Loading
-50k Views in One Month
-x number of screenings
-Premiere in Oceanside, California
In just five short years of defying expectations, Athletic Brewing had established itself as a major contender in brewing, bringing home some of the most coveted awards in the industry. And they had done it all with non-alcoholic brews.
With their new tagline “Fit for All Times,” the brand was positioning itself as a brew that could be enjoyed any time (because it’s non-alcoholic) by anyone (because it’s for ordinary people who love extraordinarily good things).
This film project was Athletic Brewing Company’s second long-form film project. With a newly established “Athletic Brewing Co. Studios” they were eager to create a documentary to reinforce their brand messaging and establish it in the minds of their target audience. By featuring the members of their IRONMAN team in the film, they wanted to stay true to their gritty and determined roots while introducing a new element: relatable characters with a strong emotional journey and human relationships at the center.
The goal of the film from the beginning was simple: This isn’t a film about IRONMAN. This is a character-driven story that follows individuals as they experience the challenges, joys, laughter, and tears of facing down an impossible challenge and coming out a stronger person—whether they succeeded or failed.
When this project started, Athletic said: “We want to make a film about 12 of our IRONMAN ambassadors, but we don’t know who to cast.” To answer this question we had to take a couple of steps backward to establish some of the baseline objectives for this project through a Creative Brief.
With the brief approved, the next step was to begin interviewing members of Team Athletic. To do so, we jumped on the phone and started asking questions. Through hours of conversations with the team, we made notes, had meetings, and slowly started to identify the three individuals we felt had the following attributes:
Once we had all three of our individuals selected, we assembled a treatment to better help us understand how all of these individuals would resonate together on screen.
With the treatment approved, the next step was to script the film. It’s not always possible to script a documentary, but given our production scope of work, it was necessary to choose stories that could be told in a relatively short amount of time in the field. We decided to script the film in a way that broke down production into two parts. The first phase was capturing the backstories of each individual, with this approach we were able to be on site for a few days with each individual, shoot the scenes necessary, and conduct interviews. The second phase was a more traditional documentary approach. We showed up to race day and documented.
Our script started in a beat sheet format. The goal of this beat sheet was for us to map out each of the important beats of each character's life. With some Sharpies, sticky notes, and a tri-fold board taped to the wall we got started.
With the beat sheet complete, we then started on the scripting process. Using recorded transcripts from interviews with the talent we started to write scenes and lay dialogue into the script to give shape to what we anticipated we would capture in production. After 135 pages and multiple revisions, we had a script in hand that felt true to the goals of the film, felt true to the characters, and gave us a blueprint to execute production on a limited scope of work.
Pre-Production
With the writing out of the way, the next phase of the project was pre-production. We built schedules, managed travel logistics, organized gear, purchased 23 permits, tracked down 139 release forms and shot listed.
Production
We had a total of 10 production days and 7 travel days spread across Chicago, Indianapolis, New York, and Lake Placid. We ate a lot of burritos and didn’t get much sleep.
Post-Production
With 5 terabytes of footage, we settled into post-production for 8 months to cut the film and a variety of assets together. With 4 rounds of client revisions, we edited, cut footage, colored, did sound design, added graphics, edited some more, and exported the final film at a length of 70 minutes.
The Impact
The film premiered in Oceanside, California during the 70.3 IRONMAN. It has since been screened at 10+ screenings around the country. After a month of being released on YouTube the film has been viewed 52,000 times. The film is actively being screened around the country and is being entered into film festivals.
Cole and the team at Port Side have been among the most productive, collaborative, and creative teams we’ve ever worked with. They are exceptionally organized and kept the complex and challenging project on track no matter the obstacles, which were many! They were tremendously attentive to our creative vision and needs and willing to offer insight and suggestions based on their experience and storytelling expertise. Their communication was impeccable. It was clear our team had the opportunity to offer input and make suggestions at every turn of the project. As if this weren’t enough, the project itself is visually stunning, with cinematic qualities beyond our expectations. Not to mention the powerful storytelling that marries the visual experience. We are so proud of the project and the story it tells. We could not have done it without the talent, hard work, and organization of the team at Port Side. It was an absolute pleasure to work with them. They took on an incredibly daunting task, which included our inexperience, and made it an experience we hope to do many more times.
Lead Adventurer
Director and Producer: Cole Heilborn
Writer: Tyler Clair Smith
Line Producer: Emily Holland
Cinematography: Spencer Astra
Editor: Brandon Garcia
Camera Operator: Chris Shane, Josh Lawless, Greg Travers
Photographer: Riley Seebeck
Additional Editors: Caleb Clarke, Liz Astra
Post Production Colorist: Spencer Astra
Post-Production Sound Designer: Colton Jackson
