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06-01-2013, 07:52 AM   #166
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Hello there, long time lurker, first time poster!

I signed up as you have one heck of a generous offer on the lens I'm currently saving my pennies for and because I took great pleasure in re-living the moment I found out that it's good to be fearless.

The moment came to me instantly and has had a more profound effect on my life than anything else I've done with my photography.
About 4 years back I picked up a Mamiya C3 off a fascinating local gentleman who had used the camera when he was norman parkinsons assistant and one of the official photographers for queen and was now too old to be faffing about with film. I instantly fell in love with the camera and it's beautiful viewfinder but always thought I was never doing the old girl any justice with random snapshots taken around town, what I really wanted to do was take portraits of people I could see on the streets of my hometown. Now I'm not the bravest of men so approaching strangers didn't exactly come easily, in fact the whole first day that I set out to photograph strangers I inevitably came home with a roll of seagulls and buildings taken as excuses as I wimped out again and again. this continued on my next couple of outings with the camera until one day I was walking home with 11 dissapointing photos on the role and I was approaching my front door, one of my neighbours who I had not met was coming out of his home and commented on my camera, I chatted with him a bit and out of nowhere I plucked up the courage to ask him for his photo, now I was using 160 iso film and the sun was setting fast so I had to shoot wide open so I was in less than ideal situations but I finally got the shot I wanted. The wait for the developing lab was fairly excruciating but as soon as I scanned that image in at home I had an instant favourite, this is the first image of my 3.


After I had got this image and seen how happy I was with it, it felt like a giant weight had been lifted off my shoulders and I was no longer afraid of asking strangers for a moment of their time, the more I did this, the more confident I became as I quickly realised that the vast majority of people are more than happy to help another person and often had amazing stories to tell, this progressed through the rest of my personal life, no longer was I afraid to put forward my ideas at work, to say hi to the pretty girl at the bar or even to dance like no-ones watching. This next photo is probably my favourite portrait of a stranger i've done.


These portraits eventually lead to my one and only paid job, taking pics of men and their beards at a facial hair competition! This gave me just enough money to get my Pentax K5 and move into the digital world, now I'm not saying being fearless is an overnight fix for everything but it sure as hell made my life a whole heap better. This last shot is probably my favourite in the 6 months I've owned my K5, I also thought it worked well as a metaphor for the theme!


I hope you enjoyed my photos and experiences and thanks for putting forward such an awesome offer, Tim.

06-01-2013, 09:31 AM   #167
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QuoteOriginally posted by timreeves Quote
snip
Tim,

Welcome to the forum! Unfortunately I have some bad news for you.

The submission window has closed. We are actually just finishing posting the last of the entries now! Here's the archive of all the entries posted thus far: Good to Be Fearless - PentaxForums.com Homepage Blog

There's three more left to be posted

Thanks for the posting anyway, and I feel professionally obliged to remind you it would behoove you to read through things a bit more carefully, as not only did you submit beyond the entry window, but to the wrong location as well

-Heie
06-17-2013, 02:22 PM - 3 Likes   #168
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What an incredible journey this giveaway has been. I started it under the auspices of creating a friendly competition to bring out some "fearless" photography from the incredible community here with the ultimate prize being a coveted and storied lens that has traveled the world and endured countless combat missions by my side. In addition to that, merely my way of giving back to this community that has proven fundamental to my development as a photographer. For those that have not seen the introduction, I will quote myself here because I feel that the history behind this lens was so critical to the spirit of this endeavor:

QuoteOriginally posted by Heie Quote
There is no lens in my "armory" that has seen so much and taken so much abuse and yet still looked up to me with its big, beautiful eye asking for more, and delivering on that promise.

It has come running with me. It has been rock climbing with me. It has shivered under countless showers. It has been entirely submerged under the talcum-like contents of an Afghan sandbag. It has deployed to Afghanistan for an entire twelve months. It has taken part in combat operations in Afghanistan. It has seen and captured the tears of Afghan schoolboys being handed humanitarian aid in the form of backpacks, school supplies, and Beanie Babies. It has honed its aperture to the emotional crumbling of warriors during a memorial for their fallen brethren. It has shot true despite tears making the viewfinder blind to what lay through the other side. It has witnessed the withering light that is the hope of some of Afghanistan's own weathered and tired veterans of wars lasting lifetimes. It has survived the Kepler and Rakiura Tracks of New Zealand, as well as her fiords' waterfalls from being forced to go directly under them.
Now that the giveaway has reached its final stage with the recent publication of the final entry to the competition on the Pentax Forums homepage, I must say - something completely unexpected occurred. I learned something. I don't mean that in a patronizing manner in that learning is beneath me - let's not be ridiculous. It's just the specificity behind that something. There are a few things that are more "logistical" and "objective" to the processes that are inherent to a competition in this style that I absolutely have learned from, and I will touch upon those in a minute. But what I am referring to is so much deeper than a mere improvement in efficiency...

