Wednesday, November 28, 2007
The Green Hell of Panama
The Republic of Panama is a rather young country and has a total population of only 3.2 million. The pretty much most important source for foreign exchange is the Panama Canal. It connects the Pacific Ocean with the Caribbean Sea and thus the Atlantic Ocean; length of the passage is merely 80 km. It is the strategically most important canal in the world and is mainly used for trade between the East Coast of the USA, China and Japan since the circumnavigation of South America means an extra 15 - 20,000 km! Cost for the passage depends on the size of the ship and are typically 50 - 150,000 USD; the crossing takes about 10 hours.
The first plans for a canal had been made in the 16th century already, but it wasn't until 1881 that France actually started excavations, approved by Colombia (Panama did not yet exist at that time!). Why France? Well, it was a French company that had successfully built the Suez Canal linking the Mediterranean Sea with the Red Sea through Egyptian terrain. Inspired by this success they thought it was as simple to build a channel through a jungle as it had been to build one through a desert.
After many scandals the works ended in fiasco in 1889. An unbelievable number of 22,000 people had lost their lives in the green hell of Panama, mainly because of Malaria and Yellow Fever (at that time little was known about how these diseases spread). Only 1/6th of the canal had been completed by that time.
The remains of the canal were sold to the USA in 1902, but Colombia did not agree to the terms of the USA for continuing work on the project. So the history repeated itself, like so many times before and also till present day – the USA supported a revolution within the country, leading to the foundation and independence of Panama from Colombia in 1903. A few months later in 1904 a corridor around the projected canal became U.S. territory – "forever", so the contract.
The construction continued from 1906 to 1914; another 6,000 workers died. Since its official opening in 1920 the Panama Canal has caused repeated political tension between the USA and Panama; on 31st Dec. 1999 the canal was finally given to Panama.
In 2006 it has been decided to expand the current Panama Canal so it can be used by larger ships, the so-called Post-Panamax class. Works have begun this year and completion is scheduled for 2015.
When checking in for flights to South America you have to show your official vaccination card with proof of vaccination against Yellow Fever. The flight from Mexico to Panama is only four hours; at the Panama customs we ran into serious trouble with the helicopter. We're pretty sure it might have become the same nightmare as in Egypt if it hadn't been for our many, many pictures of the heli in front of monuments worldwide. We explained a lot and were finally allowed to enter the country. No need to say how happy we were when thinking back to the interrogations we had had to endure in Egypt; that really had been hell on earth, there is no other words for it.
The customs officials had told us that radio frequencies were a big issue in the Canal Zone and that for use of any radio equipment permission from the Canal Authority was necessary. We of course nodded but were sure that with robbe/Futaba's 2.4 GHz FASST system and the low output power of R/C transmitters there would be no problems whatsoever. We were right about that (no surprise), but little did we know about the loads of other problems associated with flights over the Panama Canal.
The climate in Panama is tropical which means one good shower a day and extremely high air humidity. Regardless of what you do, your clothes are wet all the time; very good, of course, when changing from air conditioned rooms and cars to the outdoors and back. It's a wonder if you don't catch a cold. Another problem in this context is that when taking your film/photo equipment or the heli and transmitter out of an air conditioned car the lense, display, etc. will immediately steam up. You can't take any pictures for up to half an hour until the equipment has reached ambient temperature! We solved the problem by using the A/C as little as possible; the price you pay is that you sweat like hell and feel eternally worn out after just one or two hours. If we'd closed our eyes we'd have fallen asleep in no time …
Talking about A/C: Our hotel room of course did have such a cooling system. Unfortunately, it was so loud that normal conversations across the room were a problem! Turning it off was no good as humidity (not the heat) would have killed us. So we had to put up with the noise – it felt like sleeping in the generator room of a power plant! The best way to deal with this situation was to use earplugs. Not a comfortable stay at all, but when booking hotels in 20 countries over the internet you cannot spend hours checking every last detail of every place.
Panama-City is the capital and quite a flashy city with a nice skyline – but better not scrape off the shiny surface! Apart from some major roads the infrastructure is not the best and driving is neither relaxing nor fun. Multi-lane roads often don't have any road markings, a number of one-way streets make navigation difficult and signs e.g. on the highway are mostly ONLY at exits; in other words, when you can read the sign it is usually too late to react and you can only continue on the current road. To make it extra hard they use an especially narrow type font so you don't get the chance to read the signs already from a distance (in the unlikely case you see them coming).
Did we talk about the torrential rains? It is so bad that parts of the streets are flooded – it pays to think twice before crossing such fords. Some of the cars are equipped with snorkels for exactly these situations. And the worst: There are some really, really deep potholes! The tricky thing is they are completely filled with water so it looks as if an ordinary puddle was coming. But it isn't! Instead it's a hole which can swallow "half" a car. To us it happened twice; the cars around you drive like wild and keep you busy by using their horns so that the pothole traps catch you by surprise. We tried to turn right when all of a sudden – WHUMPP! – a good portion of our front dived down into such a hole filled with water.
