In December 2015 the team from Combo Bravo was asked to help create Karamoja Rising, a UNICEF360 film being made by the great team at Idea Studio. The film needed to be able to capture the harsh daily realities facing the children of Uganda’s Karamoja region and help tell their story.
The Challenge
Going into preproduction the main deciding factor for the technical needs was the final deliverable needed to be in stereoscopic 3D for headset activation. At the time that meant the 360heros 14 GoPro camera rig. The camera needed to be carried into the field in multiple locations and had to be broken down to fly carry on in a backpack. We would be shooting doc style on location so that meant we needed the cameras to be able to be deployed quickly and have the most uptime possible.
The Approach
The biggest thing we tackled was creating a power solution that would charge and power all 14 cameras off one Lithium Ion battery. After a lot of trial and error and learning to solder we were able to come up with a V-Lock plate and voltage convertor that would convert the 14v battery output to the 5V go pro comparable power and still support the high amperage of the multi camera array. Paired with a GoPro Smart remote paired to all the camera and a light weight tripod we had a system that one person could build and pickup and carry around with ease.
The Result
Ideas Studio delivered Karamoja Rising and released through the UNICEF360 app n May 2016 and the film is currently being utilized as a donation tool to help children all over the world. We have since used the same camera configuration and system to shoot 2 other documentary peices with great success.