Talk Top Gear Visuals

puredrifting

puredrifting

Major Contributor
Hi all:

I have recently had enough time to actually sit down and watch some BBC America and have been watching and quite enjoying Top Gear. Anyone have any connections to know formats shot on? I believe that they used to be shot on 16:9 DBeta. Anyone know if they made the move to HD?

After doing a documentary on Drifting in 2004, I have a keen appreciation of how well the segments on Top Gear are shot. The in-car camera stuff with the presenters is excellent and the running footage at their test track is breathtakingly shot and edited. Anyone have any clues about the behind the scenes people. DP(s) and editors? Beautiful grading, Magic Bullet or whatever they use.

It's funny, I am really not much of a car person yet I find the show really watchable and immensely entertaining.

Throw out your thoughts on the visuals on Top Gear. Too bad we were too lame over here to get an American version off of the ground but as Jeremy puts it, "Americans just don't get it". I tend to agree. It probably would have been like every other great Brit show that they try to Americanize, it just doesn't translate to audiences over here (other than The Office, which does pretty well) but it is a completely different show than the Brit version.

Love to hear your comments on this. Discuss.

Dan
 
I think the main problem is that American likes different aspects of cars than Brits (and probably the rest of the world, seeing how popular Top Gear is in Europe and Asia).

Americans tend to focus on the High Torque and CC of the Cars- Big, powerful engine muscle cars that handle terribly but make tons of noise.

Top gear focuses on the handling of the cars, on the technological advantages and on the "driving pleasure", aspects that are often neglected by american enthusiasts. Or maybe the number of true car and driving fans in the US are fewer than in other countries.

As for Top Gear the show, I like the Stig segments, and I love the "celebrities driving the piece of sh#it car for best lap" segment. I believe Lionel Ritchie is the top non racing driver celebrity on the show.

But my favourite car show is Fifth gear, from British Channel 4. Its much more of a car enthusiasts show, and less of a variety show like Top Gear. Check out "Fifth gear ferrari Enzo vs Mclaren F1" in youtube. Well shot, entertaining. And also check out their Face off videos. Very cool.
 
The Top Gear visual style is tight and totally unmistakable - they love their dramatic close-up "eye candy" shots of the cars and their use of vignettes, gradients and speed ramps for the landscape shots and whip-pans on the track

Great show - super entertaining for enthusiasts an non-enthusiasts alike :)
 
Top Gear is my favorite programme! i dont like cars particularly but the production quality and the presenters make it amazing :D

and i think they do shoot digi beta... and sometimes use some highspeed cameras for slow-mo as far as i can see
 
The veyron show and the antarctica show were in HD... dont know if that means the rest is... :-/
 
Yes, BBC America just showed the Veyron show again the other night. Crazy stuff. Also the Winter Olympics show from 2006 with the Mini off of the ski jump and the ice hockey with the cars. So imaginative.

Sergio, besides lousy quality YouTube clips, where can I see Fifth Gear in the U.S.? Do they have it on iTunes? BBC America is VERY selective about what they show over here, it kind of pisses me off because every time I travel to the U.K., I see so many great BBC shows that I know will never be on BBC America. I can't figure it out, they really just show one show each night, different episodes, but like 6-8 hours of the same damn show. Last night I think was the Apprentice U.K. That was all they ran from about 4:00 PM until midnight. You would think that they would want to put a bit more variety in their lineup, they really only show about 6-8 shows on the whole channel.

If there was way to just get all of the BBC and ITV channels here and turn off almost everything else, I would do it in a heartbeat, I despise American TV, it is so crappy it is pathetic.

Would be really nice to see Saxondale, The Mighty Boosh and some of the other great shows over here but that doesn't seem like it is going to happen. Not commercial enough, let's just run endless repeats of Primeval, The Apprentice, etc. At least they show Dragon's Den and at least we get Top Gear.

