DSE

We have that now. It's called "Pre-course" and "Course." You're not happy with it. Separating the two by a week, month, whatever...makes it financially impractical for anyone who is a "traveling examiner" and for those that would be candidates for the course. The few brick/mortar examiners out there are terrific. But, a lot of people don't want to travel to those brick/mortars. DJ has a great school at Spaceland. Tom runs a terrific program at Eloy. Bram has a great place in Zhills. We have a great program at Elsinore. Four out of 273 DZs doesn't work for the majority of the membership. USPA especially makes it clear that if any movement has a negative impact on a small Cessna DZ, then they're absolutely not going for it. Wanting to improve things is terrific, and there probably are much better answers out there, particularly with technology. However..... You're also one of those that argued against a wingsuit instructional program, and IIRC, part of your argument was that it was just "one jump." Well...AFF is only 5-7 jumps at a lot of DZ's. Applied logic says that if skydivers are the product of their instruction, then regardless of how much the program could possibly be changed, people will continue to do stupid things, because there will always be stupid instructors. Perfect example of stupid advanced instruction; the vast majority of wingsuit "instructors" don't teach instability recovery. Nor do their "examiners." I've had AFF students come to our DZ who have never actually touched a hackey as part of their emergency procedures training, even though this is an integral part of the training. You cannot weed out 'poor' from the process. All you can do is make the best standard that is attainable within the pool of candidates, their fiscal ability, and their geographic availability.

This has already occurred, both in WS and tracking. The "lanes" concept is a bit of a PITA but has been very effective for our DZ and other DZ's that have adopted the policy.

Chris, thanks for the non-answer answer. Sigh...there are still projectionists. and will be for years to come. Union projectionists went away with big chain theaters, not streaming services, and films are not commonly streamed to big screens 'direct from Disney.' Now.... Howabout we get back to topic without one of your novels? The only other major change in editing computers is the affordability of GPU and software that accesses the GPU. ANY off the shelf computer is just fine for video editing, unless one is dealing with file formats that aren't commonly accessible.

Of course desktop systems will continue/survive. Aside from the massive files that cannot be ported to online storage/editing, video alone (a small bit of the world) is a significant tool requiring serious horsepower. There will be powerful desktops well beyond the lifetime of anyone currently reading this page. Chris, you seem to have a hand in everything on the dropzone, what's your video/editing background?

We have seen more than a couple problems with the handles being absorbed by inner/outer systems. No one has been prevented from jumping, but the system does have issues, IMO.

The Replay is the smallest/lowest profile with the largest imager of all the small format cameras. It isn't quite as fast to access the card as a GoPro might be. In terms of small, quality cameras, it boils down to GoPro, Replay, and Sony if quality is your preference. For snag hazard, the Replay wins hands down.

You'll see its replacement soon.

"I don't want round wheels. Even though the rest of the entire world is round wheels, I want octagonal wheels because that's what Apple says I should use. I don't want to upset the Apple cart." MPEG has been slated to be the future of video for the last 23 years. Apple chooses to not directly support it. Yes, you lose quality in the re-render. You *always* lose quality in a transcode. The right tool for the right job. Sometimes PC's aren't the right tool in certain environments. Sometimes Apple computers aren't either (if speed is the need, Apple is almost never the right tool). That said, how about we bring the conversation back to the Tonfly helmet?

SSD drives for booting, faster HDD's for rendering, faster procs for processing. Not much else.

the "MTS" bullshit is exclusively an Apple problem, not a camera problem. MPEG Transport Streams are common, the future, and you might as well learn to deal with your choice of computer/camera combination. The BOSS cameras have the same file output. The next gen are XAVC, which again...same "bullshit."

Once Marc left, the writing was on the wall. No one seemed to want to believe that.

Did I say I was shooting stills with a GoPro? Meow.

most of the time, yes. Same angle for WS. I'm not a freeflier.

the very shallow pitch is not at all an issue once you've figured out the head position. On my 3X, I've kept it in the forward angle as well, simply because it keeps things consistent.

The tonfly is excellent for tandems and other photo uses. Sidemounts are OK, but at the end of a long day, you'll be grateful for center mounted cameras. The Tonfly is super lightweight, too.

