What cool stuff do you do outside of Rc?

[DrKnow65]

I'm into my home audio system, guns, and enjoying having my feet up in my favorite chair LOL.
We do camping in the summer, have a 4 wheeler for the kids, I've got my project 71' suburban, but mostly in the winter it's 1080p movies at reference level volume and preparing my RC stuff.

Well armed wife :-) Custom DPMS LR-308B (AR10 .308win)

[PBO]

Boats (everything except for deep sea fishing), bikes (DH/DJ/BMX), landscaping (stone masonry mostly), cooking, rope splicing, leatherwork (steering wheels, marine fittings etc)

[magman]

motorcycles, golf. My favorite pastime is spending time playing ball, basket ball or softball, with my daughter as well as watching her play those 2 sports

[BP-Revo]

Used to dirt bike, but haven't gone very much in the last 5 years (haven't gone at all in the last 2 or so) due to my dad hurting his knee. Used to Jet Ski, but we stopped about 7 years ago when the family friend we used to go with sold his boat.

I wrench on my car and my dad's street bikes all the time.

I just recently got into photography, and that's pretty much what I've been doing lately. I'll go on a 2-4 night "photography camping" trip where we basically go camping but take photos for most of the activity that's not eating or sleeping or driving. Here's my Flickr with just a very small portion of my photos.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/50582539@N08/

[kulangflow]

BP, those are some very impressive photos! I am a beginner at photography myself. I need to spend more time practicing to get some quality shots like yours. Very cool.

[Snowman 78]

+1 BP very cool pics!!

[BP-Revo]

Thanks guys!

kulang, it really is just putting time into it and getting a feel for it. At first your keeper rate is lower cause you still have to learn what settings to use and when. I've had my share of photos destroyed by the wrong f-stop or wrong shutter speed (well, ok, shutters speeds are far less important for landscapes, but I also shoot my dad at track days on his street bike). Soon enough you can really use certain aspects to make otherwise boring compositions really interesting.

I started back in April of 2010 and have already clicked off about 10,000 photos or so (probably half of that is timelapse, though).

[mjosparky]

Skydive and ride my Wide Glide.

Sparky

http://www.flickr.com/photos/53825637@N06/5426289998/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/5382563...7624878110307/

[snellemin]

You guys do some really cool stuff.

I'm a proffesional Dad after work hours and weekends. My daughter is a handfull and she is only 2!
I do the photography stuff too. Been doing it since the mid 90's. I still suck at it compared to my uncle. But it's fun nonetheless and heck alot cheaper with digital then when I was using 4 rolls of film a week. I don't use the best lenses either, but opt for the old school stuff(~20yr old). All the little shortcomings give the pics character. BP takes some really nice pics fo' sure.

I mess around with PC's and laptops. Currently my fastest computer is a workstation laptop. SSD drive has the same 7.2 rating as the I7 processor. Just silly and is being used for playing mp3's, and my photo's. Messing around with the latest touch screen AIO pc's and found my favorite. It will hit the market in a few months.

I use to love biking at Memorial Park here in Houston. But time has not been on my side for a while now. Loved to skateboard around the neighborhood with my son too. But a broken shoulder stopped that too.

My relax time is in front of my Audio setup in the house. I don't know what classification I would be in, as my setup contains old school equipment, pro audio, mid-fi and hi-fi stuff. I'm not into that hometheater deal. And if I were, I wouldn't be able to afford it, unless I gave up my beloved RC's hobby. I use a PC to play HD movies and music as well. Use the tv to watch family pics and whatnot. This pc is also connected to my 3 amplifier audio setup. Been into audio ever since I put a pair of headphones on. Been an apprentice at age 14 with this guy that use to build/design speakers from scratch. That's right, from scratch. Cones, baskets and motor assembly. He only had a six grade education, but man did he know speaker building. Some people just have the talent.

[RCShocker]

R/C is the next "cool thang" I am doing. Most of my cool stuff is behind me.

Right after high school I played & started on a championship semi pro football team for 5 years as a defensive end.

Then I was able to/had to lose almost 90lbs and started racing ATV's(X-country & motorcross). Did that for about 7 years. The last year of which I spent traveling the east coast competing in Quad Wars with the USHRA at Monster Jam events. That was a whole lot of fun. I stood side by side in drivers meeting with Tom Meents & Dennis Anderson.

Let see, then came almost 7 years of tournament paintball. Traveling to CA, TX, and Canada just to name a few. Was able to hook up with the pro teams and really live the lifestyle. As well as working at the pb store and building fields whenever possible.

My last year of paintball was my first year of r/c in late 2005. I have been traveling to r/c crawling events and competing at a few National events from time to time for the last 3 years but still try to bash my MT's whenever possible.

[simplechamp]

You guys that do the digital photography, I have heard that the money spent in digital photography (for like a nice DSLR, lenses, etc.) makes RC look cheap by comparison. Is this true?

[BP-Revo]

Originally Posted by simplechamp

You guys that do the digital photography, I have heard that the money spent in digital photography (for like a nice DSLR, lenses, etc.) makes RC look cheap by comparison. Is this true?

It's a lot like RC, depends how insane you want to go.

One of the lenses, (we call it the "nifty fifty"), is only a $120, but it has better corner sharpness and less chromatic aberration than a $1500 lens, so you can go kind of budget with it and still get great results.

On the other hand, one of the telephotos I dream of owning is a 400mm f/2.8 IS, and MSRP's for 8 grand, goes for 7200 or so on Amazon. Then there's the 800mm f/5.6 IS that costs 12K, and the super-rare 1200mm f/5.6 costs 100K (yes, really - there's only rumored to be 10-15 in the world).

A lot depends on the photographer, not the equipment, though the equipment just allows you more composition possibilities, so it can matter. Believe it or not, some of the photos in my flickr were taken with a Canon G11 which is a $450 point and shoot (that I got refurbished for $282 shipped to my door), so you don't NEED expensive equipment, but it certainly helps.

The big difference between RC and photography is that in RC, stuff loses value really quickly. In photography, not so much. Bodies usually drop in value pretty quickly because they pump out a new model every year or so for the consumer line cameras (for Canon, it's the "Rebel" line), while the higher end bodies see replacements every 2-3.

Lenses on the other hand get updated in cycles that usually are 5 to sometimes as long as 10 years, so other than the roughly 5-10% loss you see in value after you buy it new, they don't really drop much until a replacement is released.

[mistercrash]

I do the best I can to renovate and fix up the house. This a couple pics of the house we had a year ago. Now a lot of the work I did in that house has to be done again on the new house. I'm getting to old for this.

The front needed a little landscaping to make it purdy.

Before


After


And the backyard needed a little deck to soak up the sun or to lounge in the shade.

[simplechamp]

Originally Posted by BP-Revo

The big difference between RC and photography is that in RC, stuff loses value really quickly.

That's definitely one of my major gripes about RC. I guess it's good if you like to buy used stuff! But it's just not the same as getting that brand new kit, taking it all out of the box, everything clean, perfect condition, and building it up yourself. And that's my other gripe, not enough kits anymore.

[snellemin]

The initial investment is high, but lenses don't go out of style. The body does, but you keep those for a while too. RC is more expensive for me.