Hey, You OK?

Did you know that suicide is the biggest killer of men under the age of 45, killing more construction workers than falls?

Mental health awareness is one of the most important subjects of the modern world and the construction industry is no different.

Loxams new workplace initiative is paving the way in getting workers to talk about their mental well being, placing ‘mental health first aiders’ at the forefront of their regional businesses in an attempt to identify and help any workers that are suffering from mental health issues.

To help launch the new initiative we were tasked with producing a film highlighting the issue of workplace mental health in a bid to attract workers to come forward to become one of the companies mental health firs aiders.

We began in November last year by meeting with the client to talk about the subject, the initiative and what message they would like the film to convey. During the meeting we picked up on one fact that was quite amazing. You are asked on average 14 times a day if you are OK, with only 19% of people answering ‘I’m fine’ and actually meaning it. This simple fact formed the basis of the film.

Initially the idea was to follow an employee throughout the day with multiple people asking if he is OK at various stages. Whilst this idea would have worked in conveying the message, we felt as though the initial point of the video would not have been clear as the client wants to both raise awareness of how it feels to suffer with a mental health issue whilst engaging the workforce to come forward and express interest in the initiative.

We’ve created a short animation to showcase how closely the original storyboard matches the action in the final film.

Casting for the film took place in December with our lead Jamie Causer coming on board very early on. His performance was amazing and his input during the shoot helped shape additional details that really brought the difficult yet important subject to life. The sound design was a very important part of the production, we needed to be able to get across Jamie’s feelings throughout the film to the viewer. The sound was created in a way that slowly introduced the viewer to the issues raised in the film whilst maintaining a lever of normality during the early scenes. Completed by Joel Careless Littlewaves Productions using a mixture of on location audio and foley we feel as though the soundtrack added the final, essential touches to the production.

The finished article is something that we’re very proud of and we hope that Loxams mental health initiative helps those in need and spreads the importance of looking out for each other if something does not seem right.

Crew

Matt Edge

Harry Cartmell

Joel Careless

Shannon Bulmer

Cast (In order of appearance)

Jamie Causer

Melissa Sabine

James Nicholson

Craig Gallimore

Sarra Kasraoui

Ben Patefield

Equipment

URSA Mini Pro G2

Canon 14mm Cine Prime

Canon 24mm L series

Canon 35mm L series

Panasonic GH5

Atomos Ninja Inferno

7-14mm Lumix Lens

24mm Samyang Cine Lens

Freefly Movi Pro

Easyrig Vario with Serene arm

CAME TV wireless follow focus

3 x KinoFlo Divalite

2 x LED Panels

RODE NK

Tascam DR680 Audio Recorder

Special Thanks to

Sandhu Stores

Josh and Sophie

CITY FLYERS

Flying in a city centre can be daunting, especially for new PFCO (drone permission) holders.

In this blog post we will cover how we achieved permission to takeoff and land in the middle of Birmingham and what to consider when looking to fly in a City Centre.

1. Local authorities can be a blessing and a curse.

Local authorities can be a nightmare. There. I said it. You can call one council and be passed from department to department with nobody seemingly have a clue about the rules, the film process or even where in the city you are intending on flying from or over.

BUT when you do get to the right department you usually find a bunch of enthusiastic, like minded people who will help secure locations, contact other local authorities (police etc) and will always be at the end of the phone should you need anything.

In this case the department was Film Birmingham. They helped us secure our takeoff and landing locations, contacted surrounding building management to ensure we had their permission and joined us on the shoot to make sure everything went smoothly whilst providing an extra pair of eyes to help with any potential incursions.

2. Rooftops.

City centre rooftops are a GREAT way to keep your legal distance.

In this instance we chose to takeoff and land on the roof of Birmingham Library. With help from Film Birmingham we were able to secure the top roof terrace as a takeoff and landing area. With careful barrier placement we were able to ensure that any potential incursion were unable to affect our operations.

Our second takeoff location for the top down image was the building site opposite the Library. Again Film Birmingham came to the rescue and secured permission from the site manager to takeoff and land in the car park behind the site. As it was a weekend there were no cars on site and minimal staff on site allowing for another very easy to control TO/LA site.

3. Where are the people?

Careful planning of your flight paths is an ESSENTIAL part of any City flying.

In this instance we had the adjacent buildings to work with. The Rep theatre and the ICC both join together (bar one thin path) to form one giant flying area.

