Introducing TWELVE - Michal Prokop's 2010 Journey 5



Twelve months, twelve short documentaries on a long way to success. Training. Races. Travelling. Life. This is TWELVE - a new project about the mountain biker and BMXer Michal Prokop.




By a coarse visual inspection, TWELVE shares the style of the michal.prokop09 calendar, however it uses a wider range of video technologies. Rob Trnka's camera takes in the past month of Michal Prokop, just as he has actually spent it. Without any adornments and planning. It doesn't aim to celebrate the leading actor; it wants to capture him through its sincereness. TWELVE doesn't create dramatic situations, but it catches them if they arise. 



In first days of each month you can find out what were the last four weeks like for Michal Prokop. Interesting? Boring? Tiring? Cheerful? Successful...? As does every real calendar, TWELVE also starts in January. Tons of iron, hours in the fitness center with freezing temperatures and snow all around. This is the way Michal's year 2010 started - a season dedicated to four-cross. BMX has already started to come through, with qualification for the 2012 Olympic Games. 



Episodes of TWELVE can be found at www.redbull.cz.  Here's the first edition:








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"When working on the calendar I understood that Michal doesn't have to make somebody else of him or to create another - media - face. This helped me a lot in making decision how TWELVE should look like. Anyway, in Michal's case his spontaneity doesn't look affectedly ... When preparing scenarios I only need to know where he will appear. I try to record things for which there is no place or time anywhere else - time when the camera is switched off. No sensations, but moments, which may look trivially alone, but which will make sense when put together with Honza Mocnak. For me, it will be important when somebody will switch the result of my work on more than once," comments Rob Trnka about his work on TWELVE. Trnka is the photographer, and this time also the cameraman and screenwriter.





Editor, post-production, music, graphics ... Jan Mocnak. Yes, it is not a typing error in subtitles. This man of all seasons who created the graphical look of the calendar michal.prokop09 and his websites www.ProkopRider.net undertook the responsibility for the wide spectrum of work on the TWELVE project.



When selecting equipment, taking into account expected use and output demands, the team chose the Panasonic Lumix GH1 video reflex camera as the optimum solution. Sound like and unusual solution for video technology in Full HD quality? The first hands-on experience confirms it was the right choice. At first sight the compact body, accessible cost, and manual focusing capability transformed worked to their advantage when using a Zuiko adapter... all of this combined makes the Lumix GH1 an excellent tool for reporting work.



TWELVE Crew

Producer: Red Bull

Production: Polis.Media

Screenplay, camera: Rob Trnka

Editor, post-production, and music: Jan Mocnak 

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Michal Prokop belongs among the few exceptional sportsmen who can afford the luxury to consider his placing in the winner's circle in a top world competition as something surprising. With two World Champion rainbow jerseys, two World Cup titles and 10 World Cup wins in his pocket, Michal Prokop belongs among the living legends of gravity mountain biking history. Yet he has found another great challenge in his highly successful carrier - nothing smaller than the BMX premiere at the Summer Olympic Games 2008 in Beijing, China. 



But Michal managed to step out of the shadow of sports giants even before the flames went up over Beijing. Time on pedals is his hobby and livelihood as well. He became the King of the Czech cycling in 2006 after acquiring all available titles on his mountain bike and later defended them. Michal brought himself to the attention of the sports public particularly thanks to his dominant position in mountain bike fourcross. Unlike most of his other competitors, MP devotes himself equally to two related, but still different disciplines. Moreover, in 2006, just a few months after his severe injury, Prokop initiated the Czech national team in the track world championship on the oval… 



In 2010, Prokop is riding AGang bikes. They are made by the same company as Author bicycles that he was riding for seven long years in a row. This guy is loyal!









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