A few weeks ago I got a message asking if I was available that weekend to fly to Arlington, Texas to boom op for a short documentary. This short vid will be released by Intel later on as part of their In Process series.
Redbull Campus Clutch Short Doc
The event we were shooting at was the Redbull Campus US national final. We were going to specifically capture two individuals, one of the producers and one of the casters. The caster was going to be the main subject in the video so we mostly followed him around for most of the tournament.
Taking off from LAX in the evening, getting that nice sunset color on the clouds
The event was being held at the Esports stadium in Arlington. That stadium was originally built for Overwatch league but with the downsizing of the league, it became a esports stadium for miscellaneous use.
View of the main stage before the event started
We went in with no specific protagonist in mind outside of the main subjects. We got pretty lucky with the storyline when the event started. One of the teams in the last chance tournament before the main stage bracket was CPP Black. They barely managed to qualify for the last chance qualifiers and after a day of playing, they defeated UH Premiere in the finals to qualify for the main bracket.
Caster desk and some B roll shooting
After getting a good amount of B roll from the tournament, we shot the interviews for our main subjects.
Inside the caster's hotel room, capturing him getting ready for a day of casting.
Besides the lack of sleep and the short notice, this turned out to be a pretty fun gig. I haven't boom op'd before so it was a learning experience. I had to find ways of standing still while holding the mic up for 10-15 minute stretches. I initially had a lot of trouble holding it up past the 5 minute mark but I found ways of holding the pole without feeling that much fatigue by the last day. The T pose and pole on head postures work pretty great for long extended shots.
Backstage wall with signatures from past talent