DSE

People prefer choices between something and something, not something and nothing. It's an old marketing adage... We offer: Video/Stills (This is the only thing we advertise loudly) Video Only Stills Only HD (Blu-ray or AVCHD on DVD5) Delivery on DVD+YouTube Delivery on DVD Delivery to YouTube only To add a small bit of unrelated; we use royalty-free.

It's built by Terry Schumacher, and his work is outstanding. Just be prepared to wait and wait, and wait, and wait and...... (you get the point). for anything you order. The thing around the front of the lens is a rubber shock reduction system, otherwise known as a bathtub O-ring. It helps dampen, and was a fairly critical piece of gear when jumping the HC7 and CX7. I find it smooths out any camera shake (adds a third point of contact) irregardless of OIS/EIS.

Canopy skills: Excellent. I feel Sonic is fully qualified to teach those where skydiving is concerned. Object avoidance drills out of a plane...incomplete. There's a method to determining whether or not you actually got it turned around in time that you can't cover without reference-able objects. It's habit-forming/muscle memory, so that's a good foundation, but it's not complete. Site evaluation: What can you really know about site evaluation from 11 jumps off 2 objects? This is part of the reason you ground crew with local jumpers. In my mind, this should be left to a true BASE FJC or the *qualified* local jumpers that are willing to mentor. Lack of experience in this respect makes me worry that it will also be quite simplistic in the lessons. Packing: Well, he certainly knows how to pack. How well can he answer questions about various packing methods? Why one jumper wraps the tail and another buries the tail in the center of the packjob with A/B (sometimes even C) reduction folds on top of the centercell of the tail? Is he going to teach multiple methods of packing? Can he answer why some jumpers use one over another? Anything beyond a basic packjob and what I wrote above is suspect to me. In my conversation with Sonic, I heard far too many "it's not that hard" statements. You know what, a PCA in and of itself probably isn't. But BASE is complex. The sum of the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. Sonic says he places an importance on getting a mentor after his course. I asked that he place an importance on getting a *QUALIFIED* mentor after the course. That is, now that you have "BASE gear", don't go running off to that other new jumper on the DZ with 11 jumps and ask him to take you off a local object. Oh...wait, why not go to the guy with 11 jumps if you were just taught by someone with 11 jumps? Beyond that request, he had little concern over whether or not they do. And yeah, you can't protect stupid people from themselves. He's' got Miles and he'll guide them to him, but he should really be clear with his students that he's giving them an incomplete BASE gear course in a skydiving environment and that his course does not make them ready for a BASE jump. DSE, in your interview, he thought Twin and Moab had only been legal for a few years. Not picking on Sonic, here, but how much else does he not know? How many and what questions will he take a stab at, thinking he knows the answer, when a student asks? And again, his repeated "it's not that hard" statements leave me to believe he has a very simplistic approach to BASE jumping. Look, the root of this for me keeps coming back to 11 jumps. Bill, you started teaching when you had 100 skydives. 9 times the amount of BASE jumps Sonic has. I don't know what arbitrary number would make him seem a bit more prepared to teach anything about BASE, but it sure as shit isn't 11 jumps. The fact that anyone can defend that as a good idea is fucking ridiculous. But, Sonic owns a gear shop, is the BMOC at The Ranch, so he must know what he's doing. In closing once more, "Why would you want to learn about BASE from someone with 11 BASE jumps?" There are far better, more qualified options. -C. That is the sort of response I was looking for, Collin. Thanks. I could have corrected Sonic on the Moab/Twin comment, living in Utah, was well aware they've always been legal, but that would have taken a short interview into an unrelated direction. I've taken a lot of flak for not correcting those comments, but they weren't germaine to PIA and what the point of the over 60 interviews we did were for. It's funny that this interview is the only one that has received HUNDREDS of negative comments for any number of reasons. I don't know much about BASE at all, but I know that there are more qualified people out there to teach, but the most important aspect (I suppose) is that the interview has given birth to a dialog that skydivers looking at BASE need to witness. That said, BASE guys taking the negative perspective and pissing on skydivers, suggesting that skydivers are "lesser than" and generally picking at skydiving doesn't help that dialog remain productive. Receiving a PM from someone saying "Hey dumbfuck faggot, you don't know shit about BASE-jumping so why are you interviewing someone about BASE" doesn't make anyone want to have a dialog. I don't know much about deploying 2000lbs of weight between a soldier's legs, either, but that didn't stop me from having a great interview with Frank from Spelko, and I knew nothing about Skyhooks either until having an interview with Bill Booth. The point is that dialogs do help, do provide opportunities to learn and more importantly, to dispel myths. As Bill put it, Sonic is willing to take the time to teach. There is a tremendous value in that one aspect. However, after reading your response, I have a change in my view. People that teach with an incentive to sell product can be dangerous, IMO. I fully believe that's why we've seen some issues in wingsuiting. This isn't much different. But I hadn't thought about it this way until your response.

