S.A.T.O. Past and Present

  So Below are some links to my last S.A.T.O. 48 Project. That stands for Springfield And The Ozarks 48 Hour Film Competition. This is a competition I compete in every year for the past 5 years. Below are last years Trailer and Film. If you have ever seen a film that I have directed you would notice that in almost every one there is some form of underwater work. This film was the type of story that I'd been wanting to do with underwater for some time.
  Underwater is difficult to do under normal conditions let alone in a 48 hour period. Luckily, each year, I have upped my underwater gear. Last year I built a housing for the Canon T2i the night of the competition. The housing worked out great. I built it from a "Pelican" type case, some PVC, optical glass, and about 10 tubes of loctite 5 minute cure, two part epoxy. we shot all the mermaid shots in the Aqua Sports dive pool with the t2i and a black tarp. The other river and coin shot was got on location at Sequiota park with the gopro hd hero. The gopro footage looked ok enough for the competition and wowed the audience but there is a distortion when you use the domed lens underwater. For this year I have already solved the problem with the GoPro lens. I built myself a new lens out of a watch face and a lens adapter ring. It works amazingly! The first test of that lens was on the "Mystery Hour" shoot with Nate Black and Jeff Houghton. Our stunt man for the shoot, Frank Gonzales, had used several previous generation gopro's in the past and was completely familiar with the mounts and how to use the cameras. This shoot fully prepared us for the next shoot and more importantly, we got great shots.
  This years competition takes place in April and I've really got to step up my game. armed with 3 GoPro's and a T2i I hope to rock the competition with the most dazzling underwater footage yet. The hardest part is making a story work with the rules and underwater and in under 5 minutes. I wish I had a separate screenwriter and editor, but even without, I hope to make 2 films for this years SATO.
  So check out the videos below and comment away!