Author: Bryan Elkus

Cold, Cold, Cold

Today I took my first kite session in what seems like 2 weeks. Ever since it got cold I have well, wanted to stay warm and not go in the cold waters. I was warned that this was going to happen but I didn’t want to believe it or think that it would happen to me, but sadly it has. ~~I think~~ I am officially spoiled. After the last two warm seasons in Cape Hatteras its now getting tougher to get in what seems like frigid conditions.

On that chillier note, I did take a session today, and a great one at that. Jason and I checked the waves at lunch and they looked extremely fun, playful and were lining up all the way down the coast. We planned a downwinder from The Ranger Station back to the North of town. Jason Slezak, Brandon Scheid, Trevor Murchie, Eric Nelson and Julien Fillion and myself had a very fun session in the waves. The temp was about 52, waves were clean and waist high, which made for a great session.

Things to remember when it gets cold:

1. Use a smaller kite in cold winds
2. Wearing booties with a strapless surfboard is like wearing velco on your feet.
3. Probably should have had a surfboard leash; Body dragging to the beach 8 times in 1 downwinder gets chilly.
4. Riding with friends instead of just shooting the session is a nice change of pace.
5. Fins hurt when they hit you in the head.
6. Gloves are the last piece of rubber to wear.
7. Wax doesn’t last long enough.
8. If your just warm enough when your on the water you better pack up your gear asap and get in a hot tub, cause your gonna get COLD QUICK!
9. a 4/3 is warmer than a 3/2, and a 5/4 is warmer than a 4/3, but the 6/5/4 is warmer than them all. Stay warm.
10. If the waves are waist high and not good for unhook down the line riding, charge the wave as fast as you can right before you get to the wave turn the kite hard the other direction and see how big of a chunk of the wave you can take out before either you or your board breaks.

I got back to work later and stepped out for a couple seconds to get a couple shots of a cloudless sunset that glowed for probably an hour.

October 31, 2008
Jason Slezak Influence Portrait

I had a couple minutes to shoot after work. I took a quick HDR shot of the sunset as it was going down. After, I grabbed Jason and his new Pro Model Board the Liquid Force Influence and we were off to shoot. We grabbed a couple safe shots where I shot Trevor’s portraits a few days ago. We then headed to a different spot to try and get something a bit different. It was well a bit chilly during this shoot, about 50 degrees and 30 knot WNW winds.

I have had my eye on the elevator shaft going in, but really wanted to try a different shot than what we had tired. But I thought this set up worked rather well. There is room for text on the left if the shot is for an editorial. The strobe to cam left light up Jason well, though though if i added a snoot to the strobe it would have made for a little better effect. Also if i had another strobe would have been nice to light the board from behind to try and separate it from background little more. Over all i was happy with how this image turned out. It has been much easier to set up all the gear and ready to shoot with much less test shots than a few months ago. This allows me to try out different shot and locations with more time while keeping the subjects attention.

October 28, 2008
Bombs and Barrels

On Wednesday I spent my work day shooting as I stated in a previous post. The video below is a compilation of the morning and afternoon sessions. The Morning was again shot at the Boiler and the afternoon session at “Battle of the Banks” Mirlo Beach.

October 23, 2008
Sunset at KP with the SBC Crew

Jason Slezak, Sam Bell and I drove down to Avon yesterday to meet up with John Bryja and the rest of the crew that came down with him to do the SBC Kite and Board testing for the SBC Kiteboarding Magazine. I also finally got to meet up with David G. Tran another fellow photog. We had a great time down there with those guys, checked out the incredible view from their house, the guys rode a sunset session at Kite Point, and even checked out a couple snowboard videos in the theater room of the house.

The session at KP was good though the light dropped out on us pretty quick. It was crazy having the editor of a magazine around for a shoot. The guys were pretty underpowered but the Cape Hatteras sunset was spectacular (as always), so the shooting went on. The only worthwhile shot I got was of Sam, which im pretty excited about. It’s a little strong on the flash but im still stoked on the shot.

October 23, 2008
SUP, Surf and Kite Shooting

Today was a whirlwind of shooting. I was up at 6:30 shooting Zack, Trip and a couple others out at The Boilers until about 11am. The waves were huge on the outside bar with a couple SUPers scoring barrels. Zack and Trip both scored some terrific long rides on some rather large waves.

After that, I headed to Mirlo Beach to check out the WRV surf competition that was going on. The kids were ripping, scoring steezy standup barrels left and right the hole time I was there.

I headed then to go shoot with Jason to try and get a couple kiting shots since the wind then turned SouthWest. We got all the gear ready to go when we found out that the kite did not have a package on it. We headedback to the shot to put the lgo on the kite. By the time we headed back out the wind died down to where it made it very tough to get things done.

October 21, 2008
Trevor Murchie’s Portrait

After a rather long day of shooting surfing I was headed out to my truck when I looked over to see the sun about to set yet again. It was another great Cape Hatteras Sunset. As I kept walking Trevor and Lulu pulled up so I was sold on shooting a couple photos. I had Trevor grab his board while I ran up to the top of The Waterman’s Retreat to shoot a sunset shot. After I had Trevor do a couple portraits with his board just because. I was very excited on how a couple of them turned out. I really tried to play and experiment with the shadows using the strobes while keeping a soft glow from the sunset in the background for a little flavor.

October 21, 2008
Waves and Collapsed Houses

The angry ocean was back at it again. Other than washing over Highway 12 at the north of town, the ocean claimed a house. Hwy. 12 was closed for over 2 hours due to all the sand and water flowing in. I drove my car as far as I could then grabbed the bike out of the bed of the truck and biked the rest of the way up wind in 30 knots. But it was worth it. The waves were cracking foundations, sand burring cars and filling swimming pools.

Over on Sea Haven one of the houses was knocked over and was getting pounded by the waves. The said thing was that the owner had to leave all the stuff in it to claim insurance. So now the beach and water is scattered with debris. So next time your out in the line up at Sea Haven watch out for the toaster and refrigerator when you are going down the line. I was able to grab a couple shots before they started to put up barriers to the property.

October 20, 2008
Chucktown in Hatteras

A couple of my kiteboarding friends came up from South Carolina to ride in Hatteras for the week. They got what they asked for, Wind! It has been cranking since they have been here. We scored two really fun downwinders on Saturday and a sound side session on Sunday. Other than a couple very sketchy launches and it being nearly full on winter this week it was a very fun time.

October 20, 2008
Portraits with Dustin

I worked with Dustin, a buddy of mine, on a project of his. He needed a couple photos taken and so I obliged. I am still having some issue with posing people for photos that have not done much modeling. It took us a while to get going, but I think we came out with a couple keepers. I really liked how the image turned out. The black and white works pretty well with these images as you eye seems to have a rather easy time navigating the image.

October 17, 2008