SIC’s experience in the City of Sinners

Las Vegas.

As a Montana girl, raised in the quiet recesses of the mountains, Las Vegas was certainly an eye opener, to say the least. This was my first time visiting and I did not know what exactly to expect from the famed city of sin.

Neither Jesse or I are very good at driving in cities, so before we arrived we took a short gas/bathroom break and made a pact that no swearing, yelling, or panicking would occur while driving. Neither of us really do much of any of those, but driving is stressful when there are four lanes going super fast around us and honking all the time. We decided that if we missed a turn, we missed a turn.

So, we drove into the city, got to the strip, where our hotel was located (Yes, we stayed in a hotel! It was only about $30, so we decided it was going to be worth it for the Las Vegas experience), and then we missed the turn! It took us about half an hour of navigating back to the turn, since that was the only entrance to our hotel.

Finally, we checked into our room, took our showers, snazzed ourselves up, and headed out to explore the city. Our first stop was an overpriced bud light. Apparently, there is no open container law, but I still felt the need to keep my brew on the down-low. Montana habits die hard, I guess.

At one point, we wandered over to one of the expensive hotels and sauntered into the pool area where the fountains blew higher than our two of us. The digs were pretty dang nice and we decided to lounge on one of the round couch beds for a smidge while we decided where we wanted to grab some grub. We also decided that when we get a house, the round couch bed is essential in our décor.

The night wasn’t out of control nor did it end up a total bore, but we both discovered that gambling and spending tons of money on superfluous items really isn’t our thing. If we’d paid to see one of their tantalizing shows, the story might have been different, but I kind of doubt it.

Oh, Las Vegas. Glad to have come and glad to have left. A one-night stand is good enough for me. ;)

Road Trip – Goblin Valley State Park

After dinner with Scott and Josie, Jesse and I headed south to Goblin Valley State Park. It was a couple hour drive and we were pretty exhausted by the time we arrived at the park gate. Unfortunately for us, the park was closed and so we ended up setting up a time-lapse of the beautiful, moonless, midnight sky and pitched our tent nearby. We woke up early and snagged a campsite in the park before making our way down into the valley studded with the mushroom-shaped rock formations.

In the deep shadows of the early morning, it’s easy to see why these rock figurines are called goblins. Some sections of the valley are grooved with ravines and ridges where a few of these little guardians sit. I imagine that they’ve climbed back to their spot each morning after a night of roaming and now loom over us with their ears pricked and their eyes glassing for the horizon.

The goblins were seriously so cool. They are the remaining part of a layer of sediment that has mostly eroded away and each goblin sits on a layer of softer, easily eroded dirt. I was afraid to touch them so they wouldn’t fall off their pedestals. Oddly enough, the park allows roaming off the main trails into these ravines. So, Jesse and I took advantage of the map-less terrain.

Jesse and I decided to take the Cinestar for a spin around the goblins a couple different times during our stay in the park. The first morning Jesse flew it over me as I played around on some ridges with goblins. Since our Epic Valentine’s Day I’ve become more comfortable being around the Cinestar and letting it fly over me without ducking out of the way.  ;) Jesse also flew it through a specific group of goblins called The Three Sisters right before we left. Even though Jesse is a good pilot, I couldn’t help but hold my breath as it passed through the massive rock towers.

We also set up a couple different time-lapses in the valley. We started one early that morning grabbed a campsite so that the other hikers wouldn’t end up in our shots. It’s pretty exciting for me to be a part of all this camera work. Jesse’s been teaching me everything as we go and I feel like I’m beginning to understand all the settings that work well with time-lapses and such. Check out this little video we made!

Our last evening in Goblin Valley, the wind picked up, throwing sand in our eyes and in our food. We took shelter and hid in the tent, drinking the last of our growlers filled with delicious Draught Works Scepter Head IPA. These are the kind of moments you hope to remember fifty years into the future: not a care in the world but to make the most of the peaceful times you are given.

