Have you ever wondered what would happen if you painted a skatepark with light at night? Me either, but ben matthews actually did it and took pictures, really damn cool ones, just look!

In photography, exposure is the total amount of light allowed to fall on the photographic medium (photographic film or image sensor) during the process of taking a photograph. Exposure is measured in lux seconds, and can be computed from exposure value (EV) and scene luminance over a specified area.
In photographic jargon, an exposure generally refers to a single shutter cycle. For example: a long exposure refers to a single, protracted shutter cycle to capture enough low-intensity light, whereas a multiple exposure involves a series of relatively brief shutter cycles; effectively layering a series of photographs in one image. For the same film speed, the accumulated photometric exposure (H) should be similar in both cases.

…and With That, the Vortex Opened

Licked by the Flames

Flight to Safety

I Promised Myself a Rocket Ride….

Bubble Gum Years

Light Painting

Burn

OTT

Spirograph III

Whirligig

Volley

Tracers

Skybound

Jet Fueled

It’s Alright, He’s Armless!

This changes my whole perspective of skateparks after dark.

Skate Boarding Magazine Tagged: art night photography skatepark

Every skate park has its own local crew and flavor. Most parks have similar basic rules, but almost all follow different skate etiquette. Locals are normally  pretty cool, unless you piss them off, then you’ll feel as if you stepped into a gangland war-zone rather than a skatepark.

While every parks skater customs are different the same basic ideas hold up to not be a jerk for all. Here are a few things you can do no matter what park to not be a douche or look like a noob…

1. No Snaking!

If you have ever seen a surf movie you know how bad the locals hate being snaked out for a run. The big difference is your at a skatepark, this mean concrete and hardwood not waves and water. In other words you may get your ass kicked over this d-bag trick.

2. No Hogging!

This is probably the second easiest way to earn a beat down from a local crew. If you can pull 50 tricks out like a freaking mortal combat flawless victory session its one thing. If your rocking out wheelies and baby grinds for an hour… well you batter watch for flying fists. Most parks are pretty full and others are always waiting to get a run in. Have fun in your runs but remember not to go overboard and eat the whole park, or day for that matter, all in one pass.

3. No Pests!

Yes it’s a new park for you, yes ‘that guy’ may rip, but nobody wants some dude they don’t know asking a bunch of questions. If you start bugging everyone at the park it won’t be long until you get the same cold shoulder as you give your kid brother. Sometimes you will just have to ask something, just make sure it has a point, people are at the park to skate not gossip.

4. No Blockades!

When your at a park with lots of flat land don’t choke everyone up practicing tricks in the way. Blocking a run can be hazardous to your health in more ways than one. Setting up your lame-o trick land blockade up like it’s WWII is never going to win friends either, even if they don’t run you over.

5. No Bullies!

Kids will be at the park, don’t be that guy. Yes it’s a pain to have some kid flopping around all over. Yes it’s against the rules to be a pest, but it’s a kid. We all started some place and there’s no reason to be mean even if they can be a pain in the ass. They want to look up to somebody, why be the one douche bag who still bullies them around. Beside, some of them have smoking mom’s dude!

6. No Showboats!

Just because you can pull of the trick some local just did better, it doesn’t mean it’s a good idea to prove it. Not everyone learns the same tricks in the same order and some people just flat out suck. If you just learned to rock n’ rock and some park tourist pops in and trumps you, you’d be bent over it to. No reason to showboat and get anyone else twisted, just ride your runs and land your tricks. The rest should work out fine.

7. No Dissing!

Think about it, seriously, what pisses you off faster than anything else, someone dissing on you right? Even if you thought something else, that is normally all it takes to start a fight. No matter what you do, don’t go to a new park and dis’ the locals. Beyond being rude, it’s literally asking to start a fight.

8. No Squatters!

Rails and coping are not park benches, it is never cool to plop down on the park like it’s your private picnic area. If you need to chill get out of the way and if your going to eat find the proper spot. Nobody wants to watch you eat before they can do a trick and you may just get run over in the process.

