in making the X selfies post I realized I’ve never really shared my ski selfies as a post here.  This has been a fun idea that goes back to 2007 with my 5D and 15mm fisheye:

Let me just say mirrorless cameras have made this a LOT easier…  I remember how cold my hand was using my 5D that day bare handed…  At the time I liked that shot but since then I’ve dialed in a better formula for getting a pretty good action shot of myself while skiing.  Here’s where it all came together:

I can remember that day and the setup still.  It was at Stowe with my buddy Dave Simms.  The camera was the fuji X-A1 with the Samyang 8mm fisheye.  Set it to f/16 and manually focus to ~1m, set the shutter to ~1/60th for some motion blur and let auto ISO do it’s thing.  Drive mode at its highest FPS, hold the camera upside down so the shutter is under might right pointer and fire away!  I hate spray and pray but it’s kinda needed for this.  These shots take a LOT of trial and error in terms of how you turn, where you look, and if the shot is too blurry or just right.  Here’s another shot with the same setup:

When I switched to sony the a6000/a6400 with the same 8mm fisheye was just as good of a setup.  Love these liberty skis too btw:

These are my two favorite version, one from the covid ski season (we had to wear masks), with my full black setup and one of my all time favorite skis, line sir francis bacons (this pair got destroyed by rocks but I have another pair as I type this in December 2024):

Then I had the idea of using one of these shots on the back of my ski school business cards.  This is also on my line blades which are an amazingly fun ski:

I liked the shot in the all black enough with the ridge at Bridger as the background enough I had to go back and try to get a similar setup for my business card shot.

At this point these have become a fun tradition to also document where I’m skiing and what my current ski setup is.  I’m sure I’ll be adding more of these posts this season. 

oh, and I also know how to snowboard…