Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Better Late Than Never Wednesday: Yes, Bloggers Do Have Faces; Helicopter Videos: New Radio Poppers

Good Evening Everybody,
I'm breaking from my regular series, The Analysis of A Wedding Shoot, to bring you a few updates on what we've discovered at the WPPI Tradeshow. The last few days I've been shooting some videos of some of the celebrity speakers giving their presentations at the various booths in the trade show.
My idea was to pick up a tip or two from each one of them and share them with our DPT readers today. Late programing and early wake up calls today kept me from posting earlier today. So, if all goes well look for it tomorrow. I've got video snipits of Joe McNally, Michele Celentano, Hanson Fong, and Mary Fisk-Taylor. There are some good ideas there so I hope you enjoy it.

Conventions do make the posting a bit inconsistent. I thought I was going to bail today but I found a few minutes, get this, at the Bloggers Lounge at WPPI. Yep, even Spidy was there. Oh.... the addiction of all this. I wonder what Freud would have said about all this blogging. Anyway it has been a great show in Las Vegas - over 12,000 people - a new record - have attended the trade show and programs! - Unbelievable!

New Radio Poppers Hit The Market!
While I was in the middle of the post I got a call from Kevin King, the inventor of the very popular Radio Poppers. He was showing the models at the show and is letting me give them a try when we get back in town - I can't wait to run them thru their paces. I headed over to the Radio Popper blog and there is a ton of info and videos on these handy dandy little dudes. Here is the link - worth the peak. That's a picture of famous blogger, Syl Arena, from Pixsylated.com helping me test them on the show floor.

Bloggers Have Faces Too
I'll tell ya', when you blog you get emails and comments from other bloggers. For me, I always check out their site to see whats up. Kerry Garrison from CameraDoJo.com fame dropped me an email and we planned to hook up today. Shortly after that, I received a note from Syl Arena from Pixsylated.com about hooking up at the show too. So as we found each other amongst the crowds we had a great visit talking blog stuff while LaDawn just rolled her eyes at the whole thing. I really don't get it - Kerry, Syl and I along with the hundreds and thousands fellow bloggers have simply figured out the meaning of life;~)

The bottom line was this, it was like meeting old friends you haven't seen (in forever). We had a great visit. In the photo, from left to right is me, Kerry, and Syl.
Kerry just put up another post, "Understanding Exposure". Here is the link. Syl was telling us about his experiments with high speed flash sync and hooked up 12 - yes 12 - Canon 580 EX II flashes with Radio Poppers and used the set up for some very interesting images. Check out his post right here where he used the multi-$1000 rig to photograph Ben Willmore - very interesting. Anyway, I hope we all get to catch up again.


Video From A Remote Controlled Helicopter
Yep, you read right - this had to be the most interesting product I saw at the show. For under $300, you could buy a remote controlled helicopter complete with video camera, transmitter, and receiver! The company selling the helicopter was DigitTronics - here is their link. The demonstration was so cool. The gentleman in the booth would show how easy it was to control the helicopter and we could all see the video image on the monitor - definitely a "toy" for the kid in lots of us. Yep, I bought one - can't wait to see how it works.

Hey gang, I know it's late for me and I've got to go. Dinner plans with friends happen in less than an hour. I'm planning to cut the video together from the show so look for it tomorrow afternoon - remember, I'm on Pacific time this week. So I'll see everybody then. -David

7 comments:

  1. The helicopters are much harder to fly than they look...
    Order extras blades as you will certainly need them!!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I think Radio popper came up short. Yes it's great that they can now fire studio strobes as well as do TTL, however you have to buy two different recievers to accomplish this. This has been my major problem with them since day one. No ability to fire studio strobes with one transmitter and one reciever. Also the attachment method is very poor in my opinion. Pocket Wizard hit the nail on the head with the introduction of their new wireless transmitters. I am a Nikon shooter so I will have to wait until the second quarter of this year to get them, but I think it's worth the wait.

    ReplyDelete
  3. The helicopter!!! I can't wait to see the Bar-mitzvah party coverage now! Can you strap a 5DII to that?!?!?!?

    ReplyDelete
  4. I also think that the radiopoppers are pretty dead, after I have seen thos new pocketwizard units. and they are even more expensive - not a succesful business model for a newcomer.
    also, I must say, that I personally don't like their mentionned blog. ask a critical question, they don't publish it - even if you are polite and the question is very justified.
    I am not a particular friend of pw, but at least, they are not afraid of questions from potential customers - the same questions were published by the moderator.
    I can say for sure, that I will never buy any radiopoppers
    Phil

    ReplyDelete
  5. Hey David. I did the trade-up deal with my P1 units and was a little unhappy that the PX receiver wouldn't let me fire my TD5 like the P1 did. It actually mounts much nicer than the P1 with all the tape, but it just won't fire the QFlash for some reason. I'm wondering if Quantum will want another upgrade to use the QNexus with the PX units. It seems every time I turn around I'm sending something to them for an upgrade. I admit it is nicer than buying new but it seems every time somebody changes something it has to be upgraded, at a cost, to work with Quantum. I do love my TD5 and would like it even more if I could fire it with a PX unit. Just thought you might have a little pull over at Quantum to have them check into it. Thanks for all you do. I read your blog first thing every day. It has so much good information on it. If I could only get you to switch over to Nikon then we would be all set.

    ReplyDelete
  6. David,


    The image of the helicopter you have posted is listed at $499 on the website.

    Which model are you referring to which is under $300?

    Was it a show special?

    Thxs,


    TS

    ReplyDelete
  7. I ran into Spidy in the men's room. Didn't have the same wow factor, trust me.

    A while later we saw him next to the door which led to the outside tradeshow - my wife snapped a pic but I resisted, having just seen him...

    I wish I was able to see your presentation David but there were other priority sessions I had to see.

    ReplyDelete