Epic bike park

Braden cranks a lookback well past the clicking point

Lot's going on in Ottawa now. The biking community froths at the mouth. Everyone has heard about it and seen the sneakpeaks on facebook. The CTV did a spot on tv. Now everyone has a raging boner that won't go away. I have been lucky enough to be inside. You won't be dissapointed. It's a high class facility that has something for everyone. My hat is off to Lin and her crew for making this happen. See you at the park.

iphone offload 2014

a giant snapping turtle being removed from the side of the road where she tried to lay eggs

Sometimes it's handy to have the phone after all.

Merry Christmas and more

Snowy Owl

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, as well birthdays to Crazy Steve, Chitaroni and other people probably. Snapped a few photos of Kyle and Steve over the Holidays while observing at Taz. But let's get to the goods, what I am really excited about.

While my goods friends were visiting, I stumbled across a snowy owl landing on my garage right in front of me. I snuck into the house and even removed my keys and change so I could be stealthy with the camera. He was gone when I returned 10 seconds later though. Fast forward to Christmas day - while driving on the highway, I see him (or well, another owl at least) perched in a tree but I don't have the camera. Of course. Then yesterday while on the way back from my sister's on the backroads I spot him with Brenna perched on a fence post near the road. I have the camera but the sun has just set. I snap a photo that would have been worthy had I not found him today. So today I returned to the fence post area to see if he is around. I don't see him, but I see a large dark animal feeding on a carcass in the same field. It's far away and figure it might be a fox or a coyote picking up scraps. I ignore it and turn back, but as I pass the "animal" a second time I notice a distinct white head. I have sharp eyes, but they are not what they used to be. I can't tell what it is, my gut says bald eagle but my brain says no way not out here. I use the camera zoomed to the max and shoot a photo, then I zoom in on that blurred subject. Sure enough it is a massive bald eagle feeding on what appears to be a downed vulture, raven, or maybe a game bird. The photos of the eagle are cropped and attempted to be sharpened a bit. Thank goodness for my versatile 18-270 tamron lens! Excellent walk-around lens for stuff like this. A Raven actually comes in to feed and shoes the eagle away. I spot him flying away, snap a few photos in the distance and then race in my car to catch upto him. As soon as I got closer I snapped a few more, but his path of flight was where no car can go and all I could do was watch him fly away in awe. This is the third bald eagle I have seen (Florida and Pennsylvania) but I don't think I was happier for the others than this sighting. Right in my backyard! I had to hit crappy tire, so I made sure to take the long route along the highway since I was doing well for bird spotting. I knew I would likely see a hawk or two, and maybe the owl. Well sure enough I found the snowy owl. I had to exit further and turn back in the opposite direction. I snapped a few and scared him off in the wrong direction. So yes, I reversed down the 417 and got closer for some even better shots! And you know what? What I bought at crappy tire was on sale too! Wow what a day. Make sure to check out the birds down below. It's pretty well known I love animals. But I just really get into these predatory animals, there is something so neat about them. They really are at the top of their food chain it seems and it's really exciting to see these rare (to me at least) animals doing well in the area.

Have a safe New Year.

Happy bday Jorden and Ginger

Gordy and the wheel jam of death at L'Orignal. Shot on my t3i with Chit's 10-20mm wide lens.

 Happy birthday Jorden and Ginger. Don't know what dates or how old you guys are. I don't have Facebook and can sooner remember NHL pro's stats. But I don't love you guys any less. Here are some  classics of Ginger and more from an NYC/Philly/NJ trip we took in 2008. With the crashed hard drive I was extremely lucky to come across this cd with the trip photos (shot with the old 40D) I had burned for Chris way back when, but forgot to give the disc to him a thousand times. My fav part of that road trip with Jeff, Ginger, and Prashant, was Philly. It had amazing street and really felt like a true adventure with new things to ride around every corner. The only thing we mapped out were those cities. Nothing else. It was get in the car and go. A proper bmx road trip. Hope to go back someday. Do people ride street anymore though? And Hey, that trip made a lot of footage for Hate This. 90% of ginger's part was from this trip. Dude shredded it up road fools style. Won't be a ton of updates coming up here. People got lame for Hallowe'en, so nothing there to share. And I am off on a double knee surgery for the next good while. It's going well. hopefully I can be riding for Feb or so.