The only sticking point is that to get to the ICC roof, you have to fly over a pedestrian walkway. The only option was to ascend to a decent altitude above The Rep (in this case we opted for around 80m) and then in one smooth flight, take a B Line over the pathway.

Using the high altitude and high speed ‘transit’ over the area allowed us to clear the populated area safely as any failure combined with the speed would have carried the drone safely over the walkway and onto the roof of the Arena.

Once we were over the ICC there were multiple angles we could safely achieve for the client.

We later used the same principle to fly over the walkway between the car park and the building site for the top down shot.

4. Weather

Ah. The age old question! What is the weather like? More specifically wind speed. If the wind speed is high or it is particularly gusty, where will your drone go if a failure occurred? Where will the wind make your drone drift if you lose GPS?

If the answer to the above is over a densely populated are then it may be worth a date change or if that is not possible an adjustment to the flight plans may be required to ensure the flight is safe.

5. Signal and Compass

Buildings can soak up your signal and make your drone act in ways which may catch you out, Specifically when flying near or around metal structures.

When we were taking off from the library roof, the drone would make a sharp movement to the left just past the rail when leaving the buildings footprint. Experience told me that this was probably a GPS error caused by the metal in the building (if you haven’t seen it yet it looks like a giant golden metal box)

It was an easy one to counter as I just made sure to takeoff and land in ATTI, switching to GPS once over The Rep but it is something that has affected us many times when taking off in industrial units, on car park roofs or near pretty much any modern structure.

6. Gulls

Yep, you read that right. Gulls. They single handedly ruin your fish and chips by the seaside and if you’re not careful they can ruin your flight plans. Luckily we picked to shoot on the day a very helpful lady brings a Harris Hawk to the library roof to scare the gulls away. But if you don’t have a Harris Hawk in your kit bag we’ve found the following techniques work (almost) all the time.

Step one, carry some '‘distraction chicken’. We all know that you shouldn’t feed the gulls but if the only option of a safe takeoff and landing is to distract them away from the area with food then so be it!

Step two is to climb FAST. Once above the gulls they won’t attack. You may get one or two follow you up but they only attack from above so stay well above them if you can. Same with landing, land fast and if necessary take it down to a low altitude before manoeuvring to the landing location if you can’t bring it straight down due to a flock above the landing site.

To conclude

All of the above points are considerations for any kind of flight near or over a city. We may not have covered every single consideration for instance Heli flight paths over cities like London, Alternative TO/LA spots, how the time of day can open up many opportunities when it comes to city flying but I hope that the above has proven helpful wether you are a pilot yourself or someone considering hiring a pilot to shoot in a city or populated area.

Safe flying!

THE PORTLAND OLYMPIAN.

What happens when you combine an 18km run, 14 7a grade climbs and baking hot sunshine? 

The Portland Olympian was the brainchild of Jon Butters and Pete Scott, two University friends with a passion for climbing. A few years ago Pete (who is local to Portland) came up with the idea of climbing a 7a on every Crag on the world famous British climbing hub that is Portland in Dorset. Not only that but running (or boulder hopping) between them, with all of their gear in tow. After years of planning and many tweaks to the route, a scoring system was created to track their progress and enable other climbers to enjoy the challenge, no matter their ability (more on this later on)

Petes good friend and climbing partner Jon who we had worked with previously on our Unilite videos contacted us to film the challenge, needless to say we jumped at the chance to shoot the challenge for them. 

Last summer was a hot one (as I’m sure you remember) with the sun beating down we met Pete and Jon for the interview segments in Portland. Set against the historic jurassic coast and with minimal gear we shot the interviews at sunset after a quick recce of some of the harder to reach climbs. After the recce it was time for an early night (after a couple of pints over dinner of course) 

6AM we met Pete and Jon at the Olympic Rings at the very top of Portland Bill. And after a very quick recap of the route we set off capturing what we could before hastily getting in the van, shooting out of the window before driving ahead to the first location. 

The day was spent juggling equipment, running to the van to the next car park, unpacking and running back down to meet the climbers at the next crag.

Organising the gear was the biggest challenge of all for us, we had to meticulously plan which equipment would be best to take to each location, some of which were not safe to access with our ground equipment and some which we unfortunately had to miss in order to get ahead of the climbers, park and walk the gear down to the location. Thankfully our DJI Inspire 2 with x7 allowed us to shoot some of the more difficult climbs from above, combined with our full lens set (16,24,35 and 50mm) we were able to capture some incredible shots without having to cart the Movi, GH5, Atomos and B-cam down steep rocky paths.

