DSE

t'was absolutely hilarious watching Scotty Burns during a private, after show, hands-on experience with the 7D during the WEVA show. I'm just grateful he didn't embarrass me; his drool hit the floor, not the camera. There are currently only four 7D's in the US. And Scotty got his mitts all over one of them. Now THIS camera is interesting for video. Glad I can finally talk about it.

Worthy of being a sticky for a while til I can link it in the FAQ's.

Now THAT is a discussion worth having. There is an old paved runway in Montezuma Creek, about 6 miles from the monument. We could create Colorado, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico records in one Otter load. .5 mile distance per leg, and we're good to go. Anyone wanna play? If the Point Break Boogie pulls off, that could be an added bonus.

Hell, I definitely wasn't the first to do Four Corners. The Gould family (trading post operators) operated an Otter for a while and I'm told they had demos regularly at the height of the tourist boom on the rez. I don't know if anyone has wingsuited, but even a bad tracker could *easily* do Four Corners. Flying a couple miles down the San Juan River....that's possiblyy a different story. Some great pix of guys doing accuracy on the Four Corners monument itself back in the 70's. Don't know who they were.

Point taken, but the comment that "camera helmets don't protect...." annoyed me. I don't wear mine for takeoff, it's on my chest strap. And can't really imagine taking it off for any but the worst scenario while under canopy. It's been done by some of the best, and proven to not be a great idea. Thread derailed.

To briefly interject in this episode of the urinary Olympics , most "camera helmets" should probably be renamed "camera holders" due to the lack of head protection afforded. If anything, a full video/still setup strapped to your head is a liability in a crash. This is due to the significant amount of weight causing additional potential for whiplash-type injuries. To avoid the need to don helmets, one of our riggers sewed quick-release straps to allow easy attachment to the chest strap for takeoffs (and the occasional landing). The straps are then stowed in a jumpsuit pocket once we reach emergency exit altitude. This is a compromise solution, but at least the travel range is very limited in case the thing becomes a projectile. Lance Sorry, gotta disagree. There isn't a person who saw my bounce that would suggest I had ANY chance of living without my Bonehead FTP. NO chance. It may not be DOT, but having slammed into the ground at very high speed and the only head/facial trauma was a chipped tooth due to biting through my tongue switch.... Been there...done that. have the wad of grass to prove it. And I was wearing a 50d, CX7, Microlite panel, and wireless receiver on it. I agree, a lanyard is great for takeoff. Prevents losing the helmet in an emergency, yet provides some freedom for shooting takeoffs. Funny thing, I don't wear helmets on a motorcycle where I have a greater need for one, but I almost always wear one of three helmets on every skydive. Go figure.

You're welcome. Sometimes it's just easier to to tell someone what they wanna hear. I'm already pretty broken, falling on my sword for you is easy.

We'll try this a different way since a couple of suggested alternatives were presented to you that turned into spin.... As the producer of the project, I'm responsible for what goes IN and ON the DVD in entirety. I did not write the text that has been used for marketing. I'm not even certain who did. The last draft I've got on my laptop (I'm away from home) use the wording "World-Class Wingsuit Competitor and World Record Organizer..." yadayada. Mis-managed market messaging. It's no excuse, but with roughly 200 titles in stock, 18 in production, our corporate work, and that time of the year being our busiest season due to NAB, I obviously didn't pay as close attention to the marketing messaging as I could have. There are only two skydivers in our organization and one of them wouldn't know about wingsuiting at all as he's fresh off AFF. Most of em' are corporate video editors/shooters/recordists. Don't blame Justin, don't blame Chutingstar, Blame me. Like Roosevelt said, "The buck stops here" and for that reason, I'll take the blame. Mea culpa. I throw myself at your mercy. Hopefully that un-pisses you?

Just because I don't LIFT my reserve cover? Read again. I check my reserve pin on each jump with my finger. Dan G feels that's not good enough. I'm open to the possiblity it might not be. Have you ever put your finger under a Voodoo cover? You can feel: If the pin is secure in the pocket If the middle of the pin is over the grommets and if it's bent. Can't feel if there is a nick, because I can only feel one side of the pin. As a result, I'm reconsidering my practices. Isn't that the point of the discussion.

it's not the camera, it's the codec. MPEG at these bitrates can't manage non-redundant pixels at these speeds. Unfortunately for you, this is exacerbated by the fact that you're 50i. Those 10 extra frames really do make a difference. But...now we're getting into a discussion for the camera forum. Brian, here is a link to the 1.5" Israeli arm, I can't find the 1" arms that I know BH and Armato's sell. http://www.filmtools.com/nemiisarmw1h.html

I wonder how many people are going to pour beer all over their camera helmets to get the gaffers tape to stick better. "But DSE said to..." or "it was the only alcohol on the DZ." Dave You owe me a computer screen cleaning for that one.

We rarely disagree Jarno, but we do on this one.... With the next lines referring to a joke... Producing quality product is expensive, you know this as well as I. Bringing a great product to market and keeping costs down is a challenge. I mean hell...materials to build a Stealth are less than 300.00. I know how much Chris Warnock spent to the penny on his wingsuit. Should we say that PF is a joke for the cost they place on that suit? BTW, congrats on the successes last week. Very cool, very proud for you.

