At eye level with the athletes: the Video 90 FB

During the 2009 World Championships in Athletics in Berlin Sachtler’s Video 90 FB fluid head could be seen at an unusual perspective: The service provider for OB technology TopVision from Berlin mounted the head onto a self-made flat construction. That way the cameraman was able to capture the athletes from an exceptional perspective: at ground level on the Tartan track.

AN EXCEPTIONAL PERSPECTIVE
The Video 90 FB is the classic head for large camera systems and features an exceptionally wide payload range of 0 to 115 kg. So Director Achim Hammer and Achim Jendges, Technical Director at TopVision, used this head at the 2009 World Championships in Athletics in Berlin. While searching for an extraordinary perspective of the athletes during the 110 meters hurdles, Juergen Pfanner, vision technician at TopVision, adapted the fluid head. In order to capture the athletes‘ concentration and tension at the start Juergen Pfanner built a special flat base onto which the Video 90 FB was mounted during the three hours between the pre-runs and the final runs.

CAPTURING EMOTIONS WITH A FLAT CONSTURCTION
“With this unique configuration we were able to make the desired pans and capture the emotions,” said Eduard Palasan, Managing Director at TopVision, “we shot with a large HD camera (SuperSlowMotion) and a Canon DIGISUPER 100AF lens which we used with the auto focus switched off. The rig had to bear a total weight of 110 kilograms.” The result impressed the team. So this configuration with the Sachtler head will be in use again at the next Athletics Meeting.

Photo: © Eduard Palasan, TopVision