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Most Dangerous Photo Shoot

Spent about half an hour in a tree one day.

Had to err on the side of caution by relinquishing a particularly rich & photographically beautiful patch of forest ground cover to a moose.

It was a teenager, so I thought I had a chance at out-belligerent-ing it.

Part of my calculation was how climbable the cedar tree beside me was.

It was lovely up there.
 
In the over 5 decades I’ve been spending time in the bush (what we locals call the Great Bear Rainforest) I have never seen a mountain lion. I’ve seen their prints, and evidence of kills in snow, but never the animal itself.

Kinda makes a guy wonder how close one or more might have gotten to me and gone through a few calculations. This guy had one make the leap...

 
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Does this mean you were rescued from one of the blue tubes? Was this a Willy Wonka situation?
 
BryanFlnt said:
Does this mean you were rescued from one of the blue tubes? Was this a Willy Wonka situation?
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No, I was inside, on the footbridge just above the propellers (you can see this in the first photo). And when these start running, the doors, shutters actually, allowing the access to the bridge, closes so to better direct the vertical airflow.
But these can't be opened manually on the bridge as there were no handles.
There was a kind of a panic button in a red waterproof box with a glass plate that has to be smashed, what I did, then the whole system went into an emergency stop, but keeps the doors blocked too.

The airflow was so strong that I hardly could stand up and breed, I used my tripod as a support and my Victorinox (which I always carry while shooting for the industry) to smash the glass. And the noise was worse than when hanging out the door of a Sea King while flying in a storm (I toke that kind of pictures too) and I had no ear protection..

This aero condenser was clearly in an experimental stadium, luckily the power plant wasn't in production yet...
The blue tubes are for the (hot-) water transportation.

BTW what is a Willy Wonka situation?
 
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madNbad said:
In Roald Dahl’s story, one of the characters is drinking from a river of chocolate when he falls in and is pulled through a tube and drops into a mixing vat.
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Oh, I wished it was just a river of chocolate!

And I like the books by Roald Dahl, I read his book The Giant Peach for our children, when they were little, so many times over and over again as they loved it!
 
Retired in 2017, moved to SW Florida--a good place if you like outdoor activities, which could improve one's quality of life. It is also a good place if you like unpleasant and likely dangerous encounters with right-wing nutcases.

Decided to put together a photobook of the local village where I live. Talked with the local historical society, got some location ideas, etc.

Lots of walking with a small 35mm ... one or two lenses tops. About a year ago (2022), I am photographing a "Thrift shop" which is affiliated with nearby church (a dangerous place to be). Guy who lives across the street sees this and apparently has some "concerns." I'm standing on a public sidewalk (a rare thing ... the sidewalk, that is) when he comes driving up in a golf cart. Next to him, in the front seat, is a shovel and a rife. He tells me, in no uncertain terms, that he doesn't want anyone taking pictures of his house, his yard, ... his domain. I explain to him what I am doing, why I am doing it, and respectably tell him that I won't use any photographs of his house or yard. I also remind him that I'm on public property and have no intention of trespassing. He pauses for a moment, picks up the rifle, points it at me, and says

"Well maybe I'll just shoot you. What would you think about that?" I said something along the lines of

"Well, you can do that, and my problems will certainly be over, but your's will be just beginning. Is that really what you want?"

He paused, and put the rifle on his lap. He then began to tell me a story about some "guvment" types who had taken pictures of his backyard and that somehow resulted in a string of developers snooping around his house, and ... . I saw that he thought that perhaps I was a developer or working with "outsiders" who wanted to change the lifestyle of the village.

I explained the nature of my work and ensured him that I was strongly opposed to unchecked and irresponsible development. I also told him that I'd signed a local neighborhood petition against the (inevitable) unfettered development in this area. This was indeed true, and then I told him that he could check with the guy who lived in that house--a home that I visited and photographed several weeks prior to this, and had indeed signed a petition.

About twenty minutes later, I'd heard more of his life story and he said it was probably ok if I stayed on the street. I thanked him for hearing me out but told him that I would likewise ensure that his property did not appear in the book.
 
I had recently moved to Rochester New York and I was taken to one of the waterfalls in the area. I could not step across a waterfall flow at the top of a fall with one step so I put one foot into the stream. I did not know that the rock bottom was covered with slimy algae. I was immediately moving towards the edge quickly balanced on one foot. I shifted my weight and stepped to the other side, just before the edge. I never did anything like that again.
 