Road Trip Baby!

Life on the road isn’t always on the road. Sometimes you stay for days in one place and other times you hit a town a night and keep moving.

Jesse and I have been “on the road” for a little over a week. We left Missoula on Sunday April 15^th. We got a late start because we wanted to leave the house nice and clean before we left and we were slow in our packing process. Luckily we were not on much of a hurry. We just wanted to get to Salt Lake before it got too late and not during rush hour. Fortunately, we timed it pretty perfectly. We arrived in Salt Lake a little later than expected, but that was all right. We crashed with some of Jesse’s friends from college, Chase and Alli, who were extremely generous and so much fun for me to meet. I will be excited to see them again.

On our first day in Salt Lake after the drive, Jesse and I took a stroll down to the Mormon Temple in downtown and took some photos of whatever caught our eye. There are so many words to describe the temple, the gardens, the new Walking-Mall in downtown Salt Lake, but I think the word that best describes it, for me, is: encompassing. The attention that goes into every detail of the downtown and every part of the cultural experience of Salt Lake is obvious. Mormon and non both assert their presence in bold ways, bringing a distinct taste to the city.

We also drove up Little Cottonwood Canyon and bouldered for a bit that evening. That was my first time bouldering outside this season and, Man, my fingers were pink by the end of our climbing session. Jesse got some fun shots of Chase and his other good friend Jared pulling hard on granite.

That night we had dinner with Jared and his girlfriend Kelsey, who are both finishing up school in Salt Lake. Kelsey made a delicious Thai Peanut Noodle dish made from all gluten free ingredients. They gave us the insider’s scoop on life in Salt Lake in comparison to Missoula.

It was really fun to get the non-Mormon perspective on Salt Lake and then get the Mormon perspective the next day from my cousins in Provo. We had dinner with my cousin Scott and his wife Josie at a new Thai restaurant (Ha! That’s really funny; I didn’t realize until just now that we had Thai two nights in a row!) This was the first time they had met Jesse and Jesse’s first time meeting any of my extended family. Personally, I think it went really well. ;)

Over all, Salt Lake and the surrounding area was great. Jesse and I got to spend time with all generous and kind people who we will definitely see again!

The Change-Up

Hello from Hannah! And TTYL from Jesse!

Since I graduated with an English degree, Jesse and I decided that it only makes sense to let me take over the writing portion of SIC for now.

Jesse will definitely put up some posts on his own when he feels inspired, but I will probably be doing most of the blogging.

Hopefully that means that we will be posting more about our activities on a regular basis! J

Viator Travel Contest

Hannah and I just entered our video into this Viator Travel Contest.  If we win we, we will have the opportunity to travel to 20 cities in 60 days making short films about our experiences.  This would be an awesome summer opportunity for the both of us.  We entered kind of late in the contest, but I think we still stand a chance.  They've already selected two people and are selecting two more.
Check out the video we entered about SIC and the city of Missoula (you might need to "like" viator before the video will work).

http://on.fb.me/HDbCSq

Vote for it and please share with you friends and family

Shell Shocked - SD

Just got back from an amazing shoot in South Dakota.  Well...Amazing might be a little sarcastic.  We filmed two episodes of a Sportsman Channel show called "Shell Shocked".  This is what we were supposed to film in Kansas, but the host, Patrick Flanagan, never showed up.  Patrick lives in this area so he had no excuse to not show up.

We stayed in the town of Deadwood and then filmed everything at a shooting range.  Jake and I had to manage eight cameras for this shoot.  We got just about every angle a person could get for a shotgun show.  Patrick challenges different people at their shooting sports and then has them try one of his shotgun challenges.  He is pretty awesome with a shotgun, but that's all he shoots, so he kind of sucks with any other gun in his hand.  

