Why It Takes Five People To Operate LA’s Famous Porsche Camera Car

By this point, you may have seen camera cars with massive cranes and recording devices on top of them. But have you ever wondered what’s actually going on with them? Turns out, it’s a lot.

It takes five people, six if you count the client, to properly operate this camera Porsche Cayenne in LA. The main limitation seems to be human’s frustrating propensity for only having two arms, but the result is that it takes more choreography to run one of these than a ballet company.

First, there’s the driver, then there’s the crane operator next to them and a camera operator behind both. They’re in charge of tilting the camera, panning it, rotating it, and zooming. Next to these guys (or gals), behind the driver, is the client, who makes sure that all the shots are good and, finally, in a jumper seat in the trunk, is the focus operator, whose job it is to make sure the camera is constantly in focus.

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It’s a dizzying amount of coordination and it all has to be done perfectly because this Cayenne is often running at high speeds and on race tracks. In fact, that’s why the production company chose a Porsche. It has the perfect mix of power, space, and enough off-road ability to do everything it needs it to do.

And if you’re wondering why it’s all painted matte black, it’s not just so that it looks badass. It’s actually an important feature of the car. Basically, you don’t want the camera car to appear in the shot it’s filming, so by painting matte black, the crew is trying to reduce the amount of glare coming off of it.

That’s the same reason its headlights and taillights are covered with matte black caps. Although they can be removed to allow it to drive on the road.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the major skill that the camera car’s driver needs is precision, not out and out speed. Placing the car exactly where it needs to be is crucial to getting everything in shot and in focus and in an ad.

It’s all kind of fascinating and it makes you appreciate how much is going on inside the camera car that, if everything’s going well, you’ll never notice.