For the Laguna Seca / Skip Barber section of shooting we were one of a few units on the production. Our responsibilities were POV-heavy as well as getting special action shots with a RED One. Will largely handled the RED work and left me to run with the POV work. We had the opportunity to mount 5D’s all over the camera with specialized rigging as well as ContourHD and Contour GPS cameras everywhere. Here are a few examples of some of the shots:

A unique perspective, A.K.A. “Tire Love” captured with a 5D Mk II:

5D Mount- BF Goodrich, Laguna Seca

Up close and personal with Mr. White heading through the corkscrew:

ContourHD Screencap- BF Goodrich, Laguna Seca

Title card shot- 5D riggged up and off the body of the car:

Title Card Rigging- BF Goodrich, Laguna Seca

Shaun tearing around the track in his Skip Barber open wheel car:

Shaun in Action- BF Goodrich, Laguna Seca

All the content has been edited and is live on the BFG site. Click HERE to view Chapter 2:

Shaun White- BF Goodrich Website

On set with DC Chavez – Part II Team Need for Speed Scion tC Drift Car shoot

On Set with DC Chavez- Profoto Blog

On set with DC Chavez – Part III Rockstar / Etnies Rally Car Shoot

On Set with DC Chavez- Profoto Blog

We took advantage of some of the beautiful country roads between Richmond and VIR:

Virginia Road Trip- The drive to VIR

Virginia Road Trip- The drive to VIR

Then we got to VIR- lets just say we went through a few sets of tires during production…

Virginia International Raceway- Burning Tires

One major success from the weekend was developing a new system for time lapses on a track:

Virginia International Raceway- Time Lapse

Even Will got to get behind the wheel for a bit for part of the filming:

Virginia International Raceway- On Track Action

From VA, we hopped a plane to Burlington, VT – home of great cheese, food and LOTS OF SNOW. We happened to land in VT as the storm of the decade came through- see below:

Snowpocalypse 2011, Burlington, VT

The client was worried that we were not going to have snow for the shoot, needless to say, we had lots. We had the chance to film at the BFG Winter Driving School, Vermont Sports Car, Team O’Neill Rally School and some beautiful VT / NH countryside.

Team O'Neill Rally School

Team O'Neill Rally School

After coming back to Vermont, we got to shoot at Vermont Sports car, the birthplace of US Rally Prepped Subarus:

Vermont Sports Car

After we wrapped shooting the storm hit… HARD. We got stuck in VT for another 48 hours… Not all bad though, as we took advantage of the 26″ of fresh snow and went snowboarding!

Snowboarding at Stowe, VT

Final video clips should be up sometime mid-June.

Here is Will’s account of the trip.

We needed to shoot the race as well as get interviews from key people that contributed to the development of the game. Some of the interviews and race footage were used in this Authenticity and Realism trailer to tease the game. In addition to that clip, Will compiled all of our footage and made an edit of the 24 Hour experience.

Dubai 24h 2011 from The SpeedHunters on Vimeo.

Here are some other posts describing a full BTS look of the race:

Speedhunters Blog #1
Into the Night

After all the post was wrapped on that project, I got a call from Kia’s agency to put together a video for their trade show booth at the Chicago Auto Show. The star of this piece was the all-new Optima SX Turbo and their factory racing driver Nick Johnson. We headed down to Palm Beach International Raceway with a small crew to film the car at speed around the racetrack. Although PBIR is not the fastest track around, we were able to put something together that showed the performance side of this new vehicle.

Kia Optima SX Turbo- FINAL from DC CHAVEZ on Vimeo.

Here is the text from the auction:

The pictures in the listing that you are see are my photos of the actual camera and accessories that are up for sale.  This is a low-use, super clean, scratch-free, 100% fully functional, Canon XH-A1 for sale.  To date, I have only recorded a total of twenty-three (23) 63 minute tapes with this camera (roughly 24 hours recording time). I purchased this camera new from Samy’s camera in LA in August of 2008.  Since then I have used it for various projects up until the time I got my Canon 5D Mk II cameras. Since then the XH-A1 has been sitting in its Pelican case for over a year and a half without use.

This video is a follow-up to the highly acclaimed Climb Attack from the 2009 record setting run of Rhys Millen at Pikes Peak that was directed by my buddy Will Roegge. The video was AMAZING. Will was actually nominated for a Motor Press Guild Association award for the piece- up against Audi “Truth in 24″ and also a segment of Top Gear. It was a Herculean effort with Will and Josh running all over the mountain to capture footage and a demonstration of finesse and attention to detail in delivery. Lets just say to use the name Climb Attack in this video, I had big shoes to fill…

This was a section of the road, Serra do Rio do Rastro, that Rhys had the opportunity to drift his RMR / Red Bull / Hyundai Genesis Coupe up. Lets just say the view was INSANE. The road started in Lauro Muller, Santa Catarina, Brazil and ran for over 9km up the canyon and onto a plateau. We stayed at an incredible resort at the top of the road called Rio Do Rastro Eco Resort. Ivan and his staff were absolutely incredible and made the entire RMR / Red Bull team feel at home. We rode horses, ate great food, drank incredible wine and experienced hospitality of the highest degree.

We filmed for a total of 3 days, with some delays due to weather, filming Rhys drifting up each section and a Time Attack Run on Saturday. At any given time I was operating 12 cameras at once- 2 x 5D Mk II, an HVX200 and at least 5 ContourHD 1080P cameras oncar and 4 spread throughout the road. This was also a testing ground for the new ContourGPS video camera- linking GPS data to the POV camera footage. I was busy to say the absolute least… Additional footage was provided by Red Bull Brazil.

Scenery was amazing, Rhys’ skill behind the wheel was nuts- lets just say it was an amazing trip. I am very thankful to have been a part of it and now a part of the Climb Attack series. Lets just say that this will not be the last. Next time I will have more help and plan on making the next one much, much better.

Thanks to Red Bull Brazil, Rio do Rastro Eco Resort, RMR, ContourHD and anyone else that helped out with this project.

Here is the final edited piece:

I coordinated with clothing designer Kareenas Trends, makeup artist Evelyn Sanabria and models Diana Butova and Klaudia McDonald to make this happen. I am very pleased with the way this shoot turned out thanks to the hard work of everyone involved. Full blog posting soon to come on the Profoto Blog.

Diana Butova- Profoto Batpac Shoot

Klaudia McDonald- Profoto Batpac Shoot

Diana Butova- Profoto Batpac Shoot

Klaudia McDonald- Profoto Batpac Shoot

This is the product of two people running up and down a mountain operating up to 8 cameras at once, great input from Jeff and lots of amazing editing by Will.

Crank the audio and enjoy!