It is nice to film everything in one location and makes the filming pretty easy.  The first two days flew by and were not too bad, but then we started to run out of creativity.  There is only so much you can do from a creative standpoint at a shooting range.  There were usually a bunch of different targets so we had to set up the go pros, a Contour HD cam, a little CX camera, and then Jake and I tried to man two Sony Z7's and our big XD Cams.  It was a lot to manage and was a good experience, but four days of that was enough.

We got done early one of the days and decided to be tourists and check out Mount Rushmore.  Man, I felt like a total tourist.

Getting Some Publicity

http://missoulanews.bigskypress.com/missoula/taking-off/Content?oid=1541530

Check out the Missoula Independent this month.  Alex wrote a nice article on the filmmakers of Montana and included me with the cinestar.  Pretty sweet!

Python Hunting at Night

The next morning we decided to film the cooking segment of iguanas.  Our chef has written an iguana cookbook, but while filming him it was apparent that he hasn’t really cooked that many iguanas and doesn’t know that much about cooking.  It only took us about an hour to film this part and we even got to try the iguana.  It didn’t taste that bad.  Bill, the other cameraman, wouldn’t touch it with a ten foot pole.

Later that day we drove back across the state to the everglades for some more python hunting.  We went out at night this time.  We pretty much just drove around trying to spotlight a python.  We got out and walked on the edge of the swamps for a little bit, but it was a waste of time.  No pythons were to be found.  Non-the-less, we still got our hands on one for the cooking segment.

The producers for this show didn’t do their research very well because pythons really aren’t supposed to be eaten.  Their mercury levels are extremely high due to them being on top of the food chain.  They still cooked it and ate it, but I stayed away from eating any python.

The last morning I did a photo shoot with Scott, the host.  They needed and advertisement photo for the 15 magazines that Intermedia Outdoors owns.  They were going to send their own photographer, but I had my DSLR along, so I just did it for an additional fee : )  It might also be sweet to have some photos published in a bunch of magazines.

I don’t really know my next job assignment, so I’ll just continue flying my cinestar and working on our show.

Pythons and Iguanas

Flying over the Missions in Montana

Nothing seems to go right on these "Dead Meat" shows.  Day one we rode on airboats to go pythons hunting in the everglades.  The airboats are pretty sweet because they can go anywhere due to the huge fan that pushes the boat, but they are load and expensive.  It cost $300/hour for an airboat.

I only brought my chacos and didn't quite expect to be trudging through snake infested swamp.  For some reason I thought we would be staying on the boats, but that wasn't the case.  We didn't end up finding any pythons or any snakes for that matter.  It was just an expensive boat ride through the hot and humid swamp.
                                     

   My Hotel on the Gulf of Mexico.  The host and Bill thought

      it was a dump, but I thought it was pretty sweet.

Day two - We drove across the state to the golf of mexico to go iguana hunting.  We took a boat to another island where there were supposedly huge iguanas that need to get killed.  The iguanas are non-native reptiles that are killing all the other animals, so they need to be removed.  I stood and filmed on the deck of an unoccupied mansion as we waited for iguanas to come out.  Sure enough, they appeared from their holes and we filmed one being shot.  I was filming another iguana when a wasp decided to sting my hand.  Our guide freaked out, thinking that I was attacked by an "africanized bee".  He told me to run back to the boat and we all left the island.  I guess these bees leave their scent on you, so all the other bees can find and attack you.  It turns out that it was just a wasp.

We headed back to town to hunt iguanas out of a golf cart.  The iguanas in town were more like geckos and our guide shot them with a little air gun.  It made for some pretty stupid TV.