When I typed up and subsequently re-qualified the terms of the competition, answering any and all questions that arose as best as I could, I was under the impression that I was unwaveringly obvious as to what my intent was.

QuoteOriginally posted by Heie Quote
I created an impromptu marketing campaign for Pentax dubbed It's good to be FEARLESS. Resurrecting and building off that mantra that I have come to consider so fundamentally organic to my photography and Pentax's role in it, I invite you to earn my storied DA* 16-50.
To compound on top of that, is my personality and reputation here amongst the PF forumsphere. Earned through not just by what I put down in words, but more importantly, my photography itself. Summarized in the first sentence of my signature, it is an inherent quality that I have honed in on as being fundamental to my DNA. A reputation of willingness to put myself in pretty compromising situations to get a capture - "whether it's fearlessness or recklessness, you can count on Heie to at least go after the shot!" I take immense pride in that, I really do. And I thank you all for helping me develop as a photographer, namely in the last year through my combat photography (which I am still working to be republished).

So when it came to my intent of the competition and what I (and I assume the audience) expected to see as competitive entries - "Too easy," as my military brethren would say.

And herein lies the single greatest lesson to have come out of this competition for me: despite my preconceived notions as to the definition of "fearlessness," and no matter how well I may have believed I communicated that obvious [sic] definition, it still does not overrule others' personal feelings, limitations, interpretations, etc of fearlessness.

The two most memorable entries for me personally that I would never have imagined as being "fearless" prior to this competition were "My Version of Fearless" by jennverr and "Rising Above" by builttospill. If you have not visited them, I encourage you to do so, and I am confident you will find their "different" definitions of fearlessness as uniquely profound as I do.

As a result of this competition, yes at face value I am "losing" a very expensive and coveted piece of equipment. Conversely, in return I have obtained something far more valuable, staying with me long after the SDM fails (hehe just kidding about the SDM! ). Perspective. It's ironic, isn't it, that the less tangible something is, the more its "worth"...

Regarding the aforementioned "logistics" that I took away from this competition, I will share them with you all here not only as a testament to the execution of this competition, but so that others may find valuable advice should they find themselves in a similar position hosting a giveaway of sorts.
  • Expediency: No matter how well received a project is -- as there is no question this giveaway generated a plethora of excitement, buzz, and high aspirations -- it will dwindle. A fire, no matter how big, has to be fed, quickly and continuously, otherwise you will be dealing with embers. I recognize that toward the end of the project's publications the zeal that were experienced in the first few publications was long gone.
  • Quality over Quantity: Another way to degenerate enthusiasm for a project is to contribute to it with less than stellar work. It's akin to what we all are aware of as photographers - if you post an album of 5-10 superb shots on Facebook, it will generate far more interest than the same album but of 150 photos that are in need of editing and purging. Frankly there were some entries that did not belong on the PF homepage. Not only would the standard have been higher for what became public, but the pace of the project from first to last entry would have been far faster. In retrospect, I should have culled all the entries and posted what I felt were the best 10 and then let the same public voting process occur. I made the decision not to do so despite wanting to because I did not publish anything regarding the best x-number of entries would be published, and thus I felt that would have been unfair to the participants to change the rules after the fact.
  • You can't make everyone happy: Despite the crux of this project where something of significant monetary and emotional value is being given away with absolutely no strings attached, the old adage once again proves true. There are still those whom were not satisfied with my execution of this giveaway, which was not only perplexing, but a frustration that I took personally. A couple even went so far as to send quite vitriolic pm's to me, or worse, messages posted publicly either in this thread or on the PF Facebook page.
  • This actually required effort on my part! I now have a much greater respect for Adam and all other behind-the-scenes workers that feverishly work to provide a steady stream of information and posts appearing on the front page. I personally had to edit, format, spell check, etc every single entry as it was posted to the front page. When Adam first told me how to do it and gave me access to do it, I was excited! That quickly evaporated after editing the 3rd entry - for those that do not have any experience with operating websites/blogs/etc, it is the exact opposite of easy and quick.
---

In the end, this has been an unbelievably proud chapter in my photographic "career," and I thank you all for accompanying me throughout it. It is with that, and with no further adieu, I am absolutely enthralled and humbled to announce that the very first entry received and thus posted to the Pentax Forums Homepage (as I posted them in order of receipt), has earned the ability to claim ownership of my storied DA* 16-50 f/2.8.

