Shooting handheld from a Bell 407 Helicopter

[tanner wolfe]

I believe this is a very large and smooth flying helicopter. Has anyone shot from this? I won't have the luxury of a mount, so I'm curious about how smooth of a ride it will be hand-held. Thanks.

[Christoph Helms]

Shoot in 4k and use warp stabilizer, always the best option :)

 

I had a shoot this weekend filming out of this heli http://instagram.com/p/cDWzhJS1MF/

We used a Tyler Mini Gyro but the flight was actually pretty smooth and I felt like I almost didn't need the Tyler.

 

We still used Warp Stabilizer on all the shots, because of air pockets and such. We punched into FullHD resolution which made the shots pretty soft. I wish we would have spend the money on shooting on a Scarlet in 4K !

 

I don't know how much experience you have, just a little tip: Always frame your shot so you are sure the blades are not in it. you won't be seeing the blades once you are up in mid air (you can see it on a wfm though). For Super35mm I recommend a 16-35mm lens.

Sorry if this is not an exact response to your question, I still hope in can helpful to you.

 

Good luck!

[James Brown]

I have had to do a couple of low budget helicopter shots recently. One on an f55 with the 30-80 angenieux and one on a scarlet with 16-35.

 

I really recommend just taking a bunch of bungey rigs if you don't have a mount option. Different strengths of elasticity put together to get the right tension with a few carabiners to rig with. There is always a few options in choppers for this. This way you can get the camera in the position you want and is much easier to operate.

 

But yes, shooting 4k and stabilising in one of many programs later is a get out of jail free card, especially when you hit those wind pockets.

 

Cheers, James