I know that a ton of us have thought about the possibility of using a RC helicopter to film pow skiing. It makes sense, it’s cheap, it’s environmental, no battle scared pilots, and they can get in even closer for some fantastic angles.
KGB from Jackson Hole tapped into this resource and brought an RC heli with a camera mounted on it 10 miles deep into the Wyoming Range. The shots turned out great and it’s awesome to see someone open this style of filming. As camera technology gets smaller and smaller these RC helis might start taking over in may places where helis have been used.
KGB:
10miles deep in the Wyoming Range we bring a RC HELI to a secret pillow zone. Although the heli could not provide a lift and the athletes had to summit the old fashion way: HIKING, the Heli did provide for some amazing perspectives. Special thanks to onlocationaerial.com Jake Hawkes and the KGB Team Trevor Hiatt, Tucker Mead, Rob Lapier, Trevor Thomas, Max Hammer.
I’ve definitely thought about this a lot. Make sense. Glad to see someone using it. Wonder how much it cost to have the operator and heli for the day?
had that idea long ago, but that helicopter is about 5k at least. so for professional application awesome, but for us mere mortals not in the winter budget.
Errol Kerr, aka The Jamaican Olympic Team, has been doing this sort of thing for a couple years under the name Copter Kids http://copterkidsllc.com/
Was this his rig/outfit, or something else? He’s taken some pretty cool footage. They do a lot of work on gyro stabilizing this camera rig for good, smooth shots.
Sinecure, ‘On Location Aerial’ did this one. Thanks.
Forgot to drop the link, http://www.onlocationaerial.com
According to http://mi6films.com/ the FAA has banned all commercial use of RC helis in the United States until at least 2013, though according to http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showpost.php?p=20057847&postcount=3891 the FAA will accept an application for use. Probably a case of the right and left hands of the government meeting in a cranial-rectal collision.
Either way, awesome shots! These little helis + Cannon 5DII and 7D cameras are amazing new tool for location cinematography.
curt morgan used something like this to film parts of the art of flight. its shown briefly in the behind the scenes