I couldn't find time to take a look at the location so as far as setting up each rig was concerned, I had to improvise. One thing I could plan for however was the weather and timings for each rig.

I kept an eye on the weather looking for clearish skies and once the opportunity popped up, I set out my master plan which was a slight headache, but achievable. I wanted to sync each shot with changes in the music so I jumped into Adobe Premiere and worked out how many frames each shot would be.

I wanted a little overlap towards the end of each shot into the next so you could see the kit in action so I added a few frames to the final shot as well. I then worked out timings and as you can see from the picture above, we'd be shooting continuously for nearly 18hrs!

Add into this the fact that we had to travel to and from location and rigging time, it would end up being a 28hr shoot - I was going to need some help...

The Shoot

Luckily I chose winter to shoot this and it was a mild -4C - the perfect weather to be stood around for 18hrs! Pain doesn't really define what we went through as nobody really makes any clothes to be stood around in. At one point, whilst triggering the pixelstick animation for four hours, I could feel my left foot go numb followed by my left leg and then no feeling from the hip down even though I was wearing four pairs of trousers!

Regardless of the pain though, I was there for my passion and we struggled on. We'd rigged the kit between 11am and 3pm so it was ready to shoot and I didn't want head torches illuminating the shot later on. The only problem with this was that there was a slow build up of ice on EVERYTHING. I'd rigged Dew Heaters on all nine cameras but that only kept the cameras warm. There were some technical issues with kit a number of times but we managed to overcome them.

To help me out (carrrying kit around, rigging and holding my lack-of-sleep insanity at bay) were three camera assistants (Rob Myler, Nathan Waters and Sean Webb) and two runners (Jake Williams and Andy Barham). Rob's been my assistant for a few years now and a big shout out to him for not only helping me prep a huge amount of kit until the early hours, but also for sticking out 28hrs with me! Also big love to Nathan who turned up to load and also keep (nearly) awake for 28hrs ;-)

I planned on trying to get some sleep, even if only for 30 minutes or so but this didn't happen as I'd invested a lot of time and energy into this shoot for it not to go how I wanted so fuelled by love, I managed to just about survive for the duration and cold. On a technical level, it was the biggest shoot I've undertaken as far as location shoots go and it was certainly a challenge both physically and in complication!

In My (Many) Bag(s)

What kind of Kit does it take to create this? 1300Kg of kit! Here's each rig broken down, some off the shelf, some self-built:

1) Static opening shot

Canon 5D II, Sigma 12-24mm, 3 Legged Thing Tripod, Intervalometer

2) Rotary Arm (Self Built)

Canon 5D II, Samyang 14mm, Rotary Arm, 2x Dynamic Perception Stage R, NMX Controller, 2x 27:1 Stepper Motor

3) Contrazoom

Canon 5D II, Canon 16mm, Dynamic Perception Stage 1 Plus, Zenslider Focus, Zenslider Zoom, 15 metres of Track, NMX Controller and 19:1 Stepper Motor

4) Standard track

Canon 6D, Canon 24-105mm, Dynamic Perception Stage 0, Emotimo TB3 Black

5) Long Track

Canon 5D III, Dynamic Perception Stage 1 Plus, 3x 19:1 Stepper motors, NMX, 15 Metres of track, Ditogear Omnislider + Bitbanger Pixelstick, 1x Magic Arm

6) The Windmill (Self Built)

Canon 5D III, Canon 17-40mm, Dynamic Perception Stage R, NMX + Windmill Rig

7) Inclined Track

Canon 5D II, Samyang 14mm, Dynamic Perception Stage 0 + NMX Controller, Manfrotto Tripod

8) The Beast

Canon 5D III, Samyang 14mm, ABC Speedy 100 Crane, 'Crane Contraption', 1rpm motor, Dynamic Perception MX3 Controller.

9) The End Shot

Canon 5D III, Sigma 12-24mm, 3 Legged Thing 'Nigel', Triggertrap Intervalometer app + Cable

Misc:

15x 22Ah Sealed Lead Acid Batteries, 4x IDX Endura 95 Batteries, Various Pelican Cases, 9x Dew Heaters and Controllers, 9x Canon 12V to 8V converter, 72 Pags, 100 Wedges, 120Kg of Weights, Food and snacks for five, all of the coffee, a crew airbed and cold van to sleep in.

The Result: