This morning I met up with pro-photographer Stephen Wilde  to shoot some photos for a story that Mountain Bike Magazine is doing about me. Their journalist David Howard has gone in to some depth about my career and lifestyle, so today we went to work on capturing that. A bit of trials, a bit of mountain biking, some yoga poses, and, oh wait, shoot, I forgot to get him to shoot me drinking tea!

I have never shot with Stephen before, so I browsed his website, and could immediate tell that he’s got an eclectic taste and style, and the images struck me as very film like. Sure enough, he used 3 or 4 different film camera’s today, in a variety of formats, and like a ‘ol film pro, didn’t use the flash once. Here are a couple images from his website.

I have been a hobby photographer for a good part of my life. Watching my Grandpa patiently take nature photos, then seeing my dad run around the mountain taking photos of me cross country racing, photography has been bred in to me. I remember my Dad teaching me about shutter speed and aperture; and then going out to experiment on plants, bugs and trees. It was such an enjoyable learning curve, and so exciting to see the results after development.

It has been a long time since I was on a film photoshoot, as opposed to digital. It’s almost weird not to be able to preview the image right after the shot has been taken. I think there is a rare confident patience that is inherent in a film photographers style, it’s almost romantic.

I have been a snobbish digital SLR user for the last few years, and was adamant that people could not tell the difference between a good digital image and a film image when put side by side. My ego was wrapped up in that argument because I had spent so much money on a nice digital camera set up. Over the last year or so I have been able to observe that digital ego, and of course, that allowed it to subside and me to see things from a different perspective. Caryn has always been drawn to film photos more than digital, part of it may be noticeable, and part may be just in the patient artistic touch that comes through in a film image.

Thanks for the shoot today Stephen!

After a year of chatting with pro photographer Haruki Noguchi (Harookz), we finally managed to get out for a shoot. We decided to go back to my chain line from Crux at night because Harookz had some great ideas for lighting.

I arrived at the shoot hoping to get far enough along the chain to get the photo, not really expecting to make it all the way up on to the jersey barrier at the other end; but after about 30 minutes of attempts, I managed to clean the line again, ahhhhh! I wrote a little caption to go along with the photo for the magazines, here are those words: My fascination with riding the most questionable objects has been so enjoyable. Curiosity is an element, the romance of being ‘the first’ is an element, but primarily the euphoria felt when cleaning the envisioned line unbeatable. The most difficult aspect of this line, and most others for that matter, is my mind. It has a habit of focusing on elements of the challenge and blowing them out of proportion. For instance, the fact that the first jersey barrier wasn’t in line with the chain drove me crazy; and thinking that I’d end up on my face if my front tire didn’t roll on to the chain just right spooked me to an unnecessary level. Working through those issues is enjoyable to me, and getting to that state where I can just let my body do what it needs to do is a fantastic experience.

Harookz and some of his gear; checking out the shot together.

Hope you’re all well! Ryan.