The challenge was completed a full 13 hours after the start, fully knackered out we headed to the Cove for a quick pint before calling it quits for the day. 

The edit process was an absolute pleasure helped somewhat by the stunning scenery and the incredible bespoke score by our good friend Joel at Little Waves productions.

As I’m sure you’ll agree the challenge was quite gruelling for both Pete and Jon and us as the camera crew. 

4 Countries, 2 Weeks, 1 Video…

Bristol was the first location, the epicentre of Research and Development where new developments in the safety and operation of powered access are designed and prototyped. The night before the shoot we stayed up late, carefully examining the storyboard approved by the client weeks before. Along with our new wireless follow focus the new 422 10 Bit update for the GH5 was a little more than a week old and excitement for the shoot began to build. This was our chance to shoot something all in house, using brand new equipment pushing ourselves as film makers rather than drone op

The wireless follow focus/cine prime combo enabled us to get one of our personal favourite shots the film. Whilst Harry tracked around the designer, Matt remotely pulled focus from him proudly looking up at his machine to the machine itself where the operator was stood, thumbs up in approval. Stunning. 

In Bristol we were also fortunate enough to get into the Concorde museum before the public had access. It just so happened that Nationwide Platforms were being used to give the speed bird a final polish after she was moved to the museum, an opportunity that we simply could not miss for this film. What a beast, just being in the presence of it was awe inspiring, knowing the journeys and the speeds that that machine had travelled was just incredible, in fact this very Concorde (G-BOAF) was the last to be built and sadly the last to fly. Bagged a few selfies both inside and outside obviously, couldn't possibly miss out on a potential new profile pic.

The very next week we were off to Toulouse.

Toulouse, incredibly picturesque and about as quintessentially French as it gets. We managed to grab an insane deal on a stunning Air BnB, a beautifully small, but perfectly adequate, pent house apartment with a cast beer from our host on arrival. This was to be our base for a couple of days filming in this stunning City, and quite the base it was. Here we were focusing on the French side of the company, managed to get the drone out for this one, filming along some superb French countryside lanes. Without a cloud in the sky and the September sun blazing down on us it meant for some incredible lighting for this scene. 

Without the chance to recce the sites we were allowed to film on, and with no idea as to exactly what kind of machine usage we’d be able to capture we had to plan shots as soon as we arrived on each site and think about exactly how they would fit in with our overall vision for the project. Little did we know that we’d get the opportunity to shoot the world renowned German artist Hendrik Beikirch. Hendrik was very happy to let us shoot him in action using a Loxam machine to meticulously paint a portrait on the side of a building using paint brushes rather than spray cans. This gave us a wonderful tie in with a later section of the film where a painter uses a Nationwide machine to paint a house, playing into the notion that this company helps people achieve anything where working at height is required, whether it be a huge painting on the side of a tower block or an old house in the Scottish Highlands.

First experience of flying to Scotland, an experience to say the least. The air hosts having to sprint up and down the aisle to flog as much produce as possible in the insanely short time we’re actually up in the air. It reminds me almost of a paper round scene from on old 80s film, whereby the papers (coffees and beers in this case) are almost flung onto you on the way past. Personally my favourite country in the world I was very excited about heading up here to film. The aim of this section was to show the MEWPS in a rugged landscape, the peaks of mountains with the hint of snow still clinging on to the summit before the next winter downfall in the background. We managed to get  lost, which in Scotland is never a bad thing. Driving round aimlessly for a few hours meandering our way through the mountains of the Cairngorms, snaking past various Lochs. It really is a beautiful country. 

36 Hours in Dubai, that was it, to visualise, position and capture the shots required. Arriving in the hotel red eyed and exhausted at 2am we had 5 hours rest before getting stuck in to the day at 7am. People always mention the heat out there, you never quite realise just what its like until you first step out of the cool and crisp air conditioned hotel lobby into what feels like a dense wall of humid hot air. Off to the building site it was, trousers and shirts were required due to various health and safety legislation, this, quite obviously, did not help the overwhelming temperature changes we’d experienced in the last 24 hours. Somewhat moist and drained from the ‘sleep’ we’d had we managed to crack on and nail the shots we were after. The MEWPS looking great against the backdrop of the desert, really encapsulating the globalisation of this company and the message we were aiming to create ‘any destination, no challenge beyond our reach’ etc. etc. 

