Our behind the scenes series during the filming of Where Art Meets Architecture II continues today with episode six. In this episode we fly to Hawaii, get ripped off by Delta, lose one of our bags and our drone, and film our first lesson at a house built in the middle of a lava field.
At the beginning of this episode we show up to the airport with 21 bags, 13 of which needed to be checked. Before my rant, let me share the language from Delta.com about media rate bag checking.
Camera, film, video tape, lighting and sound equipment that is tendered by representatives of network or local television broadcasting companies or commercial film-making companies will be accepted as baggage at the fees noted below. Valid photo ID with company insignia is required.
We had business cards with our names and we had photo IDs that proved we were who we said we were but apparently that wasn't good enough. As always the lady at the counter refused to give us the media rate on bags because we didn't have a "media pass." I explained that I could produce something better than a media pass; I could pull up our website and show that Patrick and I owned the media company or I could open the bags and show $150,000 worth of video gear. Like a broken record, the lady behind the counter was only interested in seeing our "media pass" and "badge number." Of course a "photo ID with company insignia" is just as easy to create as a business card because there is nothing official about it but they don't seem to understand that. The goal of the "photo ID with company insignia" is to prove the bags we are checking are for a photo/video shoot. If I can do that in another way, then it should be possible for one of these bag checkers to use their brain and allow the bags to be checked at the media rate, but it never happens.
After arguing with the bag lady for 30 minutes we were charged an additional $600 to check our bags and with a single Tweet to Delta we were able to get it all refunded back within 20 minutes. What a massive waste of time.
I'm so sick of dealing with this every single time we fly and this episode has reminded me of what my plan was. I'm going to make a stack of ID cards, making sure not to forget about the bullshit "badge number." I'm going to Photoshop the signature of Abraham Lincoln or Vladimir Putin on it. Maybe I'll even throw a logo for Cyberdyne from Terminator on it and I'm going to proudly share it with every obnoxious bag handler at every airport I visit who smugly asks for my media pass with a badge number. I'll make sure to release my template to the public as well. You can print these things on a website for quick ID for $4.
Update: I did it.
Anyway, we finally made it to the Big Island of Hawaii and we drove 2.5 hours to the other side of the Island only to realize that Patrick had grabbed someone else's bag. I thought it was funny until I realized that my drone was in his bag.
The next day Patrick drove back across the Island to get his bag while we filmed the very first lesson in Hawaii. Mike stood out in a lava field and captured an incredible twilight shot of the very famous modern home that we were staying in.
To learn more about the full tutorial you can head over to the Fstoppers Store and make sure you subscribe to our YouTube channel to see next weeks episode.
Quite impressed with the jump from the roof.. with a broken rib..
That's a really good point. This may be proof he was faking.
I was hunting around for a Real Estate photography course to help improve my RE photography work. I saw the Mike Kelly Architecture 1 program and then took a look around at the rest of your site and saw this video! I am a Real Estate agent out here on the Big Island, I was going to take someone to see this home but it was recently withdrawn from the market. Great photos!
Ah very cool. I hope he found a buyer