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Recommended GoPro Time Lapse Settings for Driving

Are you looking for the GoPro time lapse settings for driving ?

GoPro offers this amazing feature in all the latest models, using which with right settings you can enjoy your beautiful journeys and at the same time take the memories back home to share them with friends and family.

In this article, you’ll learn about the best GoPro Time Lapse settings for driving .

GoPro Time Lapse Settings for Driving

All you need during your various journeys is to capture the mesmerizing moments in your heart and camera. GoPro lets you create some amazing Time Lapses by following a few steps.

Time Lapse is created with a set of still photos which are combined to form a video using the software.

Requirements to Shoot a Time Lapse Video while Driving:

• Fully charged GoPro camera with a fully formatted memory card .
• A couple of extra batteries to charge the camera in the car itself, if required.
• A stable mount to keep the GoPro safe and shoot quality Time Lapse videos. A GoPro windshield mount would work or some other depending on your requirement.

Tip: You can also download the GoPro smartphone app which allows you to view the footage in real-time.

Steps To Follow To Create a Time Lapse While Driving

Follow the below steps to create a Time Lapse video while driving with your GoPro.

Select Video Mode

Select  Video Mode  using the mode button on the front of the camera.

Change the Video Mode to Time Lapse

Once in video mode, change the mode to Time Lapse using the video settings. The different options that you will get are Time Lapse Video, Time Lapse Photo, and Night Lapse Photo. In the latest models, you will find another option as Time Wrap . The night lapse mode just focuses more on lowering the shutter speed to expose correctly.

For shooting Time Lapse while driving, you can switch between two settings.

• Settings that take photos one by one – In this case, you need to set up an interval rate at which the camera will take pictures during the journey. In the end, the GoPro will combine all the photos and make up a video for you. Some GoPros can do it on their while in others you will need to make it in GoPro Studio .
• Shoot a video over time – When settings are set to this mode, the camera will shoot the video, and later you can speed it up by uploading it into a program such as GoPro Studio to any rate that you want. Speeding it 10 to 15 times the normal speed will yield good results. The downside is, that it takes up a lot of memory.

Choose the Interval Settings

To change the interval settings. Go to Main Menu > Mode > Interval Option. The longer the interval is set, the shorter your resulting footage will be. By default, GoPro time-lapses use a 30 fps.

Mount the Camera

Once you are done with choosing an interval for shooting, you need a level surface or a mount to fix your GoPro. All cars are different so you need to find a space on the dash that does not have a huge glare. Mounting the camera is an important step to obtain stable and clear footage while driving.

Pro Tip: Ensure the horizon is leveled so that the output footage is as desired.

Check here the best GoPro Car Mounts: Top 12 GoPro Car Mounts [Suction/Clamp/Gimbal/Dashboard] .

Start Shooting Amazing GoPro TimeLapse Videos

Press the shutter button to start shooting your Time Lapse Videos.

Shooting Length and Shooting Interval

The two most important aspects of shooting a Time-Lapse while driving are: Shooting Length and Shooting Interval

Shooting Length

You need to have a rough idea of how long your drive is going to be. Whether you want to shoot for an hour, three hours, or the whole day. Set the shooting length as required.

Shooting Interval

Once you decide on the shooting length, you need to focus on the shooting interval that you want to set. For example, if you are on a drive for 30 minutes at 30 fps for their frame rate. A GoPro camera set at 0.5 seconds will take 120 photos in a minute . So in one minute, you will have 120 frames and at 30 fps, it comes down to 4 seconds of recorded footage .

Now, for long drives for example 2 hours , the 0.5-second interval is too less, as multiple images will be captured for such a long duration of time and it may become boring. In this case, 5 seconds interval would be ideal , which will result in 12 pictures captured in a minute which equals half a second of film. In total, 48 seconds of footage.

You can accordingly plan your interval depending upon your shooting length. I recommend  5-10 seconds under daylight conditions.   For night or day to night time-lapses set it to at least 15, better 30 seconds or more in case of long drives .

To have a full overview of the various GoPro Settings, take a look at this post:

• GoPro Settings Explained: Best for Action, Travel & More

Thanks for reading!