And I'm in the same boat. I *can* feel if the pin is still seated due to the way the pocket on the Voodoo feels, and I'm fairly sure I could feel if it's bent. My gear isn't left out where others have access to it, and it's locked up every night. I do open the flap every couple of days, and very open to the suggestion it be done every morning. Every jump? Not every gonna happen. Back to back camera load days are simply too crazy to allow for it. For AFF jumps...sure. Check it every time so the student sees it happening. Wingsuit jumps, checked every couple of days. I'll probably switch that up to every morning based on a few comments here. Were I to borrow a rig, it's always carefully inspected. Given that I have multiple rigs, I can't recall the last borrowed rig I've jumped.

my only comment is you could easily replace that huge Manfrotto double ball with a micro-Israeli arm and still have far more than enough strength, and lose no maneuverability as to camera positioning. You'd lose quite a bit of weight, too. I don't have any short Israeli's arms, or I'd lend you one. I only have longer ones (6"). I believe B&H has the 1" models.

The Flock U website is referring to the Marl event, which at the time was the biggest competition there was. Kelly Pavlik won one world boxing championship at one of the world events some time ago. He hasn't competed since, I don't think. He trains as a world champion, considered a world champion, even though the promtional competitive organization is no longer in existence. But he will always be a world champion, no matter how many competitions occur after his winning bout. Just like I'll likely never win another Grammy or Emmy...I'm still a Grammy/Emmy recipient. As far as the price of the video...if you can get that much information (repetiitively as often as you need) for the cost of three/four jump tickets, good for you. As far as the retail price of the video, blame me. I'm the guy that budgeted the cost of the DVD based on the cost of the number of jumps, slots for all the involved wingsuiters, days of production, production costs, hotels, meals, transpo, days of editing, animations, titling, overlay, graphics, color correction, DVD mastering, printing, replication, fulfillment, and shipping. Believe it or not, that's how *most* intelligent businesses work. Seems you have an axe to grind?

I'd seen that, but the first "review" is as valuable as the paper it's printed on. No discussion of dynamics, no discussion of imager, noise, bitrate, etc. This guy got a first look, but it appears he wasn't allowed to edit or transfer. The information he posted has been available from Justin at GP for a while now. I'm expecting it to be a decent cam, and they say they've got the dynamic range issue licked...but at the expense of what? If anything?

Why? I can feel under the flap on every jump, but I don't see the need to peel the tucktabs on each jump to visually inspect it.

it's entirely likely you have the last completed helmet Wes did. Like all his helmets, it's beautiful.

Makes sense. I don't have a whole lot of demo experience under my belt. The Sil is a hybrid, 111 bottom, ZP top. Had I been on the SFO demo, due to the landing area, I'd likely have been jumping my Storm 135 with my wingsuit anyway.

Curious that you posted this, I've been meaning to post a poll on canopies for demos for a while now, but an incident sorta distracted me... I jump the same two with which I qualified for my PRO; a Silhouette 190 and a Sil 170. I normally jump either a Storm 135 or a Storm 150. 190 is loaded just around 1:1. I also have a 230 for jumping a larger flag. This'll probably slide the discussion, but it seems to be common that people qualify on one canopy, and are using something else for demos. Case in point, local guy that qual'd on a Stilletto 135, but is flying a Velo 96 for demos, even into stadiums. Sparky told me a couple of years ago that for demos, I wanted fat and slow, and sinkable. Well... His advice has paid off for me on more than one occasion, and on a recent demo, the two guys that jumped the canopies they were qualified for their PRO rating with, were the only two that didn't scream in, landed in the middle of the arena, and got the most applause. Neither of us met the "cool" line on the canopyo-meter, but the crowd seemed to be pleased.

well... in the true spirit of this forum we should now discuss the definition of a 4-state jump since technically you only flew above them but didn't exactly land in all 4 of them... Well....my feet ran through three of them. I actually tried to turn and hit New Mexico before my canopy hit ground but that turned me down wind and my canopy beat me to the ground. If I could just carve a 180 on landing.... Wait!! I tried that this summer. Didn't workout so well.

Wind or fuselage struck, pushed, bent, pulled your connector?

pffftt...... I did four states last fall, jumping into Four Corners national monument. Wingsuit exit from 6K out of a cessna. In fact, I did a couple 360s over the landing area, so I crossed all four states at least half a dozen times. The San Juan river makes it an unbelievable jump. Forgot to say, it's Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado. Now they have chains up, instead of just handrails from one direction. too small to land into, unless you're Airtwardo with a big-ass accuracy canopy. That said, it's pretty cool to tell people you flew across multiple states in a wingsuit, isn't it?

Wes Rich passed away today, from a heart attack. He single-handedly changed skydiving photography with his talents. As a craftsman, no one built a better helmet. He was a good guy. He'll be tremendously missed. I appreciate your willingness to teach, share, and help answer so many questions for me, Wes. Thanks for the time we spent together, albeit rare and brief.

I don't want you checking my reserve pin. I'll check it every few days, that's good enough. My flaps have a unique closing sequence and I've yet to find anyone that understands three separate tuck tabs in two directions. No thanks..just check my main. Besides, as John Rich mentioned earlier, someone once thought my reserve pin wasn't seated far enough down. the tip was in the pocket, but the head of the pin wasn't against the grommets (as it shouldn't be) and the person checking me was telling me how he felt the reserve pin needed to be pulled down. No thanks. Leave it alone. Main only, please. I usually feel for my own, but if there are newbs or students on board, I ask someone for a pin check merely to set an example.