XXtra effort

Media launches - of new product to the mountain bike press - are one of those eagerly anticipated perks of the job. It often means a trip somewhere warm and sunny, great riding, lots of high-end bikes to try out and plenty of free food and beer. What's not to like?

Of course, from the manufacturers' point of view it's all about ensuring their new widget gets the maximum possible exposure. You don't need to be a psychologist - or a conspiracy theorist - to understand the reason for all the wining and dining. And there's no denying it's fun to get together with a bunch of like-minded bike geeks and discuss the finer points of (say) DOT 5.0 over DOT 5.1 brake fluid. 

But from a photographic point of view, media launches aren't always the best places to be. For a start, everyone else is there. Looking at the same stuff, riding the same trails, using the same locations. The manufacturer doesn't care if everyone's images end up looking the same - for them, it's not about art, it's about product.

Nikon D300, 50mm f/1.8 w/+2 dioptre, 1/250sec f/6.3 @ ISO200, single radio slave w/softbox

But I do care. And so when I found myself in a corner of Tuscan loveliness recently, basking in 30 celsius sunshine as SRAM's product managers extolled the virtues of their new (and admittedly very impressive) XX groupset, I found myself preoccupied less with the niceties of chainlines and exit ramps and more with how to turn yet another press launch into a visually arresting 7 page feature.

There's a golden rule that I apply when I'm faced with having to get shots amongst a group of other photographers: watch what they're doing, and then do something different, preferably somewhere different. So, whilst everyone else was clustered around the SRAM truck shooting static closeups of XX components on various bikes, I was working out how to get a shot of the new kit in action.

Component shots that break the mould aren't easy. I didn't want an action shot of an XX-equipped bike being ridden, because it wasn't the bike that was the story. So, I figured, I'd have to break out the Magic Arm and get my camera in close and dirty. Here's the result as it appeared in What Mountain Bike, which I'm really rather pleased with:

Nikon D300, 10.5mm f/2.8, 1/15sec f/22 @ ISO200

What you can't see is the dozens (and dozens) of pics that didn't quite work. For a variety of reasons I wasn't able to find a smooth enough trail for my usual Magic Arm technique to work, so I had to improvise and, er, 'cheat'. If you look closely at the pic you might be able to figure out what I did.

The moral of the story, I think, is that it's worth going out of your way to try something different. There were more than a dozen photographers and journos at the XX launch, and no-one else came away with an image anything like this one despite having access to the same raw materials. If I can keep coming back with images that everyone else misses, it gives my clients a reason to keep coming back to me.

Comments

[MikeD]

I'm guessing that the "cheat" is that no-one's actually riding that bike :-)

Seven pages? Crikey.

[Seb Rogers]

Bingo. And that neither wheel is in contact with the ground...

I know, I know. There was just too much vibration.

I had to write at least three extended captions on the XX derailleur. You can imagine the difficulty I had coming up with enough interesting pics to fill 7 pages ;-P

[Andy]

Really like the rear mech shot. Like the little pop of the front wheel, even though no one's riding it.

[Alan Young]

Awesome as usual Seb. Must be hard to run in those biking shoes!