Dude on a Bike

*Update*
Video added. Scroll to the bottom of this post.

As a pro photographer, when business is slow, your faced with two decisions; shoot for free, or don't shoot at all. Myself, I prefer the first.

I had a vision, and wanted to make it happen, so we did! I put an ad out on Craigslist for a, "Dude on a Bike." A rather eager gentleman by the name of Ray chimed in, and was all for it. His bike is a complete custom chopper, very shiny, very loud, and probably very expensive.

The idea was for the light from the flash to freeze Ray and his bike, while a slow shutter would streak out the lights of the passing lightpoles as we sped over a bridge here in St Pete/Tampa.

Only thing I haven't figured out, is how to be granted 2nd Curtain Sync when there's no TTL. Pop the flash manually maybe?

We attached a 580EX, a 430EX, and a set of pocket wizards to the top of our Jeep, and pointed them at Ray who was traveling behind us at about 15 ft. Inside the back of the jeep, we had the tripod propped up to hold the camera.

70mph over the Gandy Bridge with $1000 in gear strapped to the roof of the Jeep, whilst the back window hatch was open just slightly so I could get just the right shot! After one pass over the bridge, I had my settings nailed down...F/10, and over a 1 second exposure! Both speedlights were on 1/2 power, and had CTO gels attached for the second run!

Why did we do this?

Because I just had to feed the hunger to shoot, and I knew this probably had never been done before!

Was it worth the risk of losing the gear?

You bet your arse! Look at this shot!

Although I got the shot I wanted, I thought we'd push our luck a bit and get a different angle. This time around we had Ray in the next lane over, whie I was shooting out of the side window of rthe Jeep. My assistant Chris was holding a 580EX with attached pocket wizard and CTO out of the back hatch, and this is what we got.

Double Score!