump on the Mini DH run ( nothing too silly here, just one crazy gap which comes out of nowhere ), or walk 20m and you have the ladders, wall ride, dirt jumps ( 2 lines ) and mini-shore section. Looking straight down the hill you have the World Class 4X track ( which splits for a serious PRO line half way down ).

At the bottom of the hill ( and next to the entrance ) is an awesome big jump line with two big tabletops, then a little one into a very smooth Quarterpipe. Of everything in the park, this was the most fun. The sort of jumps you have to hold the bike back from really flying...you could go really big here.

So what else can I tell you? Well it looks like in the wet this place is going to be hard going ( sooo much clay around ), but it does look like it is going to be a dry summer? ( am I tempting fate there? ). The lines here are pretty intense, yes there are some easy pickings which you could build up on, but to get the most out of the day here you really do have to 'Suck it and Huck it'! Think of it as an Alpine Bike Park without the mountain behind it and you will have it spot on.

The only negative point is that to experience this playground you do have to dig out a tenner...yep £10 in new money ( £7 on late nights ). But before you run away crying lottery funding, this is a private enterprise with a passionate set-up who is constantly maintaining the course and developing it ( it has only been open a few weeks ). I would definately give it a try, but pack your armour as you are going to be experiencing some air-time.

Check out the pics by clicking any of the images or clicking here

For more info on the park check out their website here

Also worth noting that my good friends Bob and Ally of Campbell Coaching are some of the instructors on hand here along with the DH legend Neil Donoghue. Check out the details here.

Gisburn Forest - A Polaroid Adventure