SHOOTING FROM HELICOPTERS
"hanging out" on top on Mt St Sauveur QC at the Shakedown.
Back in the day I used to spend a lot of time in helicopters on the west coast and sometimes I'd literally hang out of the door over giant mountains to film my friends riding through powder. I'll never forget the first time i had to hang out of a heli to shoot. I got a call at 6am with an invite to jump on the crew to shoot with Kevin Young for a feature in SBC Magazine., I arrived at the helipad in Pemberton BC and within seconds the guide tossed me a belt, I'm like wait a minute this is supposed to be my harness? I don't get a four point harness? The guide said, Yup thats it! Holy crap , OK!
So within a few minutes we find ourselves on the top of Mt Currie, My buddy Colin Adair was the photog and i was shooting video. After watching the guide and Kevin cut a giant cornice with a rope we took off in the bird with the door already open. Colin is right on top of my shoulder and we lift off, my feet are on the ski of the heli and all my weight is on this little belt, shit! I have major butterflies in my stomach and i can feel my heart in my throat as I look down and see my house off in the distance...
Its go time!, Kevin is about to drop in, it looks sooo icy and windy at the top and im scared for his life, he drops in and scrapes ice for about 30 feet then starts to make a couple turns i gain some composure and thats when i realize i never hit the record button!!!! DAMN! SO i missed the gnarliest part but still ended up with great shots of him riding down the rest of the chute. Needless to say i never missed a shot again.
