Hershey Park Happy!

Straight Down, The Storm Runner roller coaster, Hershey Park, Hershey, PA. Nikon D70, Sigma Hyper-Zoom at 400mm. Image presented at full frame. No cropping or other Photoshop work performed.

You wait in line a long time, but once on the ride things go fast... really fast. You go from zero to seventy-two miles per hour in under two seconds. You go straight up for eighteen stories, float the top for less than a second and then drop eighteen stories straight down. You travel through a series of spirals and turns that cover a quater of the park and you do all of this in apporximately twenty seconds. When Jenne asked a trembling twelve year old what it was like the kid replied, "it's the longest twenty seconds of your life!"

Jenne was lucky enough to ride the Storm Runner. It broke down at the end of her ride, the sixth run of the Storm Runner that morning. It would break down three other times that day. Jenne and the other riders were still strapped in when the ride broke down upon returning to the station. She and the others found out the hard way that the ride does not have a manual release system for the restraints! The rider restraint system relies entirely on the hydrolics and the ride being powered. They sat strapped in for almost fifteen minutes. I waited on the sidelines and watched, as she rocketed off in what is the closest thing anyone who's not in the Navy will ever get to taking off from the deck of an aircraft carrier. And then I waited and wondered where Jenne was when her ride was over. I had no idea that the ride malfunctioned. Malfunctions aside, I would have loved to ride the Storm Runner, but big signs warned me strongly against it and so did the memory of bad back pain. So, I did something I have never done at an amusement park before; I spent the day taking photographs and not riding the rides. I filled three memory cards with images; one 256mb card and two 128mb cards. Jenne commented with as much as I was shooting that I should have most things covered for PhotoTime Tuesday, Thursday Challenge and Photo Friday for the next several weeks at least. I gave the camera a heavy work out. I photographed rides, stands, games, people, animals and even abstracts. You can not expect that I would not shoot abstract images now could you. One battery lasted me the whole day and is still three quarters charged this afternoon. My main lens was the Sigma 28-300mm (actaully because of the 1.5 multiplication factor caused by the Nikon D70 it's a 42-450mm lense) and I shot mostly on manual mode and using the 'Sunny Sixteen'** rule for determining exposures. For night shots I didn't have my tripod with me so I used whatever I could as a brace; trash cans, poles, signs, brick walls, and fences. I discovered that - left to its own devices - the Nikon D70 has a tendency to underexpose. Anyway, enough camera geek. Jenne and I had an excellent day that started with us rising and shinning at 6:30 AM Saturday and getting home and collapsing in bed at 1:00 AM Sunday. We slept in really late, we have sore leg muscles (the back feels fine) and are just felling pretty lazy today. We are staying around the house and in fact I think that I am off to take a nap with the cats. Catch ya latter with more photos from Hershey Park.

Jenne in the front right seat of Storm Runner. The empty left seat is for me. Sigh. having a screwed up back SUCKS!
Jenne rides the Flying Falcon. I gave up riding this high flying spin and puke ride last year when I got so dizy I stumbled off of it. Getting older also SUCKS!

**Rule of Sunny-16. Camera Geek Stuff.
The "rule of sunny-16" is simply a handy trick to remember a fairly simple way to set proper exposure in bright daylight (with strong shadows). The camera aperture is set to f/16 (hence the -16 in sunny-16). The "sunny" part is based on the sun having to be bright and high in the sky, casting dark shadows.

The film you load in the camera has a printed film speed (ISO/ASA rating) that typically is 25 ASA or 25 ISO through 800 ASA or 800 ISO, depending on the film's speed. Simply take the reciprocal of this number as the shutter speed. So for 25 ASA/ISO film, the speed would be 1/25th second (so use the closest standard shutter speed, here 1/30th second on most cameras). For 100 ASA/ISO film, you would use f/16 and 1/100th second (or 1/125th on many cameras). How about 400 ASA/ISO film? 800 ASA/ISO? Did you guess 1/400th second, or 1/500th on most cameras; 1/800th second, or 1/1,000th second on most cameras?

Aperture stops conditions
f/22 = -1 stop, snow or beach
f/16 = sunny-16, bright daylight dark shadows
f/11 = +1 stop, weak or hazy sun sun low in sky
f/8 = +2 stops cloudy bright
f/5.6 = +3 stops, darker clouds subject in shadow
f/4 = +4 stops, sunset