I hope this guide helped you learn about the GoPro Time Lapse settings for driving 🙂

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Related Articles:

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• GoPro Time Lapse: Creating Stunning Time-Lapse Shots
• GoPro Time Lapse: Beginners Guide (Step-by-Step) + [VIDEO TUTORIAL]
• 10 GoPro Photography Tips for Epic Shots (+ Best Settings)
• F Stop Chart – Lens Aperture (Full Stops, 1/2 Stops, 1/3 Stops)

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I’m Andy Magri, an Italian filmmaker and content creator. After graduating from University, I set off to explore the world while creating guides and reviews featuring the video gear I love and use the most. With the help of my awesome team, we share tips and reviews about GoPro, Insta360, DJI, smartphone cameras, drones, editing software and anything around action video-making. I hope my guides not only help you find the perfect camera equipment, but also inspire you to get out there and create! Since publishing my first tutorial on ProjectGO, seven years ago, our content has helped over 2M creators worldwide. Start by downloading the FREE GoPro Settings Cheat Sheet.

Best Video Setting GoPro HERO 7 (+ Cheat Sheet)

My best gopro hero 7 settings for snowboarding videos.

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How To Make a Time-Lapse Video of Your Next Road Trip

Written by, jordan r. july 22, 2016 july 22, 2016.

Want to show the world how it looks from your perspective? Have a nice morning drive or a sunset view on your evening commute? Plans to drive on an All-American Road or drive through the mountains?

You can easily capture a drive and quickly show it in a time-lapse video, and GoPro cameras make it really easy. Whether you want to have a time-lapse to quickly show everyone your experience or you just want to have a quick way to relive an important, fun or beautiful moment, try a time lapse video.

All you need  is a few pieces of equipment and the right camera settings, and you can make a really cool time-lapse video anywhere.

Different Methods for Shooting a Timelapse Video on a GoPro

Interval settings that take photos one-by-one

This is very easy way to make a time-lapse with a GoPro and GoPros are very high-quality, so the footage will look beautiful. There are two GoPro options for this method. First is set an interval rate for the camera to take pictures and then upload them into GoPro studio, and the program will create the time-lapse video for you.

Or there’s the new special interval "Time Lapse" setting that GoPro added to the new Hero4 Silver or Black. This new setting takes still photos in 4k resolution, and then the GoPro automatically puts them into a video file once filming is complete.

Shoot a video over a period of time

Set up the camera, press record, and leave it alone. The result is a time-lapse video with no time jumps or frames missing. This will look more smooth or less “jumpy” but since this method is constantly recording, it takes up a lot of memory space, which will require a lot of big memory cards and a lot of memory on the computer used for film editing.

Also, since the camera is recording actual time, you have to put the footage into your computer and then edit the video to play at a faster frame rate.

Necessary Equipment for a Time-Lapse Video in the Car

• Fully charged GoPro with an already formatted memory card or two. Do  the math to figure out how much memory you need.
• How long is your trip? If it is more than 2 hours, you will either need to buy multiple batteries or a special accessory that will allow your GoPro to hook up to a power source.
• A level surface and a mount to keep it in place. There are a variety of mounts out there. Download the GoPro 
• Your car (duh)

Time-Lapse Camera Settings for the Drive

As discussed, there are two ways to go about this and if you are making a time-lapse from video footage, you don’t need to worry about this part. But if you are doing a time-lapse that is a compilation of still frames taken at intervals, your interval settings are very important, and you need to consider a few things.

• How long do you want the video to be?

How much time-lapse do you want? The best part about time-lapse is that it provides the imagery of everything in a condensed time so 30 seconds of footage actually shows a ton footage!

• How long is your car trip?

If you are going on a shorter ride, you can set it at a faster interval, but if are going on a long car ride, you might want to use a longer interval. But, that’s up to you and your purpose of the time-lapse.

So what will a 30 minute car ride get you? Let’s start with the basics.

To get one second of film, you need 24-30 pictures. This is because 1 second of film consists of 24 or 30 frames per second (fps), depends on what you want, but these days 30fps is fairly standard.

To make the math a little easier, all of the below examples are going to relate to film using 30 fps.  

So if the camera is set at .5 seconds, in one minute the video is 4 seconds long -- in 60 seconds 120 photos have been taken, so that is 120 frames and you need 30 frames for 1 second, so 120 frames / 30fps = 4 seconds of footage.

So, a .5 second interval on a 30 minute car ride will produce 2 minutes of footage.

Are you traveling for two hours? A .5 second interval for 2 hours will result in an 8 minute time-lapse video, and that’s a pretty long time-lapse video and it could be a little boring.

Try a 5 second interval. In one minute the camera has taken 12 photos. In 120 minutes or 2 hours, you’ll have 48 seconds of timelapse footage.