That was part of my point; there is nothing exposed on the camera except the record and zoom button (OK, the photo button is too, but that won't make a diff) The HypEye controls zoom/start/stop, so the one button does it all. the type of lens I use doesn't allow zoom through, so I don't worry about that, and after a few jumps, I've gotten pretty good at knowing what's in my frame without seeing the LCD panel. I don't like having the panel open in the aircraft anyway. That said, i don't disagree with anything you mentioned here. The cage is a tad of overkill; I'm using a cage that covers top, front, back, right side but left side is open for the LCD panel to open and grant access to the card. [edited to add photos]

Socks are pretty soft, should something want to hang up. I'm more a fan of the machinable foam (fairly cheap, and scrap might be available), covered in gaffers tape. Lightweight, strong, as removeable as the plate and socks are, and could be carved smooth to add some aerodynamic value.

Coming entirely from an uninformed perspective; Other than the lack of teaching zero wind exits (and I understand the importance of that critical component), what part of the course is considered "wrong/inappropriate/lacking?"

Why do you need the screen open? Mine opens for two reasons only: -Set manual focus on backfocus chart at start of day. -Remove card from camera. My cage allows for that, however.

short answer; no. IIRC, shutter speed varies from 1/15 to 1/1000; it's not user-selectable.

I have a Sabre II 150 in one rig and a Storm 150 in the other. Both are great. A Storm 170 would most likely fit nicely in your existing rig. How old is your Sabre II? You've already heard it once...but here it comes again... I hope you worry more about learning to fly your body before you get *any* further into wingsuiting. At least 100 more learning jumps flying your body?

It was the only way I'd ever get my face in a photo line up with Craig, Eliana, and Jay. BTW, what does 50,000 jumps look like? You took the photo (thanks for that, BTW).

Right. No cards, no batts, no tapes, no connectors connected to cam.

outside of telling you your mainconcept encoder/decoder is causing a problem, I can't. Since it's a trial, there could be issues. There may be other codecs on your system (for instance, if you loaded the K-Lite codec pack, that'll kill main concept) Beyond being able to read that in the crash code, I don't have a clue.

Wrap em' in butcher paper with silica gel packs in the paper, then in plastic, then put in box and temp controlled environment. No batteries, no cards in the cams. Make sure there is no moisture when you do seal em' up. Paper first accomplishes two things; static is all but eliminated by going paper first, and it further wicks what moisture may be in the gear, along with the silica gel packs. If you don't know what silica gel packs are, just open any electronic product; it's the little bag that says "don't eat me." Not much to it, seems like you've already got the general idea.

Yeah, but you were around when it was known as "kid Latin." Y'know...when everyone actually *spoke* Latin? Wasn't this slang 'back in the day?' gotta say it again...I've met Tunasalad/Josh in person and jumped with him. he's full of questions, full of drive, and exactly the kind of person I like jumping with. His questions make you think a bit, and then he questions the answer to make you think more. He really does want to do the right things and more impressive; he wants to know WHY they're the right things. That's more than you can say for a lot of folks. if you ever get to meet this very enthusiastic person... give him the time of day, he's worth it. He's gonna be an awesome instructor one day, IMO.

IS=Steadyshot. All versions of Vegas 8/9 fully support native AVCHD.

http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=3477579;sb=post_latest_reply;so=ASC;forum_view=forum_view_collapsed;;page=unread#unread

Based on the little information you offer (was this Zhills?), I'd say you didn't make the best choice. Like others have said, spiraling in the pattern is not acceptable for myriad reasons. Changing up the pattern isn't a good idea unless you're the first guy down, and even then... Agreed-upon landing direction is a good plan. Landing cross wind would have likely been okay. I've seen you land, you're just fine. What was the pattern on that load? Where were you in the pattern? Others above? Below? Last man down/high pull? Also, if the wind changed during your downwind leg, it may have been a temp thing (like prop wash). Sticking with the original plan makes you predictable. If you're going to be unpredictable, be sure to land well off/away from others. the bigger point, Josh...You're thinking things through and asking questions. That's more than a lot of armchair skydivers do. Illegitimi non carborundum

there isn't a way of triggering smooth slow motion on this camera ie; online editing... another argument for 'puters. My preferences are: VX Color ON Wide Adapter ON IS ON Manual Focus Auto Expose/Scene Selection AUTO Expose set to -1 White Balance AUTO Fader OFF External card (I prefer saving Internal for emergencies) Auto Slow Shutter OFF Face Function OFF Smile Function OFF Digital Zoom OFF Zoom mic Off MicRef LOW Power On by LCD OFF I can't recall which (if any) other settings I've selected. Sitting in an airport and don't have the camera available to me right now.

