Awesome Chapters’ experience in working in the film industry, in reverse chronological order.

VAYM and Rosa Luxumburg Stiftung – Colonial Past and present from a legal lens

2021-11 to 2022-01: Awesome Chapters obtained all the permits and visas for this sensitive subject, and ensured a successful production by providing Accommodation and Transportation for the team while in Namibia. The team provided positive feedback of their experience in Namibia. As this video is still being processed, it will be a time before we can link to the experience.

Some views on the road down to Luderitz from Maltahohe with the team enjoying the experience:

Oban Productions – Nou Toer Ons

2021-08: Yes, they came back for another episode! The experience was so great that they picked Awesome Chapters again for the next episode. Awesome Chapters again organized all the permits and work visas for this South African Production house. The budget was kept to it’s super-small limit, and Awesome Chapters gained more experience in keeping to micro-budgets.

Save Your Day – A simple path

2021-04: Awesome Chapters obtained all the necessary permits and work visas for this video, and Chaperoned the production team for their entire production. This was also a micro production, and so the budget was even lower than usual. The documentary is about the Nambian experience for the skateboarding community

Oban Productions – Nou Toer Ons

2021-04: Awesome Chapters organized all the permits and work visas for this South African Production house. Being a super-small productionfor KykNet, budget was kept really low.

National Geographic – One Strange Rock

2020-03: Will Smith came to Namibia for this one. I was employed as a driver for a much bigger Namibian production company, from the 24th January 2021 to 8 February 2021. During this time COVID-19 protocols were followed to ensure that everybody stays disease free. The intended term went perfect, with no incidents or accidents.

BBC Africa Gender Based Violence in Namibia

2020-11-15 Performed on-camera interviews with the family and friends of Shannon Wasserfall, who was murdered early in 2020. This murder sparked a national outrage in Namibia.

The link to the article in the BBC

Tom Snelgrove art film in Luderitz & Sossusvlei

2019/09 – We were contacted months in advance for this film, and what a good thing that was. Luderitz is one of the most challenging places to shoot, with everything you can think of and a few things you may never have thought of putting wrinkles to the best laid plans.

The experience gained by providing the full service to clients is invaluable.

Permitting for this location is substantial, with Work Visa, General Film Permit, Park permits from Ministry of Environment and Tourism (MET), Permission from Ministry of Mines and Energy(MME), NAMDEB that owns the whole place, and Namport on some of the locations. Drone work was carried out with proper permission from Namibia’s Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA & CAUA), even in the restricted airspace of Luderitz airport. Add to this the remoteness of this rustic coastal town, it was our pleasure to go on a scouting mission and send the VR footage to our client. In the end, we came in under budget and got all the footage that we needed.

We supplied permitting, visas, insurance, drivers, vehicles and talent on location, as well as helped with the production planning for the shoot.

France 5 – Les Rutes de L’Impossibles – Namibie

2019/03 – We were hired just before the producer and camera man of this 2 man crew arrived. The experience gained in this production is invaluable in how to obtain permits and permission on very short notice. Supplying them with a 4×4 vehicle and Driver/Fixer was easy. Exploring Namibia and shooting on the fly was a great adventure. Getting all the permits in order was a different matter. The permit process in Namibia is as slow as molasses, and there were some areas that we could not get to for permitting reasons. As good as the production turned out, it could have been even better!

During this shoot we stayed in remote locations in Namibia, sometimes in the caravan, sometimes in very basic accommodation. With this style of shooting we spent a day scouting each area, looking for talent and stories, mingling with people, then planning, setting up and shooting.

Once the shoot was over, we provided translations from Damara and Herero to English.

Blue Ice Films

2019/03 – As blue ice was making a long production in South Africa and were running into visa problems, they needed a Chaperone for their staff while they were in Namibia renewing their work visas for South Africa.

Isolde collected them at the airport, and chaperoned them throughout their stay at the coast, and took the clients on little outings when they felt the need to take a break.

MTV The Challenge

2018/12 – For this production as things were getting a little out of hand for the people that started it, we were hired as Location Assistant.

Having a vast experience of the desert, knowing it like the back of our hands came in handy when preparing the next location for the shoot. With our public transport licensed vehicles we were also able to transport talent between locations as they were needed as an extra film service. Traffic control on the national roads and in the river bed was carried out and everybody was happy.

Paco Rabanne

2018/03 – Working through Lemonreel film services, we were mainly employed as drivers. This was more experience in dealing with talent and the production team while on set.

With a 120 crew this was no small production! In fact, it was the most expensive advertisement made in Africa, ever.

Our knowledge of the local conditions and the roads were invaluable to this production. Challenges on this shoot were many, from the high iron content in the dunes blocking radio communications to rainfall in the desert making the roads near impassable. Talent and passengers were transferred safely and without incident.

You can read a review of the work done on Evert’s profile at Worldfixer.com

Lemonreel film services, Spitzkoppe – Location Assistant

2018/01 – On this shoot, the film services required were to make a camp at Spitzkoppe for 14 people. We managed to do this with 7 tents and 14 stretchers and bedrolls brought out to this remote desert location. Valuable experience was gained in catering for a team on set. Working with Lemonreel film services the clients had their magical night at Spitzkoppe, and were extremely happy.

Spitzkoppe is very easy to film in, as it has good access and great surroundings.

You can read a review of the work done on Evert’s profile at Worldfixer.com, or on the Blog Post here.