Fjallferð — Six Days, Three-Person Crew, Mini 3 Pro

Method

Constraint first: six days on location and a $6.5k USD budget. Solution: move fast, split coverage, and use small, flexible kit. The three directors divided the field work to follow separate farmer groups, trading cameras and roles as scenes unfolded.

Gear listed by the production: Sony FX3, Sony FX6 and Sony A7S III. Drone: DJI Mini 3 Pro (rented from Charthouse Productions). Frame rates: not stated. Aspect ratio: not stated. Lenses: not stated. Archive source: Ísland á filmu (licensed material).

Operationally they treated the round-up as concurrent mini-shoots. One director stayed with lead farmers to capture context and sound from the ground while the others chased action elsewhere. When weather or spectacle arrived they put the drone up and grabbed as many passes as time allowed. A single small drone and three bodies produced both intimate close coverage and the aerial scale the edit needed.

Edit choices preserved that intimacy: the team deliberately resisted expanding outward into explanatory scenes, keeping the film inside the farmers’ week-long trek. Selective archive was used sparingly to add historical texture without interrupting momentum.

"I think the challenge of not having Ragnar on the trip ultimately benefited us as filmmakers and shaped the way we interacted with the farmers."

— Jesse Smolan, director

"From the beginning, we knew the réttir and the landscape were incredibly visual, but we didn’t want the film to become a collection of beautiful images of Iceland."

— Jesse Smolan, director