Blind Summit - Kilimanjaro 2011 PART 1

I am back on UK turf!

For the last 2 weeks I have been out in Tanzania in East Africa climbing Mt Kilimanjaro ( the highest freestanding mountain in the world ) with my dad who is blind for RP...

Please visit our JustGiving page here and donate if you haven't already done so.

http://www.justgiving.com/BlindSummit2011

Anyway 7 days of walking from 6am - 6pm...sleeping on weird slopes at 15,000+ feet, -20 temps, every possible climate zone under the sun etc all = one amazing week.

First and foremost was the total lack of tech and contact with the outside world which for me was very refreshing. Being out of contact with the whole world for a whole week was amazing itself without the mountain.

Anyway the photos...

Unsurprisingly an amazing place for photography, so varied, wild and stunning everywhere you look.

I also shot video so expect to see a short video documenting the trip in the coming weeks...but till then some photos...

This is only about a quarter of the images I got while up there...To see the rest of them check out the book im going to put together from the trip soon, more info at bottom of post...

As with most trips, it started on a plane...sunset somewhere over Europe...
In the dense rainforest's on the lower slopes of the Mt...the man himself here looking tired already ha
On the first day we where there, we got this glimpse of the task ahead...looks pretty big eh! try 20,000 feet!
The bulk of the days where spent doing just this, walking. Its what we signed up for after all...
At the start of day 2 we broke out above the Forrest and had a day trekking through heath/moorland...
Our AMAZING guide Nelson...He made the trip that bit much more special, a new friend.
The weather up there was very fickle, clouds would move in and out with shocking pace
Some of the many big rocks in the moorland we where walking through for a whole day
One of the porters playing about climbing one of the rocks, with the rest of the party walking on in the BG
Sun set of day 2...you know trips like this are special when you see this kind of thing day after day...
Nelson leading my dad on the trail. with such little vision my dad needs someone a foot infront of him so he can follow where you put your feet. Makes things very interesting to say the least ha
The vast open spaces of the place where one of the most shocking things...you could walk for a day in most directions before hitting anything of importance...
Getting heigher, the peak peaking through the mist
Some moss growing on one of the many gnarled old bushes
Sunset at the upper edges of the moors...
yet more walking...for my dad if he wanted to look at the views, drink etc he had to stop, so he didnt see to much...
The mists rolling in
the mists and cloud moving in to cover the hillside before bed...
one of the many small streams running down the Mt
Fire red sunset looking out toward Mt Meru, simply stunning...

Now I will be putting together a book of all the work from this trip, along with short extracts from my dads journal which he wrote everyday while out their giving a great insight to how much of a challenge something like this is for someone with only 5% of their sight left...

I will do another post on that when its done in around a week...

The best is still to come!

Thanks

Jacob

Off the grid for a week

I am off to climb Kilimanjaro in Africa for the next week or so. This means im in a total black hole as far as contacting me goes.

If you want anything, email and I will get back as soon as I can.

Thanks

Jacob

Dirt TV - Mitch and Berny...

I was down in Surry last week shooting with USA pinner and UK mad mad Mitch Ropelato and Berny Kerr for Dirt TV.

Anyway the video and pics went up live a day or so ago on Dirt...

See that here: http://dirt.mpora.com/news/dirttv-mitch-ropelato-bernard-kerr.html

And the video here:


More Mountain Biking Videos

and a few photos...

click the link to Dirt above to see a few more pics...

What camera gear do you take to 20,000 feet?

If you follow me on twitter or FB the chances are you already know about what my dad and I are doing in the next week or so...

We are climbing Kilimanjaro, the highest freestanding mountain in the world.

At just shy of 20,000 feet its a big un, and will take us 6 days of solid trekking to get to the top.

What makes it all the more of a challenge is the fact my dads blind...

For all the info on what,who,when,where and why see the just giving page here:

http://www.justgiving.com/BlindSummit2011

please give what you can, ALL MONEY DONATED GOES RIGHT TO RESEARCH TO RP

Anyway why your here, camera gear!

When you have to haul all your gear up that big hill for 6 days you start thinking about every little bit of gear...so I have slimmed down the bag from the full camera bag to the smaller Lowe Pro Nova 170 AW.

See what my normal bag looks like here:

http://jacobgibbinsdotcodotuk.blogspot.com/2010/12/camera-bag-showdown.html

Anyway...some photos of what the Kili Bag looks like:

This is the one...The Lowe pro Nova 170 AW. Perfect for the job, belt loops on the back for the waist strap of the bag so its always there, quick to open buckle, AW cover for when shit goes south, tough enough that I'm not scared of it ripping all the time, and big enough to fit a fair amount of gear in! WIN WIN WIN

This is the gear that's inside that thing... and even though the bag my be small, as I don't want to get to the top and think " if only I had that lens" I am taking all my best glass...which isn't the lightest option...the bag still comes in at around 4.5 KG...that's very light for what it is, but its still a notable amount to carry up to that height...

Here is the gear then...In the front pocket you have the SLR Gorilapod, study enough for the d300s and 80-200 if needs be.

Then Nikon D300s with 15mm Fish eye
Nikon 80-200 2.8
Nikon 50mm 1.8
GoPro
Shotgun Mic
Lots of batteries
Lots of memory cards ( 100 gig worth )
and some shit to clean it all with...

The belly of the beast. Lots of batteries, lens and GoPro all wedged in there like sardines...

Anyway that pretty much sums up what I'm taking... I will be in a total media black hole for just over a week...no phone, no Internet, no Facebook, no nothing!

So if you need me, email me and I will get back ASAP.

Anyway visit the just giving page via the link above the photos, and please, donate what you can.

Thanks

Jacob

New Published work...

This afternoon I went through the pile of magazines that seems to gather in the corner of my room each month looking for all my work that has graced its pages...

Every few months I go through, and shoot photos of all my work in them and add them to the published work gallery on my site ( see that here )

http://www.jacobgibbins.co.uk/Gallery-Published.html

Anyway few bits and bobs in Dirt, few stories in MBUK , Adverts for Orange and Mpora etc

Take a look, if you want to see a step by step from the original raw file, right through editing to the final version let me know which one and I will get it done!

1:This is in the YNOTW part of Dirt, Dig day and trails being built in Tavistock



2:Shot in Josh Brycelands column in Dirt from when I was up shooting with him before Xmas


3:Part of a a great article I both shot and wrote on how to legally build trails


4:An Add for the new Orange ST4 that has run in MBUK and Dirt


5:Shot from the end of last season in Dirts new pages


6:Big DPS Add for Mpora's Iphone App that's been running in Dirt for the past 6 months...


7:Shot of mono riding down at Gawton for an article in MBUK on riding holidays in the UK


8:The startgate photo for the latest issue of Dirt taken at a recent dig day at Gawton...

Like I said , if you want to see a step by step from the original raw file, right through editing to the final version let me know which one...

Ta

Jacob

Social Media

Social Media is such a vital tool for the modern Photographer/Filmer/Writer etc that if your not on it, your either just flat out amazing, or probably arnt doing to well...

There are a whole host of sites out there for you to use, all do slightly different things, and i know when it came round to starting using them all i was like " whats the point, FB seems to do 90% of what the others do ? " but its not quite that simple once you get in to it.

I will go through the list of the main places that I'm both active and social on the interweb, I have linked my profiles so you can see how I use them and what I use them for...

My Blog: I will spare you the link, as I'm pretty sure if your reading this you know how to get to it/here.

But this is the hub, this is where I try to get people to come to. The all social media for me is to get people to come to my blog or site and to see more of my work.



Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Jacob-Gibbins-Photography/125095350896134?v=info

First up is the big one, Facebook, hundreds of Millions of active members, and in this day and age the go to way of contacting most people outside of professional conversations...

I use my FB fan page to tell all the people who follow me about all new blog posts, new videos I find that I like, news on up and coming work etc its main strength is its number of users, simple!


