Cold Collaborative redefines the race documentary with GSS.
Cold Collaborative Films is known for documentary and sports films that constantly push creative boundaries through cinematic style, camera movement, and innovative storytelling techniques. We caught up with director Shannon Vandivier at the 2025 NAB show where he and editor Blake Campbell were talking about their recent film series sponsored by Mazda, titled “Call of a Lifetime”.
“Call of a Lifetime” documents the Lifetime Grand Prix, a series of off-road bicycle races across the US that bring elite bike racers together to compete in some of the most challenging off-road races out there. As there was a lot of buzz about these events in the racing world, event sponsor Mazda asked the Cold Collaborative team to turn their race films around in 48 hours to ride that enthusiasm.
“To a client that seems like a small ask, given that many sports events get broadcast live”, said Vandivier, “but from our perspective this was a massive shift due to the style of coverage we had planned. Our core premise was around building connections with the athletes and weaving the stories around their personal struggles as the race develops, rather than simply reporting the facts as they happened, so tightening the deadline forced us to re-think our methods in a big way.”
Fortunately, one of Cold Collaborative’s favorite cinematography tools is the GSS C512 gimbal mounted on a AS360 Eurocopter, which provides a dynamic overhead view of the race, not only delivering great shots but also acting as a visual platform for tracking a constantly shifting race field.
In talking with editor Blake Campbell, Vandivier realized that the overhead view could provide an end-to-end editorial thread for assembling the story, so he took his announcers in the helicopter with him as he directed the show from the air. By providing Campbell with this narrated overhead view of the race, they were able to sync all the other various angles to this master perspective and start the editorial process with start-to-finish multi-track race coverage.
The resulting films feels like they are covering the race in real time, but the secret sauce is Vandivier's interviews with the individual athletes, filmed in the days surrounding the event, which go deep into the challenges and heartbreaks they experience on race day.
“For a cross-country event like this, the only real way to see the whole race is from the air”, said Vandivier. With these races covering 80 to 200 miles in a day, connecting all of the ground-based cameras into a control room was prohibitively expensive, but by following the action from above – and seeing it in detail via a stabilized Canon CN20 50-1000mm lens – Vandivier could effectively direct his team and weave the story together on the fly in collaboration with his narrators.
“Call of a Lifetime” is available on the Life Time Grand Prix YouTube channel and Cold Collaborative can be found at www.coldcollaborative.com Check out our interview with Shannon Vandivier below:
