The focal length we were working with was also a challenge for focus, so we started our first day by shooting most of our shots statically. Naturally we worried about capturing things in focus at an effective length of 42mm because when you buzz focus in slow motion, it stays out of focus just that much longer. By the day’s end however, we weren’t thrilled with our shots, as they just didn’t feel dynamic enough without camera movement. So on day two we gave the camera to Mauricio to operate. He’s a skater, so he was able to ride his board alongside the skaters or toward them as we shot. To deal with focus we worked with the skaters to pick points on the bowl or ramp where they would do their trick, and then measured focus to that point, and pre-set the lens to be focused there. We also cranked the ISO on the camera to 800 (it can go to 1600, but we decided to not max it out) and stopped down the lens as much as possible. The only variable was Mauricio’s timing, but fortunately he was spot on.