Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics “Behind the Scenes”

Victory Ceremony

Thu, 11 Mar 2010 17:54:00 -0600

As you can see I still had some more stuff to share with you all. I just ran out of time and energy recently and needed to edit some images. These images are from a victory ceremony that I bought a ticket to before I even left for the Olympics. I lucked out that this was on one of my only two days off there and INXS was the headlining act for the evening.

These victory ceremonies are for the athletes who won medals that day to get up on the big stage and be recognized. They took place everyday and there was a different band at each ceremony. I wanted to share a few images with you of what it looked like. I didn’t have a close seat and I didn’t have a super long lens. So, the images of the band aren’t what I normally shoot. It was a fun event... and INXS was great!

Dan and Dave...

Thu, 11 Mar 2010 17:32:02 -0600

So... going back to my first post on the Vancouver Olympics, I posted a really cool video of a time lapse of the city. Well, we tracked down the two brothers who created it and got them to do a quick demo of the gear they have created to put something like this together.

Their names are Dan and Dave and they are twins. Like most twins they finish each others sentences which was really funny. They are two super nice guys and they were more than generous to show us their inventions for doing these time lapses.

The first piece is a motorized tripod head that can pan and tilt automatically. It moves a little bit, stops, the camera fires, then it moves a little bit again. It’s all controlled by a timing box that is pre-programmed to shoot at a specific interval and for a specific number of shots in each interval. They invented all of this themselves and neither one is an engineer!

Pin Trading...

Sun, 28 Feb 2010 17:05:38 -0600

So... (remember I’m still talking Canadian here!) I had no idea how much fun Olympic pin trading would be. I’m really not a collector of stuff, but after getting handed a couple of pins early on in these Olympic games I decided to try my hand at trading. As of today, here’s what I have. I feel like I’m wearing a boat anchor at times!

Ice Dancing

Tue, 23 Feb 2010 15:50:45 -0600

So... (I figured out that Canadians start every opening sentence with “so”!) I got to go to an event the other night. It was the finals of the Ice Dancing where Canada won a Gold Medal and the USA won a Silver Medal. It was a very crazy and exciting place to be. My good friend, Mark Cruz, from Nikon Canada got a couple extra tickets from a good friend of his so he asked me to go with him. We actually went to my only event back at the Beijing Olympics together so it was great to do this together again.

Here’s Mark outside the Pacific Coliseum...

Night Lights

Mon, 22 Feb 2010 14:28:17 -0600

A couple of nights ago Bill Pekala and I decided to do some after-dark shooting at a couple of bridges in town. The first bridge we went to was the Cambie Street bridge. There is a very nice view of the Russian House (Sochi House named after the next Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia). It’s the “disco ball” on the right side of the frame in the picture below.

Shooting time... finally.

Mon, 22 Feb 2010 10:15:33 -0600

Now I feel like I am finally getting some good, touristy Olympic photos! ;-) On Saturday a group of us made it out to Stanley Park which is across the water from the Main Press Center and on the other side of the barge with the Olympic rings on it. It’s a very popular place and you may have already seen a whole bunch of images floating around the internet taken from the same location, but I always like to say... go ahead and shoot the cliche’ postcard shots, at least you know they are yours! Then try to do something different with them... The above shot is an HDR at sunset of the backside of the rings. The sky color came out great.

This is where we were for these images... all courtesy of a Nikon GP-1 GPS unit. I love this little toy.

Jam Night - Part II

Sun, 14 Feb 2010 16:34:40 -0600

I couldn’t pass up another opportunity to jam with Dave Martone. It was Valentine’s Day so the club was a bit slower than the previous week. The picture above is Dave playing a beautiful instrumental for his girlfriend, Carmelina.

Kris Bosworth and Sara Moosbrugger joined me this evening and we had a great time. All three of us shot images and I did some D3s video as well. Then I got up and played four songs with the band... Superstitious, Tush, Keep On Rockin’ in the Free World and Voodoo Child. We figured them all out as we went along. At least there was always one of us that knew what to play and the rest would follow.