I love skydivingmovies.com, and have watched quite a few vids... That said, I no longer have issues with sites that recompress, and in fact, prefer it. Flash is great, the HD encodes are very, very, good, they use less bandwidth, and if I want to enable download of the original video, I get that option too. YouTube HD looks pretty good, Vimeo is stellar. But IMO, skydivingmovies.com is a fabulous resource no matter how you slice it.

Breaking rules means you acted with intentionality. If someone is hurt or dies as a result of that intentionality... a lot of options open up. Legally and ethically.

I suppose that's why there is a smiley face after that comment. Except for the diff colors, diff brand, diff canopy, diff size, diff everything, they're similar, I suppose. I did. It's equally bullsh** to send a mass email about an incident that you know nothing about, have incorrect facts for, and making inappropriate comments about those one "thinks" are involved, but not have the balls to admit that "oops, I made a mistake, this person wasn't involved after all..." In fact, I'd call that "cowardly." Furthermore, the facts are VERY available both here on Dropzone and on other websites. Jump numbers, name, etc all available. There is no defense for making light of the fatality, period. I was there as a witness to it, and nothing about it was funny. As far as an appeal to not do it anymore...it sounds like "I'm guilty of this as recent as last week, but I won't do it anymore, even though others in my organization have said they can take someone just off A-license status and teach them to wingsuit...." Sorry, that don't wash. I disagree the thread should be modded, unless it's split off to its own thread. There are "names" in the WX community that have made some significant mistakes; people have been injured and in three cases, killed recently. How those mistakes happened, how they could be avoided, why it's important to avoid them, why the rules are what they are, how we can better the sport, make the discipline more safe.... it's a VERY important discussion. One that has to happen as this discipline moves forward.

I don't want to be part of a pissing contest either, but I'm grateful that two of the guys who got "Burked" at the Eloy wingsuit event in November were cut from the Elsinore event. A recent email has been circulating some of the wingsuit community about "I'd never take anyone with sub-200 jumps" from one of the BMCI guys. I call BS on the authors of those emails to step up with a straight face and say they've never taken anyone on a First Flight Course knowing the student had fewer than 200 jumps. I'll be one of the first to admit it, I took a guy with 160 jumps on an FFC and he had a cutaway after a marginal jump. I've probably scared him off of wingsuits for the rest of his life, similar to how I was scared after my first jump. I learned in one. I made a mistake. Can the authors of the blog/email say the same? This blog has the "facts" about Sebastian wrong in so many ways...it's amazing how the facts got twisted by someone that had a first-person source. Making reference to the deceased's gear being for sale in a comical way is in extremely poor taste as well. I guess "BMCI's" are "Instructors" and everyone else is a "coach?" FWIW (probably more popcorn time for some), I believe that the people who were part of the 71 way jumped their butts off all summer, were current, and had their stuff together; I know I did and saw most of the 71 way people at one event or another... This shouldn't be a thread about safety practices, but since it's gone in that direction... Not having been around for the infamous AN72 event that seems to be a hot topic, the one thing that I've heard reiterated over and over again is how the 71 Way couldn't be like that event, and that safety was paramount. Consider that dozens of 30+way events occurred during the summer, not one incident of any kind.... I'd submit that the goal was met, and new techniques were learned, taught, discovered, and effected during the summer at the various events held in Lodi, Pepperell, Salt Lake City, ZHills, Sebastian, Elsinore, SDC, and other qualifying dropzones. I think I was at most of them. One of my first dozen WX jumps was a gainer from a Skyvan, and have since done many from Otters, Skyvans, Casa, KingAir. They're a blast. Just be sure the guy next to you knows what he's doing and doesn't do a barrel roll as part of his gainer. I've got a great photo of the bruise somewhere... Juan Mayer's video shows t'wasn't I that did the gainer with a twist. Gainers are at their best, IMO, when you're at the front of the skyvan and have the length of the airplane to run.

http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=3501834;sb=post_latest_reply;so=ASC;forum_view=forum_view_collapsed;;page=unread#unread PBWing, I've been doing a series of production pieces at the Alexis Band Reserve, not far from Edmonton for the past 3 months. Seems like I'm flying through YEG every other week now.

Have done it. Recommend it. Don't do one from a Skyvan next to a very large guy named Nick with a camo Blade.

you can easily toss a lightweight wide adapter on a Canon G10, and it's a very impressive little cam. 2.5mm plug for bite/tongue/blow switch too.