When I’m not taking pictures for the Times Free Press or other news organizations, I like to rock climb.  I haven’t been doing it very long (I started last September) and I wouldn’t characterize myself as good at it, but it’s a lot of fun and a great workout.  It looked like so much fun that a few days after my shoot last year at Urban Rocks Gym, I signed up for a membership and have been climbing ever since.  I also think that since Chattanooga is essentially the rock climbing Mecca of the southeast, having the skill should give me plenty of extra opportunities for freelance work as I develop.

Anyway, I bought a GoPro from my photo editor last week at a great value for use in my sports coverage and the climbing gym seemed like a great opportunity to give it a test run.  It uses a fisheye lens, which makes it great for video when worn on a headband or chest harness.  I didn’t do any top-rope climbing today, but I did do some bouldering which made for decent enough video.

GoPro Climbing at Urban Rocks Gym in Chattanooga from Doug Strickland on Vimeo.

Using a head-strap mounted GoPro while bouldering at Urban Rocks Climbing Gym in Chattanooga, Tennessee. I wasn’t doing very difficult routes, and this was mostly just to test out the GoPro.