 |
Re: Doubleheader Last Weekend- Helicopter
Author: David Busse
Date: 05-29-2007 - 22:57
Helicopters, whether operated by local TV stations, law enforcement or chartered by photographers, are a part of life in the big city...ANY big city. Like it or not, they have a great deal of freedom to go as they please, and events like operation of steam locomotives, tall ships and other curios attract them like flies.
When 4449 and 844 staged their "race" over Cajon in the late 1980s, I was concerned enough about aircraft congestion that I spent a great deal of time before the event attempting to get the FAA to impose FAR 91.91 airspace restrictions on Cajon Pass for the "race". It didn't work--my proposal was pushing the envelope--and the late video producer David Goodheart even accused me of trying to sabotage his costly charter of a helicopter for the chase. Anyone who was there knows that Goodheart's guy stayed wide and away from railfans, while KNBC-TV's pilot Bob Pettee spoiled much of the day for railfans, flying his JetRanger about 50 feet off the ground between tracks...what they don't know was that SP and UP officials were tickled that day with the (free)coverage that both railroads got on KNBC and other LA stations that night. Nonetheless, it was spectacular to be there on the ground.
I have logged something like 3500 flight-hours in various helicopters using a variety of camera systems for news and sports events as well as projects for several railroads and railroad video producers. The cost of this kind of production is substantial if you employ stabilized cameras and pilots who really know what they are doing. I was not on the 4449-844 thing in the Northwest that started this thread, but would suspect from the description that the video people were hand-holding their camera. That's a crude but cost-effective way of shooting in today's world, and it requires a lot of close-flying by the pilot to really make it work. That would certainly piss off anyone on the ground.
I shot a video for Pentrex a few years ago called "Above 3751 over Cajon" where we utilized pilot Larry Welk's AS350B helicopter and a then-state-of-the-art camera system called a FLIR Ultramedia II. I am proudest of the fact that my favorite shots of that day were telephoto scenes shot with the helicopter flying about 50 feet off the ground almost a half-mile from the tracks. Try that hand-held! And I'll bet people at trackside didn't know I was there.
When 4449 and 844 staged their "race" over Cajon in the late 1980s, I was concerned enough about aircraft congestion that I spent a great deal of time before the event attempting to get the FAA to impose FAR 91.91 airspace restrictions on Cajon Pass for the "race". It didn't work--my proposal was pushing the envelope--and the late video producer David Goodheart even accused me of trying to sabotage his costly charter of a helicopter for the chase. Anyone who was there knows that Goodheart's guy stayed wide and away from railfans, while KNBC-TV's pilot Bob Pettee spoiled much of the day for railfans, flying his JetRanger about 50 feet off the ground between tracks...what they don't know was that SP and UP officials were tickled that day with the (free)coverage that both railroads got on KNBC and other LA stations that night. Nonetheless, it was spectacular to be there on the ground.
I have logged something like 3500 flight-hours in various helicopters using a variety of camera systems for news and sports events as well as projects for several railroads and railroad video producers. The cost of this kind of production is substantial if you employ stabilized cameras and pilots who really know what they are doing. I was not on the 4449-844 thing in the Northwest that started this thread, but would suspect from the description that the video people were hand-holding their camera. That's a crude but cost-effective way of shooting in today's world, and it requires a lot of close-flying by the pilot to really make it work. That would certainly piss off anyone on the ground.
I shot a video for Pentrex a few years ago called "Above 3751 over Cajon" where we utilized pilot Larry Welk's AS350B helicopter and a then-state-of-the-art camera system called a FLIR Ultramedia II. I am proudest of the fact that my favorite shots of that day were telephoto scenes shot with the helicopter flying about 50 feet off the ground almost a half-mile from the tracks. Try that hand-held! And I'll bet people at trackside didn't know I was there.
