Toyota Russia - Fedor Konyukhov Hot Air Balloon World Record Attempt
Fedor Konyukhov is a Russian adventurist, traveler and sailor.
Among his long list of lifetime achievements, he has; reached the North Pole 3 times, the South Pole, submitted Everest twice and sailed around the world via Cape Horn 4 times. He has crossed the Atlantic Ocean in row boat, completed the longest dog race in the world and is the third person in the world who has completed the Explorers Grand Slam;- where you reach the North and South Pole as well as climbing seven Summits.
As as of 12th July 2016;- he looked to add the quickest time to circumnavigate the world in a hot air balloon. This is his biggest challenge yet. And we we're asked to be there.
On short notice we received a call from Toyota WA on behalf of Toyota Russia; they were looking for a videographer to cover an attempt to break world record in ballooning. The team originally had a Russia videography team following the attempt, but due to month's delays in the balloon's launch caused by the weather, they had to head back to Russia - leaving the Toyota without a videographer. We we're asked to step in.
Our brief was to capture the vital role that Toyota and the two Toyota HiLux's played in the project's undertaking. We headed to Northam a few days before the flight to catch up with the Russian-led, British, South African and Australian team.
Let's take a look at sample screenshots from our footage from our first trip.
On our first trip to the Northam Airstrip we worked with the team to capture three key interviews;- Oscar, Fredor's son and Project Manager, Fredor;- the balloon's pilot and Don Cameron;- Founder of Cameron Balloons. The interviews, captured in a mixture of Russian and English, provide an overview of the project, the preparations involved and challenges with the project as well as covering the role that Toyota and the Toyota HiLux had had on the project.
A week later we headed back to Northam for a very early start so as to capture the lift off, let;s take a look at some sample screenshots we captured.
Preparations for a world record attempt are long with the team starting the day before we got there to roll out the balloon. The inflation took place overnight at around 11pm until 1am. We arrived on site at 4am to capture the final preparations and the launch itself.
Key to this project was capturing the role of the Toyota HiLux on the project so, alongside capturing footage that would be useful for editing later, we needed to keep the vehicle as a star of the show.
Lets take a look at some sample footage that we captured.
This piece of work was delivered as part of our "shoot-only" services. Our footage has now been transferred to Russia where it will be edited with other footage captured by the Russian Videography Team and drone footage. The final product will be used online as part of a marketing campaign in Russia for the Toyota Hilux.
If you are interested in our "Shoot-Only" services, please feel free to get in contact. Along with working directly with companies, this is becoming a more common service used by marketing and advertising agencies as well as other media companies, usually when they are located on the East coast.
Good luck to Fedor and the team. You can follow all Fedor's latest news here.
