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#1
03-20-2012, 01:07 AM
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This is Laffit Pincay Jr. -- one of the strongest stretch riders in racing history -- pulling Sham up for the entire final furlong of the Ky Derby. Fast forward to 4 minutes and 25 seconds in.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GhHfn...eature=related 
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#2
03-20-2012, 08:56 AM
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#3
03-20-2012, 09:17 AM
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The Jeep cam is lovely, but it's all a fairly wide shot. To get in closer, you can't just zoom in on the picture, because the focus will be off, or, in the case of video where everything is in focus, you won't have any depth of field and the shot will look very flat. In addition, all of your shots would be limited to wide-range side shots and POV if the track happens to have jockey cams. You can't have any lower straight-on shots because the fence will be in the way. In the lead-up to the start of the race in the clip from Secretariat, there are dozens of shots- a close up of hooves in the dirt, a jockey stroking a lock of his mount's mane, two jockeys eyeballing each other. Those are all necessary to build dramatic tension, would never be shot before an actual race (would take too long) and if you shot them separately and then cut them into shots of an actual race, with other horses, etc., even if, by some fortune, all of the horses you'd cast matched the look of all the horses in the actual race, and all the jockeys' silks matched, the video quality would not match and the race would look like what it is- stock footage. Plus, there's no way to guide the audience's eye with a wide shot. People who know how to watch races can focus on one horse's trip, but a movie-going audience is going to be totally lost as to which horse they are supposed to be watching. Even the most complete racing result form is not going to list what the angles of the camera were, and that's what an editor needs- to know what the shot looked like, and there's no way to do that other than going through the hours and hours of video and watching it. It's not about what happens in the race; it's about what the shot looked like. Part of the challenge is that horse races, by the nature of what they are, aren't ideal for the film medium. I sometimes think it would be cool if a fictional piece would film a race in the style of the Robert Downey Jr. Sherlock Holmes movie- where the camera and effects show you Holmes' thought process, since a lot of the dramatic tension of a race is a person on the back of a running horse making split-second decisions about what to do based on what is happening right then. And I wish movies would stop with the close-ups on a horse's eye. For the audience to really experience an emotional reaction, you really need both eyes facing forward. It's the reason dogs look so expressive on camera. Good short explanation of stock footage, along with a great trip down memory lane of examples of it in certain movies and TV shows: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/StockFootage
__________________
Gentlemen! We're burning daylight! Riders up! -Bill Murray
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#5
03-21-2012, 06:23 AM
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Too bad the computer rendering and CGI that is so present in movies like Lord of the Rings, Jurassic Park, all the recent science fiction titles, is not quite up to being able to accurately render a horse race from scratch.
One could conceivably pan the empty track and superimpose the virtual horses (with real jockey closeups and placement in shots) and make it look good. I don't think they are quite there yet with living things. Inanimate objects of all sorts can be done and look as real as anything else. In a couple of years, this issue could be moot - there would be no potential for injury and nothing for the "animal rights" people to complain about, and yet we could depict horse racing from any angle, in any scenario onscreen.
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#6
03-21-2012, 09:29 AM
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__________________
"An Absolute Thriller!!" - Grassy wins a six-way photo finish, Saratoga 9th, 8-22-09
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#7
03-21-2012, 10:25 AM
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__________________
Do I think Charity can win? Well, I am walking around in yesterday's suit.
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#8
03-21-2012, 01:50 PM
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Great story. The whole situation is a real shame! I've watched every episode and although I thought the first few episodes were a little dry, I think the show was really starting to gain momentum. But, in the end I think it really came down to ratings. If I wasn't a race fan, I'm not sure I would have watched it.
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