Above is a unique surfing sequence that was shot shot recently during making the documentary series “South Pacific” with the BBC Natural History Unit in Bristol. (Its on BBC2 at 8-30pm this Sunday)
You may have seen this super slow mo camera kit in action on Blue Planet, Planet Earth and other BBC NHU documentaries; this time the BBC manufactured a water housing to take it into the surf zone for the first time. The detail is awesome.
Click here to watch the surfing clip > Super Slo mo surfing (will be live today, Thursday at 9am GMT
The cameraman who took this beast out was Bali Strickland and surfer was Dylan Longbottom at Ponape (Pohnpei) in Micronesia.
Below are some tech spec’s of the camera if you’re interested. It’ll set you back about £100k, plus the cost of having a bespoke housing engineered, but the results are pretty stunning.
High Speed Cameras
TyphoonHD4 & UwaVis
Using an advanced CMOS sensor with ultra high light sensitivity of 1000 ASA – colour
Resolution 1280 X 1024 pixels
HD res. 720p up to 1000 fps
Max. frame rates up to 200,000 fps
4 GB internal memory, storage 3500 frames (recording time e.g. 3.5sec at 1000 fps or 7 sec at 500fps / at 720p). Internal memory can be partitioned into 2, 4 or 8 partitions.
UW-housing:
A live image is displayed on a LCD viewfinder. All camera functions can be operated while diving. The recorded shot can be viewed immediately. Lens control via servo motors (iris, focus, zoom)
Lenses used: (F-mount) Nikon prime lenses 14mm and 17-35mm.