As with the previous week there were some very talented musicians playing that evening. Here are a few videos that I did with a D3s camera. Please pardon the in and out of focus playing that I did on occasion. I was experimenting with some manual focusing and it didn’t quite go like I had hoped. I’m still experimenting with getting used to shooting video. I just thought you’d enjoy some video stuff from the evening.

Where’s Sasquatch?

Sat, 13 Feb 2010 22:31:04 -0600

Hi Everyone! So, yes, I’m “back dating” a post or two and I’ll tell you why... Two things have really kept me from my self-appointed blog stories. One of those is the fact that it has been busier with work related duties than I have expected and the other is that I just haven’t really shot anything that I am that happy with that I want to share with you. I feel like after my Beijing posts from a year and a half ago I have created some big shoes to fill for myself. The rain and poor weather here has not been motivating and so the lower number of images shot has led me to posts fewer times than I had hoped.

Now, that isn’t saying that I am not enjoying myself or the people I am with... I am having a great time in Vancouver. It really kicked up and totally changed after the opening ceremonies and although I want the USA to win gold I am also very happy when I am out and about and Canada wins a medal. They just get pretty crazy! So, the excitement is a big part of the fun for me.

If you have been reading any of my posts for some time now you know I am a big fan of beer... and any sort of interesting factoids that go along with different kinds of beer. This particular story all started last weekend in a washroom (restroom) at an English Pub near the press center.

Opening Ceremony - Fireworks

Sat, 13 Feb 2010 12:32:06 -0600

As you can see from the image above, the weather on the day of the opening ceremonies wasn’t looking too good. This picture was taken on my way into the MPC for the early shift and I just liked the clouds. Unfortunately it has been raining most of the time here...

But, rain won’t stop people from getting excited about the opening ceremonies. As you can imagine, tickets are impossible to get, way too expensive if you do find one and any sort of “photo op” for a non-photo credentialed photographer is next to impossible to get to! So, some of us were looking for at least a decent location to get some sort of photos of the happenings but everything is kept so secret that you really have to guess as to what’s happening and where to be. It was like that for the closing ceremonies at the Beijing Olympics as well.

So, we had a “wink wink, nod nod” that there was something happening on the other side of the IBC (International Broadcast Center) building so we walked over that way. The entire area was fenced off and pretty well sealed but I managed to stick a camera lens up next to a fence and got the picture below... I had no idea what this was at the time until I saw it on TV later on. Of course, you had to be a credentialed photographer to get anywhere near it.

Quick Break - Nice Light

Wed, 10 Feb 2010 01:13:33 -0600

It’s been picking up today and I hear that there are 125,000 people showing up at the airport tomorrow! So, I guess it’s going to get pretty busy around here real soon!

I had quick break today and the weather was good and the light was right... so, I took advantage of it and grabbed my camera. Since the MPC is actually a cruise ship terminal in the summer time, it’s right on the water. It was the clearest, nicest day that we have had since we got here almost a week ago. I hope it holds out considering I have a day off tomorrow!

I took my D300s camera and my favorite, 70-300mm VR lens with me and ventured to the end of what’s called “Canada Place”. (This is what the cruise ship terminal is called.) I just love the mountains above North Vancouver, and the sea planes that constantly land and take off during the day...

Sunday Night Jam

Mon, 8 Feb 2010 21:18:40 -0600

Like I said before... this is a “behind-the-scenes” look at the Olympics. Well, this is a VERY behind the scenes blog entry tonight! I’ll keep the story of how this came about very short but I will say that I had a blast last night.

