Firing Squad: January 26, 2009
By Tim Zimmerman • Jan 26th, 2010 • Category: Latest, Photo BattleWho would have ever thought a voting scandal would hit the YoBeat Firing Squad? I guess that makes it at least as important as the 2000 election, perhaps more so. But for whoever hacked it, chaptcha has officially been added and the votes should now be as legit as any Internet contest can be. Our continuing champ will have to rely on nothing but the quality of his photo to out do his new opponent. Does it cut it? You decide.
The Champ

The Challenger

Which photo has a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow?
- The Challenger (54.0%, 313 Votes)
- The Champ (46.0%, 272 Votes)
Total Voters: 585
Think you can do better? Then quit your bitching. The Firing Squad is a weekly photo competition. Winners of a single battle will receive a pair of Da Kine gloves and should a photo survive 4 weeks, the photographer receives a place in the Champions Gallery and a Da Kine Camera Pack, as well as a chance to compete in the year-end Ultimate Champions battle. To enter your own photo in the Firing Squad, check out our submission guidelines.
Tim Zimmerman the supreme master of Yobeat photos.
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ehh
another weird digi crop
i liked the idea, when the losing photo didn’t get into the next fight.
both have bad lightning and like tomek said - weird square crop on the challenger.
really like the champ. i feel like the lighting adds to the effect
It’s gonna take a few more than 10 stairs to win this one, champ definitely stays.
Hey Adam. Technically that photo won by over 1000 votes. Since we didn’t know which were real though, it only seemed fair it got to continue. We’ll get you in there soon enough… don’t worry.
did Zim bite my comment from last weeks battle to write this intro?
i feel honored
bring back “these both suck”
That shadow at the bottom of the frame and the crop are killing it for me on the bottom one. Have to go with the champ on this one.
Oh man these are both soooo bad. Gels are such a shitty gimmick. I’m not voting this week unless the ‘they both suck’ option comes back’.
if i’m going to vote, it’ll at least be for the one where the rider’s in (better) focus.
10 stairs or not, gotta go with the challenger
I havent seen any lense flair in the photo battle in at least a week….
My camera just got a new firmware update, all it did was have a shoot in square option, where the fuck is the benefit in that?!?
Good use of color for the challenger, always helps make a smaller feature look more interesting. Would like to see the full frame, looks like the gels would have filled the frame with added color.
sorry but both of these are weak, lets get some proper photos back in the mix eh
?
challenger has a good idea going, just not fully baked.
All that time setting up the lights on the challenger and no one cleared the stairs? For shame- 10 demerits…
both are terrible. who stood in front of the flash on the challengers photo? killin me… Im not voting.
He stood in front of his flash….
i believe the quality of light is better in the challenger for sure. yeah theres a shadow but i don’t think thats as noticeable as shooting into a light
Challenger for sure. The champ seems too out of focus, and the snow splashing in front is too distracting to what the focus should be: the rider. Challenger should definately get this one.
umm… neither
I voted challenger because they tried to do a lot more in the photo whether it be successful or not.
Log or stairs? stairs, better color and lighting
challenger has my vote. I kind of like the gels I think his picture looks like it could definitely be used in an add.
I think it’s lame that the Champ in this is going around on facebook asking everyone to vote and posting the link, that is the only reason he is getting votes. Asking people who clearly have no interest in photography just to vote for you so you win is kind of defeating the purpose of taking a good photo.
I believe good photos are for everyone to enjoy
but to be able to fully critique a photo instead of “OH THAT’S SICK, or cool” you need to know a bit. everyone can enjoy them but the yobeat photo battles from what I have noticed get more in depth not just I like this and not that.
Yeah, I don’t like either. But I gave it to the challenger. If your from the East Coast most likely you have gotten an inbox to vote for this dude or have seen it on every single of your friends Facebook walls ha. Maybe even your own?
I think its lame…
so scandalous!
I think that it’s fine to ask his facebook friends to vote on a picture… ALOT of his facebook fans ARE photographers - who enjoy art - there is NOTHING wrong with asking for support.
no. he asked every single snowboarder i’m friends with and spammed just about everywhere.
@admin: oh. didn’t see that it won, my bad.
btw. I like the idea with captcha, maybe it will be a bit more hack proof.
I’m voting for the challenger because I think it’s a sick idea, I just wish that the flash wasn’t so hot (either that or the kid needs to get some serious sun) because the brightness of the rider sort of overwhelms the obviously dimmer gel lights.
and I don’t feel that gels are a cop-out. They add a photographers own brush-stroke to a photo. I think good photography isn’t always about capturing a moment exactly how it was, but more capturing the vision in the mind of the photographer. Saying that gels are a cop-out is like saying abstract art is a cop-out. It’s not, it’s just different.
