Aerial Photography

Creative Shot Composition

• Dynamic Camera Movement: Drones can create sweeping, smooth, and dynamic camera movements, such as flying through a scene, circling around characters or objects, or gliding over landscapes. This adds energy and excitement to a shot.

• Bird’s Eye View: Using drones to capture stunning bird’s-eye views of a scene, revealing the context, environment, or scale in ways that are often used for dramatic effect.

• Tracking Shots: Drones can follow characters or vehicles with fluid motion, even in outdoor environments, enhancing the action or continuity without requiring cumbersome equipment like cranes or dollies.

Unique Locations and Shots

• Remote Areas: Drones allow the to access hard-to-reach locations, such as mountainous terrain, coastal cliffs, or busy urban environments, without the logistical challenges of setting up traditional camera equipment.

• Wide-Scale Landscape: A drone can capture vast, sweeping landscapes, cityscapes, or nature shots that emphasize the environment and help establish the tone or setting for the story.

• Environmental Context: Drones can be used to reveal the scale of a scene, whether it’s showing a character in a vast field or capturing the grandeur of a building or monument.

Efficiency and Flexibility

• Cost-Effective: Traditional aerial shots (such as those taken from a helicopter) are expensive and require a lot of resources, but drones are a more affordable alternative that still delivers high-quality footage.

• Quick Setups: Drones are faster to set up than traditional aerial rigs, which is particularly beneficial for tight production schedules. They can also be deployed quickly for multiple shots in different locations.

• Adaptability: Drones can adjust their altitude and direction quickly, making them perfect for spontaneous shots that require flexibility. This is particularly useful in fast-paced environments like live sports or dynamic scenes.

Drones can shoot in 4K or higher resolutions, making them suitable for high-quality TV productions. Most drones have built-in stabilization systems that help produce smooth footage, even when flying at higher speeds.

As a Director of Photography, using both standard and FPV ( FIRST PERSON VIEW), drones for aerial photography opens up a wide range of creative possibilities that can elevate the visual storytelling of a production. Drones allow for capturing shots from unique perspectives that would otherwise be difficult, expensive, or impossible to achieve.

Motion Controlled

Time Lapses

Motion-controlled time lapses are a visually striking and highly effective technique used in commercial television to create compelling, cinematic shots. As a visual artist, employing motion-controlled time lapses adds depth, dynamism, and visual interest, especially when you're working with commercials that require a polished, high-impact aesthetic.

Using motorized rigs and precision systems to move the camera along a specific path or axis during the time-lapse shoot. This allows the camera to move in a controlled, repeatable way, adding smooth motion to the time-lapse sequence. By combining time lapse with motion control, we can create striking shots where the camera smoothly pans, tilts, or tracks through the scene, giving viewers a sense of fluidity and motion. This enhances the visual storytelling and adds sophistication to the final product.

• Dynamic and Engaging: Motion-controlled time lapses create eye-catching visuals that instantly grab attention. In a commercial, where keeping the viewer's interest is paramount, this technique can serve as a powerful hook. For example, a moving time lapse of a cityscape with the camera traveling across the scene while the sky transitions from day to night can captivate viewers and convey a sense of innovation and modernity.

• Increased Depth and Perspective: The camera movement in a motion-controlled time lapse can emphasize perspective, making objects or landscapes appear larger, more dramatic, or more detailed. This can add a sense of grandeur or importance, especially when showcasing products, architecture, or scenic landscapes.