Pre-Production
Planning ran to several weeks. We produced a full creative treatment for both films before a frame was shot, establishing the nine-scene structure and narrative thread. Working with the Council's event team, we confirmed vehicle access, crew parking, and our position within the event footprint. A ground risk assessment covered 19 hazards, with a separate drone assessment for the day's fixed-wing and parachute displays. Airspace permissions were secured well in advance around two non-negotiable windows: the formation capture and the 11:49am satellite pass. We also pre-filmed interviews with Sam Doody of Airbus Portsmouth and Mark Waldron of Portsmouth News alongside the Lord Mayor, and coordinated with Shaping Portsmouth on contributors.
Production
Armed Forces Day was a full production day, 9am to 5pm, with a crew of five. We captured the morning build-up from the ground as the formation filled in. Michael led drone operations with Oliver Wilson as safety observer; the formation capture was the centrepiece, thousands of people settling into the P100 shape, documented from above. The 11:49am pass was the moment everything was built around: the Common fell quiet, people looked up, and cloud meant the satellite caught a view of cloud rather than crowd. We caught the same moment from the drone, and those became some of the project's most striking images. On the ground, Keiran Boyd ran vox pops and David Marks worked a tele lens to pick faces and flags out of the crowd, while Sara coordinated Council liaison, including an unguarded, visibly moved reaction from the Lord Mayor moments after the formation. The next morning the satellite passed again and caught the logo clearly on an empty Common: the emotional centre of the second film.
Post-Production
Post moved quickly. The first film was delivered on 12 June, ahead of the event; the second was turned around within days for a city museum screening on 10 July. The edit drew on every part of the shoot: interviews, ground coverage, vox pops, parade, tele-lens material, drone aerials, and the satellite images. With more than 1,500 lines of transcribed interview material, we cut down against the nine-scene structure to a tight six-to-seven-minute film, sequenced from the build-up and the stillness of 11:49am, through an honest reveal of the cloud image, to the next morning's satellite capture as the payoff. We chose not to paper over the cloud, which made for a more human ending: Portsmouth showed up regardless, and the sky caught up a day later.
Equipment Used
Filming Locations
"As part of the Portsmouth 100 celebrations, the city council were looking for a creative partner to develop a film to explain a project to the wider public, and to capture it in action. The project was an innovative attempt to capture a photograph of massed residents of the city from the air as a satellite passed over in its orbit. The significance was that the technology and innovation in the satellite was made in Portsmouth, by Airbus, a major business based here. Making a complex idea accessible and exciting to the wider public was the brief, and previous work with Solent Sky Services indicated that they would have exactly the right vision and skills to create the piece for us. The team at SSS worked with us to build the brief and met with all partners to the project to ensure the film perfectly explained the mechanics of the project, but also created the right buzz. The explainer film was used as a trailer to build excitement for the event, and then the capture of the activity itself was used at other events including the summer reception celebrating Portsnouth P100 events, The films were high quality, engaging and importantly, perfectly tailored to the different formats we needed, including clipped to social media-friendly reels. We would have no hesitation in recommending Solent Sky Services, who worked to a difficult brief on short timescales and with a high level of event complexity to deliver engaging and exciting content that showcased the city and the event to the best possible effect. "
Kelly Nash
Corporate Performance Manager — Portsmouth City Council
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