9. No Fatheads!

If you screw up, claim it. Plain and simple, this may be the most import thing on the list. Don’t be afraid to say your sorry if you do something wrong. Nobody is saying be a punk at the park but if your do bad, fess up. This will be the surest way to smooth over any bumps your booboo may cause.

10. No Jock Riding

Unless your at a few select parks who fly the rainbow flag, you wont get cool point riding someone’s jock. Keep your man crush to yourself and don’t go eyeballing everyone. If you need to say something just do it, don’t sit there and stare at people until they get your psychic vibe, it’s not going to happen. If you have a habit of spacing out, try to make sure your eys are pointed in any direction other than butts or nuts. You should be fine beyond that.

Now that you know the top 10 no’s, go out and shred something!

Skate Boarding Magazine Tagged: locals rules skatepark top10

Extreme Sport Infographic Crash Course, Ranney Park:

by ~Satyagraha417

Skateboard Park – Ranney SkatePark, Lansing Michigan:

Address: michigan ave, lansing Michigan 48906
Crashup Derby Factor: 5
Do you have to wear pads?: none required
Does it cost money to skate?: no

Skateboarding Magazine Tagged: infographic lansing michigan ranney skatepark

And you thought that skatepark in the hood was bad…

photo

***SK8 ALERT*** Mystery critter skate course footage has been reported missing. Skate photographer reports the skateboard videographer was last seen with the east side badger crew. Please report any updates to the park ranger or the old drunk guy in the bowl…

Skate Boarding Magazine Tagged: animals humor news skatepark

Well you can always leave it to yahoo answers to get good reliable answers. So this answer might be close, but what does it really cost to build a skatepark?

For years I’ve questioned the promise of 15 and 20 year warranties offered by some companies and, I have to say, they are too good to be true. Seriously, can anyone really expect any product built from concrete or steel to last 15 or 20 years, let alone have a realistic expectation that same product will have a warranty that long? Police cars, fire trucks, computers, electric generators, water lines or even the very building in which you are probably sitting right now… are any of them covered for 20 years? 15? Maybe 10? How about 5? In short, no they’re not… and neither is your skatepark.

Can customers really believe this promise? These prefab steel parks have a history of 3-5 year effective lifespans after which time they are typically either removed, replaced or refurbished. So what, you say? After performing the necessary maintenance to keep one of these items viable and safe- or moving the ramp within the same park or to another location- the warranty is VOID…. period, done like dinner, it’s all on you now. It’s hard to imagine that moving a ramp across the lot (remember all the promises of being able to reconfigure the park to keep it interesting?) can some how be responsible for the steel walls rusting but it must be true, otherwise why would they write it?

Below is a copy of the warranty from a prefab steel and precast concrete ramp manufacturer. When a promise of a 15 or 20 year warranty is qualified by saying “installation of replacement parts… not covered under this warranty and freight is to be PREPAID by purchaser” I think the “purchaser” should be scared. Can you imagine not only paying twice for an item but prepaying for shipping on 10,000 pounds of prefab concrete? Then, once the item arrives at your site you have to remove the old ramp with a crane and dispose of it, install the new one with a crane and perform the necessary repairs to the surrounding site. Do we see a problem here?

Here’s how I read this warranty-
* warranty is at the discretion of manufacturer
* warranty does not cover normal wear and tear (it is a skatepark, remember)
* warranty does not cover acts of God (such as freeze and thaw cycles?)
* if a purchaser does not follow the daily, weekly and monthly maintenance recommendations the warranty is void

In my opinion, these promises are misleading and intended to offer nothing more than an empty one-up to the competition in a selfish game of sales wars. And as long as “purchasers” hang their hats on the number of years the product is (supposedly) covered our industry will remain stagnant and the skaters will lose.

Seriously, isn’t using a warranty written by the vendor like asking the fox to guard the hen house? WRITE YOUR OWN WARRANTY!!!