Mike Corrado who works for Nikon worked with the drummer from Nickelback this year, Daniel Adair. Daniel played on a CD in a group fronted by a guitarist named Dave Martone. Dave Martone lives near Vancouver and Mike got us in touch with each other via Facebook. I found out that Dave hosts an open “jam” night at a place called the The Point Pub in the town of Port Moody. A few of us decided to see what it was all about. I had also rented a guitar for the month and brought it with me just in case...

The pub is a really nice restaurant/bar and they had about a dozen or more local acts signed up to perform that evening. I introduced myself to Dave Martone and he is a really nice guy! I was only planning on checking the whole deal out and taking a few pictures but Dave convinced me to bring in my guitar and play a couple of songs with him and his band that night. (Sorry, Daniel Adair wasn’t there...)

So, when it was my turn I tuned up and plugged in and started jamming on ZZ Top’s “Tush”. I guess that song went well enough that Dave started into “Superstition” by Stevie Wonder. I hadn’t played it before but it wasn’t too hard to learn... but it was a lot of fun.

A Busy Start...

Thu, 4 Feb 2010 00:58:25 -0600

Well, I finally made it... and so did everyone else. In just a day and a half of time there have been so many small “things” that have happened between all of us here... a forgotten passport, a fun time at immigration, learning a whole new city and dealing with a boat-load of camera gear! (BTW... none of the above besides the gear was me!)

We flew into Seattle and met up on Wednesday to drive up to Vancouver. One of us for got our passport to get into Canada! I won’t say who it was... but in this department when you “limp” you get jumped on! This was a big “limp”! It all worked out in the end but it won’t be forgotten for a long time! ;-)

So, you know I was worried about the border crossing, right? Well, it was like a ghost town! Very weird! I just drove up to an empty border crossing booth and had absolutely no wait. I did have to play 20+ questions with the Canadian agents, however. They just couldn’t understand what three cars of people were doing at the Olympics and why those jobs weren’t done by Canadians. Well, they were done with Canadians but there aren’t enough people in Nikon Canada to handle the whole thing! So, after a few minutes of back and forth we got through. Others that flew in today got pulled aside by immigration and had to deal with 200 questions instead! Once you are in and have an Olympic credential there’s no problem. Except if the Olympic accreditation department messes up your birthday and you are denied your credential. That has happened to three so far! But, it all got fixed and we are all good now! These sort of situations really make you think on your toes!

For those who thought that I was going to photograph the games... here’s what I’ve been doing. Not quite as glamorous. We started in Seattle at 5am yesterday morning and after getting 23 skids of gear in last night we finished at 2am. That’s a long day. Today we got there at 9am and unloaded it all. Here are some pictures from the day. Like I said... not so glamorous! :-)

This is what the Main Press Center (MPC) looks like inside... it’s a big place

Getting ready...

Sun, 31 Jan 2010 14:13:17 -0600

I just wanted to quickly say “hi” to all the newcomers to my blog recently. Hi to all those at the FUMC in LaPorte, Indiana and to those following from the Photo Club at LaPorte High School. Welcome!

I leave for Seattle on Tuesday morning and then drive to Vancouver on Wednesday. If you are wondering why, it’s all about the cost of a rental car for a month believe it or not. We’re all supposed to be gone from 2/3 to 3/2 but if you try to rent a car for a month and return it a day early the price jumped by a whopping $1700. Now I don’t mean the total is $1700... That is in addition to the monthly rental cost! So, three of us are renting cars and we needed to stay over one more night to avoid that huge cost by a factor of three!

There are a lot of interesting tidbits in the planning for this event and that is just one of them. We’re also flying into Seattle because it was a whole lot cheaper than flying into Vancouver. I’m hoping the border crossing going in and out of the country will be easy. I’ve done this two other times this year and the border crossings were anywhere from ten minutes to two hours! We’ll see what happens.

In the meantime, I found a really cool time lapse video link of Vancouver by some people that I don’t know but would like to meet and ask questions... All done with Nikon cameras! Pretty cool stuff... and a very beautiful city.