A Day At The Movies

Hannah was a very lucky girl, and was allowed to have her birthday present VERY early this year. This was largely due to the fact that I was too excited to wait. Even wrapping it was difficult, as I was trying to rush faster than the speed of light, so that she could "OPEN IT! OPEN IT! C'MON HANNAH, COME AND OPEN IT!" Which she did.

The other reason for the early gift-giving ceremony (read: shoving a hastily wrapped package at Hannah shouting the aforementioned rant) was that the prezzie was intended for use in Bali. I grabbed a GoPro Surf Hero, a surf board mounted digital video camera, waterproof to 30m and capable of shooting a photo up to every 2 seconds, or the infinitely more awesome 56-odd minutes of video footage. A 3hr surf session might yield only half an hour of actual wave riding (on a very good day) so an hour of footage is HEAPS. Check out the sample videos on the GoPro site, and on YouTube.

We've had a few trial runs at local breaks, including a great twin session down at Isolator's in Cottesloe. Hannah's used her considerable skill as an auteur to whip the clips into a couple of cool movies, viewable on her YouTube channel. And the results? Fantastic! It's so great to see yourself riding a wave, something you obviously don't ever get to do, ordinarily. And the fish-eye lens creates a much grander view than the probable reality, so you even look like a better surfer...

The camera clips into a plate stuck to the front (or back) of your board, and can face either backwards at you, or forwards at the wave face. We grabbed a bunch of extra plates too, so we can stick them on all of our boards. I'm hoping we'll be able to upload some of our clips next week.

I'm really looking forward to having a go on the waves in Bali, which are supposed to be excellent. Even if the waves are average, the "awesome multiplier" (i.e. fish eye lens) should help produce some really cool little movies.

Keep an eye on this blog, and Hannah's YT!

A quick plug: for fans of other sport, GoPro have all sorts of stuff. Chest harness, helmet and car mounted cameras are all available, if that's your bag, baby.