Okay, where is that canal?! In maps and satellite pictures you could see a small road following the course of the canal; we tried hard to find it, but after about five hours we had to realize that it was merely a support road and not open to the public. It may sound as unbelievable to you as it sounded to us, but the Panama Canal is one of the best-secured structures we have ever seen. There are high fences everywhere, usually with barbed wire on the top (and no, we didn't have a ladder at hand this time :-) ). The streets near the canal are patrolled by a number of security cars of the Canal Authority. Every big ship is accompanied by a tug boat plus one patrol boat. Between the ships a wealth of such fast canal patrol boats go back and forth. In other words: There is no reasonable way to get close to the canal! You think this cannot be true, but it is. You stretch your hand out over the water, they will come for you.
The reason for all the fences and stuff may be that the terrain used to be U.S. American property. Remember, the canal didn't belong to Panama until the year 2000! Now, are all the 80 km fenced in?! Good question, and the answer is: Probably not! BUT: That's not necessary anyway because the canal leads through tropical rainforest. This kind of forest is so dense it is totally impenetrable; hard to imagine, but even a huge tank wouldn't make it more than a few feet into the thicket. It's often swampland, too, and the home of a wealth of animals you don't want to meet; we saw the first big silver-grey snake cross the street while driving along some deserted roads. And then, even in the theoretical case you'd make it to the canal banks, how could you possibly lift off?! So 'Game Over' for the Panama Canal?
Labels: camera problem, Green Hell, Panama, Panama Canal, security problem, topical rainforest, tropical climate, Yellow Fever
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
The Grand Canyon Flights
The Grand Canyon certainly is one of the most impressive natural structures of this planet. It is situated in Northern Arizona and has an unbelievable length of 450 km, its width varying from 6 to 30 km. One distinguishes the higher North Rim, the South Rim and the Inner Canyon; the depth is up to 1.8 km and thus it is no wonder that on the way down through five different climatic zones both flora and fauna change significantly.
Natives already lived here some 3,000 years ago, but it wasn't until 1540 that a Spanish expedition (who else at that time!) first reached the South Rim – they were impressed and realized it was impossible to cross the canyon. So they left, and it took more than 300 years until the first serious explorers and cartographers came back to the area.
How did the Grand Canyon came to be? About 70 million years ago the Rocky Mountains were born and blocked the Colorado River which used to flow in south-eastern direction. So it changed its path in western direction, right across the newly formed Colorado Plateau. The rock there was comparatively loose and melted snow and ice from the Rockies let the Colorado grow into a mighty river; an unstoppable erosion process started, and here we are, 50 million years later, left breathless with such an incredible piece of nature.
Guess what – the UNESCO guys were also here! In 1979 the Grand Canyon was added to the list of world nature heritage. We really wonder when these guys will show up in our backyard at home …
After exchanging the main drive wheel of the Three Dee MP-XL I thought it was a good idea to do a quick test before flying it out over the Grand Canyon. Some guys who know me personally will smile now, but: With age comes wisdom …! ;-)
All kidding aside, the problem was that the whole area is densely covered with trees; except the roads and the parking lots in the Grand Canyon National Park there are no suitable spots for flying. We drove 25 miles through the park and finally found what appeared to be a former road into the woods. It was quite covered with trees, too, but at least reasonably firm soil so the heli wouldn't disappear in a cloud of dust during take-off and landing. I lifted off – nothing unusual. The gears were louder than normal but that's nothing uncommon with new gears. After 10 seconds I got bored and did a couple of precision flips between the trees. Everything seemed fine; very well then, back to the canyon!
It is until the very edge of the canyon that the terrain is completely covered with trees – one more step and the mighty canyon opens up before your eyes. Wow! – There is no words for this. One keeps looking in all possible directions, desperately trying to get this view under control; the sheer size and depth of the structure are just unbelievable. And now comes the problem …
The human eye and brain are a marvel that technology will never be able to hold a candle to. Capturing ultra-wide structures like the Grand Canyon is generally a big problem: The picture of any type of camera is limited! Granted, you could use special wide-angle lenses – but then the only way to create impressive scenes is to project them onto a large cinema screen. And even this leaves you with the danger of picturing just a plain "wallpaper" with not much of a depth perspective. Next issue when going for panoramic or full shots are the shadows. On the one hand they help you to add a third dimension to the scene – that's good! On the other hand this generates a high contrast situation – and that's very bad! Once again, other than the human eye film cameras – and especially digital video/photo cameras – have a very limited contrast range. Or in other words: If you don't want smaller details to break away in brighter spots the camera has to reduce the luminance of the picture. But this comes at a price: In the darker regions of the picture some objects will blend in with the background. So isn't it possible to brighten the picture just in the darker regions while not sacrificing details in overexposed spots? You'll guess the quick answer: No, you can't (you'd loose contrast!). It all boils down to increasing the dynamic range of the recording device, and like said before there is only so and so much that technology is capable of. Also think of videos of 3D aerobatic flying: When the sky is clouded and thus much light is reflected and the heli suddenly goes down and flies below the tree line it just disappears in the dark.
