Community Center Drone Tour Behind the Scenes

145,000 square feet.

Thousands of activities and programs annually.

Open to all ages.

Encapsulating the sheer breadth of the Westerville Community Center in one medium is no small task.

Enter Jacob Augenstein, a commercial drone pilot who resides in the Westerville area and was looking for a project that would not only challenge his skill levels, but also expand a growing portfolio of indoor and outdoor venues for his business, Sky is the Limit Media.

"I was recommended for this project by community members who loved the Community Center and wanted to show it off," said Augenstein, who graduated from Columbus College of Art and Design in 2011. "One of the most unique aspects simply is its scale. A drone tour is one of the only techniques that can truly capture the expansiveness of the facility in a single take."

Augenstein first reached out to David Chambers, Special Project Administrator at the Community Center, who was intrigued by the possibility of conducting a fly-through tour of the facility.

"We have such a massive facility. It is difficult to summarize everything we have in our messaging and marketing efforts," said Chambers. "This is something that has been on our radar for some time now but finding someone who can execute a project of this magnitude hasn't quite come to fruition. So when Jacob reached out about doing this, we were definitely motivated to get the conversation started."

As exciting as the prospect was, it was more than matched in overall scope and complexity.

"The scale of the center made it the most challenging project I have done," said Augenstein. "Filling such a large space with actors and maintaining signal to the drone while flying to every corner of the building required intense planning. The prep process is massive. While the shoot itself took about 90 minutes, the planning took hours. First, we did a walkthrough to identify key areas and plot a flight path that didn't backtrack or feel repetitive. Next, we had to coordinate the logistics of actors-where they would be and what they would do-while working around the center's large operating hours."

The shoot, which was rescheduled because of a late fall storm, was conducted on a Sunday morning ahead of the Community Center opening its doors at 10 a.m. and consisted of approximately 100 volunteers acting out different roles throughout the numerous scenes.

"On the day of the shoot, we had coordinators on radios throughout the building to cue the actors so they could perform naturally without looking at the drone," said Augenstein. "The sheer number of people involved and the size of the building were the biggest hurdles, but everyone nailed it on the last two takes."

The four-minute video has had thousands of views so far on social media and the City's website. While many commenters applauded the timeliness and precision of the shoot, in reality, Augenstein worked some post-production magic to smooth out several minor mistakes that occurred on flight day.

"Since the drone doesn't record audio, we went back through the facility with microphones to record ambient sounds-basketballs bouncing and weights clinking-to layer into the final video," said Augenstein. "I had to digitally superimpose images onto four TV screens that were turned off, remove a person who walked into the frame at the wrong time and seamlessly splice two different takes together to get the perfect run. It was a fun challenge to make those edits invisible and I'd be curious to see if people can find where I made them."

Overall, Augenstein, who has worked on drone shoot projects on several different continents, not only said he has taken pleasure in the final product of the Community Center tour, but also in the fact he was able to showcase a point of pride near his hometown.

"I live in Blendon Township, just on the outskirts of Westerville. Since our township is small, my family and I find ourselves in Westerville quite a bit to enjoy the playgrounds, parks, Uptown area and local businesses," said Augenstein. "The Community Center's reputation preceded itself. I had heard so much about it that when I started doing these drone tours, filming there was high on my bucket list."

To view the Westerville Community Center drone tour and a behind-the-scenes video of the shoot, please visit www.Westerville.org/CommunityCenter. For additional information and to watch more of Augenstein's drone tours, head to www.SkyIsTheLimit.Media.