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Chasing Swell & Far North Fun – Alive In New Zealand – Ep 10

Pheww episode 10 already! A milestone of sorts….

Dbag 3 blog

Not really but this episode shot in April was too much fun. You hear that!? TOO much!

This little series has been going almost a year now. Has it gained traction? No, not really but I will keep it going.

See you at the beach!

-Sam

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Boating & Marine Sports Content Creation

Hands up if you like the water? To say I do is an understatement.

I am now offering services based around the Boating and any marine based sports and industries. This ranges from boat shoots, fishing, surfing, scenic, sales, social media, video, photo, documentary, diving aaand you get the point. The options are basically endless. More details are in the video below

Own a business and need to show it off to the world? Then I have plenty of options to suit. Want to capture the true feeling of a Game Fishing trip? I can be there shooting it all. Have you been on trips with your mates and are looking to capture it? I know how to do it! Water sport event won’t film itself? I can do it!

Capturing the adventure in still form is a favourite of mine, from under the water to multi layer aerial panoramas suited for canvas or framed prints. Here’s a few favourites.

Talk More blog

One of the caves at Goat Isand

Jase pic blog

Underneath the action

FC blog

Motorsport applications? No worries.

northern-contrast-blog

Exploration to some of New Zealands remotest coastline. We are actually in this shot.

Nearly there crop blog

A classic pano of home. The original copy is over 10000 pixels wide!

Boat 3 blog

New Zealand love their boats. All applications are suited.

I quite literally have thousands of photos that I could add but if you’re curious for more then I suggest keeping up on Facebook or Instagram.

You can of course view my video work here on YouTube.

Creative ideas, plans and pricing are all available by emailing me sam@oxsenterprises.com or call me 0211297511.

See you at the beach!

-Sam

 

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Creating Content

There are so many types of content floating around out there that I don’t even really know where to be begin.

GBI Drone Me 4 blog

In my first phase years ago of making stuff to put online it was all skimboard orientated because that’s what I knew. Fast forward a few years to where I am now. I tend to split between vlogs/day in the life stuff, informative and more nicely edited visual treats. Or however you want to explain it all.

Here’s some interesting stats of my own that I’ve learnt from my own content.

-Vlogs have a much higher initial engagement due to the personal aspect of them. You can see in this weeks one below

– Informative videos seem to work well once they’ve been in the system for a long time.

– Finely edited videos with very little personality expressed, don’t do as well as they did 5 or so years ago but…. If you create a video targeted at something specific then they can and do get on a little roll.

– The average spearfishing video possesses zero creativity. There’s no personality or context to what is going on.

– The average drone video possesses zero creativity. There’s so many people putting content out now that it has become overused and dull.

– Surfing related content creates a heeeeeap of interest but also the most negativity.

– Podcasts are rad and are booming. Is this the rise of real news from real people?

-Adventure based content from little businesses and/or groups is on a massive boom right now. Soon to be horribly saturated.

-Fishing content is so popular to the point that I don’t really think you can make anything original!?

-There’s a lot of negativity online but the channels I have created seem to get much lower than my average share, which is great!

That’s just a few things I can think of off the top of my head that I’ve noticed from my own experiences. As the online content market rises so do the opportunities for people, young people in particular.

See you at the beach!

-Sam

 

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Boats, Golf & Water

It’s taken me a long time to work out my direction with my business.

GBI Drone Me 5 blog

From starting making skimboards in 08, which sold quite well. Expanding a bit into screen printing and finally making some effort to expand my future in the content creation world.

You see when you have so many things on the go it’s hard to get anywhere.  I like too many things so when one thing is going well I want the others to which I feel tends to take away from the momentum of  thing that was working. Put simply 10 10’s don’t make 100. Basically what this means as of late is that I’ve had to make a few decisions as to my future and I feel the photography and videography is where I’m heading.

The areas I’m focusing on are the boating and marine industry, golf and lastly, shooting all the stuff I enjoy shooting. The dream of making an outdoors based show is being put at the end of the list of priorities.

I’ve been on a few projects lately which have fitted the bill nicely. That has of course been a couple of videos for a local business supporting Emirates Team New Zealand. Below is a vlog or behind the scenes from one of the videos

You can check the videos on full on the Matakana Botanicals Facebook page.

As for the future I know what I’m targeting, how to “get it out there” and most importantly I’m feeling focused on it!

Phew! Time to get to work.

See you at the beach!

Sam

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Do

Do swim. Do skim. Do surf, dive, spear, fish, explore, adventure, learn, bleed and live.

Causeway blog

Do go do something new and get uncomfortable.

Do try, eat well, drink lots of water and get fit.

Last Sunday involved some epic doing in and around the water (as usual)

Monday into Tuesday was more about sales and I DO need to sell a few

Don’t wait and wonder. Just don’t.

Do start. Do go!

See you at the beach!

-Sam

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Winter

It’s the time of year we’re blessed with no crowds, quiet beaches, ice cream headaches without ice cream and wetsuits.

Team blog

To people who don’t skim, surf or spear the immediate reaction every time is, isn’t it cold?

