PRODUCTION. FINDING MICHAEL
trek was carried up by six Sherpas and a couple of yaks. When it came to choosing kit, Taylor informed Hutchings that he had a Sony FX6 and Red Gemini. “He said he wanted to use the Red,” says Taylor. “I asked if he was absolutely sure he wanted to do that up Everest. He said yes. The scope of it was such that we wanted to use the best cameras we could. We wanted it to look amazing and didn’t want to cut corners in any way. I bought some bits to make the Red work as a shoulder camera better.” THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS Producing the required look and feel meant the crew had to think hard about lenses. Taylor says they initially wanted to use primes. “Once [director] Tom Beard got involved, we shot some tests on primes,” he recalls. “We realised that lots of what we were going to do was observational even if we were trying to keep it cinematic – after all, we were following a real, unfolding story, not creating something to our schedule. Primes, for most of the time, were not going to be sensible.” Taylor’s friend and fellow DOP Justin Frahm loaned him some Angénieux EZ zoom lenses to use instead. “You can change the back so they’re either Super 35 or full-frame – they cover both sensors,” he adds. “They’re zooms, but have a cinematic prime look and are fast at T2 in Super 35 mode. For me, they’re one of the most prime-looking zooms. We shot the first interviews on them and I immediately bought some.” The base camp team consisted of Taylor, Beard, Matthews, Andy Hoare (sound supervisor) and renowned Nepal- born mountaineer, Nirmal ‘Nims’ Purja. “I always knew that Nims’ high- altitude search team would be filming without me, so I held detailed briefing
SERIOUS KIT DOP Rob Taylor opted for a Red Gemini for shooting at base camp, and made the most of its low-light capabilities
“I was very keen to make sure we could tell every beat of the search from Spencer’s perspective”
“On the mountain was the climbing team, which was fairly independent,” says Taylor. “They were a team of altitude experts, but at over 8000m you’re still dictated to by what’s physically possible – so they used smaller cameras. What they achieved up there was remarkable. Spencer and my team stayed at base camp and liaised with the team on the mountain to tie things together.” Beard adds: “I was very keen to make sure we could tell every beat of the unfolding search from Spencer’s perspective, as the person on location with the most emotional investment in the project. Nims and his team handled everything above base camp, including the camerawork to cover the search.” WEATHER WINDOW Even in the warmer months, the Himalayas can produce four seasons in just a few hours. With that in mind, the team had to wait for a ‘weather window’ to emerge in order to make use of the best possible conditions.
sessions with them, which began while I was still in the UK,” says Beard. “The two people I particularly relied on were Suman Sherpa, an incredibly strong mountaineer with lots of drone and filming experience, and Scottish climber and mountain rescue expert Brodie Hood – who’s filmed many challenging climbs. I discussed technical settings, camerawork and editorial choices in detail with them so they could work autonomously on the mountain and deliver great results. The rest of the search team also had a GoPro each, and I held a briefing session at base camp about how best to use it to cover the search process and anything they found.” The search team consisted of around 12 people armed with GoPros, Sony A7S IIIs and two DJI Mavic 3 drones.
HARROWING The documentary is cut with emotional talking heads from Michael’s loved ones – including Jamie Everett, who climbed Everest alongside him in 1999
10. DEFINITIONMAGAZINE.COM
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