Skydive Utah (very close to SLC) Skydive Ogden (very close to Ogden and the tunnel) Both are good DZs. Both have a lot of tandems. Utah has a King 90. Ogden has a Caravan. Utah has by far a better view and more outs. Ogden has a tunnel. Both are terrific dropzones.

It wasn't his first, was very well thought out, he had a terrific crew, and the overall risk was relatively low compared to the apparent intensity of the stunt. Skydive Chicago wouldn't have participated otherwise. Definitely getting a lot of news for our sport.

Certainly provides vidiots more opportunity to be in their own photos.

There are short weeds in all that sand, but even if it was bare, it wouldn't matter. Fire can jump a 50' wide runway with no problem. The fires are under control, people were allowed back to their houses around 3 a.m. this morning, the DZ was not at risk with this particular fire.

I've jumped mine several times, shooting straight to the card instead of the internal. The sensor wasn't a problem, although it did glitch on deployment.

The reference guide can be found: http://tinyurl.com/pdowhl4 The videos (old series) can be found: http://skyvideo.wordpress.com/2011/12/11/skydive-elsinore-wingsuit-school-video-guides/ It appears some of my image/video links have become broken, apologies, they're old links. Both are old references, and will be updated in the next few weeks.

This is certainly a consideration. Another consideration is the guy that jumps a 'real camera' probably started out doing so, but after hundreds (or thousands) of jumps, as realized the cost to his neck. When you're doing 10-14 jumps a day, every ounce counts. That said, love my NEX5.

Yes. They have. With varying results. Until a different method is shown that demonstrates consistency, I'll keep teaching the method that works for P1's to Apache's (and have video of both extremes). What a tease! What is it? you have to pay for that information lol! Well, y'know...given the huge medical expenses and forced retirement related to a stoned, brain-fried yokel slamming into my head, I gotta do whatever I can to make ends meet, right? That being said, the videos have been online for nearly 3 years, were featured as a dz.com article, and are overall pretty easy to find (and are free). And best of all, one of the vids was linked earlier in this thread. http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=4516216#4516216 Reading is fundamental. There are two others we're using locally at the school that I haven't taken time to upload.

There have been numerous problems with instability. True "flatspins" are incredibly rare, and in most instances where someone has talked about one, video shows it to merely be corkscrewing. However, in those rare moments that are real, I've personally witnessed three, two of which ended up with bruised eyes, and I'm aware of at least four other similar instances. None resulted in a fatality. However, the two that I witnessed nearly did. Loss of altitude awareness, loss of consciousness (in one of them). There is one fatality that is suspected to have been from a disorienting spin. The old school thought taught one way of dealing with instability, predominantly from people who had never actually been seriously unstable. We spent 48 jumps testing spins in a variety of suits, using a device built by a NASA and Air Force engineer. We've used those results to also figure out how to get out of them. With big suits, there may be more than one method, yet in trying everything we've seen described, only one method with minor variation worked efficiently and fast. It's frustrating to see so many young wingsuiters screwing up and plowing into each other, into canopies, losing altitude awareness and having AAD fires simply because they were in a rush to get into big suits before they knew how to fly their body first. However, while it's true that upsizing in a wingsuit too soon is just as dumb as downsizing a canopy too soon, the larger wingsuit won't auger one into the ground like a small canopy may do in with an inexperienced jumper.

"Relax" is arbitrary and may mean very different things to different people. For this reason, the word "breathe," a specific physical action that induces 'relaxation' tends to work more effectively. Regarding training for cutaways, we give ourselves a hard deck (preferably known as a "decision altitude" at which regardless of the situation, we should be getting rid of a canopy that isn't properly functioning. This should be a very clear part of every FJC, and frequently discussed even among experienced skydivers. Those that use audibles might consider an indicator at the decision altitude, and this becomes easier with the new L&B tools that provide more than three indication altitudes. There will always be a few that choose to try to turn a bad canopy into a good one until it's too late to use their best option. Having made a firm decision about "at what altitude are you getting rid of a bad canopy," and having it drummed into our own minds goes further than anything else, IMO.