Hagen

...I guess his German isn't as good as you thought, Skywalker. :D ...b.t.w. a good online German/English dictionary is leo.org

I can see two different kinds of artifacts in the clip: 1) Interlaced artifacts on sharp edges (i.e. those jagged lines on the rider). The reason for that is that the video camera records interlaced video and you play it back on a progressive display. I would think that there are filters available for video editing software that can eliminate those artifacts... 2) Blurry artifacts in the snow when the camera moves too much. That's a general artifact of video compression - basically your bitrate is too low to compress all the information. So the encoder does a low pass filter on some of the content. Also part of the compression algorithm is that it tries to predict motion of elements in the video. That way the encoder only needs to encode information on where elements move instead of encoding the whole element again. Again because of limited bandwidth it's possible that the encoder overuses this feature and stuff starts to move that shouldn't move... Try to encode it at a higher bitrate. If you want/need a lower bitrate you can try to scale the video to a smaller size...

Hi Kamran, I doubt that I (or anyone else) can break D-sub's record. But I do have a job - fortunately it's on a computer and one of my windows is reserved for e-mail and BOL... Not sure if I'll make it to kwood again this season - we are selling our condo and then we are planning to buy a house. ...and I guess you know how crazy the housing market is here in the bay area. Which is good for selling the condo. But buying the house after that could require some time... Hagen.

Yep they do sell it in CA. Just go to your closest beverages & more... ...they also have all kinds of other good European beers, including some good Belgium ones... :D

Great pics again! Thanks, Scott! ...when you get back to CA we should try to hook up, so that we can also get some good carving shot of yourself - may be I'll also bring my D70 to the mountain... Hagen.

Phil, I just checked out your web site - great pictures! ...can't believe on what gear some people go down that run... Hagen.

Great pictures Scott! Thanks for sharing.... Hagen.

...search is in the bottom right corner of the forum page. Hagen.

2 more to post a way to fix the broken light bulb with duct tape and metric screws 10 to ask where to get the tape and metric screws 1 to buy 100 metric screws then offering to send them to anyone who needs any 10 replies asking for those free screws 5 more replies a couple of month later asking if there are still screws available

Hi Randy, Sounds like you are in desperate need for some snow under your feet... ...how is the recovery going? Hagen.

...he actually learned to snowboard for that video. I saw a documentary on how they made that video - pretty funny! Hagen.

Most racers in USASA in the upper age classes are more in for the fun. Guys and girls who are more serious about racing you usually find in the lower age classes or in the open class. ...after all most of us have to go back to work on Monday. Hagen.

Dan, I would make a reservation for a car with all wheel drive. You can always cancel that and switch to a 2 wheel drive car if there is no snow in the forecast. The problem in CA is that they have chain controlls when there is snow on the roads - so you'll have to buy chains for a 2 wheel drive car if that's the case... Barry, we still have plenty of snow and there is more in the forecast. But we also had somewhat warm weather so it's not quite 19 feet anymore. Spring riding is usually pretty good for like an hour to two (i.e. betwen 9:30/10 am when it gets soft and 11:30/12 when it gets too soft... ...after that you can still stay on the mountain and enjoy the girls in their bikinis... :D

Reno would be your airport of choice. The closest resort to the airport would be Mount Rose, which is also a great carving mountain. Other resorts that are great for carving would be: - Kirkwood Not close to the airport but one of the preffered resorts by the Tahoe Carvers. - Squaw Valley has a really good race team and you might run into Mort there. Should be about one and a half hours from Reno. - North Star. Great grooming, should be okay on Monday, not recommended on weekends (way too crowded). A little bit closer to the airport than Squaw. - Alpine Meadows can be good - but quite often their grooming sucks... About 5 minutes further away from Reno than Squaw. - I personally like Sugarbowl - but it's even further away from Reno than Alpine and Squaw, but should be closer than Kirkwood. Demoing is a different storry - there might be one store (Dave's in Tahoe City) that still has a burton board or two. But I'm not sure if they have anything left... I guess 7pm should work to fly out... ...unless we get another storm that day. Hagen.

Hi Mark, ...you made me finally order some spare heels. B.t.w. they now also have the cables only again at the bomber online store... Hagen.

...I had problems with my flow bindings - my boots, I guess, had an incompatible shape... Since she had burton step ins before I guess your wife will also need new boots. I would suggest to find boots that she likes and then test if those work with the flow bindings. If not the K2 bindings that Gecko mentioned sound good too and should be more adjustable to boot shape. After dumping my flow bindings I went back to regular straps and realsized that it's not really that much hassle to get in and out. ...now I don't like to ride in softies at all anymore and mount my TD2s on my freeride deck for powder days... Hagen.

...I guess my money would also be on Mort. But I'm not sure if he'll have enough time for USASA races this season... ...last season he came in 4th in Boardercross at the nationals. Hagen.

Check out Chris Klug's website he is selling some short Burton Alps and Ultra primes for cheap ($150-$160). Those might be good boards to start on... Hagen.

I would think that the boards in the 150s are a little bit too short for you - go for the 167. Hagen.

This might be helpfull... ...I always have blankets and stuff in my car, now I have a reason to also add a couple cases of beer... :D

...they are doing that rfid thing already in Austria (and I guess other places back in Europe). Although I don't think they use that info to punish ski code violators. And here in the states some resorts use a simpler method: fist offense - clip off a corner of the season pass, second offense - pass is gone (or work your way all around the pass until there are no more corners to be clipped off and then pull pass...). Hagen.

...still shopping for more boards Kamran? The pro carve is $565. They also have cheaper all mountain boards ($385 and $315). Check out their website. The pro carve sounds interesting... Hagen.

...this looks like a common problem. Since I got better in avoiding random skiers (by checking uphill before I get going) I'm having more trouble with people that I ride together with. I guess one of the reasons is that we think that we know what other carvers are doing... ...yet at the speeds that we are riding just small misjudgments can get us pretty close.

Right now our little man can't really complain, so we took him on a short xcountry ski trip...

No hate here. For now I don't go snowboarding enough to try skis on the groomers. But I already started to put skis on for some backcountry sking (was cheaper than a split board...). And I'm also planning to put on some carving skis once my son is old enough to learn to ski (hopefully in two years...). Hagen.