When your truck looks as good as ours it needs to be in the movies and there’s only one place for it… Hollywood. Well – actually, just a few miles north of tinseltown, off Interstate 5 on the LA and Kern county borders, Lebec in fact.

Having taken delivery of our new Kenworth T680 and had it wrapped nose to tail with the most fabulous head turning graphics we decided it was the perfect time to shoot a promotional video for our website and grab some super stills for other marketing material whilst the truck is in absolute pristine condition.

We arrived for the crew call and briefing with the director first thing in the morning. The location – Tejon Ranch, Lebec.

Extending to over 270,000 acres this working ranch is a truly stunning place. It was to form an impressive backdrop for our shoot.

Tejon offers a dramatic tapestry of rugged mountains, steep canyons, oak-covered rolling hills, and broad valleys.  Oaks of almost every kind can be found on the land, as can conifer forests, and Joshua trees.

The drone crew set up their “Inspire II”. It shoots high resolution video and still images. It requires a camera operator and a qualified pilot. Not surprising given that it can be flown remotely from 6 miles away and at speeds of up to 60 MPH. We didn’t push the envelope!

In the chase vehicle was a second video camera and a stills photographer capturing behind the scenes images throughout the day. And to complete the team, an environmentalist from Tejon Ranch who was on hand to track their amazing Condors, Eagles, and other wildlife to ensure we didn’t interfere with them, and visa versa.

The director had everyone in place his story board to follow and his shot list in hand. Action!

The drone was airborne, the truck started to roll.

Cut – regroup and go again.

The “chicken shot” was great fun to setup and witness.

It involved the drone pilot sitting on the rear of the flatbed in the chase vehicle. The drone was positioned between the truck and the crew flying backwards just a couple of feet off the ground. The convoy started to roll. The truck built up speed to 20, 25, 30, 35… All the time the drone was very slowly backing down the road at very low level with the gigantic green monster hurtling towards it.

Through radio contact, the director calmly and carefully choreographed the action between the pilot, the camera operator, and the drivers of the chase vehicle and truck. As the Kenworth closed in who would chicken out? The driver of our truck didn’t want a bug on his windshield far less a huge drone and camera rig. The drone pilot didn’t was to kiss goodbye to his $6,500 toy.

With split second precision, as the truck closed on the drone it rose swiftly into the air and captured the moment the truck passed safely under it. Cut!

One by one the director ticked off his shot list. Action, cut, Action, cut.

As temperatures rose, nudging 100 degrees, it was time for some respite from the heat. We broke for lunch and reviewed the footage in the shade of a beautiful oak that had been withstanding the scorching sun for hundreds of years.

Paul, our director, briefed the team on the next sequence of shots he was looking for and everybody got back to their stations. Action.

Video shoot – done!

Some great promotional footage obtained, but this is not all about image and marketing. This is about dramatic improvements in fuel efficiency and reducing emissions.

Now the real work starts.

Our demo truck, with addvantage retrofitted in just 4 hours will now undergo intensive independent studies to verify the results and produce irrefutable data to provide early adopters the comfort that they’ve made the right decision to retrofit our product.

In the UK and Europe customers have been achieving in excess of 15% in fuel efficiency gains in real world, over the road scenarios. That means additional profits dropping straight to their bottom line.,

In an industry with such notoriously tight margins, the improvements we can deliver to US trucking fleets are substantial. We are significantly driving down one of the major expenses a trucking fleet faces – diesel. Even a small improvement in fuel efficiency can transform margins – imagine what a fuel reduction of 15% would do for a business.

To find out about our free demo program please contact enquiries@addvantage.net or call 844 484 9084