Doing bigway video

[billvon 3,085]

Last weekend I got the chance to do video for a PPP 120-way at Perris. It was my first time doing video on a 100+ way (previous largest was ~40) and it was definitely a learning experience.

The dive was a pretty standard PPP bigway - six way base, zipper struts, 18-way outer base ring. There were six helixes coming off the base. There were four video guys total. One (George) was tasked with getting the overall dive from above. The remaining three of us were each assigned two helixes. I had the 4 and 6 o'clock helixes to cover, and was jaunching from the base Skyvan. My secondary jobs were to get the base launch and shoot at least one tracking team on breakoff. The "bonus" was the opportunity to shoot stills, which the camp didn't need (but I wanted to get.)

On breakoff one video person would take the center and the rest of us would backslide, turn to get a tracking group, track with them unti clear then deploy. We also built in some pull altitude difference as a backup.

I used my standard setup, a CX100 with a Century .5 lens, and a T2i with the Canon 15mm prime lens. We were going as high as 18,000 with low ground temps, which meant potential issues with low temperatures vs. batteries - but I was exiting from the Skyvan, which meant I could stay out of the wind until the actual launch. The 15mm is wider than my video lens which worked out well in this case - even when keeping just my sectors in frame the 15mm lens often got the entire dive.

I've done a fair amount of bigways - probably 200 or so 100+ ways, from 100-way diamonds to the 400-way. So some of the basics (knowing where the airplanes would be, knowing how to use O2, understanding the exit procedures) were second nature. However, that familiarity with big ways got me in trouble on the first dive I did. I unconsciously set up in the standard stadium approach, which for bigway video is way too low. Although I got the right sectors in the shot, not only was the video somewhat hard to interpret (small level differences would "hide" the people closer to the base) breakoff became problematic, because the people docking last were light and could track upwards pretty aggressively. My wings let me out-float anyone on the dive, but on the first dive I got caught unawares and ended up pulling too close (in my opinion) to the second wave.

I hung around the captain's debrief and then the main debrief to see if anyone had anything negative to say about the angle. Fortunately they didn't. (I've noticed more and more that while I am getting pretty picky about my video, almost no one else really cares that much as long as they can see the dive.) I talked to the other video guys who gave me some good feedback on the dives, and I was able to use Terry's video (taken from my position the day before) as a goal.

The next one went better but I was still a little too low. I thought the last three went pretty well - I got pretty much what I thought they wanted, the two wackers with most of the base visible at the very top. Some things I took away from it:

As always you have to trust your lens. It was a little nerve wracking to have to guess at where the limits of the lens were, but I've done enough 8 way video to know when I'm starting to lose people off the sides.

You have to get used to flying in other people's burbles. The ideal angle is very steep, almost over the "solid" part of the dive. Although you don't actually stay in people's burbles, if you're in the right place people will be flying under you with some regularity. It's a bit creepy to stay so steep over so many people; all my bigway instincts were telling me to back off.

It also takes some time to getting used to not having a specific target. In my case my aim point was between the two wackers, basically following the build out, so I was looking straight at nothing most of the time, trying to estimate what the edges of my lens were getting.

Although there are some opportunities for stills, 90% of the time you're not going to be able to get the shot you want. The background will be cluttered and you won't be able to reposition without losing the shot you're getting paid for, or the base will start to build and you'll have to pull back rapidly to get the building wackers. On the other hand, once your sectors are complete, and there's not much more to debrief, you have the freedom to float up and get the whole thing (or drop beneath for the formation against the sky shot.) Another way of saying this is - remember what they're paying you for, which is debriefable video.

Plan breakoffs beforehand and think about where you have to be _before_ the first wackers leave. For us we had to backup, rotate and start tracking while keeping the first tracking team in view, and if breakoff catches you by surprise that can be hard to pull off. I used an audible to help me with this.

Plan pull altitudes and landing patterns. I had a smallish canopy for the purpose (a 2:1 loaded Crossfire2) but I was pulling at around 6000 feet so I was able to float in brakes until all the camp participants landed. That left just the video people to deal with in the pattern.

Listen to the debriefs to see how people are using your video. One hint that you could do a better job is when people start craning their necks* to try to see around someone else; that generally means you need to be higher. If the captain starts watching the margins of the screen to see what people are doing as they enter the frame, a bit farther away might be a good idea to get more of the approaches. And of course if they are pointing at a section of dive that's going in and out of frame, adjust a little to cover that area better.

(* - of course craning their necks doesn't do a thing to help them see a video better, but it seems to be almost an instinct.)

BTW one of the coolest parts of the day was during one dive where I had a 90 degree off heading opening (not that unusual for the Crossfire2.) I looked down and to the right and saw a still-built ~50 way falling away from me. I could still hear them in freefall over the noise my slider was making.

Some pictures:

Dive from the still camera
Same picture cropped to approximate what I was getting on video (higher aspect ratio, narrower field)
Landing area while I was floating in brakes
Tracking team

[quade 4]

Big-ways were always fun to shoot.

Some planes in the formation are easier to deal with than the others; the A plane in a 7 plane formation can kinda suck.

Because you're the "local" expert, people will look to you for things like "is the oxygen working?" and "where are we on jump run?" It also helps to know which tricks you can pull on which airplanes to either keep the heat in or let a little out.

Also there's always the question of which angles you're shooting; are you flying relative to the jump run or relative to a particular set of jumpers in the formation. Ideally they're one in the same, but big-ways can rotate and weird things can happen. The last thing you need is to have some other camera flyer unexpectedly fly into your quadrant because he thought you were suppose to track the group and you though it was line of flight.

Expect to get whacked on exit by somebody.
Expect some knucklehead to side slide into you.

ALWAYS expect somebody's parachute to open prematurely.

I had a tendency to try to find gaps to fly in if I could rather than directly over people. If the formation was densely packed, I tried to not fly any further in than the feet of the outside ring. Where you're at in "building2_videoframe.jpg" is where I'd like to be (maybe just a tad closer to the center since you have that big juicy gap there).

Pull high, keep your head on a swivel, land as late as you can. Everyone IS trying to kill you.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver