Helichopter Shoot help

NickMilo

NickMilo

Well-known member
I got a shoot the weekend before holloween, and I needed some help on how I was going about filming it. I'm in the pre-production process and I am trying to figure out the best equipment to use. It will be in the Glamis sand dunes ...filming a sandrail manufacterer ripping it up. I already plan on a ground unit filming some ground stuff and mounting my helmet cam to get some incar stuff.

I would be up in the helichopter filming w/ my dvx100a, but I was wondering what I should get that would help me get a smooth flawless shot.

any ideas as far as lenses, steadycam setups, ...?

To get an idea... here is a link to a sandrail helichopter video shoot... mine will be very similar:

http://www.buckshotracing.com/video/videos/x4heli1.mpg

...I plan on renting some equipment to pull this off, so ALL tips and reccomendations are appreciated!

Thanks,
Nick
 
I have heard about these gyro units that you can rent that you screw onto the bottom of you camera. Made for exactly what your talking about. They make a lot of noise but it holds your camera incredibly still. I I've also heard of stedicam people using them also. I don't remember there name, sorry.
(Edit) I found the link http://www.ken-lab.com/
Hope this helps.
 
Do a google for Kenyon Gyros. They manufacture small units to mount onto the base of the camera
 
NickMilo said:
so ALL tips and reccomendations are appreciated!
Thanks,
Nick
Click to expand...
Tip number one...Invite me along, cause I go to the dunes and I'm a filmmaker too

Tip two have me hook my onboard to my quad to get some follow behind shots capturing the roost.

OK enough about me going...

For the heli, if you come to the shoot with a shoulder rig setup, sticks, and shoot handheld too you should be fine. Some combination of all three would be what I would go for.
Try the sticks and see if they are solid enough without getting shake from the heli's motor. Try the shoulder rig if your not feeling the handheld. If your come prepaired to shoot all three ways I'm sure you'll be satisfied.
Dude your gonna be in a heli. Point and shoot and I'm sure you'll get amazing results.

Hit me up...I'm serious about going. I can bring a s16mm cam for slow-mo!
 
Get a good pilot. With Helicopter shoots, it's all about the pilot understanding how to position the bird to get the shot, and not doing a whole lot of correction with the tail rotor. An inexperienced pilot can be trying to keep the helicopter on course and be jockying the bird back and forth constantly, making it hard to get a smooth shot. For handheld shots, the closer you can be to the ground, the better, so a good pilot is important for that as well. Try to get an A-Star, rather than a Jet Ranger. A- Stars have 3 rotors, and the up and down motion is greatly reduced from a Jet Ranger. Another possibility is an ultralight aircraft. Around here, you vcan get an ultralight and a pilot for a day for about what a chopper costs for a day. A Challenger ultralight aircraft gives you some protection from the wind and is a lot smoother than a Helicopter.
 
They make a remote heli with built in gyro that rocks for these type things, but it's waaaay expensive. But the guy that comes with it knows his **** and gets the shots and if you're shooting all day and paying for fuel on the heli then it may be worth it to rent the remote for a day. It's true that the guy driving the machine is critical.

Gyros are best, but real ones with remote control. The advantage of the real ones setup for these type shoots in range of motion since they are mounted under the heli, whereas you can only shoot out a window severly limiting your shot choices and moves.

check out usa@flying-cam.com
 
The remote control choppers are not what they're cracked up to be in my experience. The whole problem is keeping the shot steady, and these litle choppers are constantly oscillating back and forth with the tail rotors, so, even stabilized the shots are constantly drifting back and forth. I got a demo tape a while ago, and it didn't look any better than handheld, and this was on a demo.
 
The Kenyon lab gyros make a world of a difference. They have a couple of different models depending on the size of your camera. We use two on our shoots. A Ks-8 and a Ks-6 together for a PD-170. These things are quite heavy so a harness to the chopper will be very useful, plus you don't want your camera to accidentally take a skydive! Its very important the pilot knows where the camera is aiming, so a small monitor for them is helpful. This because you usually don't want to be making many camera moves. Work with your pilot to use the helicopter to pan, tilt dolly, etc... You'll get great results!

Before these, we always found ourselves slowing down our shots in order to make them appear smooth. Its not that great but if you can't budget in the gyros give it a try.
 
I'm a helicopter FLIR camera operator for my local news station. I can tell you, you will NOT be ok handheld. I've never seen these handheld gyro stabilizers but they look like they'll help significantly. We fly in an A-star and its a smooth ride until you bring out your camera. Its been said before, but you'll get your best results with wide shots, and I'd recommend renting one of those gyros for the best results. Rental of a helicopter with a FLIR mount on it will get expensive rather quickly ($2,000 an hour) so I'd try the handheld (w/gyro) route.
-Ryan
 
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