In 1968. Walking through Checkpoint Charlie in Berlin from East Berlin to West Berlin. Taking a photo of the VoPos while still in East Berlin. I set the 10-second timer on my Nikon and then walked though.

That plus taking photos of East Germany on the train from West Berlin to West Germany. The British guy in the train with me was petrified. Those police standing on the side of the train when it stopped. They all looked like ex-SS.
 

All the ex gestapo found a welcome home in the East German police force.
 
Mountain lions are one of the least dangerous large predators in the world unless you're a deer or bighorn sheep or guanaco etc. I've been around them my whole life. They are secretive. But being confronted as an alleged Government spy by armed, literally inbred anti-Govt squatters-rights wackos and polygamist cult enforcers with pointy long beards is rather scary. Do all sneaky spies use 8x10 cameras on big wooden tripods?
 

Setting up the 8x10 and exposing a few sheets of Provia in the middle of a currently burning forest was probably not the wisest thing I did in remote north Queensland, but the pictures were pretty good, and I did not get set on fire, though the soles of my boots melted a bit.
 
Re-wrote from another thread.
In Central Europe, early 2000’s, taking photos from a stairwell perch halfway up an apartment building looking out a large full size window down toward an “auto shop” maybe 40 yards away, this shop owned by muscled youngish guys with shaved heads, black leather jackets and strong cologne. Taking photos of these same attendees (Ukrainian mafia), comings and going. They‘d killed several people inside in past year(s). They’d have visiting prostitutes. But mostly this branch’s meeting place. One day important fella on phone out in the lot was standing by his car chatting, occasionally looking about. And then he sees me up in the apartment building with my camera taking pictures. Wait, does he really see me? Yes, I think so… No. I know so. And he’s angry. Seeing this through a zoom lens makes your heart really race. Terminates his call and slams his hand on the car roof still staring at me. Now more than angry. He bolts inside the auto shop. Probably to get his friends or… tools.

Do I head to the roof or race as fast as possible down many flights of stairs to the backside lot to my rental car and make a run for it? I certainly didn’t anticipate this contingency. This isn’t a movie with a practical roof option. (I’d left the sidearm back in the office safe that day and my host support co-workers were absent on another task at least fifteen minutes away unable to help— this was the only day of several months activity when they had to leave me solo - so yes I was a little unnerved, feeling helpless.) You’ve never seen a man spill so fast down a stairwell and fly away in a VW as if it were a Ferrari.
 

What a friggin' idiot. Dangeous, too. Unfortunately, too many of this type around these days.
 
Kilgallb said:
All the ex gestapo found a welcome home in the East German police force.
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Well, I saw the Bastille Day parade in on the Champs-Elysee Paris in 1966. There was this group of older looking Foreign Legion types. I was told they were ex Wehrmacht or Gestapo types. There were people around me cheering like crazy. Irony is that some of those guys fought the French 25 years earlier and may have occupied Paris.
 
I was in a small town in Western Poland in 2008. Before lunch, there were a lot of people sitting on a roof and drinking. I did some photos with my 500 mm mirror lens. Someone saw me and started moving down the street towards me. I got the heck out of there, fast!
 
One time in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, I was photographing the Japanese Tea Garden pond. I don't remember exactly what happened, but the next thng you know, I fell into the pond, which was not deep. Somehow, somehow I had the presence of mind to hold my camera above the water. A Nikon F2 + motor drive and battery pack. I was soaked, and we had to drive back home, about 40 miles. My wife had a friend who was visiting with us at the time. They both laughed.
 
A few years ago I got a phone call from some chaps in the UK. They had a lot of $$$ invested in an oil drilling project out here in Central Nevada. East of Tybo and just a bit south of the first underground nuke test. 38°38'09"N 116°12'42"W if anyone wants to fly in. The lads were convinced that nothing much was happening with their cash and desired some photos on the ground. So I came up with a day rate and drove the considerable distance, rougly 85 miles from my home in Tonopah. On the second visit a crew was on the ground working and let it be known that harm would come if I persisted in taking pictures. I told them on public lands I had the privilege of taking photographs as long as I wasn't trespassing on their leased ground. They got nasty and I decided it wasn't worth $300 bucks to be molested. So I backed out an 1/8th of a mile and did a series with the trusty 300mm Nikkor. No other danger to report.
 


I went through Checkpoint Charlie in 1969, as a 15 yo student. I was so scared of the Vopos that my camera never came out of its case!

Scary? Any of the many rallies I have photographed on Parliament Hill, in Ottawa, Ontario, over the past 20-odd years.
 
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