A BMX rider performs a high jump over a speeding Formula 1 car with a Red Bull logo on a racetrack; another BMX rider is mid-air above a stationary Red Bull Formula 1 car on a cloudy day.BMX rider Kriss Kyle leaps over a moving F1 car. | Red Bull Content Pool

BMX rider Kriss Kyle recently jumped over a moving Formula 1 car in a stunt for Red Bull that was expertly documented by photographer Dan Griffiths and Marcus Cole.

Kyle used a custom-built kicker that was designed by Red Bull Technologies so that he could jump the required 4.2 feet (1.3 meters) to safely clear the car. The F1 vehicle was driven by ex-F1 racing driver David Coulthard, but the stunt was still perilous thanks to the danger of landing on one of the razor-sharp wings attached to the Red Bull RB7 — Sebastian Vettel’s 2011 championship-winning machine.

A man in white clothes and a Red Bull helmet stands next to a BMX bike, touching the rear wing of a Red Bull Formula 1 car parked on grass, with trees and a cloudy sky in the background.Dan Griffiths / Red Bull Content Pool Four people are gathered around a Red Bull Formula 1 car on a racetrack. Two wear Red Bull team gear, one in a white shirt, and one person sits in the car. They appear to be discussing or preparing for an event.Dan Griffiths / Red Bull Content Pool A person in a white outfit and helmet stands with hands on their head behind a BMX bike, near a race car, with a cloudy sky and fencing in the background.Marcus Cole / Red Bull Content Pool A man in white clothing and a Red Bull helmet sits on a white BMX bike in front of a Red Bull Formula 1 race car outdoors, with green trees in the background.Dan Griffiths / Red Bull Content Pool

Photographer Dan Griffiths tells PetaPixel that the initial two-day shoot became elongated after the first attempt at the Knock Hill circuit in Scotland was scuppered because of poor weather.

“The wind picked up a bit and it just scared him a little bit; kind of threw him off,” Griffiths explains. “He bailed out of his attempt and went to the side. It was too windy to continue and we had to just call it a day.”

A person on a BMX bike performs a high jump over a Red Bull Formula 1 car driving on a racetrack under a cloudy sky.Marcus Cole / Red Bull Content Pool

Fortunately for the team, another opportunity presented itself at Goodwood a little while after. For Griffiths, his job is to capture spectacular images that drive people to the video. “You need to shoot it in a way that is going to immediately grab people’s attention.”

Griffiths’ photo features on the thumbnail of the YouTube video, which shows the car’s trail, giving the photo a sense of motion. Griffiths says he got this idea in between the two shoots, meaning the delay actually benefited him.

“I just used the highest peak frame of Kriss because I didn’t want to do a sequence of him; I just wanted a single frame of him. Then for the car, I used a few frames from a sequence, and then it was a Photoshop job to create that motion blur,” he says.

“At Knock Hill, we were looking at it and it was like, okay, he’s over the top of a car, but unless you’ve seen the video, it does look like he’s just jumping over a stationary car.”

A person on a BMX bike performs a high jump over a speeding Red Bull Formula 1 car on a racetrack, with blurred motion and a clear sky in the background.Dan Griffiths / Red Bull Content Pool A BMX rider performs a high jump over a speeding Red Bull Formula 1 car on a racetrack, with motion blur showing the car's fast movement and a grassy field in the background.Dan Griffiths / Red Bull Content Pool Two men enthusiastically hug or tackle a man wearing a Red Bull helmet and white suit on a grassy field, all appearing to be having fun outdoors.Celebrations. | Dan Griffiths / Red Bull Content Pool A racing driver in a Red Bull suit and helmet stands close to another person in a Red Bull cap and T-shirt, having a conversation on a racetrack with blurred trees and sky in the background.Dan Griffiths / Red Bull Content Pool

Griffiths was using a remote camera to capture two angles. Both were Canon R5s; the one in his hand had an RF 70-200mm and the remote had an RF 24-105mm lens for a side-on shot.

“I’m really happy how it turned out,” says Griffiths. “There was a lot of pressure on getting that shot… Between practice hops, I was running over to the side camera to check that the remote was firing… You have to hope the timing is right, there is a lot that could get in the way of the shot working and, fortunately, everything did work out.”

Image credits: Red Bull Content Pool