Dakota Knotts
VIDEOGRAPHER/STORYTELLER
A day at the airport
About the project
"A Day at the Airport" is a short documentary about a pilot I met and how he goes about his day at the airport near my home in Valley Point, West Virginia.
The origin
When this project was first conceptualized, it was originally supposed to be an experiential short exploring the airport near my house. If I'm being honest, and this only stays between you and I dear reader, the idea was kind of flimsy at best. I had no plan, storyboard or much to go on. At best it was gonna be some shots of the place at night with some music under it. Nothing awful but nothing worth writing home about.
One day, as luck would have it, I met Tim Stockdale while trying to get footage for the bogus experimental short. Tim was this gift from nowhere, and I couldn't have been happier to meet him when I did. Though in hindsight, I don't know why I was so surprised to see a pilot at an airport. Either way, we struck up a conversation and the rest of the day became the video posted above.
Welcome to my Tim Talk
As previously stated, meeting Tim when I had was nothing short of a miracle. I knew from the moment I started talking to him that he would be perfect for a short documentary. He was had this quality about him that was really captivating.
Being able to spend the day with him was nothing short of a good time. He was a natural on camera. Honestly, I think he forgot he was on camera most of the time. He also taught me so much the gyrocopter featured in the documentary that didn't know about, which turned out to be a lot.
Some self criticism
As much pride as I hold in this piece, given that it was made while the world was in a pandemic due to COVID-19 and shot in a day, it's not without it's flaws. The main issue being audio.
The audio for this piece is a little all over the place. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to give Tim a personal mic for his audio and all audio was captured on a shotgun mic. As a result, you can hear the wind and a very hard to ignore clicking noise coming from Tim's hanger. While stuff like that I don't have control over, but y'know what I do have control over? How hard I breathe. Boy oh boy am I a heavy breather. I was taking that stuff in like it was going out-of-style.
What I accomplished
After reflecting on the project and the experience, I have nothing but immense pride the in final product. With a pandemic and other factors working against me, I still managed to make the most of it. This project might not be perfect, but it's still something special.