SHOOT STORY | JETMAN
we were fine except for the very windy days when we could see a little bit of movement
the four weeks they were shooting, but nonetheless the team had to always be ready for a break in the clouds. Travelling light was the answer, says Phil. “You had to move around with a backpack full of lenses because it might take you two hours to get to a mountain – so you had that physical challenge mixed in with the shoot. Sometimes we would
in the tripod.” RED SHOOT
Phil initially wanted to shoot using the 8K Red, but back in 2016 they couldn’t get hold of one. He ended up with the DSMC2 Dragon-X 6K model. “These were brand new cameras at the time and looked stunning. I’ve always loved the Dragon sensor and we managed to get three of the new DSMC2 Weapons. We also had some of the older Dragon bodies, as well as a Phantom Flex4K for the slow motion. The camera in the Shotover F1 was also a Red Weapon 6K. “We had the Fujinon 75-400mm on the ground with the Canon 30-300mm on the Shotover. There was also a Fujinon 19-90mm Cabrio zoom and a set of Leica Summicrons. The thing with them is that they are tiny, so you can sit with five or six of them in a backpack on the side of a mountain. They were a great trade-off
catch a ride with the helicopter to get up to the location but other times there just wasn’t the budget to do that.” Phil’s kit included some big zoom glass: he had
DID YOU KNOW?
The Jet wings have no steering, the only way to direct the wing is to adjust your body
Fujinon’s 75-400mm with the doubler from Duclos. “We had the doubler most of the time as we could afford to lose the stop to T4. So that was shooting at 150- 800mm, which would really compress the valley and get the jet wings in frame. “Stabilising those shots was just a matter of a big tripod. We actually went with the O’Connor 2560 head, which is lighter than the 2575 (that would have been better but heavier to haul up there). It was a trade-off between weight and stability, but
“Much of the shooting was concerned with the preparations for the flight as well as the actual flying. “There is a whole back story about these preparations, since when you start involving jetpacks near mountains you are, to an extent, a slave to the weather. When you’re flying in free space, if something goes wrong there is an element of having time to rescue the situation, whereas in valleys next to mountains your choices are lessened hugely. “In Norway, there were about five people shooting in various roles just to cover every angle,” explains Phil, “which was especially important as we had a limited flight time and it takes quite a while to get to the location. Carrying a large amount of supplies isn’t an option.” SHOOTING The Jetman experience is so unusual that there weren’t many in the crew who had experienced it, including the pilot of the helicopter. Commissioning a helicopter meant they could use it as a launch platform, and a shooting platform kitted out with a Shotover F1 gimbal, RED Dragon and Canon 30-300mm lens. There was also a handheld shooter travelling as a passenger, filming with another RED Dragon fitted with Leitz (Leica) Summicron prime lenses. “You’ve really got to know how these guys fly – they are really very quick and can come up on you incredibly fast. The biggest thing is knowing the flight characteristics of what a jet wing can do – they can fly around 140 knots.” Unfortunately, due to the bad weather, there wasn’t that much flight time during
IMAGES Coverage is essential for this unique type of documentary says Phil Arntz pictured far right.
There was a handheld shooter travelling as a passenger, filming with a RED Dragon fitted with Leitz Summicron prime lenses
20 DEF I N I T ION | JANUARY 20 1 9
Powered by FlippingBook