“Somewhere” – Paralleling Natural Beauty with Man-made Industrial Wonders

“Somewhere” is a timelapse film about the world’s natural beauty alongside man made industrial wonders. We recently had a chance to catch up with Garrit & Ciarán.

Kessler University (KU): Tell me a little about yourself.

Garrit Pieper (GP): Well, my name is Garrit Pieper and I am a photographer with my main focus being nature and industrial work. My colleague, Ciarán Ryan, comes from a post-production background. Our paths crossed a few years back when we worked on a few jobs together and we kept in touch. About 18 months ago we got to talking – I wanted to take my creative side further by perhaps crossing into film and Ciarán wanted to learn more about the actual production end of things rather than just working in the post side of it. We decided that timelapse was a natural step for us to whet our appetite for film. So we are the people behind Miadox and on March 21st of 2012 we opened our doors for business.

KU:Why did you choose Kessler Crane over other companies? What is it like shooting with Kessler Crane gear?

Ciarán Ryan (CR): After checking out a lot of reviews of equipment we became more and more convinced that Kessler was the choice for us, chiefly due to the combination of reasonable prices and what was said as great build quality. When we got our hands on the stuff we weren’t disappointed. The stuff is so robust it’s amazing. We just throw it in the back of the car and head off to shoot – simple. When we’re on the road we see often see something that we just have to stop and shoot and setting up the gear is so easy that we lose no time at all for the actual shooting.

Another important factor was that the gear is multifunctional. The fact that the Cineslider would function greatly in both the timelapse and film worlds made it a must buy for us.

We then invested in the KC-12 system because we knew that it will work together with the Shuttle Pod enabling us to use the system in both timelapse and film. The Shuttle Pod is next on our to buy list along with the Revolution Head, as this will function on both the Cineslider and the KC-12.

This modular design of the equipment also weighed heavy in our decision to go with Kessler.

KU: We would love to know more about the film. Can you elaborate?

GP: This film was inspired by man’s ingenuity alongside natures own.

If you look at both industry and nature, what it all boils down to is function. Function dictates design. We are inspired by nature in so many ways that we mirror it time and time again. A lot of the times you will find that man will study nature to get ideas how to design their products in a similar manner. They will look to nature because most of the time nature has already developed a solution. A perfect example of this is how the Wright brothers studied birds to see how they stayed airborne. When such a solution is found then humans implement it time and again such as when the flowers bloom the same way year after year.

The same goes for when bees leave the hive in the morning juxtaposed with human rush hour traffic you will notice the same actions being implemented over and over again. It happens all the time. Some of these actions take time and that means the viewer usually can’t always see this but when captured as a timelapse it becomes very clear. The title comes from the fact that it’s happening somewhere right now around us, we just have to open our eyes and look for it.

Overall it’s about design, repeating processes and it shows that the human world and the natural world are more intertwined and interconnected than one would think. We can only hope that it’s always beneficial.

KU: How do you feel the gear has helped you with your storytelling?

CR: Put simply – a lot. I mean, straight off the bat, as we said above, the portability of this gear is great. It means we can get it into some tricky locations that otherwise we would have given up on. Using the Cineslider to reveal hidden sections of the scene is fantastic and it helps to give the audience a better feeling of the scale. It can really add a lot of drama. We like to be spontaneous with our shooting so when we see something that we want to capture we know that we can just grab the gear out of the car and it will work with minimal set up and that lets us focus more on the image.

Again, the modular design of Kessler is a key feature. It means we can add features step by step which is important if you need to squeeze every penny out of your budget, which, being a young company like we are, is of the utmost importance. This modular design makes it possible to go from simple slider movements to large scale crane movements. It’s good to know that such options are there and we know it will give us much more artistic freedom. The same thinking applies to the Revolution head and combined with the rest of the Kessler gear it gives the film maker almost endless possibilities to create the shot they want since the technology is not limiting. It supports the vision.

KU: What’s next from you?

GP & CR: Well, “Somewhere” is planed to be in three parts. The majority of the first part were tripod shots. Once we bought the Cineslider we added another feather to our cap as filmmakers. These films are a kind of self-reflection our own growth as artists as with each film we want to add better and more daring shots, both on a technical and an artistic level. We have already begun work on the second part.

In general though, we have been overwhelmed by the response we have got since we first published “Somewhere”. I don’t think in our wildest dreams we ever thought we would have gotten such amazing feedback. A lot of people have been in touch with us regarding work so it’s great to have been noticed. So much has been going on in the background for us over these last few weeks. One thing that we can say, though, is that we are in the pre-production phase to shoot for two nature documentaries that will air on prime-time national television in 2013. It’s crazy for us right now, but in the best possible way of course!

Best Regards from Garrit & Ciarán