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Cameraman Fail!
I’ll let the video speak for itself.
https://failblog.org/2011/06/27/epic-fail-photos-cameraman-fail/Chuck
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16 Replies
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I’d like to see the footage from the camera.
Mike Cohen
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I’m sure it was just a rental:-)
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It looks like it was an XD or maybe a P2 so the footage probably survived IF he was rolling. I’m really curious what the talent was saying about him? “Look at our stupid cameraman, he’s never skied before and we thought it would be funny to send him down the speed slope, camera in tow and see what happens” They must be Germans!
Chuck
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I’ll give him some credit. He hung onto the thing… which is probably more than I would have done.
T2
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Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com
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First half of the tumble, the lens was pointed up hill, which could have saved it, but once he started rolling over it, that would have been it.
Okay, confession time.
Somewhere out there is an Associated Press news photo of me in a similar situation from MANY years ago. Please DON’T look it up.Every year we document the state fair, and one of our governors (one of those not in jail) had a tradition of taking his young daughter on a ride down a giant 4-story toboggan slide, as part of the opening ceremonies. We always shot this telephoto from the ground, but one year decided to try to get a second, unique angle, a POV shot.
Our gear was primitive; Sony M-7 and Umatic 3/4-inch portable deck, with a 6-foot cable. Our plan was for two of us, shooter and sound man, to double-up on one of the burlap sacks used for riding the slide, offset a few lanes over, and we would try to synchronize our descent to start a second or so ahead of the target, so we could get the POV experience, shooting them in a wide 2-shot to our right… He sat behind me with the deck between his knees, poking the small of my back.
Not only did it not work, we looked just like the cartoon illustration of when comic book character Andy Capp gets into a bar fight: a cloud with a tangle of arms, legs, and lenses poking out at odd angles. The caboose end of our little train overtook me and we swapped ends. I saved the camera, natch, but not our pride. Damn thing made the papers in a wide 2-shot of the guv and his daughter, racing a human tumbleweed, down the bumpy toboggan slide.
Hey, we were pushing the limits of what we could do. That’s what it’s about. And we still had the safety main camera shot.
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[Mark Suszko] “Not only did it not work, we looked just like the cartoon illustration of when comic book character Andy Capp gets into a bar fight: a cloud with a tangle of arms, legs, and lenses poking out at odd angles. The caboose end of our little train overtook me and we swapped ends. I saved the camera, natch, but not our pride. Damn thing made the papers in a wide 2-shot of the guv and his daughter, racing a human tumbleweed, down the bumpy toboggan slide.”
Mark,
One of the things I love about your posts is you have a great ability to paint a great visual with your words.Living in Colorado, I have done my fair share of skiing gigs. And this type of thing is always in the back of your mind if you’re trying to ski the gear down the mountain when there’s no sled available.
Scott Sheriff
Director
https://www.sstdigitalmedia.comI have a system, it has stuff in it, and stuff hooked to it. I have a camera, it can record stuff. I read the manuals, and know how to use this stuff and lots of other stuff too.
You should be suitably impressed…“If you think it’s expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur.” —Red Adair
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It’s only fair, since I showed you mine, you guys need to fess up and tell one on yourselves as well.
Don’t leave a bro hanging. You know you have a story. -
[Mark Suszko] “It’s only fair, since I showed you mine, you guys need to fess up and tell one on yourselves as well.
Don’t leave a bro hanging. You know you have a story.”OK, I will admit we did some dumb things back in the day.
We were doing a spot for a local appliance rental store, and it was my turn in the rotation to direct. Lucky me.
The running gag was a girl is having a bad day, and everything in her life is broken, she needs new stuff now.
She comes home and the sprinklers come on and get her wet. She’s carrying a bag of groceries, and the bottom falls out. She can’t dry her wet clothes because the dryer died. Trying to nuke a cup of hot water for tea, and the microwave goes up in smoke. Then the money shot. Disgusted, she plops down on the couch, grabs the remote, and flips on the TV. There’s a flash, and it goes up in a shower of sparks. Then the logo backplate and tag.
The money shot went off in one take. It all worked really well. Too well in fact.
The house we were shooting in belonged to a couple that rented the basement apartment to a station employee. The TV/money shot was done on the main floor, in their part of the house. We had to buy them all new drapes, furniture and rugs, as well as replace the actresses clothes due to little pinhole spark burns in everything from the flash gag. That cost the station some cash. Needless to say, this also didn’t make this guy their all time favorite roommate either.
The ‘flash’ was more of an explosion, and was a lot bigger than we thought. The producer procured the materials, but only bought enough for one take, so no test or rehearsal. Very dumb.
That is where I made mistake number one. I should have put the kibosh on the gag unless I saw a test first. But, there was a lot of pressure to just knock stuff out on these local spots with small budgets.
The shot was an OTS of the TV looking back at the actress through the rabbit ears, as she plops down on a big poofy ’80’s style couch. We rolled, she comes in, grabs the remote as she jumps onto the couch. Then the producer triggers the flash, and the actress didn’t have to do much acting! WOOF! Not really loud, but a huge flash, and a shower of sparks. She must have jumped back a good twelve inches in about one frame! And the look on her face was priceless. Well, actually it wasn’t priceless, it was 4 grand.
In the end, it was all good. No one got fired, or even a stern talking to. There wasn’t a person in the station that didn’t come down to the tape room to watch the footage, and get a laugh out of it. The worst part was we were still using a tube camera back then, and the flash bloomed the shot for about 10 frames. So we lost the best chunk of her initial reaction, but it still looked pretty funny despite that.
After seeing the footage, I realized where I made mistake number two. We probably could have faked it, and not done a physical gag. But it was the ’80’s, and we didn’t always think as clearly as we do now…
And then there was the time a six hundred pound pig escaped from the studio into downtown…….
Scott Sheriff
Director
https://www.sstdigitalmedia.comI have a system, it has stuff in it, and stuff hooked to it. I have a camera, it can record stuff. I read the manuals, and know how to use this stuff and lots of other stuff too.
You should be suitably impressed…“If you think it’s expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur.” —Red Adair
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Mark, I am going to consider the timing of your post a mere coincidence and not an ominous warning of the worst possible outcome of my next shoot. I am planning the exact same shot to open a show this weekend. Obviously I don’t expect to be tethered to a soundman or 3/4” deck either for that matter, but do you have any advice to keep me from becoming another “human tumbleweed”?
Chuck
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Gaff-tape go-pro cams to the top of the rider’s shoes?
The sideways shot would be way easier to do today with the tiny, image-stablizing cameras available now. I was cradling the camera and trying to look down into the eyepiece while sliding down the bumps.
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