Beautiful sunsets the last few nights, days blazingly hot: Fire season came early to California this year. Much as I generally think nature should be allowed to take its course, this Station fire in Los Angeles has been a brutal one, with firefighters dead, homes destroyed, and more than 100,000 acres torched. Dan Blank found awesome beauty in it–check out his timelapse video, which compresses 40 minutes to 2.
From the monthly archives:
August 2009
California Wildfire Smoke Caught on Timelapse
8 responses
How to Destroy Your Quiver in One Easy Move
2 responses
It’s Idiot Week on The Adventure Life. Here’s what not to do with your 4Runner.
You expect to get beat up when racing ’cross, but not from your bike breaking. And if your bike breaks, it should be something small, like the end cap of a stem valve—not your steerer tube. Unfortunately, for all you owners of the 2007-08 F1X cross bikes from Felt, the steerer tube exactly what’s failing, and the Irvine, California, company has just recalled the bike…CONTINUE>
Canon’s G-Series cameras have long stood as the gold standards for top-shelf compact shooters: Solid image quality, lots of manual controls, the ability to shoot in RAW format, excellent video functions, and more. The G9 continues to be my workhorse. The arrival a year or so ago of the G10 had many photographers pretty psyched, but I wasn’t one of them. The G10 was slightly bigger, had lower top video resolution, and lacked the G9’s video time-lapse function. It was not a big step forward. This morning Canon showed a half dozen new models to the press, including the G11, and already the response is breathless. I say, slow down, Spanky…CONTINUE>
There are some who think Lance Armstrong can do no wrong, with Saturday’s record-breaking performance at the Leadville 100 as the most recent evidence. Me, I think the coolest news from Leadville is that normal, nice guy (job, family, etc.) Len Zanni took fifth (oh yeah–founder of Big Agnes, too). Sal Ruibal of USA Today is not one of the Lance fans, at least not in regards to Leadville. In a blog post dropped online right after the race, he called bullshit on what he says as unnecessary and unsporting tactics…CONTINUE>
Ski patrolling isn’t all that difficult, and this idea that you need lots and lots of intensive training is a myth. Dynamite, schynamite. I mean, really. So, what with it being the time of year to start thinking about winter occupations, it seemed appropriate to pull back to curtain on trolling and open it up to the masses. Always wanted to be a red coat? The only training you need is to watch this video…CONTINUE>
“Signatures” is not ski pornography, and thank god for it. The new ski/snowboard/telemark movie is a sonnet, or maybe a love letter, an unabashedly romantic, even tender, look at a life spent sliding on snow, this time in Hokkkaido, Japan. At least, that’s the case judging from the trailer and also from previous work from Sweetgrass Productions. I’m hoping the whole movie will be available for review soon–I’d been planning on running the trailer then, but you know, it just snowed in the Tetons and I have skiing on the brain so I just can’t wait.
Magical Things Can Be Made With Pen and Paper
5 responses
Have you heard about Olympus’s new E-P1 camera, also known as the new Pen? The gorgeous rangefinder style shooter has the camera world abuzz, with normally staid reviewers reaching for napkins to dab the salivant from their khaki multi-pocket vests. A clear lovechild of the classic cameras from the 1950s, including the original Olympus Pen, the sculpted metal beauty is just about the smallest interchangeable-lens camera available, and it has a sensor snatched from big-boy SLRs. In other words: beauty and brawn…CONTINUE>
I Wanna Not Work at Horny Toad, Too
3 responses
Santa Barbara-based Horny Toad is repeatedly named one of the best places to work, and not just by their marketing department. But do they really actually work? I’m thinking not. I’m thinking everything’s done by robot so they can just dance and float rivers on tubes and longboard all day. But I don’t know for sure. In any event, this explains a lot…CONTINUE>
The Mesmerizing Age of Japanese Aquariums
2 responses
Two million gallons and a whole lot of sushi…the big tank at Okinawa Churaumi, Japan, has an acrylic plate two feet thick to keep at all that sea water from splashing your shoes and the whale sharks from getting fish ick all over your wrinkle-free Dockers. And Jon Rawlinson has filmmaker skills and motivation and a Canon 5DMKII and, combined with a haunting little tune from Barcelona, he used them to make this lovely, going-viral video. Who wants to be one of the divers?
There may be some mysto hardcore waterwoman out there somewhere who’s saddling unknown big wave spots, but it’s highly unlikely, so all due props go to Maya Gabeira for shredding this massive tanker at Dungeons, South Africa, two days ago. Here’s a slightly different angle than shown previously–makes the wave seem even bigger.
The long hot tease toward winter has begun with the annual arrival of ski-movie trailers. Warren Miller’s dropped not that long ago and once again the question arises how someone can so consistently strip the soul out of such a soulful sport. Great skiers, great mountains, great skiing, but watching it is like eating the plastic fruit from a bowl on your grandmother’s coffee table. Looks good at first, but sticks in the throat and leaves kind an industrial taste. The newest teaser from Steve and Murray at Matchstick, however, from this fall’s release “In Deep” is…fresh. And while you might have seen it on YouTube, the boys sent over the original to toss up on The Adventure Life server, so the def is as high as you’ll get online. Dive in.
Let the inmates run the asylum and things get a little out of control, but that doesn’t mean you should throw out asylum procedures–that’s the essence of a ruling by a federal judge in D.C., which allows mining companies to continue ripping the tops off Appalachian peaks and dumping their tailings in creeks and other waterways.
Lest you decry the commercialism of today’s pro bike racing, take a look at this sweet old map from the 1957 Tour de France. Think you could squeeze another bottle of Perrier on it? Absolutely. Pschitt!
Smokey Bear turns 65 today and one can only imagine the look on his face at they roll out the blazing cake with nearly 70 candles. Oh, the irony. Well, that’s not what this little piece is about–it’s actually that Smokey now speaks Spanish. Si! Apparently, speakers of español light forest fires, too, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture is distributing a bilingual Smokey guide in schools. The dude is a full-on modern bear: He has a two tongues, Facebook page, My Space page, and a new catchphrase, “Get Your Smokey On”. The new slogan refers to the printable bear masks on his website and a pledge to prevent fires, not what you say to your bro the minute you settle onto the chairlift, but hey, more irony.
60-Second Expert: How to Manage Your Climbing Skins
‘Pillow Line’ Is A Charming Stop-Motion Winter Delight
Telluride Contest Has a Winner: Home-Made Video Grabs the Loot
8 Days of Climbing + 10 Pounds of Tequila = New 1,100-Foot Tepui Route
The Gallery of the OIdest Living Things in the World
60-Second Expert: How to Make a Skiing Kick Turn
And the Oscar For Best Use of Sheep Goes To…
Clothes Make the Man…And They Make A Difference for Nepal’s Women
Surviving A Massive Earthquake and Tsunami: What It Feels Like
Waves That Will Make You Say ‘Hurry Up, Summer’
The New Snow Test That Could Save Your Life
Earth’s Day Shortened, Axis Tilted By Chile Earthquake
The Greenest Job? Might Be Professional Tree Climber
60-Second Expert: The Right Way to Clean Your Goggles
Before There Was The Hurricane, There Was the Double Daffy
