I have never seen takeoffs executed in that manner. Quite extraordinary - or is that just my inexperience showing?
I highly suspect that photo is of that gyro landing, or, the pilot is dragging the tail to show the engine's power to sustain the attitude, in slow flight.
I also suspect that slight gully or depression just under the front of the gyro would have caused the dragging tail to dig into the upward sloping portion of that ditch as he flew another 10' to the left, and cause his flight just off the ground to slow it just enough to cause the gyro to smack the ground on it's mains, and then front wheel. I'd love to be able to ask the pilot what actually did happen there.
Taking off in a gyroplane requires sufficient airspeed for the rotors (wing) to begin lifting the entire weight of the machine & pilot, just like an airplane, powered parachute, or trike. That amount of AS isn't there in slow flight.
For my and the gyro's weight, 27 mph is as slow as I can get b/4 starts going into a vertical descent. Additional throttle beyond that setting causes it to ascend, W-A-Y behind the power curve.
Having experimented w/ my gyro, it won't lift off the ground when rocked back on the tail wheel. The airspeed isn't high enough yet. I have to either balance on the mains (or push the nose wheel back onto the ground) to achieve approximately 43-45 mph AS so that it then levitates. Heavier gyros require even higher AS to be able to unstick from the ground.
When flying the same gyro w/ a Rotax 503 DCDI, it would lift off about 10 mph less (I also weighed some 50# less than now), and I couldn't fly in slow flight hardly at all. Those 52 horses just didn't have enough grunt power. It would descend at full throttle w/ only a slight amount of nose-high attitude.
I have no proof of my opinion the photo is not a takeoff. The rotors are coned upward well, showing they are supporting the aircraft sufficiently for flight. My time spent toying around @ slow flight w/ a powerful Yamaha engine enabling me to fly in that style for extended periods of time is my basis for my opinion about that gyro.
It take getting airborne, and then slowing by throttling back as well as pulling gradually back on the cyclic. Flying in that attitude requires considerably more power than cruise flight, just as in other aircraft where the pilot can control the wing's angle of attack.
Expert gyro pilots flying w/ the powerful 2-stroke McCulloch engine on their Bensen or Brock single place gyros, such as Dave Prater, Gary Goldsberry, and Dave Bacon, are able to fly like that extreme attitude. Having seen all three fly their machines so wonderfully, I don't believe they can lift off in that extreme angle, but they can easily achieve it by slowing down while airborne.
Steve McGowan can drag his two place Parsons trainer, the "Black" (powered by a Mazda rotary engine) by it's tail along the ground in that attitude, in slow flight, just as Ron Awad would do in his Dominator tandem, powered by the Yamaha 3 cyl. snowmobile engine.