AN OLYMPIC NIGHT!

Yesterday was a different day of shooting for me up here in Vancouver. I spent the first part of the day trying to get caught up on image editing and blogging (hence the multiple blogs) and then went off to shoot the Team USA Hockey party at a nearby country club. I can't post any of the images from the party since it was a private event and in order to respect the athletes and their families, it is best to keep them for the team use only. But, suffice it to say that it was a really nice event at a very cool country club with every sport you can imagine, including a full sized ice rink. My kind of place!

Since the party was over at 8pm, I decided to come back to the condo, change back into jeans and head out for some night shots. Believe it or not, I made my first trip over to see the Olympic flame last night (even though it is in the building next to the Main Press Center).

So, here I am, at the stupid chain linked fence that surrounds the Olympic Caldron and I see thousands of people taking the same night picture. It looks good, but it sure as heck isn't original. See the image below.

And since I am surrounded by amazing photographers here at the Olympics who always seem to think of different angles, perspectives...I thought that I would try something different. So, I set up my tripod to shoot through the fence and then rolled the zoom during the exposure. This gave me a pretty cool effect that is different from most everyone else's shot.

You will have to let me know what you think, but either way, it is different!

After shooting the flame images, I hopped in a cab with a couple of friends and we went over to Stanley Park to shoot some images back towards the city. You may recall that I shot from this same vantage point a couple of months ago, but the weather was terrible. Last night we had very clear skies and mild temperatures.

Finally, in the spirit of trying to capture images that are different (since we saw many other people out at the point with their cameras and tripods), I used the same zoom effect from this vantage point. I really like the way that the Olympic Rings, which are on a platform in the middle of the water, have a "Superman" kind of look. For those of us who remember the opening to the Superman movie. :)

Now I am going to head out and make my way up to Whistler for the first time to try and grab some images of Bob Sleigh in action. This could be a tough one for me, since I have never photographed anything like this and have no idea what I am doing when it comes to Olympic sliding events. Wish me luck!