Selected by Ian Hylands - In the aftermath of SOPA, a post apocalyptic wasteland... Well after yesterdays awesome response to the SOPA issue I thought everyone deserved something pretty sick, and this shot by Robin Kitchin definitely is that. Also the editing by Bob Bogdan Williams, he spent a bit of time working on this I'm sure so any photoshop comments are a waste of time. Bob has agreed to do some work with us, so stay tuned for more of this type of thing in the future...
Agreed connor, and one of those chopper/plane things from Avatar and some Orks for good measure, feck it whilst they're at it can they add a dragon or 2.
Gnarcolepsy : a chronic sleep disorder brought upon after seeing something so gnar, impressive bike maneuvers no longer bring amazement but a bout of drowzyness. Although alarming it is not permanent or dabilitating. If you know someone who suffers from gnarcolepsy tell them to get off the computer and ride their bike!
I would think its a composite/layered image, like one shot of him riding, one shot of the storm rolling across the horizon, both off a tripod and then stitched..... I may be wrong, but either way I love the shot
A great piece of digital work. The photo to begin with was timed and framed very nicely. Personally I would not consider this a photography, I would call it digital art. Regardless, nice work on all three involved!
Tom _ the chopping was tongue in cheek ya numpty Bob ... well see that's the only bit that's off-putting. It's the doubt in my mind. If it happened, then it looks awesome... if it didn't then it looks cheap and tacky - go figure!
I honestly think it looks amazing with the lightning in, and I'm going to guess that it was put in by Bob. Pretty difficult to shoot the lighting and the trick in the same shot during the day, close to impossible actually. But cheap and tacky? The photo looks great as it is, and personally I don't think knowing that makes it any different unless the whole image looked very realistic and we didn't know from looking that it had had a lot done in post. That's just my opinion though...
Firstly thanks for selecting the shot Ian - always a special day when you score a POD. When Bob sent me the version with a lighting strike I cringed, then laughed, then looked confused at my screen for way too long....then made it my wallpaper. It has been their for 6 weeks now and still makes me smile.
Sam Pilgrim is an amazing rider to shoot and I look forward to laughing with him again soon.
Fair point Ian, but looking at the image it feels more like it should be an advert for something - like an event (don't know why I feel that looking at it).
Definitely an awesome shot, well shopped, but the lightning spoils it for me.
It's something very usual in the industry (not really in sports) but shooting templates then layering them, I've seen a lot of commercial photographers doing it mostly for smoke, water, elements you can't control the timing.