Your introduction to coaster porn

I was thinking about the coaster porn thing, and got to thinking about some of the "off-duty" shirt some of the CP crews had in '05.

Among my favorite dirter ones:

Blue Streak: Proudly proclaimed to "Be the oldest woodie in the park and get you up, down & off in under 2:30!

Mean Streak: "We're the BIGGEST WOOD in town!"

Corkscrew: As '05 was the first year they added crotch straps: "We screwed so hard we needed seatbelts!"

And last but not least, the Gemini crew has shirts that said "Our wood is ribbed with steel!"The crew were banned from wearing these anywhere in the park.

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janfrederick said:
I was hoping you would chime in, I was thinking of you...

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My story is going to read like a novel, so fair warning before I even begin...

My own downward spiral into full-fledged coaster porn peddler was a long, slow one. I think somewhere deep inside me was always an interest in parks, but as a kid I rarely visited and by the time I was an adult living on my own I had only been to three parks, but my future wife and I were doing yearly visits to both Kennywood and Cedar Point throughout the mid 90's.

I never kept or collected anything nor had an interest in the parks or rides beyond spending the day (or two) there. In fact, my online interest only went as far as park's official sites.

In early 1999 RCT was released and as a fan of sim/management games with a yet unknown gleam of love for the parks in my eye, I scored a copy. From there I found myself hitting up the online RCT communities which, in turn, indirectly exposed me to coaster enthusiasts and the communities of the people who liked the real thing.

Couple that with moving to Jacksonville, FL a month later and visiting the Orlando parks for the first time that summer and it all fell into place. Not necessarily a need to travel, but an online interest in the enthusiast communities. It was also about this time that I started holding onto little things like park maps and brochures and stuff.

The one thing that seemed to be sorely lacking in the 1999/2000 era was good photos. Back then the only site worth much was Joyrides - and even there the selection was limited. Aside from that there wasn't much. (this was before everybody had a digital camera and a free place to post their countless snapshots)

It seemed like a gaping hole and a pretty easy one to fill...if you could travel. I don't know why I noticed or cared or why I thought I could do it, but I did.

By the late summer of 2000 I had pretty much set my mind to go for it. I needed a domain and after some research and deliberation settled on coastergallery.com - but I didn't register it right away.

At the time, I was making really nice money from mp3.com (back in the golden era they profit-shared with artists on the site) and planned to use that money to set up the coaster photo thing. I waited for my next payment (late September) to get the ball rolling.

When I went to register the coastergallery.com domain, I was heartbroken to see someone had registered it in the time that I was waiting to get the money. (that someone turned out to be Joel Rogers and I think I briefly mentioned that I initially wanted coastergallery.com to him once in the past - to this day he and his brother Jeff [known as 'Peabody' around here] do an outstanding job with the site)

I settled on what was my close-second choice: coasterimages.com and registered the singular version of coasterimage.com as well. Somewhere between registering those and putting the site online I decided I liked the sound of the singular version better and decided to make that the domain (and name) I'd use for the site.

(fun fact: If you do the research you'll find that coastergallery.com was registered on September 2, 2000 and coasterimages.com was registered on September 21, 2000 - funny how one simple thing like waiting for a check changed so much.)

I dropped a chunk of change on a SLR film camera and some lenses in December with no knowledge of how to use them (I just knew that's what Joe at Joyrides used) and planned on visiting parks and taking pictures. Once I got enough to share, I'd get the website online.

On February 12, 2001 I took a camera I barely knew how to use to a park I'd never been to and off I went snapping pics like the tool I am at Busch Gardens Tampa.

It was shortly after that that I found CoasterBuzz and started posting and reading regularly there too. The info shared by enthusiasts on CoasterBuzz combined with my own blossoming interest in photogrpahing the parks to share with the world kept me motivated.

I finally felt confident that I had enough material to make a go at the website by late 2002 and coasterimage went online on February 24, 2003. Again, I had no idea what I was doing (and still don't most of the time), I just followed the trail blazed by Joyrides and a little later furthered by CoasterGallery - put up pics with little facts and comments and let people look at them.

It just kind of snowballed from there. People visited and I got a lot of positive feedback. I did more and put more back into the site and more people visited and gave more positive feedback. Continue that cycle for 5 years and here I sit.

I think that's where I differ a little from most enthusiasts. I never traveled out of the sheer desire to visit more parks or ride new rides. I usually stayed close to home and if I wanted to visit a park I visited those close to me. The travel side comes from the uncharacteristic desire to fill that niche that needed filled 8 years ago. If it weren't for coasterimage I wouldn't travel to nearly as many parks as I do and much of the time I wouldn't be travelling to specific parks than I do. That's not say I don't enjoy it, because I do, but the circumstances of having a website make it (and coaster enthusiasm in general) more of a part of my life than it would be otherwise.

