June 2012: Eric Burdon, Edgar Winter, J Boog, Radio Moscow

June 01  Swamp Zen @ Crystal Bay CLub
  Fishtank Ensemble @ Truckee Rec center
  Wildfire awareness film @ Explore Tahoe Trailhead
June 02  National Trails Day @ Van Sickle bi-state park
  Big Bad Voodoo Daddy @ Harrah's
  Mamma's Cookin, Jellybread and Tracorum @ Crystal Bay Club
  Raggae in the Hills fest. in Angel's Camp
  Feat. Bushman, Yellowman, Pato Benton, Mystic Roots, Thrive,
  Highway 50 Wagon Train starter @ Zephyr Cove marina
June 03  America's Most Beautiful Bike Ride (Visit BikeTheWest.com for more info)
  Wagon Train through Lake Tahoe
June 04  DJ Sonar feat. Flysofee @ Rojos
June 05  Bass Science, Wet Dreams, Chris B. @ Whisky Dick's
June 06  The Wailers (CANCELED) @ MontBleu
June 08  Tahoe Cup men's hocky Tournement @ South Tahoe Ice Arena
  Donavon Frankenreiter w/ Micah Brown – + After Party w/ Dad’s LPs @ Crystal Bay Club
June 09  Eric Burdon and the Animals @ Harrah's
  Censu$ (formerly of Adient Zoo), Groovebox w/ Fat Tire cruiser raffle @ Mo's Place
  DJ Fluxxx @ Rojos
  Naive Melodies (Talking Heads Tribute) / DJ Theory, feat. Auxiliary @ Crystal Bay Club
June 10  Scale the Summit, Today i Caught the Plague, The Delirium Process, Walk Away Alpha  @ American Legion
June 12  “Comedy Night” w/ Tony D’ Andrea, Will C, Lizzie Smith, & Jose Sarduy @ Crystal Bay Club
June 15  G.B.A.A., I Wish We Were Robots, Removal Of A Tenth, Awaiting The Apocalypse and Josh Lease @ Whiskey Dicks.
  Brothers Comatose @ Crystal Bay Club
June 16  Edgar Winter @ Harrah's
  David Allen Coe / Hellbound Glory (Outlaw country) @ Crystal Bay Club
June 17  GIFT of GAB (BLACKALICIOUS), EQUIPTO, Z-MAN, ENZYME DYNAMITE, DJ TUE JUSTICE, LOGIC ONE @ Mo's Place
  Live Jazz @ Tahoe Biltmore
  Art show featuring +Scott Thomson and +Tony Spiker @ Vista Gallery in Truckee, CA
June 20  John Wayne and the Pain / Mystic Roots @ Mo's Place
June 21  TOCCATTA summer music fest kickoff @ West Shore Cafe
June 22  Jeff Jones @ Beacon
  Albino "Heavy Afrobeats" / Andrew the Pirate feat. Pleasuremaker @ Crystal Bay Club
June 23  Gary Valenciano @ Montbleu
  Starship feat. Mickey Thomas @ Harrah's
  Radio Moscow, Abatis, Molly Taylor @ Whisky Dick's
  2:54 @ Tahoe Biltmore
  Tahoe City wine walk
  Pretty Things Peep Show  Vaudeville Burlesque / Prof. Stone feat. DJ Paul @ Crystal Bay Club
  Heavenly Village fine art fest (3 days)
June 24  Blues Monsters, Downbeat, Jellybread @ Commons Beach in Tahoe City
June 27  Logic One w/ special Guests @ Rojos
June 29  Nathan Owens @ Harrah's
  Canned Heat @ Jethro's in Gardnerville
  Revolver w/ special guest @ Rojo's Bar
  Surf Guitar ledgend Dick Dale @ Crystal Bay Club
  GBoz african Drumming @ South tahoe Library
June 30  Lake Tahoe Raggae Festival feat. Pepper, Katchafire, J Boog, Hot Rain, Keyser Soze & The Mark Sexton Band @ Montbleu
  Kevin Scott Hughes @ Rojos
  Leftover Salmon feat. The Real Nasty @ Crystal Bay Club

Official Proof: Slow Rollers is the worlds longest bicycle parade

Slow Rollers 2012 Bicycle Parade through Lake Tahoe

On May 17, 2012 the SlowRollers.org group made an attempt to make the Guinness Book of World Records  as the world's longest bicycle parade.  The previous record-holder, Davis, CA was a 916 person bike parade in 2010.  According to the organizers this event drew over 1888 registered participants, which, if they are willing to accept our proof will easily break the record for both world's longest and world's largest bicycle parade.