Okay, so we obviously have a problem – how can we fix it? Well, depending on what you actually want to express and to show with your pictures there is a number of things you can do. Even though it is very interesting to discuss such camera related problems, let's just focus on our very situation.
To add depth to still shots you will want to add "layers" to your picture. Find a bush for the foreground, then place the main object (person, heli, etc.) behind it, further in the background could be a distinct mountain, and only then follows the "wallpaper" far behind. Have a look at the shot below, it's quite three-dimensional.
Compared to still photography filming is always more difficult but at the same time greatly increases your possibilities. We wanted the viewer to first focus onto the helicopter and not to reveal the incredible backdrop at once. So at first the camera follows the heli with a close-up or at least a medium long shot while it is travelling towards us more or less along the edge of the canyon. At the point where it is closest the picture is almost fully open (heli still big!); the machine then dives down into the canyon, the camera zooming behind. It glides to the right and starts kind of a nose-in pie dish manoeuvre. The camera does not follow anymore but now opens the picture – wow! The vast size of the canyon becomes obvious while the heli gets smaller and smaller; the picture now slightly pans to follow the motion of the aircraft. When returning to the cameraman and pilot the picture again zooms in. Very impressive!
This simple kind of camera movement solves a couple of problems at the same time. First, the heli is presented to the viewer; his attraction is not torn between what the machine is doing and where it is flying. In addition, limiting the view quite effectively avoids bright and dark spots in the same picture; thus it is easy for the camera's automatic mode to light the scene correctly. Third, there's the "wow!" effect when the picture finally opens and the heli glides over the vast canyon structure.
The above sounds simple – and that's what it is in principle. However, good timing is required to create the "magical" scene we were looking for. It took us 2.5 battery packs to achieve an acceptable result. This means there was not much airtime left for still shots; so unfortunately we had to compromise a little on those.
Flying over the Grand Canyon was different from all other flights before. To get rid of the trees in the foreground and avoid disturbance by other visitors of the national park we had to climb down a couple of meters into the canyon. Not so easy with a helicopter, transmitter, battery packs, cameras and a tripod; one wrong step and you may end up on the rocks a kilometer beneath you! Same problem while flying and filming: You focus so much on the heli and the camera picture that the reference around you for keeping the balance is somehow missing. It feels somewhat like standing on top of a ladder while looking up into the sky; only the drop is a little longer … Now does this mean you have to stand directly at the edge?! Yes of course, how else could you fly and film down?! :-)
Crashing into a river, the sea or also into difficult terrain like at the Great Wall of China means the heli is completely lost – no way to get it back. But it was never more obvious then when flying over the Grand Canyon; the heli flies out and dives down until it is a mere speck in the sky, soundless, somehow lost in an unbelievably wide environment, gliding 1.5 km over the ground. I nearly got a heart attack when all of a sudden the tail swung around!
Emergency landing. Hell, what was that?! I had a very close look at the whole helicopter but couldn't find anything. After watching the situation on the video a couple of times I decided it was an RPM problem. Now how's that possible?
A couple of people have noticed (and asked by email) we sometimes use Kontronik's Power Jazz 63 V as electronic speed controller, and some other times the big Schulze ESC. The governor mode of Kontronik ESCs is legendary, and we use Kontronik equipment in pretty much most of our electric machines. However, when flying with throttle curves rather than flat lines (i.e. governor mode) we often prefer the Schulze controller. At the Grand Canyon site we wanted the heli to dive down into the depth as smoothly as possible. It looks best if you do not force it down in 3D mode or with constant RPM, but if you actually let it autorotate; in other words a throttle curve will work best in this case. Again this comes at a price: You cannot fly fast backward autos and/or do pirouettes forever. There is a point when the tail comes round and the machine "locks" into forward flight. That's what caught me a little by surprise, so … phew!
The 800 km drive back to LA was smoother than expected, and we had half a day left for visiting the Universal Studios; as cool as always. Personally I'm pretty sure that if I started my life again, I'd become a filmmaker. Isn't HeliGraphix moving more and more towards filming anyway? That's true; still there is a significant difference to Hollywood (at least up to now): HeliGraphix is NO special effects! Every second of film footage you see is REAL! Real people, real stunts, real adventures, real helicopters, real challenges, real crashes in a real world! Our life is no different from yours – that's what makes HeliGraphix so exciting, so tangible, so cool. And so insane … ;-)
Labels: Arizona, camera problem, Grand Canyon, Kontronik, Schulze, Universal Studios
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