Two birds with one Car

I know some of you don't care when and how often we air the YouTube episodes, but I like to make strict schedules and procedures, and follow them to the letter. However, sometimes work and other things pile up, and these YouTube episodes get delayed. This week's episode will have to be delayed till next week. There is just no way I can maintain the quality I had intended for this episode, and air the episode in time.

The coming episode will touch upon the Bridgestone Potenza RE070s Extreme Summer Performance tires, as well as a slight overview of the current state of the STI on our show, our very own Project Impulse.

I'll be trying out some new editing techniques on this episode as well, and if successful we will be using it on many future episodes. All of the above takes time, so please be patient. However, because we aren't airing the episode on time this week, I thought it would be nice to show you guys some screen captures of our work in progress.

Three live cameras, synced together.

Spades doing most of the driving for the episode.

As mentioned earlier, there was an accident during our shoot. One of the GoPro cameras mounted on Puyang's lead camera car, fell off and made a huge tumble on the pavement. Camera C mounted on his car, caught the whole thing on film. Below are a sequence of four images, depicting what happened:

GoPro camera (Camera B) loses suction on the Honda Prelude and falls off. Both the Camera car and Subject car are moving at 40 MPH.

Distance between the two cars are consistent, as seen in the picture sequence. The camera is bouncing off the pavement, and flying towards the STI at an alarming rate. 

Spades behind the wheel, does a quick steering maneuver to avoid it. Not knowing it was the Camera at the time.

After the maneuver, Spades looks up and sees the missing Camera B on Puyang's car.

We actually have the footage from the falling camera as well. I went through that footage frame by frame, and counted the amount of times the Camera did a complete 360 degree tumble. It had done nine complete tumbles before coming to a complete stop on the pavement face down. In the footage, you see the back end of the Honda Prelude, and you see glimpses of the STI's hawkeye headlights coming towards it. There were some glimpses of the sky, trees, and other things as well. The footage was massively distorted, but I think I will include that footage for you guys anyways, lol.

It's just a thought right now, but I might use the footage we have right now for two episodes. Since this week's episode will be delayed, I'd like to make it up to you guys, and possibly give you guys two videos on back to back weeks. I'll see what I can do to keep you guys entertained.

That's it for now! Stay tuned!

The Good, the Bad, and the Handsome

This morning, the Machine Zealots team set in motion to do some massive filming for the next episode. One of the viewers had asked us to talk about the difference between Performance Summer tires and Performance Winter tires. The episode in progress was meant to touch upon that subject, but mainly, it has been a while since we've shown some good old driving videos! That is all the information we are going to release on this episode for now. However, if you are interested in todays process, feel free to continue reading.

GoPro Cameras setup!

We'd like to thank GoPro for sponsoring us these two new cameras, because for shots like these, having more than one camera is very benefitial. If you are a frequent race car driver, investing in one or two of these cameras are a must. More cameras, means more angles, means more footage in one pass. We actually had to rotate the three cameras around three times in different locations, giving us nine different angles to use in our final edit.

STI ready for action!

Puyang, as our second camera man today.

We woke up at 9 AM this morning, planning out our shooting route, pit stops, and the different angles needed for today. We left home base around 10 AM, packed up all the cameras, tripods, and other equipment. We proceeded to shoot on our most familiar location, which I like to call it, the Machine Zealots' Test Track, lol.

Puyang and the STI.

Admiring the STI, while the car cools down.

We finished shooting part one around 12 PM. We went back to home base and set up Puyang's car to be the camera car. This would give us more dynamic shots of the STI as it's driving. On the way to our destination, one of the GoPro cameras fell off his car and did a massive tumble on the pavement! I was behind Puyang at the time, thank God, and saw some plastic thing fly towards the STI. We went back to pick up the camera, and found it like this:

GoPro lens and case is beat up from falling off moving car.

As I ran for the dropped camera, several cars seem to have just ignored it, and drove on through it. Luckily the camera avoided its ruthless demise since it had dropped in the middle of the street, and avoided all the tires of the oncoming cars. We met up at the nearest pit stop, and checked the condition of the camera. The good news is, the camera was STILL SHOOTING! I'll be sure to include the dropping of the camera in our final edit, it made us all laugh. We finished up around 12:30 PM, giving today a total shooting time of two and a half hours. I'll have more previews from our edit for you guys to see as soon as I find the time to compile them!

Stay tuned.

Oh yes, one last thing, we are on Instagram, so be sure to follow us if you are interested in some Machine Zealots daily life adventures!

MZ Promo Trailer

This is a promotional trailer that I made over the past couple of days. I've been trying to establish more viewers, creating better content and videos. It's been hard since I've changed over to the STI though. However, I've turned over a new leaf and I'm approaching Machine Zealots a bit differently than SpadesV6. I've been aggressively contacting companies for sponsorships, most of them are nice enough to actually reply my e-mails, lol. However, other than that, nothing substantial has taken place... yet. However, one company and I are in the works of bringing a brand new, never before released product into the Subaru community. If my old Camaro readers are reading this, you would know this company quite well, since I've praised their products. Hopefully the package will come in the mail in a week or two. More updates on this later.

As of now, I am in the works of editing more videos, and will be online in the weeks to follow.