In mid-March of this year, special assistant to ARB’s Chair came to me with plans underway for a different kind of media event.
They had wanted to unveil two new hydrogen fueling stations, promoting that the hydrogen future is here and now. What better way to promote it than in the style of the California road trip?
On Wednesday, April 20, California Air Resources Board Chair Mary Nichols led a caravan of hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles with Energy Commissioner Janea Scott and Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development (GO-Biz) Deputy Director Tyson Eckerle on a 400-mile journey from Los Angeles to ARB headquarters in Sacramento. The rally highlights the fact that these ultra-clean vehicles are now available for sale or lease, and there is a rapidly growing statewide network of hydrogen filling stations to support them.
Original concept in the storyboard had a sort of score card that marks the number of pit-stops (to be few), number of refuels (also few) and amount of emissions reduced (plenty!).
The score card concept was an agreeable first draft idea, but would have been impossible to calculate comparable emissions reductions.
- ARB’s NEX VG-20 with x lens (one in Santa Monica, the other with me)
- My personal GoPro Hero4 set up on the dash of Mary’s car
- Misc iPhone video clips
- Archived periscope footage
- And stock footage of the Santa Monica Pier and palm trees (requested, but never acquired by SoCal cameraperson).
Generally I’m against what I call “patchwork videos”, but I had given exception to this team effort.
Juan Contreas of the CA Fuel Cell Partnership was my “hot shot driver” for the day, making sure we arrived ahead of the caravan so I can get my arrival shots, plus helped me get whatever trucking shots I needed. Credit is deserved, a real cool dude to work with!
Surely, it made for an exciting, fresh assignment as it isn’t always run-n-gun here at the agency.
All graphics and backgrounds used were created and provided by in-house graphics wizard Margaret Sanchez. I had repurposed them for use of supers and for the end slate.