Short Surf Movie

Yesterday, Theresa and I took the day off and ran to the coast to try out a new piece of filming gear. In an exchange of emails, Michael of Quebec, who had recently returned from filming in the Florida Everglades, mentioned that he was looking at the Oregon Scientific ATC2K. The price is reasonable and I felt it might be a great way to provide a second perspective to film clips, so I placed an order.

The surf forecast for the Washington coast was 3’ to 5’ so it was manageable, and although we missed out on the recent sunshine, winds were forecast to be light. As it was mid-week, we had the beach to ourselves which is always a special treat. Attempting to film from three platforms, it took a bit of time to get everything rigged, but finally I was out among the waves. Although the helmet cam is light and I hardly noticed it attached to my helmet, just having to operate so many controls made me feel a bit awkward. After a short time I felt better and I feel this is just part of the breaking in process. Otherwise it’s pretty much fire and forget.

As this was only the second time I’d used the helmet cam, this is intended as a preliminary report, but two things jumped out at me right away.

First, it is a bit of a handicap not having some kind of viewer to see camera angles. The first time I used the camera was on flat water, and I realized after viewing the surf footage, that while in the surf I have a tendency to paddle with my head down in order to have the bill of my helmet deflect some of the water away from my face. As a consequence, most of the helmet cam footage was of my deck, even though I was peeking from under my bill at the top of the waves. It would have been nice to catch this out in the field.

Second, while filming I need to slow down my head movements. There’s no way the audience can keep up when I’m swiveling my head from side to side. Still, I think the helmet cam has great potential as a secondary film platform and I’m anxious to get out there and try again. I’ll update soon.