In June 2019, Porch House Pictures hired Drone Tech Aerial to film a car lapping Willow Springs International Raceway. The car was the 1939 Porsche Type 64: the oldest car to wear the Porsche name, the sole survivor of three built, and the headline consignment of RM Sotheby’s Monterey auction that August, where it was expected to become the most expensive Porsche ever sold at auction. Our aerial footage runs throughout RM Sotheby’s film for the consignment, “Porsche Type 64: An Origin Story”, from the track sequences to the closing shots.
Filming an Irreplaceable Car
There is no shot list note for “the car cannot be replaced at any price,” but it governs every decision on a day like this. We flew the DJI Inspire 2 with the Zenmuse X7, a Super 35 cinema camera that delivers auction-film image quality from conservative standoff distances. Flying around a one-of-one vehicle means exactly that: standoff discipline, no positioning that puts the aircraft over the car, and coordination with the track and the car’s handlers on every pass. The aerial work itself, tracking a vintage racer through Willow Springs’ sweepers, is the kind of automotive coverage we have flown for years. The stakes were the difference.
That trust is the real product on a shoot like this. Porch House Pictures is a repeat client, and the hire came to us because the production needed an operator whose flying around a subject of this value was a settled question.
The Auction
The Type 64 crossed the block at RM Sotheby’s Monterey on August 17, 2019, projected to exceed 20 million dollars. What followed became one of the most talked-about moments in auction history: a display error showed bids of 30, then 50, then 70 million dollars while actual bidding sat at 13 to 17 million. When the correction was announced, bidding stalled at 17 million, short of reserve, and the car did not sell. The story ran everywhere from Forbes to Artnet. The car remains, as it was on our shoot day, in a category of one.
Related Work
For automotive aerial cinematography in Los Angeles, from brand campaigns to one-of-one vehicles, request a quote or see our motorsports and racing coverage.