Happy birthday guys!

Beautiful September

Derek cruises with style on his Honda Shadow

September has proven to been one of the nicer months we have had all year. It's been sunny and perfect for wearing jeans and a tshirt. Can't complain. Check out some stuff going on in life while you are stuck at work not enjoying this weather. All shot with the 50mm on the t3i, except for the bmx photos of me, that was Chitaroni with the 7d and 15mm fisheye.

Sudbury roadtrip edit 2013

Here it is. I finally paid for a vimeo plus account. Not happy giving them $60 for a year, but at least this way I can upload video way sooner since I can never ever remember how to compress things while maintaining decent quality. It seriously took me days with my work schedule to just get this crap online. My internet is as slow a volkswagen and my brain is getting dumber. Now that onus is on you as riders to make me ride more and film more next year to and pump out more edits to justify this expense. I prefer wasting money on this from kijiji that I can re-sell on kijiji when I realize I don't need them. Anyone want to buy my edit? Didn't think so. Oh and make sure to have the HD option on.

Enjoy.

Big Nickel Trip 2013

Josh gainers unknown water off a train bridge in Sturgeon falls. We estimated this jump at about 48-50ft. He did the gainer first jump. Then did it again perfectly as well. Then he called it there like a wise man. Don't think you're cool by saying it's not that high. A: you can't even see how much more he drops into the water. B: he did it first jump, INTO UNKNOWN water. C: the friggin' guy jumped off a beam, sideways, no running start, just standing balancing on a beam. D: Josh is the shit

It's important to me to make it down to Sudbury at least once a year. I have good friends there that do lots of driving to hang out on my account. Last year I failed, I didn't even make it once. I was able to break the slump. I didn't ride as much as the maniacs pictured below, but I felt good and had a blast hanging out and laughing. And yah, this post can only start with the best move of the trip. Josh is nuts. Oh and that is Rich Red photoshop job above there there. I opened all the photos I wanted to make a sequence of in some foolish paint program for 4yr olds and cut and past Josh into the relative area he should be, overlap and all. All shot on the T3i with Tamron 18-270mm which has been acting up. I also broke my fisheye trying to film Kyle. But I just got a new 50mm lens to sorta make up for that. It's my third one after smashing one in Spain and having one stolen in Gatineau. Enjoy.

Taz session Jan 2013

Tommy with a trick rarely seen these days. The fufanu. Not all is lost with the younger generation after all?

Check out some recent Taz photos from this month. People shredded and we logged some great footage as well. Shot with the T3i - canon 35mm and Opteka 6.5mm fisheye. 

An afternoon at the Brose Farm

Jay was trying to perfect his no footed cans all afternoon. It's a good shot when you can see the waffle in the sole

I was unable to ride the last Brose Farm jam, but got lucky enough to have Josh have myself and a few others out for a session before it got too cold. Here are a bunch of photos and video edit of the shredding. People went pretty hard for the camera. The video below captures MOST of the best things that went down. On a roll here recently, let's keep it up. Somehow motivated to ride and film while the weather runs out on us. Hey, make sure to watch that video in HD from the vimeo page too! Click for more pics and video link!

2012 end of summer mix edit

2012 end of summer mix from Dirty Lens Productions on Vimeo.

I had a fun summer doing all sorts of things. Here is a video simply smashed together since I had too many random clips and not enough to do proper individual edits. Cherish the warm sunny days, they won't last long now!

Make sure you click the vimeo link and go my page and watch in HD. It won't be amazing quality because I don't have vimeo plus, so I had to squish a big vid to fit a small margin...

