Masters of the Hooniverse
Ken Block's Gymkhana series of rally-car mayhem videos are what fun-with-cars looks like in the age of Oculus Rift: jumping, sliding, and tire shredding for the pure joy of it.
For a generation raised on YouTube, names of motorsport icons like Dan Gurney, Mario Andretti, and Ayrton Senna don’t mean anything. Instead, American kids idolize Ken Block, whose six (so far) “gymkhana” rally-car mayhem videos are what fun-with-cars looks like in the age of Oculus Rift. Block’s videos pull millions of views on YouTube, outpacing major motorsports events. Here’s how Ken Block’s Hoonigan Racing and Hooligan Industries are capturing a massive audience with their motorsports-related content.
Hoonigan—a mash-up of the Australian slang term “hoon” and hooligan—is led by Block, 46, who was one of the founders of DC Shoes in the early 1990s before pursuing rally racing, finding unusual success after completing his first race at age 37.
Block teams up with Brian Scotto, Hoonigan Industries’ creative director, and video director Ben Conrad. Scotto, 34, was the founding editor of 0-60 magazine, while Conrad, 39, runs a Los Angeles-based design and production company and has directed the last three gymkhana videos.
Motorsports and corporate sponsorship go hand-in-hand. For the latest gymkhana video, “Footkhana,” Hoonigan teamed up with Castrol, which also partners with Brazilian-born soccer star Neymar Jr., who freestyles soccer tricks in the video while Block shreds tires.
Unlike past videos, Footkhana did not require much location scouting or shutting down public roads. Instead, the entire shoot took place on a truck-parking pad measuring an approximately half an acre in size.
The amount of crew and equipment needed to make Footkhana was relatively little. Only 35 people were on location, with only 15 of those connected to the production. Two medium-duty box trucks carried the production equipment, while a separate truck handled the catering services and a transporter for the car and a team truck to support it completed the whole circus.
The shoot ran into a problem when a practice run in the modified Ford Fiesta saw the car sliding over a coating of white fertilizer that covered the pad, limiting tire smoke. After a quick meeting, the Hoonigan team decided to shift the shoot to the nearby Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya.
The team’s main tool is the GoPro Hero camera, with Scotto explaining that they have “used as many as 100 in a shoot.” Tucked into every crevice of the Fiesta to capture the drift action, Hoonigan can destroy up to 25 percent of the cameras during a shoot. “It helps that GoPro is one of Ken’s sponsors,” said Scotto.
Unlike on major Hollywood shoots, there isn’t a whole cast of stunt cars for Block to use. There’s only one hand-built, 650-hp, four-wheel-drive, carbon-fiber-bodied, $600,000 Ford Fiesta on hand, so if something happens to the car, the shoot comes to a screeching halt.
After the shoot wraps up, the post-production process begins. Audio and video editing and digital color balancing takes around a month to complete, with Conrad explaining that the edits need to create “drama and energy and speed.”
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
Masters of the Hooniverse
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