Next up - eating iguana and night hunting pythons

Heading to Florida

I leave for my next shoot tomorrow.  I'll be filming a show for Dead Meat about hunting pythons.  This should be interesting : )

Shell Shocked

I flew into Kansas today to film a show called Shell Shocked.  The show is fast paced with lots of quick cuts, so I had to bring 5 cameras down with me.  The flight went smooth, I got my rental car, and drove to Hutchinson, KS. I ran around the city and filmed B-roll during the day, and was supposed to meet up with the host, Patrick Flanigan tonight.
Anyway, I get a text saying he missed his flight for reasons I can't discuss.  Our shoot was only supposed to be two days, so cramming it into a smaller time-frame would be impossible.  Ginger, the producer, called me just a little bit ago and decided to cancel the shoot.  So, I fly back to Missoula tomorrow.  You never know what's going to happen with these TV shows.  I guess I can view it as a good little break from the Montana winter : )

Cinestar

I completed the cinestar and have had some awesome test flights.  Besides the accident on Valentines day, the cinestar took me about a weekend to build and then a couple of days of programming and making small adjustments to get it to fly smooth.  The cinestar is awesome!  It will be easy to travel with and films super smooth footage.  I'll put some of my test flights online later.  In the mean time, here's a photo of the cinestar and a shot of it compared the my octocopter in the back.

Epic Valentines Day - Seriously

So Valentines Day took an interesting turn and put Hannah in the hospital.  I built the new Cinestar 6 for filming aerial shots and was running some tests inside.  For the tests I was doing, the propellers have to be on, so I had Hannah hold the Cinestar down while I ran the motors.  Some setting was drastically off and the cinestar ripped through two wooden chairs and sliced Hannah's arm : (  Neither of of were expecting that to happen, and I'm not new to this programing, so it was a freak accident.  Her arm was sliced by the propeller and swelled up huge, so I took her to the ER.  It turns out her arm is not broken, but just needed five stitches.  I've known these helicopters were dangerous, but last night we really witnessed their power.

Hannah's arm will heal and the Cinestar settings are now adjusted correctly, so we're back in business.  This was a Valentines Day we will never forget.

Creating a Monster

I've officially turned my camera into a monster.  I've added a new lens to the collection and a bunch of awesome audio gear (sennheiser wireless mics with a juiced link preamp).  This is the sweetest rig I've ever filmed with.   I've used some pretty awesome $100,000 Sony XD cams, but they just don't compare.  The lenses on the XDCAMS are pretty amazing, but with this rig I can use any canon lens and it's much lighter and easier to switch stuff around than on the XD cams.  It is a little awkward and not super compact, but very versatile with superb quality.

HOTT Secrets: Wanna Know a Secret?

HOTT Secrets: Wanna Know a Secret?: Wanna know a secret? A HOTT secret? Well, now you can! Keep updated on Hot On The Trail's latest news and activities here. More to come soon...

Nerding Out

Man, who'd-of-thought I'd be such a nerd?  I just recently bought a first person view (FPV) setup for my octocopter.  This means I can now wear these goofy glasses and see exactly what I'm filming with my octocopter.  There is a little camera on the octocopter that has a live video feed to these goggles, so I can view everything up to about a thousand feet away.  I can actually go further, but if I loose the signal then I'm kind of screwed.  I know...I look like a nerd, but to get professional video these are kind of essential. Right next to the little camera I'll attach my SLR to get stunning HD video.

Powder Day

Missoula is kind of shut down right now.  With about two feet of snow, it's time to take a little break with work and enjoy the powder day.  Snowbowl got about three feet of snow, so Kevin and I got up there early and had first tracks down China bowl.  Definitely one of my top days.
Aside from snowbowl, Hannah is writing a grant to help fund our pilot episode.  We've also been starting up a "kickstarter" page to help raise money.  That should be up in the next week or so.

New Website

Just uploaded a new website for "Hot On The Trail."  Check it out and share with your friends:
http://hotonthetrailtv.com/

A New Show Is Born

I don't have any work lined up with InterMedia Outdoors for the month of January, so it's time to focus on my own show.  Hannah and I just finished designing the logo and now we're working on a kickstarter page, so we can raise money to produce the pilot episode.  It's going to be an exciting year!!!!!!!!