Companies like Who Skates do not hide behind caveats but rather clearly and honestly spell out what we will and will not cover and for how long. Cities and Towns should write the warranties as Exhibits to the contract and remove all of the wiggling and fine print… force builders to make the commitment to no-fine-print warranties covering EVERYTHING in their contract, give them little or no wiggle room and go for the jugular if they leave you hanging… in a test of only the strong (or experienced) survive you will be doing a service to the taxpayers and the skaters.

Text and Image Courtesy Who Skates

On Sunday, January 17th, the youth of Long Beach, California got a brand new facility where they can exercise their passions and distract themselves from the hardships of living in what 1st District Councilman Robert Garcia called “one of the most dense and poor communities in Long Beach.” The new skatepark, which replaced existing equipment and expanded upon the site’s footprint, is a 8,000 sq. ft. hybrid style skatepark, consisting of TrueRide ramps and pre-cast Spohncrete features.

I am a long beach local myself so I went downtown today and to my surprise I found a skatepark that was actually rideable and it had a mini ramp. I don’t remember what was there before cause i just drove through and had no desire to hit the few ramps they had. Now there is a fun mini ramp, a street course behind it that the young and the old (like myself) can have fun on. There are some concrete features built throughout the park that are mixed in with the above ground park and it was a nice use of space. There is also a kids section that is completely seperate which keeps them out of harms way.

After skating the mini ramp for about an hour or so I decided to roll through the street course with about 15 other guys. To my amazement I had no accidents and didn’t even have any close calls. The flow in this park is excellent in my opinion. Now I don’t have to go Houghton Skatepark or the El Dorado Skatepark if I want to ride transition in Long Beach. Here is the address. 1390 Pacific Ave, Long Beach, CA, United States

Here is what the kiddy course looks like.

Here is a shot of the street course.

Another view of the street course. This was shot from the mini ramp.

The mini ramp is about 5 foot tall and really fun

Random Skateboarding At the Downtown Long Beach Skatepark

Rolling Through The New Long Beach Skatepark

Downtown Long Beach Skatepark Kids Section

The New Downtown Long Beach Skatepark Tour From The Outside Of The Skatepark

Skateboarder Smashes The Windshield Of A Cop Car

A LONE police officer had her patrol car windscreen smashed by an angry 12-year-old boy wielding a skateboard at Caroline Bay on Saturday.

The constable was at the skatepark on Caroline Bay responding to complaints from the public about a group of young boys, aged about 12, who were causing problems in the area on Saturday afternoon.

She took one of the boys home because of his behaviour, and then returned to the skatepark to ensure that the rest of the group were behaving.

Acting sergeant Greg Sutherland said one 12-year-old in the group gave the constable the fingers and was using offensive language to her, so while sitting in the patrol car, she beckoned him to come to her.

“He walked toward the patrol car, got to the passenger side, and used his skateboard to smash the windscreen on the passenger side three times.”

Mr Sutherland said the boy was arrested and would be dealt with by Youth Aid on charges of wilful damage and disorderly behaviour likely to cause violence.

When asked why he had smashed the windscreen, the boy said he thought the constable had taken his cousin into custody, so he was upset.

Muskogee Oklahoma is building a new indoor skatepark and the finishing touches are being put on it as I write this blog post. The skatepark is set to open on Feb. 13 at 212 N Main St. Muskogee, Oklahoma 74401.
The park is in an old three-story building that used to house an office supply store. The picture below is just a snapshot of how this skatepark is shaping up. Looking good so far can’t wait to see the rest of the pictures.

Muskogee Oklahoma Indoor Skatepark

There’s hardly a child on the planet that hasn’t played with these multi-colored, Danish-made hunks of plastic. Lego-bricks can be assembled and connected in many ways, to construct such objects as skateparks, skateboards and skateable objects like the photos you see below. Anything constructed can then be taken apart again, and the pieces used to make other objects. There are skateboard related kits available which contain all necessary pieces for any of the projects in the photographs below. Here is a look at 10 different possible lego configurations with regard to skateboarding.