Its called social networking I’m asking them to vote for it that does not mean they have too!…. and yes I do have a lot of friends on the east coast both photographers and shredders! so if what you call me doing is wrong….. so be it!
did obama win by sitting at home?
nice 5 foot rail
Well, I think the whole point of it is that, while you’re welcome to spam the shit out of the link to the photo contest, you aren’t supposed to tell people which one is your photo. It sort of negates the whole point of the competition being fair. Obama didn’t win by sending letters to companies bribing them for their employees votes. That’s kind of like the thing people have a problem with you doing I think. You’re influencing your friends votes by telling them which photo is yours, when what you really should be doing is linking them to the battle and let them decide, unbiasedly, which photo is better.
Hell, I voted for your shot, it’s not like you don’t stand a chance without corrupting the vote
i did not corrupt the vote… due to non scripting knowledge! but i get what your getting at now!
Just like to let you know that “challenger” isn’t the actual challenging photog in this comp…so don’t bother wasting your time answering or responding to what they are saying.
This was my first experience knowing that this site existed and so I was thrilled to be able to see some great snowboarding photography by being asked to vote. Well this will also be the last time that I will be on this website and it has nothing to do with the photos or the talents of the photographers and the riders involved in this competition. I am disgusted by the comments that people are making. You say that you all pride yourself on the how wonderful this site is and yet all the comments are slander and bad mouthing people rather than pure comments on the work and not the vote. I am highly dissapointed in the people on this site and will be telling my friends “not to bother” checking it out. It’s a waste of time. You all should grow up and focus on what you claim to be important and stop focussing on petty crap that will be over in a week.
hey hey hey now… yobeat’s been good to me. if you cant stand the heat- get the F out. you’ll always have critics and supporters. you gotta be able to take it if you dish it!
Unimpressed- Honestly, you looked at the comments from less than one week of a single battle which, no offense to either photographer, isn’t the most impressive one on the site, and you made your opinion to never repeat-visit based on that? Seriously? I would hate to think hat this is how you make all of your decisions. If it is, my guess is that you’ve liquidated everything you had due to the terrifying economy at the moment and invested all your money in tofu-based fuels.
The comment board is a place to comment, you don’t have to read them. Not to mention that this is a Snowboarding website, and not a photography website. It’s mostly snowboarders who may or may not have any interest in photography at all on here. In the words of Zimmerman himself, you cant expect everyone to comment on here “like their Ansel fucking Adams”
i’m just gonna vote for which kid i find the cutest.
meghan who is the cutest?
Jimbo- It’s not really any of your business how I make my decisions but an economical decision is made a hell of a lot differently then one about a stinkin website. And by the way….Obama and other politicians don’t annonymously get votes. Tv commercials and prerecorded phone calls don’t say “Hey there is an election coming up! Here are the views. Go vote and when it’s over we’ll tell you who the winner is!” No. They tell you up front, this is who I am, this is what I stand for and I want you to vote for me. You know there name and there face and they ask for votes from random people they don’t know inorder to win. This is a vote. Asking friends or aquaintences to vote for you isn’t rigging the vote. Especially if you are asking for votes from other snowboarders and photographers which you just stated were the main people on this site.
i’m going with the challenger. he’s got a sick nasty press goin on in that photo. the lighting is also awesome.
I’ll let you know when I decide, I still have to use the loupe tool in bridge
Brooke - Are you aware that the new captcha addition is allowing for repeat-votes or is that just my computer?
Unimpressed-
Well first of all, I think it’s pretty funny that you said you would never visit this site again, and that you would actively boycott it, and then you returned to reply to my comment. We won’t hold it against you though, I have a knack for pushing peoples buttons enough that they get addicted to arguing with me. Don’t mis-take what I’m saying here. I’m not trying to bicker with you or anything, I just feel like you aren’t on the same page as us for the reasoning behind our being agro
First, I don’t actually care about anything you said in the first half because the “financial decisions” comment was for the sake of humor.
Secondly, the “this is who I am, this is blah blah blah” argument pertaining to presidential candidates you just posed is basically the equivalent of the photograph itself in this competition. And no shit, when it comes to people you aren’t going to vote anonymously, you took the analogy too literally. What you wouldn’t do, however, is vote for a candidate because your favorite car company told you to, you vote for the candidate that, in your opinion, is the best one, based on your own judgement.
What people have a problem with on here isn’t the fact that people tell other people on facebook and what-have-you to vote on the competition itself, it’s the fact that many times they tell their friends to vote on THEIR photo specifically. That DOES corrupt the vote, because (aside from the fact that it says you can’t do that in the submission guidelines), your friends are more likely to vote on your photo based solely on the fact that it’s yours and they want to help you win, regardless of whether or not it’s the superior shot.
Anyways, this isn’t meant to be an argument. I just wanted to clarify what it seems a lot people are confused about, and everyone is bitching about this week, not that it’s my job to do so. I guess I just get roped into shit easily.
you could not tell your friends which photo is yours but chances are, if they are your friend they will know which one is anyway
Which is totally cool cause that can’t be helped. That’s why I have no problem with people putting out mass vote invites. Hell, I’ve done it too. It just bums me out when they attach their picture and say “vote for the champ”
what happened to the these both suck option? was it too hateful?
is the rider even in focus on the challengers?
neither should be an option