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	Thursday, 31 January 2008

The Middle of Town My first attempt at some seriously urban kite aerial photography. This is the very center of Nelson's Business District. The Nelson Central Post Office building and clock tower is (imho) one of the ugliest, but it's ours. Even though its been there for a couple of decades (give or take), I think most Nelsonians are still wondering when they are going to finish building the tower and take the scafolding down. My kite in the middle of town attracted quite a few curious spectators. The camera was directly over the busiest intersection in town, but all safety checks had been down and the wind was steady and strong. The suburb by the city. Just across the Maitai River is "The Wood". That's Neale Park in the distant background where we had our kite festival a couple of weeks ago. You can see me in this picture flying my kite from the Maitai River bank, next to the bridge. That's my friend Ted on his Xtracycle crossing the bridge (my Xtracycle is parked just off-camera on the river bank, having transported me and all my KAP gear to the location). I didn't know he was there but he had followed my kiteline to say hello. It often happens when I'm KAPing; someone I know will spot my kite and find me. Kind of a neat spin-off of the activity. I like this intersection because I am a cyclist and cyclists get priority here (at least from one direction), as the green lanes show. We're ALLOWED to queue-jump and when the light goes green, we get to go first. Nahhh-na-na-nah-na! I think it's a bit of an experiment to see if it works. I hope it catches on. 9:27:43 PM    Comment []

	Thursday, 17 January 2008

Trafalger Park Panorama (and other KAP missions) It's kite aerial photography season. There are lovely, steady sea-breezes every day now. This week I've set my self the goal to at least try and do some KAP everyday to build up my portfolio. It's Thursday morning and so far I've had two successful flights and two aborted attempts (one due to not setting exposure correctly before launch, and one due to not enough wind). By far the most successful flight so far, for me, is the four shot panorama of Trafalger Park above. I'm pretty stoked with it. The full image is nearly 8000 pixels across and has heaps of detail (if you are a Flickr member you can download full size image and check it out). The reason I wanted to shoot this location in the first place was this.... ...Should be a great concert, although I won't be able to see it directly from my launch site. I'm hoping to get another shot of the park but this time with an event in full swing. (BTW all my KAP gear is on the Xtracycle in this shot, including 4 kites, 1000 feet of line, winder, backstrap, two cameras, and the KAP aerial rig, and hand held controller. Compact aye? Lets see ya do that with a helium blimp!) Another shoot I did on Sunday was a location I've explored before, but I revisited purely for fun. It is a lovely place to fly. Lots of room, and very smooth winds. Wakapuaka Sand Flats. This time I attempted to get enough shots to stitch together 360 degree interactive panorama. I got the shots... and I'm halfway through the stitching process, so look out for a new QTVR to download soon. I got some other nice shots too. The colours of this landscape are quite dramatic from the air and they change with the seasons. I like KAP shots like the one above that include the kite line and flyer. Many KAP photographers go to great lengths to remove these from their images. I like to leave them in as a bit of added interest, and to supplement a touch of vertigo. I'm in the Trafalger Park panorama shot too, although it's like a game of "Where's Wally?". I hope to get out again today for more photos. The breeze is already teasing the tops of the pines on the ridge and the sky is blue from horizon to horizon. Ahhh, summer. 11:23:03 AM    Comment []

© Copyright 2008 Murray Neill . Last update: 1/02/2008; 6:31:28 p.m. .