My beginnings at KAP were slow at first and some 15 to 20 years ago. Living in Southeast
Alaska there were few other kite flyers and no other Kite Aerial Photographers to draw
experience from, so I was basically on my own. My desires were to photograph some favorite
hunting areas from the air (this I still haven't done, as hunting is less of a passion now).
My first attempts were to just hang an Olympus XA camera by it's strap and use the self timer
to trip the shutter. Using a 8ft flowform as the lifting engine, I would attach the camera to the
line after having walked it down a ways. Then push the shutter release button and let the whole
works go. These first attempts produced mostly blurry images because I had no device to stop
the camera from pivoting on the strap.
At some point I tried using a pendulum setup that stopped camera pivoting. I also used an
additional timer (windup 15 second) which allowed me 25 seconds until the shutter was
tripped. This produced a much better average of acceptable photos. I shot occasional
photos this way for a few years. After a while I started looking for Point & Shoot cameras at garage sales (I have since
bought several for around $5). These formed the basis for my KAP nearly to present day as they were expendable in the
event of an "Oops". With these cameras, I could afford to take considerable chances as to complete loss or water damage.
Eventually I was fortunate enough to learn of "Brooks Leffler", I had seen an article in "Kitelines" (a kiteflyers
magazine) that mentioned Brooks was going to be giving a seminar on KAP at Long Beach, Washington. I was not able to
attend, but I did write Brooks a letter and he surprised me with a telephone call. He informed me of a group of KAP'ers
and publication "KAPWA" headed by "Michel Dusariez" of Brussels, Belgium. This publication is no longer available, but
helped me to improve my technique. It was also nice to know there were other people throughout the world doing this and I
didn't have to completely "go it alone".