Enjoy!

more photos from Quebec + Roland bonus shot

Roland with a pocket table transfer in North Carolina. Photo by Stacey Peralta of Peralta Grind 

Just some more photos from our QC trip. Also a great shot I have been meaning to put of Roland shot by his friend. Roland was down this summer, so hopefully you got to shred a bit with him. He hasn't slowed down a bit! Way to go Roland. Awesome sequence!

photo overload

Craig insisted on seeing this photo right after to check for "proper knee placement". I'd say it was good

Took a trip to Mtl and rode some secret trails. Well, I watched. They were a crazy creation that I wasn't gonna give a go. Instead I sat back and watched the locals do their thing. We also rode through the school protest at a time of night where it wasn't violent yet, and also saw "zombie boy", google image him. It has been a very random week. Here are some photos, unfortunately none of zombie boy or the protest.

road trip: Toronto

Chris Silva walltaps a really neat DIY mini near some train tracks

I packed up and went solo all the way to Toronto to see Prashant, Leland, and Pat at their new place together. I hadn't seen the guys in far too long, and Pat/Lelo were about to embark on a cycling trip across Canada. I rode Gananoque, Napanee, and Trenton parks on the way up and had a great time by myself, which is rare. My Civic passed 375k on the body and then I parked it for thew weekend which was a nice change. Luckily I didn't get ticketed, towed, or robbed since my car no longer locks. These guys live in a super interesting industrialized building that is basically a bunch of studios rented out for living situations to all sorts of weirdos that you come to expect. Mostly hipsters. Prashant did not like how I threw that word around, but it's true. The guys live in an ex-dominatrix porn studio. The place is really neat, the history of it makes sense with some of the styling. You would just have to be there to understand. Toronto was alive and the weather was good. We were able to bike everywhere. I rode a bunch of spots I have never even seen before and really enjoyed myself riding street and cruising around. I actually slept ok and ate relatively well. That is a big change because bmx trips for me are normally less sleep than I want and snacks all day, then lots of pain and more drinking. It helped out because I don't normally ride 3 days in a row anymore, but my body help up ok. Kyle came down solo as well from Sudbury and stayed at his sister's. He made several appearances and shredded as usual. I got a lot of filming done over the course of the weekend and it turns out I am doing a web edit for Embassy of the trip. It's almost done and much, much longer than I anticipated. But it if wasn't drawn out, then it wouldn't be my edit. Come back soon for more.

Best of luck on the trip guys and thanks for the hospitality!

almost pool season?

I won't say no to a good pool session. But facts are facts, and pretty much nobody is going pool hunting without Jeff. Jeff ain't here. That means I ain't riding pools this year. Here is a quick look of some of the guys "shralping pools" as it was commonly referred to a few years back. That was a great year. Thanks to everyone's kean eye and Jeff's motivation. I realize that last part is an oxymoron.

Jeff shreds, excuse me, shralps the meadowlands pool. When full of water this was a frequent illegal swim hole as well with a really fun diving board and safely deep section

Dirty Lens spring edit

First Day of Spring 2012 from Rich Red on Vimeo.


I have sent the T3i in for warranty for the dead pixel. Luckil;y it has happened just short of the manufacturer's one year warranty. In the meantime I have figured out how to embed video. MAKE SURE TO WATCH IT FULL SCREEN IN HD ON THE VIMEO SITE PLEASE. Or straight up visit the Dirty Lens Productions vimeo page link in the top right corner of this blog. This is a video from the last of the good weather a few weeks ago. I will have to get a new proper filming camera as this DSLR style just won't cut it for everything I want to do filming wise. You will see the dead pixel in the video. You will also notice I forgot my light I purchased specifically for night like in this video. Fuck. Enjoy!

Oh yah. Obviously I won't have a camera for the next few weeks, but do come back. I will upload some hard drive goodies next week.

metro jam !!!

I am missing my first metro jam since 2002 or so, maybe even earlier. In light of the epic weekend that is metro, here a bunch of photos from 2010 event. Enjoy.

guys will get gay and light blue angels

Clicked; random

We are amidst an unbelievable indian summer RIGHT NOW. Check the photos and then get back to riding.

Chris has always had some of the best lookbacks

2010 Canon 40D photo offload

The 40D is long gone now. It made it's way to the mysterious Chris Campbell somewhere in Alberta. It's either collecting dust or being used for creepy photos of girls. Here are a bunch of my favs from 2010 I found while poking around on my hard drive. More photos after the jump. Did I get that right? "after the jump..." Bloggin'!

Norco's Ben Kaufmann, one footed pancake in Montreal's Le Taz