The event was exceptionally well attended and a huge costumed crowd turned out to participate in this event.  I went out to the Slow Rollers event with my camera and made this video of ALL 1180+ bicycles going past my location and put it up on my youtube channel complete with the idea that it might get used as official proof... I really didn't think much more about it than that, until the organizers saw my video on YouTube and decided to actually take me up on my offer of proof, so I'm proud to report that my video is now in their hands and will be officially submitted to Guinness (along with TahoeSouth's excelent promotional video and LakeTahoeWeather's video of the other side of them) as proof of their attempt! 

  

I want to congradulate the organizers on pulling off this long and hard-to-organize parade and share the few still pictures I got while out that day with you guys... It's a new world record, folks, go out and celebrate it.

Filming the "Ring of Fire" Solar Eclipse in Lake Tahoe

"Ring of Fire" Annular Eclipse of the Sun in Lake Tahoe (VIDEO)

May 20th, 2012 there was a solar eclipse in Lake Tahoe, so I packed up all my photography gear and hopped in my buddy's porche and we headed down to Nevada Beach with the sunroof open.

It was remarkably non-crowded for a once-in-a-lifetime event. There was still parking available at the regular $7 rate, and lots of space on the beach still open.

There was a generally festive atmosphere as all the people wandered around in their eclipse glasses and enjoyed my favorite beach on Lake Tahoe.

It was everything you could've hoped for in a natural setting, wide open views of the entire Tahoe basin and not a cloud in the sky to the northwest; it was so beautiful I couldn't resist taking this picture and posting it to my Google+ profile with a GPS attached in case anybody wanted to track me down and do a Hangout in Real Life #HIRL.

After filming my intro I looked up and saw that people were already starting to look at the sun through their eclipse glasses.  I hastily trucked my camera and tripod over to my filming location and duct taped a piece of #13 welder's glass loaned to me by Alpine Welding over my camera and shot what became this video:




While my HD video camera filmed the eclipse, I took some shots of the crowd and changing light with my cell phone camera

Though it wasn't exactly darkness in broad daylight, the sunlight did dim noticable (to about 25% of normal daylight. 

Right at the totality of the eclipse a flock of birds went out circling over the lake, giving everyone an amazing acrobatic show.

Though I explicitly warned my audience in the announcement video that they probably couldn't get a good eclipse picture with their cell phone camera, I couldn't resist trying ot for myself... Not too bad for a cell phone camera, but then again I did make an instructional video on camera phone photography so maybe I'm a little more skilled than most. 

By this point the totality of the eclipse was passing and the sunlight starting to return, so I checked my cell phone and noticed that my google+ buddy +Krishna Vinod had left me a message saying he was on the beach, too... So I arranged to interview him and his daughter for the video.  He actually found me using the GPS on the picture I posted, marking the first time in years of posting locations anybody ever found me in real life from an internet GPS. 

Once I got home, I rushed to photoshop the best still I could out of my video footage... I was amazed by the level of detail my HD camera captured; though I didn't capture a very tight border on the moon, I did get a lot of the sun's corona, including several solar flares... Awesome.

Solar Eclipse in Tahoe May 20th

Tahoe is going to have a solar eclipse!

There will be an annular eclipse of the sun visible throughout the Reno/Tahoe region on May 20th, 2012.  According to Nevada Magazine the totality of the eclipse will last from 6:28 to 6:33 p.m local time in the regions with the longest totality. 

Though a partial eclipse will be visible across the region, Reno, Lake Tahoe, and Pyramid Lake are all directly in the path of the moon's shadow where all of the sun except for a small ring of light will be totally obscured.


Since this is an evening eclipse, the best observing sites will be places with a clear view to the west, like just about anywhere on the east shore of Lake Tahoe or Pyramid lake.  The amount of time the sun stays eclipsed will vary across the region depending on where you are.  It will last about 2:45 in South Lake Tahoe, 3:55 in Reno and Truckee, and a full 4:30 at the south end of Pyramid Lake where the 3-day Eclipse music festival has been organized arround the astronomical event.  Click here for detailed maps of exact times and durations of this eclipse from EclipseMaps.com.

