"Red Bull Stratos" - record-breaking advertising

On 14 October, 2012, millions of viewers watched with bated breath the actions of the Austrian skydiver Felix Baumgartner, who after five years of thorough preparations jumped from a height of more than 39 km to finalize the Red Bull Stratos project. The sky jumper beat three records: the highest manned balloon flight, jump from the highest height, and the one most exciting people's imagination - the speed record during free fall. Reaching a speed of 1342.8 km/h, Baumgartner broke two barriers, the sound barrier and the limit of human potential.

The Red Bull itself can add a few more records. The most remarkable one is the "best ever" marketing campaign. Only the specially prepared Youtube channel was watched live by over 8 million people. There would be even more viewers, but the demand exceeded server capabilities of the world's largest service. This is an absolute record, leaving far behind all sporting events, not to mention U.S. presidential debates.

Next to this amazing human achievement, other extraordinary things involved in this project were the technologies of capturing, recording, and transmitting the coverage of the event. The whole happening was recorded using a system consisting of over thirty cameras. Those at the top had to work in conditions of low temperature and pressure, those on the ground - had to capture images of objects located a few dozen kilometers away.

The whole event was recorded using a system consisting of over thirty cameras. Most of them had been designed for space missions. Five cameras were placed on the spacesuit of the skydiver.

 
Two ground based optical tracking systems JLAIR (Joint Long-range Aerospace Imaging and Relay), used for the first time in a commercial venture. Each of them was equipped with two HD cameras recording 60 frames per second and 4K camera (4000 x 2000 pixels) recording 120 frames per second. The set of the cameras connected with dedicated telescope systems had a focal length equivalent of 8000 mm. For comparison, the largest lenses available on the market provide focal length 10 times lower, 800 mm. To track the skydiver falling at the speed of sound there were also used infrared cameras which allowed for the reduction of the negative impact of the radiation on image quality. [source: redbullstratos.com]

It might seem that the whole Stratos project has been a no-return investment of Red Bull, which will be forgotten in a few weeks. However, as mentioned at the beginning, the project is now considered to be the best advertising in history. The $ 20 million spent by Red Bull within 5 years of preparations for the jump is nothing in comparison with the money allocated by major corporations e.g. on the Olympic Games. What is also undeniable is the fact that the experience gained during the project will be used by the scientific community and armed forces. Conspiracy theorists may even suspect that the name "Stratos" - meaning "army" in Greek - shows the main purpose of this experiment. It is said that every moment pilots of reconnaissance aircraft operating at high altitudes could use the spacesuits developed for this project. In the case of an accident or shooting down the plane, the suit could save the life of the pilot.