Autumn is in the air and the landscape is changing rapidly, with the Alps currently looking near their finest. I had a clear schedule this weekend so I set myself the challenge of capturing myself in an action self portrait. Wanting to keep things in Switzerland, I found three locations that all offered something a little different aesthetically. This first image was taken at the highest point of Villars ski resort, just as the sun was setting on Friday night. Despite being one of the first stops of the weekend, I think this came out as my favourite shot.Saturday came around and I ventured just across the valley to the Portes du Soleil. All of the images in this blog post are self portraits, with a tripod mounted camera being triggered by a pocketwizard remote (look closely at the images and you can see one in my hand). Using a fast frame rate I was able to work around my shortcomings as an athlete, including having a goofy running stance, belly hanging out (which is very easily done in Compressport), or a horrible gurning face. It also meant that I could capture sequences that didn’t quite work out. Like this one.
This second day almost had an English Lake District type feel to it, with the terrain working perfectly as camouflage for my feline companion.
Sunday was all set to be a down day, so I didn’t expect to get much from it. Waking up to a blue sky but with the threat of the afternoon closing in, I quickly made my way right to the edge of Switzerland to the spectacular Emosson dam. I’ve been up here once before to Photograph an 80km trail race and was blown away by the views. Ideally I would have ventured higher up into the mountain range but time and weather was not on my side. It’s funny how I had to hike for about an hour on the first two days, whereas the dramatic views of Emosson were 5 minutes above where I parked the car…
So there we have it, 3 days of shooting and a couple of different results. All of the images carry a slightly different vibe, but as a group go to show of how beautiful Switzerland is right now. With the colours starting to pop, it makes me want to stay outside all day everyday.As soon as those first snowflakes start falling the trails will all be over until next year.
Tag: self portrait
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Capturing Myself
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Roles Reversed – VO2 Max Self Portrait
I’m a big geek when it comes to sports performance. A vast majority of sports that I photograph rely on the human endurance capabilities, with trail running and the cycling grand tours really highlighting what professional athletes put their bodies through. Of course, any talk of cyclists and endurance often descends into the authenticity of certain performances (even more for me with a girlfriend who works in the anti doping industry), usually highlighted by dominant displays by riders such as Team Sky’s Chris Froome. Moving away from the “Armstrong Era” I like to believe that the these sports are coming to a period where the battles we see out on the course are down to physical shape with the strongest winning on the day.At the complete other end of the spectrum are the people like me. I also love to compete in endurance events, with trail runs over a variety of distances up to the 160km mark. Any question marks about my performances largely go unnoticed. A large part of that is down to the fact that i’m not very good. The dream is still there, of course, that come the last weekend in August i’ll be at the sharp end of the field competing with the best distance runners in the world as I descend into Chamonix with 168km of the UTMB course in my legs. I much prefer to shy away from the reality that is crawling over the line 20 hours since the winners, along with the 20,000 strong cheering spectators, have long since left.My VO2 Max was an eye opening experience. I’m not sure everyone would like it as a birthday present (geeks like me rejoice at this type of thing), but for performance analysis, along with training recommendations, I think it’s an incredible tool.Time to shift that 3.5kg of excess weight.Self portrait setup – Camera: Canon EOS 1D Mark IV – lens: Sigma 15mm Fisheye – Additional: Intervalometer to record image every 10 seconds, Manfrotto magic arm and clamp to hold camera in place