SAFETY FIRST:

Remember, it's never wise to stare into the sun without protection! Even during the totality of a solar eclipse the part of the sun that is visible still puts out enough light to damage your retina after a few minutes.  You can protect yourself by buying an eclipse viewerr or set of eclipse glasses from Amazon.com or your local party supply store; if you have a set of welding goggles or a piece of smoked glass that will also offer adiquite protection. 

If you must observe an eclipse without proper protection, you can still get a decent view of what the sun is doing by looking DOWN.  Put a pinhole in a piece of paper or cardboard and use that pinhole to project an image of the sun's disc onto the ground, and then watch that: the light reflected off the ground is perfectly safe and the resulting image of the sun is much larger and more detailed than what you can see directly by looking up. (This also works for observing sunspots and the upcoming transit of Venus due June 5th.)

PHOTOGRAPHY:

Fair warning, photographing an eclipse is NOT an easy photography task. NEVER point your camera into the sun without a solar filter or you'll fry your CCD because the extreme brightness of the solar disc is just as hazardous to the sensor in your digital camera as it is to your eye. You can get a solar filter for $100-200 at your local camera store or from Amazon.com. -- (I've heard talk that a welding shield will also offer adiquite protection at a much lower price, but I can't confirm this so try it at your own risk only.)

If you want to successfully photograph an eclipse, you must use the manual mode of your camera with exactly the right camera settings and filters or you won't get a usable image.  (For full technical details, see Eclipse Chaser's excelent blog on "How to Photograph a Solar Eclipse")
My advice to the non-professional: Don't even bother trying to photograph the eclipse itself with a low resolution pocket camera or camera phone, all you'll get is a blurry dot and a fried sensor.  To get a good shot of an eclipse you need an SLR with a long telephoto lens and a good manual mode. 

If you don't have the skills and quality of camera to take pictures of the eclipse itself, focus on the crowds, the changing light in the surroundings, or your pinhole projection on the ground; or choose to just enjoy the event itself and save yourself the bother and just rely on the internet to serve you up plenty of pictures later.

May 2012 Concerts in Tahoe South: Cinco de Mayo, Chickenfoot, Bob Saget, Thrive, Rick Springfield

May 2-6  Dat Phan, David Gee @ Improv @ Harvey's
May 2  Thrive feat. Weapon @ Mo's Place
  Grapes and Gates wine tasting @ Edgewood
May 4-5  Radio Daze (songs from the 30s-50s) @ LTCC 
May 5   Chickenfoot @ Harrah's
  Vokab Kompany @ Montbleu
  Ninja Slaughterhouse, Machine Gun Vendetta, Bum City Saints, Falcon A, Brain Rash @ Whisky Dick's
  Cinco de Mayo @ Montbleu (also Lakeside inn, Heavenly Lodge)
May 8  Gladkill, HammFM, TYMK @ Whisky Dick's
  Boys and Girls club benefit @ Edgewood lodge
May 9-13  Allan Havey, Chris Mancini @ Improv @ Harvey's
May 10  Mother's Day BAHM @ Valhalla
  Sean Cummings Anne Roos Traditional celtic music @ Murphy's Irish Pub
May 12   Dev w/ Whitney Meyer band, Young L & Star @ Montbleu
  Rick Springfield @ Harrah's
  Jesse Kalin @ Murphy's Irish Pub
May 17  Slow Rollers bike parade (Millers outpost - Montbleu)
  The Shell corporation @ Whisky Dick's
May 18  Acadamey of Dance @ Montbleu
May 19  Beatles vs Stones musical review @ Harrah's
  Hot Buttered Rum / Frutition @ Mo's Place
  4-Tay, Benni Boom, Dreda Dre @ Whisky Dick's
May 23-27 Bruce Fine, Frazer Smith @ Improv @ Harvey's
May 23  High Sierra adult skate camp @ Tahoe Ice arena
May 24  Neutralboy and Bite @ Rojos
May 26  Elvin Bishop @ Harrah's
  Eligh feat. DNAEBEATS @ American Legion Hall
  Memorial weekend bash feat. Rising Sun, Molly Taylor, the R.U.G.S. @ Whisky Dick's
May 27  Bob Saget (adult show) @ Montbleu
May 28  The Itals (raggae) @ Mo's Place

May 2012 Concert playlist

Bands playing May 2012 in South Lake Tahoe