Twitter: @jacobgibbins

http://twitter.com/#!/JacobGibbins

Twitter is a "micro Blogging site" which means in use full terms its like Fb but you only get the status updates...but its so much more than that!...

Its much more professionally minded than FB, full of networking, sharing videos,photos,inside info much more. for eg I post up a lot of sneak peaks of what I'm working on twitter...





The way its users interact is also much more social in that every time you comment on anything you have to link back to where you got the info from...once you get a half decent number of followers ( I'm no where near yet ha ) its a very use full tool...

Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/people/jacobgibbins/

Flickr is the home of a more specific community on the web based around photography.

A vast number of photographers from pros to amateurs use it, post photos daily most of the time, comment on others, it has groups like most other formats of social media etc



Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/millki

Youtube, the home of Danny macs 20 odd Million hit video. There is only one place on the the Internet where that can happen to a video...YT.

With pretty much the whole Internet savvy world using it to watch people falling in to ponds and hurting themselves its the perfect place for bikes...It have a very active user base though, you get comments, lots of views etc all very fast. Its also rather neutral in terms of other bike industry sites so they wont mind linking to it. ( for eg if you ask vital to post up a video that's only online via pinkbike, they probably wont )

Vimeo: http://vimeo.com/channels/jacobgibbins and my channel here http://vimeo.com/jacobgibbins

Vimeo is much the same as YT but more professional, full of the kind of people who make the TV shows you watch, the adverts you see on TV, the films in the cinema. so it has a smaller user count than youtube, but the videos are better quality, its a nicer interface, and you get more use full comments and criticism. rather than a vid shouting YEEEEY! you get someone telling you that your colours are a bit out and how to fix them, or that they like it and the music choice works with the mood of the footage really well...you get the idea!

Now Bike sites...There are 3 main ones that are much more social than others...

Pinkbike: http://jacobgibbins.pinkbike.com/

Mpora: http://mpora.com/millki/

Vital: http://www.vitalmtb.com/community/jacobgibbins,5917/all

I have listed them in order of which I personally consider the most active and social. Pinkbike is the largest ( by some way I believe ) bike site in the world, and therefore its of little surprise that its the most used and active site of the 3.

But the users tend to be younger, less well educated, and give feedback of very little real world worth POD! doesn't tell you much about your work other than they liked it which is still good to know....

Mpora and Vital are better on that front but still not anywhere close to Flickr and Vimeo...

You then have the whole list of other sites for news etc which I touched on in a post on sites I visit a few weeks back: http://jacobgibbinsdotcodotuk.blogspot.com/2011/01/sites-i-visit.html

So to recap...lots of sites, all doing very similar things just with slight differences, and rather annoyingly as I'm sure you can gather by how I have profiles on them all, you should use them all and update them all regularly...

The more places your video is, the more likely it is to get a lot of views, and views = money ( that's another post all together )

So for me it goes something like this...post of a sneak peak while working on something on twitter, which gets auto fed in to my FB news feed.

then a few weeks later when I can upload the work to Flickr, my Blog,Pinkbike,Youtube,Vimeo,Mpora,vital etc then link it all about via twitter and Facebook. That's it put simply.

Anyway that sums up this post, hopefully you should have a better idea of what its about, what it can do for you and how to use it...its a bit of hastle, but its marketing for very little cost or time, and when you think of it like that it seems to make a bit more sense...

Jay Williamson: Profiles # 3

Number 3 in a new series of short web videos im doing over the off season with various riders.

The idea is 2-3 minutes long, short interviews just getting to know some of the riders a bit better, who they are, why they ride etc

Number 3 is with Jay Williamson, A junior level racer from Cornwall riding the steep tech DH trail down at Gawton in the mist and rain...

Not the perfect weather to shoot in, but interesting weather makes interesting footage...

Anyway some photos and the video bellow...

For the full release see WOs site here:

Few screen grabs from the video...




Few photos from the shoot:













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