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Getting the big picture sometimes requires helium and a digital camera
Photo by Mark HolmTribune
Tribune
David Balstad closes the gas valve on a helium balloon as he prepares to tether it 300 feet above Montgomery Park in the Northeast Heights. Balstad, a retired science teacher, suspended a bracket from the balloon which held a small digital camera last week. He can trigger and rotate the camera with a remote control to create a 360-degree panoramic series of pictures.
Photo by Mark HolmTribune
Tribune
Dr. Robert Castillo pulls a helium balloon back down to earth as David Balstad rewinds the line on to his makeshift spool. Balstad flew the balloon 300 feet above Montgomery Park in Northeast Albuquerque last week to test out a device suspended from the balloon holding a small digital camera which he can trigger and rotate remotely with a radio controller to create a 360-degree panoramic series of pictures.
Courtesy of David Balstad
Here's a portion of the 360-degree panorama of Albuquerque pieced together from a series of digital photos taken from a helium balloon over the Northeast Heights.
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David Balstad is a guy who isn't satisfied with the limits of a conventional photograph.
The images captured within the single, severe frame of a snapshot never tell the whole story, never give the whole experience.
"You take this wonderful picture, you've got this tiny little frame," says Balstad. "You totally lose the sense of the scenery you're in."
So, using the sensibilities and desire to tinker that come with being a retired high school science teacher, Balstad, 63, took to the skies.
He and his friend Robert Castillo, a retired surgeon, found themselves at Montgomery Park in the Northeast Heights last week, lofting a bright-red helium balloon 300 feet into the sky.
Attached was a digital camera, with which Balstad hoped to capture a panoramic view of Albuquerque.
Directing the camera via remote control, Balstad snapped a picture, turned the camera, snapped another, turned the camera, and so on until the camera captured every inch of the Duke City landscape.
He later loaded the digital images into a computer program that pieced them together into a successful panoramic image.
"It worked," said Balstad, who taught science in Florida and Colorado before retiring to Albuquerque. "Actually, it worked better than I expected."
The result is a unique glimpse of Albuquerque from all angles, captured in one, long horizontal shot.
Panoramic photography has been a hobby of Balstad's for 35 years.
It began on camping trips with a 35 mm camera, taking snapshot after snapshot of scenery and later piecing the prints together with tape.
"What I'm doing now is just the logical extension of what I've been doing for the past 30-odd years," he said. "Now I do it from a bird's-eye view."
The next project is more adventurous.
Balstad, Castillo and the helium balloon are planning a road trip to the Jemez Mountains, probably next week. Balstad has scoped out a half-dozen locations where they can reach up to 10,000 feet from the road.
"We can get to those places, put up the balloon so we get another 300 feet, and see what we we can see," Balstad said. "A bird's-eye view."
