RaySolomon

The Bridal Veil Falls outside of Valdez Alaska is always a treat. In the winter the locals free climb them. No kidding. I was born 8 miles north of the arctic circle in northern interior alaska. Fairbanks is the place to be in the summer. Ray--

Video might try a little teaser in the beginning with appropriate licensed or do-it-yourself music. Try this link for ideas. See Nils in action. Check out the video Feb17_2007.mp4

Your camera settings: Nikon D80 at 100mm F5.6 using F5.0 lens at 1/640 sec. ISO 200. Great timing. I would shoot at ISO 800/1600 for ALL "bullet capture attempts", if you did you would be shooting around 1/2500 or 1/5000 sec or so... then you might get a better glimpse of the bullet smear. I shoot at F2.8 and ISO 800 and shoot 1/4000 to 1/16,000 depending on lighting. Anything 1/4000 or better works for me. Ray-- Here is a photo of Nolan's MG bullet:

I have plenty of videos on my web site: www.raysolomon.com Most of my videos are from local Rio Salado club matches and Tuesday Night Steel. You need to download QuickTime to view them. Ray--

I prefer only the shooter and close enough to invade their personal space (from a distance) because stages come and go, but shooters shoot with a certain emotion and passion that I'm after. www.raysolomon.com is a good place to see what close-ups can reveal - emotion and passion. Close-ups by themselves mean nothing if you don't get a clean look of their face - the eyes are the most important ways we express ourselves. Don't shoot until you see the whites of their eyes---I digress. Closeups with faces in the shadows don't work for me. One series of shots of Saul Kirsch (yes, I'm dropping a name) that he says is the best shots ever shot of him is used by him in promoting his latest venture with CED, his new CED7000 which I just received from CED (free) for the use of that photo in their advertisements, etc. The reason I bring this up is if that image were a long shot, it wouldn't work because the shooter disappears into the stage unless there were other design elements working - which is hard to predict and highly dependend on luck. Closeups seem to have more commercial potential. Hopefully one of your shots is used by one of your favorite shooters in this manner. I prefer shots of competitive shooters for ads, etc. made while the competitor is shooting a real match under match stress situations because you can see the emotion and that thousand yard stare in their eyes that they mean business. You just can't re-create that on-demand for pictures. Not the same. If I were commissioned to photograph an event, I would shoot everything, all the stages, look for design elements, etc. If not, I go for shots that may have some commercial value down the road - closeups with a longer than normal lens or an extreme-wide while following the shooter through the stage while they are shooting if you are allowed. One year at nationals I shot Max shooting a stage he won, I photoshopped in the stage graphic into the image - best of both worlds thanks to Photoshop - closeups that the shooter likes and something unique to the stage. I printed him a copy of that image and he says he likes it because he won that stage. I always publish a lot of repetitive shots of shooters because if that is a photo of you, you tend to examine every detail of your image to try to understand or remember what you felt while you were shooting at that moment, hey, the more the merrier. Plus, when viewing on a FLASH presentation, they tend to work by blending in/out from one to the other. Music would be nice with a select group of images...more digression. The technical stuff: D1X, 70-200 F2.8 shot either at 2.8 or F4, ISO at 400-800, shutter speed: out of this world from 1/4,000 - 1/16,000. Exposure: Manual (no exceptions), Metering: Matrix, Single shot mode (never in motordrive mode). Every shot I liked used the above for action/closeup shooting. I could drone on and on but I will stop for now. Ray Solomon

Great discussion. I gotta pipe in. Check out my photos on www.raysolomon.com and you will see two good examples of bullets leaving the 1911 and the gun is still in battery. Some photos show air being expelled rapidly out of the gun at the moment of truth. 1. Officer Yong Lee's Montana Gold has left the barrell and gun is still in battery. He is using 180 gr. Montana Gold JHP. I gave him an 8X10 at nationals that year of this shot. 2. Nolan Smyth's bullet has left the barrell and gun is definitely out of battery (a little), possibly using a lighter recoil spring. My guess is the equilibrium is gone quicker due to lighter springs? Who knows? I use a Nikon D1X using only F2.8 lenses (70-200F2.8 wide open) in manual. ISO at 800 in full daylight will give me 1/16,000 at F2.8. I use this speed combo to CATCH BULLETS. You have to anticipate and press the trigger (pun intended) before the gun is fired just to time it. I always shoot one frame at at time. Never in motor drive mode. Check out my homebrew videos also, you have to download Apple's QuickTime to see the MP4 videos. Ray--

I have photos up on my site of Area II: http://www.raysolomon.com/page4/page18/page18.html Also more photos on the Rio Salado Area II web site: http://www.riosaladodesertclassic.com/Photos.aspx Ray--

I have uploaded some videos from the 2002 SC stages of Roundabout and Outerlimits on my web site: http://www.raysolomon.com/page7/page1/page1.html. I got inspired to post these videos after reading this discussion. It is interesting to see how some of the top shooters "get ready" and compose themselves before and during each of the runs. Ong45 is there also. Ray--

They're up on www.steelchallenge.com. All results are posted for 2005.

Tuesday Night Steel in Mesa still works. 4 practical steel stages. 150-184 shooters every Tuesday afternoon. Shooting starts at 3pm to 7pm. I have some videos on my web site for tuesday night steel matches as well as the annual spring steel match.

That's true. It was quite the dramatic finish. Going into the Speed OP, JJ actually had a chance at the 25 thousand big ones. But it wasn't in the cards for him, on that day, at the Steel Challenge, in the year 2005. After JJ, Doug finished up real tough on the SO putting him in the lead ahead of JJ, which left only Max with a chance to beat Doug for the match win. Coming into it, Max needed to average 3.05 or better to take the title from Doug. He pulled if off - impressively - digging in on every run. It was a terrific finish - really fun to watch. Congratulations to Max!!! And Doug and JJ! I saw some nice, crisp shooting out of all of them. be <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Anyone know how Matt McLearn did? I watched him practice here at Rio Salado.

Rika..you shot well on Saturday (Hosemaster). Quick foot speed. You shoot production like we shoot our open guns. Besides that you run faster than our ROs!

Hi, I'm one of the guys who said hello to you. Glad you are able to shoot with us. See you on Saturday. If you don't remember what I look like check out www.raysolomon.com Ray--