I woke up at 3AM and just had to check in. You guys scouring Flickr are doing a magnificent job!
You will notice that pics from Gasworks park don't seem to be quite so plentiful this year. THis is what I noticed yesterday at the end of the ride - a large contigent of riders made a U-turn just before entering the park and headed back up towards Leary, never to be seen again (by me). Exactly what this meant, I don't know. The thing is that sooner or later, they would have run into the floats headed the other way, and would not be able to get by them. So they must have left the parade route somewhere at some point, stopped, dressed, and left, etc. Somewhere besides the usual Gasworks Park. This in effect split up the end-of-parade photo ops into two groups. with one exiting at some unknown location. Lets see if pics turn up. Anyway, I think this probably means that the group just wanted more crowd exposure as opposed to not wanting to be seen by the multitudes in the park. PEdro is right - these girls want to be seen and appreciated! At the painting party, EVERYONE at some point seemed to strike up a pose for some photog. Its the thing to do at FRemont! I rarely look for the posed shots, but yesterday a few girls, seeing me photographing them, actually struck up a formal pose! How often has that happened to me before - um, try never!
And lastly, also a first for me in a pic I will post soon - a topless spectator. Now thats an exciting trend! THis particular women did not ride at all. She just got caught up in the fun and removed her top while watching the spectacle. THis has got to be one of the greatest public nudity events today
Here are a few more pics of a girl that I photographed extensively. She is my runner up star of the PArade.
EDIT: FLanker7 - there we go posting simultaneously again, and even expressing similar thoughts. I think both you and PEdro are right, and yesterday I came away feeling much the same about things, while marveling at this city and its culture. MOre and more women seem attracted to the unique aspects of bodypainting which allows them to both express themselves and get attention and adulation. And with bodypaint, there are so many possibilities and degrees of nakedness and expression that you can adopt. The black paint, for example, hides one almost as well as clothes. Want to be a little more daring (and quite a few women did this year)? - get a paint job like this woman below...
Klondike