Capturing the Essence of Flying

The romance and dream of aviation on the big screen.

Monday, May 08, 2023 at 11:55 AM ET

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Producer/director Brian J. Terwilliger’s aviation documentary films feature elegant camera work showing stunning aerial scenes that take viewers on a journey into our colorful world of aviation. [Courtesy of Brian J. Terwilliger]

Key Takeaways:

Brian J. Terwilliger's acclaimed aviation documentaries, such as One Six Right and Living in the Age of Airplanes, were extraordinary undertakings, each taking 5-6 years to complete, involving extensive fundraising, complex logistics like global travel with a small crew, and the efforts of hundreds of people.
Terwilliger prioritized creative freedom by independently financing his films, enabling him to achieve stunning, high-resolution aerial cinematography through meticulous planning, patience, and a strict emphasis on safety during complex air-to-air shooting sequences.
One Six Right, a "love letter" to general aviation airports, was recently remastered to fully display its original 1080p resolution, while Living in the Age of Airplanes demonstrated aviation's profound global impact through compelling narratives, such as tracing a flower's journey across continents.

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We’ve all seen documentary films we love, and if you are reading this, chances are pretty good that you loved One Six Right and Living in the Age of Airplanes. Both captured the essence of what it means to fly, with lusciously layered storylines delivered brilliantly by producer/director Brian J. Terwilliger. Both of Terwilliger’s aviation documentary films featured elegant camera work showing stunning aerial scenes, and took viewers on a journey into our colorful world of aviation. But as you will see in this interview with Terwilliger, making films is a difficult undertaking full of challenges, and an incredible amount of work goes into taking these projects from conceptual idea to distribution and ultimately being shown on a big screen.

This Article First Appeared in FLYING Magazine

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