Managing our equipment during this incredibly short visit, in the blistering heat was a challenge in itself. Batteries nearing their maximum operating temperature meant we had to nail shots first time and get back under the shade as quickly as possible to wipe the sweat off our foreheads before planning and executing the next shot or scene. We had storyboarded rough sections for the film however given that there was no time to recce plans had to be thought up and shot on site with little to no time in the schedule to retake. Thankfully everything went according to plan, no equipment was taken at customs and as you can see, the results slot straight in-between ‘properly’ storyboarded sections very well, matching the more traditional shoot style we were aiming for quite well.

Cutting from beautiful countryside to massive construction projects such as the MerseyLink in one single project to show the scope of work this company is involved in took a little fiddling. Using traditional straight cuts with no fancy transitions we linked sections of the film using common movement direction and subject. 

One thing that we feel this film represents well is the togetherness of the company and how everyone from the Bristol ‘Aladdins Cave’ R&D Department to the Rental Desk of Dubai work together like a well oiled machine to deliver to clients both big and small across the globe.

How to win an OSCAR

It’s taken us a while here at Papercut to get our teeth into blogging but we have a very blog worthy story to bring you, so we may as well start on a high.

This image kicked off this whole rollercoaster ride.

Back in January 2017 whilst scouting directories for potential clients, we came across a small advertisement for a drone operator to work on a short film in Stoke-on-Trent. The budget was low but we were free and as it had been a while since we worked on a short film or drama we went for it. After all, if we didn’t, another (potentially unlicensed) drone operator may have taken up the opportunity. 

We arrived to the set on a day so foggy that normally we’d have had to re-arrange the job and come back another day. However after a chat with the crew it was decided that we would move forward with the shoot as the schedule could not be rearranged even if the fog stuck around.

So we sat around, chatting to various crew members between scenes generally enjoying watching the film making process until the afternoon. Chris Overton (Director) made the decision that we should head out to our first location to capture the opening shot of the film where Joanne (A Social Worker Played by Rachel Shenton) rides a bicycle through the countryside on her way to meet Libby (A profoundly deaf girl played by the incredible Maisie Sly) The shot required us to follow her overhead for a few seconds before speeding up slightly, falling between the overhanging trees to ground level where we would continue tracking her from the front. Although the weather had delivered us fog, the wind was relatively low, meaning we got this in the bag after only 2-3 takes (we wanted it to be perfect!)

Returning to the school, the children weren’t quite ready for the final scene so we headed out once again into the fog to get the ‘bonus’ car driving shot. With Rachel driving the car we tried various follow shots, being careful to keep the drone in sight through the thick fog in order to avoid the trees (again). In the end the final cut features a tracking shot where we fly to the right in between the bush and the tree canopy into a field (also meaning that we were in clear airspace in case visual became difficult).

Returning for the second time with two incredible shots in the bag, we were confident that the final scene would go very smoothly. The idea was that Libby would be stood against the wall of the school gazing at Joanne who was looking through the school gates while the other children were playing together in between them. The shot itself was a ‘downward twisty’ shot, slowly revealing more of the playground and eventually the school gates before slowly moving towards Rachel who then walked off leaving Libby behind at the school. The final cut of the film left the move toward the gate out (as the walk off required a different shot, when you see the film, you’ll see why!) however the ‘downward twisty’ part remained.

Now for the unexpected part.

From talking to Rachel during the shoot, we learned of the significance of the film and it’s importance in raising awareness of the plight of profoundly deaf children when it comes to mainstream education. Seeing the film making process in action, we knew that this was no ordinary short film, but little did we know that a few months down the line this film would be nominated for ‘best live action short’ in the most prestigious film awards in the world. The Oscars. It gives us tingles to say that we provided the aerials for an OSCAR NOMINATED film. 

Catching up with Rachel and Chris prior to the oscars at a screening in Cannock you could see how genuinely grateful and humbled they were that this film has touched so many people across the globe.

The original post was written pre OSCARS. We are delighted to announce that The Silent Child WON the OSCAR for Best Live Action short.

We caught up with the team during a special screening in Cannock where we chatted with Chris and Rachel and had the opportunity to hold the oscars we contributed toward.