Congratulations, Fearless in Inner City Kingston by
skism!

Note that after analyzing all the votes received per entry and then purging all 0.5 votes as an attempt to negate the effect of sandbagging should there be any on the best entries, there was no change in the results and ranking. In the interest of full transparency, here are the results from the top ten posts:

Name:  Results.jpg
Views: 2214
Size:  114.8 KB

I understand there may be some discontent with the end result of this competition - this was done in an entirely democratic manner, and as such, I implore each of you to ensure that the "will of the people" is respected.

I thank you all for your participation, patience, enthusiasm, and support during the execution of this proud project.

Very Respectfully,
Heie

Last edited by Heie; 06-17-2013 at 02:30 PM. Reason: typo
06-17-2013, 03:07 PM   #169
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Hello,

i just would like to thank you for the oportunity and care to give away such precious piece of equipment.
Is there a way to check who voted where?
I just don't want to die knowing that i coulda have voted for myself and maybe coulda have won.


Again, thank you for all of this experiencie and devoted time

06-17-2013, 03:11 PM   #170
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Congrats skism, well deserved win. Kudos to Heie for the competition and generosity of time and prize.
06-17-2013, 06:14 PM - 5 Likes   #171
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Hello,

I am truly honoured, and very grateful for Heie's idea, generosity, and work - I promise to give his lens an honoured and kind home. It will be respected, and it will be used. I also want to mention two of the entries as well, and they happen to be the same two cited by Heie - Jennerr and BuilttoSpill. They were very moving stories, and I wish them both so much happiness with their cameras.

So many entries could have won, and I am humbled to be in that list. We all take photos because, as Dorothea Lange once said (I may be remembering wrongly, but you get the idea..) a camera is a tool that helps you see without a camera. Exactly. I suspect none of us know why exactly, but photography just...does something inside. Every once in a while we all take a photo that makes our souls, however we define that, go 'yeah, that's it.'

I know for me, after a very tough period in my life, photography helped me find myself again. My new camera - my K-30 - and my oldies - K-1000, Contax 139,Canon QL17 - mean a lot to me. So I know what the lens means for Heie.

And, I want to figure out something myself that I can offer to this Forum. I don't have a surfeit of lenses, but I will figure out something to offer. I want to continue Heie's good example.

In my entry, I mentioned that I was packing for a working trip to Cameroon. It was rough travel at times, but I visited some great projects, volunteers and local community leaders. My next mission may be my most fearless yet - I'm a Scout leader, and will accompany 16 kids to the Canadian Jamboree this July in Alberta...there will be around 5,000 youth there. I'll have my K-30, lots of pain killers, ear plugs - and Heie's fearless lens.

Thanks so much everyone, thanks to Heie, and thanks to everyone for the wonderful entries.
06-17-2013, 06:47 PM - 1 Like   #172
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Congratulations skism, it's well deserved. And thanks for the mention. I love what I do and that's an important part of photography. Thanks to Heie for the fun contest!

06-20-2013, 06:19 PM   #173
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Big congrats!
06-20-2013, 06:55 PM   #174
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Well deserved skism! You had a really interesting take on the subject, way beyond the concepts that first pops up in the mind. I would say that your work is a bit similar to what heie usually post so the lens will for sure feel like home.
06-20-2013, 08:40 PM   #175
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Congrats--it was a well-deserved win!
06-20-2013, 10:25 PM   #176
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Big congrats to the winner, but first a foremost, thank you Heie!
06-20-2013, 10:46 PM   #177
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Congrats to the winner...!
06-21-2013, 12:39 AM   #178
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Congrats - well deserved!
06-21-2013, 03:13 AM   #179
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Congratulations to the winner, and thanks to Heie for a great competition. It would have been easier to list the lens on eBay, but Heie took the high road over Everest to move his lens into new hands. Good stuff indeed.

Regards
06-21-2013, 06:01 AM   #180
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QuoteOriginally posted by sam-joseph Quote
Congratulations to the winner, and thanks to Heie for a great competition. It would have been easier to list the lens on eBay, but Heie took the high road over Everest to move his lens into new hands. Good stuff indeed.

Regards
Indeed ... agreed and congrats to the winner ! J
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