Read up on our Denver cameraman‘s experience at Wrestlemania 33: Wrestlemania 33 baby! The most epic stage of them all! My five days spent in Orlando for Mania 33 were amazing. This was certainly not my first rodeo with WWE, but as it was my first Mania. My stoke level was at 100%! The week was content heavy as we covered everything from the backstage to the main stage for NXT, RAW and SmackDown as well as the main event. The lighting, stage, pyro, elaborate entrances and just the sheer size and scale of what had been built were pretty mind blowing. I would say the most epic moment was after the Undertaker’s match with Roman. We shot this sequence in a combination of normal and high-speed frame rates on the Sony F5. Undertaker stood in the middle of the ring with the ominous lighting as he removed his gloves, coat and signature hat. After removing them he placed them in the middle of the ring and exited the stage. I was busy in the crowd getting their reactions as this was likely a sign that “Taker” wouldn’t return to the ring. The crowd looked on in disbelief as this act signified the end of his legendary career. Some were taken aback and sitting with their head in their hands. Other fans became unglued as they stood and chanted “Thank You, Taker!” It was a pretty epic thing to see. |
Outside of the ring, we shot some stylized interviews. My favorite being our piece with Seth Rollins. We used an open air suite that overlooked the arena. Luckily for the camera crew, production blacked out the room so it was nice to have a controlled environment to light the interview in. There wasn’t much of a backdrop so we used the metal trash cans in our room to make something creative and stylized. The metal trash cans really popped with some light and it made a great effect with the Canon 17-120 lens. It was an epic weekend for sure and I can’t thank our client WWE Network enough for trusting me to tag along, shoot and witness wrestling history in the making. Stay tuned for Part 2… |
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