Tour of the Pyrenees, videos 1 and 2

I've just returned from a 7-day tour of the Pyrenees. Unlike last year, we've stayed mostly on the Spanish side this time and only strayed into France for just a few miles. We've found that mountain roads in France are in a bad state of repair and gasoline is 40% more expensive than in Spain... :blink:

Our trip started and ended in Barcelona (which we reached by car-ferry from Italy) and I split the video in 2 halves for YouTube purposes. In its entirety it's 14 minutes long.

The fisrt half's highlight is a spirited dogfight between 2 FJRs on a wonderful, deserted mountain road heading for the high country. Road's pretty narrow but the surface was great and, lacking any traffic, we could take a few liberties. Max speed here was maybe 70 mph. Don't trust your eyes, the wide angle lens makes it look like we're redlining our rides We're not... As a soundtrack for this section I've gone back to using a favorite of mine, Hevia's haunting bagpipe in "Busindre Reel". I thought it went well with the endless sequence of curves...



Enjoy... B)

Stef

Nice videos Stef... as always. Thanks for posting. I've always enjoyed Enya's music as well.

Awesome Stef, thanks for sharing the riding...Maybe we can do this sometime, eh?

BTW, my trip later this year looks to be coming together, hope to see you again.

--G

Stef, thanks for the great vidio.

Thats probably the closest I will ever come to seeing the Alps.

Dats some good video B) Loved the music in the first one

Very very nice work there TeeRex51.. I enjoy that

Jdog

escapefjrtist said:

Awesome Stef, thanks for sharing the riding...Maybe we can do this sometime, eh?
BTW, my trip later this year looks to be coming together, hope to see you again.

--G

Click to expand...

Thank you all for your comments.

George, I talked with Mike-H since we've been planning a 2008 Tour of the Alps for some time now.

Given the state of the roads in Spain and the almost complete lack of car traffic, I told him we should consider moving west of the Alps and run our tour in

Spain.

I'll post all details months ahead of time so that any friends from this Board can join in if they wish.

BTW, I've also found that price levels in Spain would virtually eliminate the currently hefty exchange-rate disadvantage for Americans traveling in

Europe (and that's no minor factor I'd guess... )

Watch this space

Stef

I love the videos.

We just bought a Samsung Sport Cam w/remote lens....and there's a lot to learn.

If you don't mind my asking, what program do you use to fade the clips from one to the next, and how do you put the whole thing together?

Thanks....

-Iris

Stef

Nice video. My wife and I are thinking of a hopping the pond in a few years. We have a friend that goes back to France every year to visit family. She told us there is an open invitation to come along and stay with them. I've dreamed of going and taking a bike for a day or two.

Keep the videos coming.

devanator

herfjr said:

I love the videos. We just bought a Samsung Sport Cam w/remote lens....and there's a lot to learn.

If you don't mind my asking, what program do you use to fade the clips from one to the next, and how do you put the whole thing together?

Thanks....

-Iris

Click to expand...

Iris,

It's a wide-open secret...

Last time I was in the US I bought this Magix Movie Edit Pro 11 software at BestBuy (only to find out it is actually a German software).

It was pretty inexpensive and I think it's better than Ulead (which I used at the outset of my movie-making "career" :rofl: and it kept crashing my PC all the time... :angry2: )

It's pretty easy when you start with a single recording (my set-up is a Sony bullet camera connected to an Archos hard-drive).

You upload the recording from the hard-drive (or Sportcam) onto your PC, edit out the bits you don't want and import any photos that you also took during that outing if you so wish.The fade effects you simply drag and drop from a menu and that's it.

Obviously, when you try and edit a movie using several different takes, camera angles and such it gets more complicated (and "heavy" on your CPU), more so when you choose to import a soundtrack. (This SW will also allow you to "compose" a unique custom-tailored soundtrack for your video, without using copyrighted music.)

The good thing is, you can start from a simple 5-minute one-take recording and turn it into a nice video with all bells and whistles. Once you've realized you can do it, you can then become more adventurous and try out more complex combinations and effects.

Stef

PS: and while on the subject, you can browse our photos from the Pyrenees right here. Captions are in Italian, but who needs them?

Thanks for all of that. I am going to run out to Best Buy right after work and see what's available. I can't wait to put together something as nice as your videos. I wish I had more time to do this kind of stuff. Work gets in the way of my fun.

Thanks again....

herfjr said:

<snip> Work gets in the way of my fun.
Thanks again....

Click to expand...

fftopic:

Work...??? No, wait...it's coming back to me Oh yes, I remember now

Joking aside, you'll find the first edit job excruciatingly slow. :blink:

I promise you, though, once you've put your first 2 or 3 short videos behind you, you'll naturally move on to more complex and ...

Gotta go, boss is coming in :big_boss:

fftopic:

Keep the videos coming.
devanator

Click to expand...

Be glad to... You will let me know when you visit won't you? Be great to try and organize a ride or two... B)

Stef

Very nice vids stef,really like your music selections also.

What type of elevations were you riding in?

Also was wondering how does your insurance work when you go hopscotching from one country to another over there.

Thanks for sharing them with us.

Hey...I want to visit too!

As I said, we're probably going to make this Tour of the Pyrenees into a yearly event and FJRForum friends are most welcome to join in. (And if you visit Southern Europe please let me know. I've met a number of very good folks this way). :cap:

Now to the questions:

Elevations: we've been mostly riding at 2,000-3,000 ft elevations while on valley roads, reaching 6,000 ft at most Pyrenee passes and 8,000 ft at Andorra.

Insurance: a non-issue. The standard 3rd party-liability coverage is by international agreement extended to all EU countries and a number of non-EU countries including Turkey. Notable exceptions are Albania, Iran, Bulgaria etc. where extra coverage mut be purchased (normally at border posts). BTW, in Part 2 of the video there's a scene in which we cross an old border post between Spain and France (a roofed structure spanning the pass road). This is where, until the EU became a reality, you had to stop and show your ID and insurance papers on request. Now it's just a useless building slowly rusting away.

This is true of all border posts within Europe. We rode from Italy into Spain, France, Andorra, Spain again, France and one more time into Spain. We never even had to slow down for the crossings... As non-EU citizens you'd only be asked to produce your passport upon entering Europe at the chosen country of arrival. It's a free ride after that...

Stef

Stef

What about bike rentals in Europe or would you recommend shipping bike? I would imagine it is cheaper to rent. Do they have FJR rentals over their?

devanator/Mike