New drone videos offer stunning views of Arundel Cathedral

Screenshot ICN/JS

Do you ever find yourself in a cathedral wishing you could get a closer look at some of those features high above? A series of new drone videos offers stunning birds eye views of the beautiful stained glass windows and soaring arches of Arundel Cathedral in West Sussex.

Arundel resident Bryden Isbister, a software consultant, who has produced the cathedral website for many years, came up with the idea.

A keen photographer, Bryden said he had often shot the outside of the cathedral which is very beautiful after dark when illuminated.

"When drones came out I thought this would make an excellent film," so - together with his son James (A PhD student at Oxford University studying Computational Neuroscience) they made their first drone video of the cathedral at night. Bryden was revamping the website at the time, so at the end of 2018 he added it to the new website.

Bishop Richard Moth, Canon Tim Madely and the Cathedral team were very impressed with the video and asked Bryden and James to make a drone video of the Cathedral interior.

Bryden said: "The Cathedral was prepared by Mike Bloxham of the Cathedral team and filming took place on Easter Monday. We were able to complete filming while the Cathedral remained open. Visitors were very interested in the drone filming activities and took photos of the filming! My son James piloted the Parrot Anafi drone and I edited the video."

Key features in the film are the beautiful Rose Window, the Organ, and the Shrine of St Philip Howard.

There's a great deal of work behind the scenes making videos of this quality. Drone filming is strictly regulated and filmmakers need to take into account things like weather and scaffolding. The GPS navigation system can be affected by things like towers. The video editing was done using Da Vinci Resolve video production suite. Music was carefully chosen and royalties purchased from several different companies.

Bryden and James have since gone on to make a short film of the Corpus Christi carpet of flowers, and are looking into making further videos in future - possibly filming the next Corpus Christi procession and service at Arundel Castle. "With crowds though you do need to prepare," he said, "Because people are fascinated by drones and of course if they see one they do tend to look up."

All the videos can be seen on the Arundel Cathedral website here: http://arundelcathedral.uk/

They are also on Youtube:

Arundel Cathedral By Night - https://youtu.be/Xq2GVYVGMBk

Arundel Cathedral Drone Fly Through - https://youtu.be/GPC5oGVs-pk

Corpus Christi Carpet Of Flowers 2019 - www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdCWqrCnILk

For more information, email: arundelcathedralvideos@gmail.com