I've never been a member of ACE or big official enthsuaist clubs. I don't personally know very many enthusiasts. I don't travel to events outside of the CoasterBuzz stuff. I don't have cool inside connections with park people that allow me special access or anything like that. I'm just a guy taking pictures of amusement parks.

I got into this whole thing on a silly whim that actually panned out. :)

Now we have all this talk of "coaster porn," When's the first issue of "Playride" due out? Maybe a few girls on coaster with nothing but the OTSR's in the "right places"...

Mine started when I was younger. Our parents would take my brother and I to Ponchartrain Beach a few times every summer. Loved watching the Zephyr as you entered the parking lot.

They also had a wild mouse I use to like to stand and watch. I was too young to ride the mouse or the Zephyr.

Then in the mid or late 70's, they built an Arrow looping coaster. Our local paper did an article about it with pictures. I cut it out of the paper and saved it. The newspaper also did an article on the Bat at Kings Island when it opened which I also cut out and saved.

No one knew of my addiction to coasters and didn't know anyone else that loved them as much as I did.

I moved to Georgia about 19 years ago and SFOG became my home park. I joined ACE 4 years ago and get all excited when the new RollerCoaster magazine comes in. I throw the bills on the desk and open it first.

I have a few maps, but mostly coaster books, dvd's and a wallhanging I got off of Ebay.

^My moms old office used to look out on the station that was left by the Zephyr.

For me the signs were there, when I went over to my friends house and played RCT and ended up playing all night, and I had a book on roller coasters checked out of my school library for the whole year. I didnt ride roller coasters, I used to live in Maryland and my dad made attempt after attempt to make me ride, then we moved to Louisiana and my family went to Jazzland and I rode Mega Zeph, and thats how I contracted the disease ;)

I think Hopman needs to take a spin on the nearest Rapids ride or Shoot the Chutes. LOL

Saw a lot of R-rated stuff working on Rip Roaring Rapids back in the day. ;)

You wanna pay for my admission? I'm flat-broke right now. Bear, if you ever worked a CP, there's stuff you don't WANT to know that goes on after hours, behind the sceens, and in the restricted areas.

Think about it, you have 4,000 or so 20-somethings & teenagers working 40-50 hours per week for four months straight. They gotta blow off steam somehow. Amongst the staffers there were "ride whores," (those who worked may different rides over the course of a season) the "Screw Crew," (Corkscrew ride ops), and the "Streakers" (Those who worked on Blue or Mean Streak).

IT all started with the Voyage! When they announced it, I virtually rode it 100's of times. Took me a couple visits to get on a coaster. That was back in Labor day of 2006 when I first rode and I ahve never looked back. I am up to 35 on the coaster count, but my feelings towards going to parks are going down as gas prices go up. Along with my home park getting boring to me (Holiday World) and my other home park getting the corperate attitude (Indiana Beach) (random ride closings and a lot of other things) I just don't have that push anymroe to do as much as I had once hoped.

Gonch, count me along with RGB as someone who really got into it by perusing the endless of galleries at rcdb and seeing many little coasterimage logo's in the upper-left corner!!

Imagine my surprise at finally connecting the dots between seeing the cool pics with the CI logo's while in college in 03, to finally discovering the "man behind the curtain" while bored at an office job in 06!!

For me it was when I first read this story in 2004.

Oh wait, you meant "porn" sarcastically.

-Pagoda (who never thought there'd be a thread with porn in the title on CB)

*** Edited 7/30/2008 3:34:31 PM UTC by Pagoda Gift Shop***

I remember reading that hoping they somehow disinfected the seats afterwards. ;)

The idea for the title came from "Food Porn" by the way. ;)

Bwahahaha....that's friggin' great. That's great that they actually LET people do that. Can you imagine Cedar Point allowing 80+ riders coming to the park and riding their rides naked? Doubtful. LOL

I only have one response to this question:

N:TOP

I've been trying to get on that for years now but so far no luck ;)

Huh?

Exactly.

LMAO! This thread is hysterical. ;)

RCDB is one of the *first* coaster-related sites I got addicted to and still frequent. The site has helped me plan several week-long coaster trips! It's EXTREMELY helpful in many ways!

-Tina

*** Edited 8/1/2008 11:58:32 AM UTC by coasterqueenTRN***

Any thread with Nasai popping in and Moosh-jacking is hysterical. ;)

And speaking of Moosh and coaster porn, I just wanted add that some of my favorite coaster porn was spawned by Moosh. I wanna 2009 calendar dangit! ;)

Tina - ever play the "random coaster" game on RCDB? Click on the random coaster link and see how many in a row appear that you've ridden!

Eric - funny you should mention the calendar...I've been contemplating bringing it back but even if I started now I wouldn't have ample time for a calendar for next year. But for 2010 its definitely possible :)