Dan
 
As of last season, only the Artic special was shot HD (Maybe Veyron too as mentioned above)

Everything else is shot digibeta interlaced SD and de-interlaced in post.

The sky filters and everything are done with actual filters, not in post.

They have also used 16mm for some specialty shots.
 
Yep Top Gear rocks here too. Try U-tube for some segments, saw one on the boxes of filters they carry with 'em. Looks like they send someone off for a couple of hours to gather various grad stuff.

O/T a note on the voices. I enjoy the effort the Brit presenters have to put into their voice, they speak from the back of the throat, not the US style chest. Watch their struggling mouths, they must be exhausted after the studio segments. A good example is Vicki Butler Henderson (not on the show now) lovely gal but has to really push to get it out.

And the music, record a show shut the pix off and listen. It's a work of art to go along with the European marques, classical works, soaring 18th century baroque choirs, great stuff.

And to top it off, the whole thing has a self deprecating tongue in check feel.

Didn't like the tractor race across the ploughed field show though, bad day in the office.

Cheers.
 
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I completely rip-off Top Gear in my documentary projects. The grading, camera angles, slo-mo/fast-mo effects. Nothing is sacred.
 
Topgear look is nearly a trademark. But in the latest series, they seem to put a bit too much effort into effects and post. In one part it was hard to even make a picture of a car in your head, the editing was so fast...

Nevetherless, I would say, that I don´t know any show in Europe (now they´ve started Topgear America, but I´m sory, it´s becoming a Superstar phenomenon, and making a different show with almost the same script... c´mon!), that has this level of camera work and postproduction.
It´s closer to a movie on a weekly basis, than a car show. The 25P is damn close to he 24. Thank god I live in pal country. I´ve started watching Topgear america recently, but I must say, the NTSC shots are really killing the topgear looks...

For everyone that want´s to watch topgear, here´s a page, that has torrents of every single show, also the Topgear Australia, Russia and America, also Fifthgear. They also have info of when the next show is going to start and news from the background of the show. Even topgear producer Andy Willman reads this page, and he mentioned it a few times when writing about feedback in his blog.
www.finalgear.com

And great tip: Jeremy has a DVD out for a month now - The italian job (yeah I can see confusion already :D ) and it has a behind the scenes which is excelent for anyone shooting cars, to see how its done big time :D Just search for a torrent of "The italian job 2010 bonus" .... and buy a DVD if you like it :D

Cheers
D.K.

PS: for those looking to copy some of the topgear looks - don´t overDo it! I´ve been that way and it´s not good :D
 
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It's called BBC money. That show is subsidized by the British Government. Need a helicopter with a gyro-stabilized camera? Got it. Need 5, HD camera's, plus operators, all day?? Got it. Basically, they have the best, of the best, of everything. A virtually unlimited budget, and a pool of resources(The BBC) with which to pull any equipment they need, at any time.

By contrast, the American version has a budget, is not subsidized by the American Government, and is stupidly trying to exactly duplicate what has become, for me, some of the most brilliant documentary photography I've ever seen. They even have an American Stig(I think it's Paul Tracy). Seriously?? That show is a joke. I've watched only one episode. This will be it's first, and last season.
There is also a German Top Gear, and an Australian Top Gear. I haven't seen those, but I have heard they are just as horrible as the American Version.

Hopefully I didn't offend anyone here, who may be connected with the American Version. If I did, I apologize. You're probably doing the best you can, with limited budget/equipment.
 
To be fair, I´ve watched every single episode of topgear since 2002, every other coutry spinoffs and I must say, the topgear America is way way better than Australia and the others.
Firstly - those 3 guys have some energy between them, that´s closest to the tall one, the short one, and the other one :D (Offcourse I mean the Jezza, Hamster and Capitain slow :D ) which the other topgears sort of lack.
The original Topgear is still the on to watch, but unfortunately, I have a feeling that their renesaince is comming to an slow end.