Firstly yes. Winter is the opposite of Summer but we don’t do these things to be either warm or cold. We do it because we love doing these things. Simple. I don’t particularly enjoy freezing my ass off for things I don’t enjoy but for things I do wellll….

With the official winter season here, it isn’t that cold. In fact there has been a few Marlin caught this week just off the coast. It’s bloody awful out as I type this though.

Every so often a little session comes along that you will remember for some time. Last Saturdays session was exactly that.

As for those of you not into the outdoors then enjoy the next six months or so inside. I’m going to be out there with a big dumb smile on my face!

See you at the beach.

-Sam

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Aerial Photography For Real Estate

 

Aerial photography gives you a unique perspective of a property and surrounding area. Showcase your homes character and property with stunning aerial views.

Suited for all types of property including residential, commercial and subdivisions.

Current equipment is a DJI Phantom 4 Pro
– 20mp one inch sensor produces stunning photos with no curved horizons!
– Beautiful 4K video
– Professionally edited photos and video
– 360  web ready panos
– Boundary lines overlaid for extra charge
– Less than 24 hour turnaround
Prices from $180+GST for photos and $330+GST for web ready video.
Real estate site
Rates include a 30 minute one way travel time from Omaha. Priced accordingly for extra travel. All aerial operation is done in accordance with CAA regulation.
Call Sam on 0211297511 or email sam@oxsenterprises.com
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Boardsports & Watersports – Alive In New Zealand – Ep 8

February was the best month this year, so far! The water was warm and clear. So clear at stages it was hard to believe, for the Gulf that is.

AINZ blog

The best thing about this month is that the holiday crowds have typically gone and we’re free to play. I didn’t quite realise how much play time there was until it came time to edit.

Sit back and enjoy this 12 minutes of action

I sit here frothing over Summer footage as we’ve just had our first two frosts of the Winter. Gaggh.

See you at the beach!

-Sam

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How About That Weather?

Living in New Zealand is great! Doing stuff in the outdoors in New Zealand is great! Trying to get it done around the weather is not so great.

I’ve turned into a bit of a forecasting nerd. The constant reading of maps to establish what the best thing to do and where will be happening. Is there surf? Is the going to be? Will it be raining? Will that matter? The wind is usually the biggest factor and if it’s going to be onshore or off.

Weather blog

2016 was wet. The start of this year was dry until about mid-late Feb. Then it started raining again and hasn’t really stopped. To put it into perspective here at Omaha I have two things at my sheds I’ve noticed.

  1. We have a row of Feijoa trees there which have a drain underneath them. In the 6 or so years I have only seen this drain run during big storms for a day or two. This year it has run steady the whole time the Feijoas have been in season.
  2. The shed floor leaks. This is because there’s a big concrete pad dug into the ground. No big deal as it only leaks onto the floor once or twice a year in particularly damp Winter periods. This year it’s done it pretty much every time it rains.

Right now how do we get around this issue? I really have no idea, it’s the weather. It does however indicate a particularly high water table.

I do however enjoy having a flexible work pattern. No 9-5 here so I try to make the most of it. The surf came up late last week so we were on it. Saturday we somehow got skunked but it was a ripper of a day!

Sunday turned into Monday. A last minute decision saw me work most of Sunday then dive on Monday instead. Even had a pod of dolphins came say hi

As for this weather I would love to provide a solution but I don’t have one. I intend to wait it out. Or move to the tropics, I’m not sure yet.

See you at the beach!

-Sam

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Get A Hobby

The dictionaries definition of hobby is this “an activity done regularly in one’s leisure time for pleasure.”

Blues blog

As children we all have hobbies. We have plenty of free time, therefore we have hobbies. Some of us continue with these hobbies our whole lives, most of us don’t.

As “adults” we need a hobby or two. Judging by our obesity statistics my opinion is that that hobby could do with being somewhat physical. A hobby that makes you sweat and improves your physical fitness is the best kind of hobby.

A lot of retired people need more hobbies. This would help occupy their time, assist with the aging process and lastly (and hopefully) give them an interest besides targeting young people having fun.

Even though we retire from work at a late age we seem to retire from hobbies much, much earlier. Remember the days when you had time to be bored? BORED! Now most of us just work too much in order to “get ahead”. I don’t quite know what is “ahead” but I do know a life without time for my hobbies is a shit life.

One of my favourite quotes is “You didn’t stop skateboarding because you got old. You got old because you stopped skateboarding”. I don’t skate but this is absolutely perfect.

I am an obsessive hobbyist. When I find something I like, I like to do it. Every so often isn’t enough, that’s not a true hobby. I want to get good at it and everything is a competition, including with myself. It’s gotten to the point where I believe you can monetize any hobby. But why do you want to make money from your hobby?

TO DO IT MORE!

This isn’t easy. In fact it’s bloody hard, just like life.

This weekend consisted of hobbies, nothing really else. Skimboarding, diving and good food was the order for Saturday

Sunday with better viz and a beaut forecast we were off to hit the water

If you’ve been following me for a while that this is a fairly common thing here. I’m learning more about myself all the time and where my hobbies can take me. It’s much further than you would think.

I welcome you to adopt a similar view.

See you at the beach. Obviously.

-Sam