Photo: Garrett Cortese

Date: May 9, 2009

Locaton: The Projects. Byerly Toe Jam Rockstar Rail Jam.

Trick: Boardslide to fakie

Temp: Way, way, way too hot

Driver:  Kirby

These days Toe Jam is swarming with digital camera wielding kids running around taking shots of all the action, then combine that with the power of the Internet and you’ve got coverage of the event spread around the world 0.003 seconds after it’s all over. So my goal when shooting an event like Toe Jam is to do whatever it is nobody else is doing. Maybe that means a different angle or a different lens or a different use of the available light. Either way, I just want my photos to look as different as possible from the hundreds of other shots out there. For this shot I had my camera and a fisheye lens attached to a monopod so I could stand in the shallow water and reach it out closer to the rail. I adjusted my settings to silhouette Yan against the sun and sky, and just fired as he hit the rail. Being different can be risky because you might miss the banger trick of the whole day, but sometimes it pays off and you get a cool, different shot that nobody else really got.