The copying part I also don´t like. At first, I had hope that there´s a light for them to be original. And they were sort of, trying their own best, but when I saw the Best GM car part, and that was an exact copy of British Leyland part of the English topgear.

Everybody seems to be copying stuff from others or even buying formats nowadays. Bad times for invention and creativity :(
Recently I read a comment on youtube to a "Africa" song from Toto, and boy, did the poster hit a nail on the head:
"Dear music, we miss you, where have you gone?"
All the stuff nowadays seems to lack the WHAT and concentrates more on HOW (remakes, spinoffs, show copies....).
Stop copying and MAKE! We can do that! :D
 
Daniel Krnac said:
To be fair, I´ve watched every single episode of topgear since 2002, every other coutry spinoffs and I must say, the topgear America is way way better than Australia and the others.
Firstly - those 3 guys have some energy between them, that´s closest to the tall one, the short one, and the other one :D (Offcourse I mean the Jezza, Hamster and Capitain slow :D ) which the other topgears sort of lack.
The original Topgear is still the on to watch, but unfortunately, I have a feeling that their renesaince is comming to an slow end.

The copying part I also don´t like. At first, I had hope that there´s a light for them to be original. And they were sort of, trying their own best, but when I saw the Best GM car part, and that was an exact copy of British Leyland part of the English topgear.

Everybody seems to be copying stuff from others or even buying formats nowadays. Bad times for invention and creativity :(
Recently I read a comment on youtube to a "Africa" song from Toto, and boy, did the poster hit a nail on the head:
"Dear music, we miss you, where have you gone?"
All the stuff nowadays seems to lack the WHAT and concentrates more on HOW (remakes, spinoffs, show copies....).
Stop copying and MAKE! We can do that! :D
Click to expand...

Spot on!!! It's if the "viewing public" is in some sort of a Coma. Do they really expect us to watch that???
There are so many stupid "reality shows" on TV these days, that I find myself just watching the News, more often than not. If I wanna watch a guy bake a cake, cut down a tree, or kill an Alligator; We've got reality shows for that. But seriously, where is the creativity anymore??
 
havasuphoto said:
I've watched only one episode. This will be it's first, and last season.
There is also a German Top Gear, and an Australian Top Gear. I haven't seen those, but I have heard they are just as horrible as the American Version.

Hopefully I didn't offend anyone here, who may be connected with the American Version. If I did, I apologize. You're probably doing the best you can, with limited budget/equipment.
Click to expand...

Only one episode? Kinda like listening to one track of an album and making predictions on an entire band's future.

I've seen every episode of BBCs top gear. I think it is quite honestly the best thing I have ever seen on television. It is as close to perfection as you can come. When I first saw the American top gear, frankly I was embarrassed. I mean, how does a country built around the automobile and a country that houses an entire city basically dedicated to the highest quality film production on the planet come out with this?!?

But then I recalled Top Gear series 1 in 2002, before Captian Slow came back to the show. It was pretttyyy rough and nothing like what it is today.

After four episodes I can say the American version is off to a better start then the BBC one was. It isn't without it's share of problems (and some are glaring) but it is probably one of the best shows on American TV right now. Think about. What other show features something so common, something so prevalent in our day to day life and presents it in a good wholesome way?

Like I said, there are a lot of problems with the show. At first I thought they had missed entirely the point of Top Gear. It isn't about the gimmicks, it isn't about even the cars. It is a show about a people and a country. I thought that until the end of the fourth episode, and with the close of the Chevy segment it showed me "they get it." It will never be the same as the BBC. American audiences are too impatient and to concentrated on gimmicks for that. But for an AMERICAN show, it is quite spectacular, and will go on to many more seasons.
 
Yep gets its message across well, sounds like the designer said a lot more and you've condensed his salient bits, even with a couple of rough edits :) The pix seem like addons to reinforce the v/o. No problem for me, it all works very well, easily stand repeat watching. I expect the other 3 dovetail into the campaign.
Like the grading and the music too.

Cheers.
 
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