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Torrent Description
Travel Documentary film shot on EOS 500D SLR Camera, powered with solar panels head loaded to the words largest mountain chain : The Himalayas.
ABOUT THE FILM This Documentary is a journey to the Himalayas.Four friends starts from Yuksam, the trekking hub of west Sikkim, together with a crew of eight people and 10 yaks to Goecha La, a remote mountain pass between India and Tibet at an altitude of 5000 meters above sea level. The eight day trek ended at the depression between Mt Pandim and Mt Kabru, on the east face of Mount Kanchenjunga, the highest peak in India. This trek is popularly known as The Goecha La trek or the Goeche La trek of West Sikkim. GOECHA LA IN SEARCH OF HOLY KANGCHENJUNGA – DIRECTORS NOTE. This making of the film Goechala In search of Holy Kangchenjunga was a big challe : it involved a lot of risk and uncertainty; mostly due to the remoteness and inhospitable conditions of the location. The only source of power to make the camera work was solar panels : a method which was never tried or tested before. THE BEGINNINGS It was Sunday 18th September 2011, Everything was set for my filming trip to Sikkim to document the popular Goecha La trek of West Sikkim. But all my preparations went in vein after receiving a call from Dhanraj Gurung : my travel agent at 7 PM. “Sir Pleaseeee donâ™t start.” What? “There is a big earthquake here in Sikkim. Our trekking route is destroyed and you canâ™t reach Yuksam, due to road blocks by landslides! “ It was heart breaking: the video footages of the aftermath in the news and a few hundred phone calls from my friends really put me down. I had to wait for another three months to receive a green signal from Red Panda: Dhanaraj Gurung, a well know travel agent in Sikkim who is popularly known as Red Panda. PRODUCTION I started `to Sikkim by the mid December. I reached Yuksam via Bagdogra> Jorethang > Yuksam. The road repairs were not complete and some portions of the road were blocked by huge stones. It was an unusually cold winter and we were the last batch to trek during the winter. We were accompanied with a crew of two cooks, an yakman, a cook and two guides. Our equipment and food were carried up the mountain on eight yaks. Lucas, Joe , Chew and me had a wonderful time trekking in Sikkim. During the initial days, the climate was not favourable and sky was not clear. I was afraid about the possibilities of shooting. With the blessings of snowman and mountain gods, we were happy to see clear skies from the second day of our trek. Two of our team members had to revert due to acute mountain syndrome or altitude sickness, which is common at an altitude of above 2500 meters above sea level. After crossing Tshoka, the last village on the first day, we had no contact with the outside world for more than a week. The winds at Lamuney was so strong that, it ripped of the tent in which Lucas and I were sleeping; at the mid of night. We had to sleep open : inside the sleeping bag. I still remember Lucas comment: “The stars are very beautiful. He was lucky to get a few excellent night shots. The greatest challenge during the shoot was providing power to the camera and power hungry lenses. It was not practical to carry heavy batteries, we had to depend on solar panels. The low temperature, much lower than the freezing point of water; drained of the batteries pretty fast and we had to recharge it frequently. We made a custom solar charger for the Battery.We took several backup batteries, panels and chargers to use in case of equipment failure. Every day we trekked about 15 miles in about 6-7 hours. The duration of day was very short and finding time to charge the batteries were difficult. We had to conserve power and we could not even preview the shots. All footages were replicated into my laptop every evening, as backup. POST PRODUCTION This was the easiest part of the production. The final script was made based of the captured shots and editing was performed in Adobe Premiere. Few of the pan-shots of panoramas were created in 3dsmax and maps were created using 3dsmax. EPILOGUE There are a lot of challenges when shooting at mountains. We have to be at least two steps ahead and make triple times adequate precautions to cope up with environment. News Links IN THE NEWS City Express/ The Indian Express Friday August 10 2012 Coimbatore Edition. – Through the less Travelled Roads Complete script available at http://www.theindia.info/films/goechala_in_search_of_holy_kangchenjunga1.htm Making of solar camera charger for EOS 500D http://www.mathmade.info/filming/solar_charging_500d.htm TEAM Written & Directed by George Joseph Thengummoottil Travel Arrangements Dhanaraj Gurung (Dhanraj Gurung), Red Panda Tours and Travels, Yuksam, Sikkim Trekking Team Chew Zi Yi Joe Kaczmarski Camera Lucas Tan Wenjie George Joseph Thengummoottil Recording Studio Crea MEDIA LABS Graphics geoshrad IMAGES Narration Jelu Jeyaraj Title Song Somnad Chetri Technical Assistance Rohit A Chelat Boominahan Saravanan Thomas Joseph Thengummoottil Location Managers Tula Ram Gurung Ben Kumar Gurung Yaks and Logistics Somnad Chetri Food Sn Subba Thanks to Smohit PM Tanzeela Wajid EQUIPMENTS USED Camera> Canon EOS500D, Canon Powershot S5 IS Lenses > 10-22 Canon, 90mm Tamron, 150 500 Sigma, 18 55 Canon Battery >LPE5 X5, AAA X20, AA X20 GPS > Garmin Geko 201, Nokia X6 Tripod > Simplex heavy duty, Pocket tripod Solar Panels > 12 V 250 MA X 5 Storage > Asus 101 X, 500 GB Seagate, 128 GB SD Memory Card Others > Solar Charger , Ocean Pack, 
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