Can you explain to readers your movie set-up and how it differs from other reality / gameshow movie teams?
After doing three seasons, our camera setup is now the simplest it has ever been. The first season we filmed on iPhones, GoPros and a Blackmagic Pocket Cinema that was awful to lug around the country, especially in Vegas in 110 degree heat. We even brought a mini drone that never saw the light of day. We learned that we need to streamline production so as not to let production get in the way of content. So we simplified to iPhone 13 Pros, Rode low microphones and some 360 cameras. We were always moving, so we needed cameras that were just super reliable, easy to use, charge and transfer data. Right now we are a whole iPhone 13 Pro production. They are so easy to find, so if we break a device halfway through, the possibility of just getting a direct replacement within an hour or two is huge.
What changes in season 2?
In season 2, the game format is a whole different one, and it’s a whole different placement. Basically, it’s a race to get around the world. We started in Denver, and the first team to return to Denver after crossing each longitude and traveling a distance greater than Cancer’s Tropic (approximately 22,500 miles) wins. There is a record for sailing around the world on commercial flights; it’s something people regularly do. Usually, the people who do it have a little bit of help, or it is high-profile enough that the airlines will try to make it happen.
We did not want to do anything about it. We wanted to make the right version, having to deal with check-in lines and security lines – and what actually made us more excited to do so now was the extra complexity that Covid introduces, like having to think about border openings, Covid tests, entry forms, massive security lines and understaffed airports.
How did you stay safe while filming a state-hopping game show during a global pandemic, especially given states’ different levels of security and Covid control?
This format is somewhat dictated by the fact that it is quite good with Covid because it evolved under Covid. In many of the other productions we do, we have to do months of preparatory work to arrange interviews, on-site visits and on-site visits. We had to start locking dates months in advance, which is really hard when you never know when the next Covid wave is. Here, the only thing we do in advance is just design the game; we spend no production money. We could decide two hours before that we do not do this now because the Covid rates are too high or because this person on the cast was tested positive and is not losing costs. We have only ever filmed when prices are relatively low and in the post-vaccine era, and then we go into the normal precautions for vaccines, testing before departure and on arrival and masking.
Can you tell me more about how to offset the aircraft’s CO2 emissions? finance replacements of Burmese stoves? What was your main takeaway on carbon offsets after releasing a video below Jetlagsent with the title “The Carbon Compensation Problem.”