Inition has been in Berlin and Brighton, shooting skateboarding veteran Tony Hawk on his European tour. Working with Boomerang Productions, Inition shot Tony giving press interviews and performing skate tricks at a number of locations including performances on the vert ramp, Europe’s largest half pipe.
Inition shot everything on Toshiba 1080i cameras, a compact lightweight mini-cam ideal for this type of shoot where the set-up needs to be ultra mobile to capture this fast paced sport. Nano Flash Recorders were attached as well as a StereoBrain Processor for live monitoring and alignment adjustments.
On the Berlin shoot 3 camera positions were adopted, two opposing ramp side positions and one at the flat of the half pipe to give good overall coverage of the action. Iniiton completed the 3D edit from the 2D edited sequence. The 3D footage was used to create a half hour TV programme which aired on French TV channel Canal + in October.
3D Filming: Tony Hawk on Tour
The Brief
Extreme sports production specialist Boomerang Productions, asked Inition to supplied stereoscopic equipment, crew, consultancy and 3D post services for a half hour 3D programme following Tony Hawk on his European tour in Berlin and Brighton.
Solution
Due to a combination of low weight, compact size and high quality image output, Inition chose to shoot everything with Toshiba IK-HD1(1920x1080i) minicams to capture the essence and drama of the competitor's daring skate tricks.
Inition’s crew established three camera positions during the Berlin shoot in order to captuire the action from all angles.
A Fig Rig gave the cameraman incredible flexibility to capture fast motion shots. A Polecam lightweight jib was positioned at the top of a ramp side which captured stunning sweeping overhead shots including those classic 3D shots when the skater appears to be jumping out the screen. The third stereoscopic rig was mounted on a regular tripod which was used to capture ground level footage and close ups.
To monitor the action, each rig was connected to a StereoBrain Processor. Battery powered and highly lightweight, the StereoBrain processor can process a left and right signal and output a variety of 3D modes which can be viewed on a 2D or 3D monitor. During the Tony Hawk shoot, Inition’s crew used StereoBrain processors to output an anaglyph feed to 7” HD-SDI monitors. Media was recorded to Nanoflash solid state recorders.
Results
Using the three camera set up, Inition was able to deliver motion rich, immersive 3D footage for Boomerang Productions. Boomerang Productions delivered a 2D edit to Inition where it was geometrically corrected and mastered into 3D for 3D Blu-ray authoring.
The 3D footage was used to create a half hour TV programme which aired on French TV channel Canal+ in October.