However, if you are trying to capture a timelapse video of a long road trip, you want to make the intervals a little longer, maybe 10, 15 or 30 seconds, otherwise you will have too much footage.  

The problem with longer intervals is that the final video might look little less fluid, than the a video with faster intervals. This is because you have traveled much farther than you did in 5 seconds.

However, if you are traveling on a long stretch of highway where the terrain doesn’t change very much, it won’t be as drastic looking as you think. The same thing applies to slow traffic.

So, how long is your long road trip? Here is what you will get a these intervals.

10 seconds = 6 photos per minute. In 5 minutes there is 1 second of footage, so in one hour there is 12 seconds of footage. In a 4-hour drive you have 48 seconds of footage.

15 seconds = 4 photos per minute. In 7.5 minutes there is 1 second of footage. So in one hour that is 8 seconds of time lapse footage. So an 8-hour drive at a 15 second interval will produce one minute and four seconds of footage.

Things to Keep in Mind

Be strategic with your GoPro placement. The front window pane can produce a glare and ruin your footage. Each car is different so you will need to test it out to make sure you don’t get a glare.

Test out the time intervals for yourself to see what looks best to you.

Ta-da! You’ve made your very first time-lapse video. Show us what you made on our Facebook or Twitter. Who knows…we may have a contest some day.

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The Ultimate Guide To Road Trippin’ With A GoPro: GoPro Tips & Tricks

by Hannah Collerson

If you’re heading out on a road trip, and you want to capture some of your journey, whether for a travel vlog, to show friends and family or just for fun, you NEED to take a GoPro  with you.

Thanks to their size and the different available mounts, you can mount them almost anywhere in or on your car. So you can get unique angles of the journey, the car, the driver and the passengers. You’ll be set up for your very own Top Gear special.

Before you hit the road with your GoPro though, here are 13 GoPro driving tips to help you capture the best possible driving footage. Or if you were hoping to use your GoPro more as a safety measure, like a dash cam, we’ve got tips for that too!

The Best GoPro For Road Trips

So if you want to capture some quality footage of your road trip, you’ll need to find the best GoPro  for the job.

GoPros have come a long way in recent years, which means there’s quite a few big differences between the different models.

It’s easy to get drawn in by cameras that offer the highest resolution, but for road trip driving footage, you also need to consider frame rate.

If you want to get clear shots of the road, the scenery and the moving car, you’ll need a GoPro that can shoot in a high resolution at a high frame rate. And if you have to sacrifice one or the other, sacrifice a bit of resolution.

For example, if you’ve got the option of 4K at 10fps, or 2.7k at 60fps, in this case you want to prioritize frame rate.

When you’re on the road you’re going to be moving pretty fast (hopefully, unless traffic slows you down). And for your GoPro footage to look smooth and clear, you’ll need that higher frame rate.

GoPro Hero 7 Black – The Ultimate Road Trip Camera

If you want the very best GoPro model to take on your road trip, it has to be the GoPro Hero 7 Black. This new release is a huge improvement on the other GoPros, and as well as being great fun to use, it’s going to create professional looking, top quality road trip videos.

In terms of 4K, it can shoot at 60fps, same as the Hero 6, so there’s no real change there. But if you wanted a really high frame rate, you can shoot in 2.7K at 120fps. You probably wouldn’t opt for 120fps for standard footage, because of motion blur, but this is great if you want to slow down your footage later.

The Hero 7 also has the best stabilisation we’ve seen on a GoPro yet. Hyper Smooth will record, well, hyper smooth footage, even on the bumpiest of roads. So you can even go off-roading, and still get perfect footage.

The stabilisation even works whilst you’re live streaming. That’s right, you can live stream your road trip videos right to Facebook or Instagram.

The voice control is also a great feature for those on a solo road trip, as you’ll be able to start and stop your camera recording, and even change settings or take a picture, all without taking your hands off the wheel.

The waterproof and shockproof nature of the Hero 7 means that you really can mount it anywhere on the car, even on the exterior, in the rain.

GoPro Hero 6 – The Second Best GoPro For Road Trips

The Hero 6 takes it one step further, shooting in 60fps in 4K, which gives you the best of both worlds. It also has some good image stabilisation, which make the bumps in the road less of an issue.

The Best Budget GoPros For Road Trips: Hero 4 Black, Hero 5 and Hero 5 Session

I’ve grouped these GoPro cameras together because they can all film with a frame rate of 60fps at 1440p, so they’re all going to give you more than adequate footage.

These models are also much more affordable than the latest GoPro, and whilst the footage won’t be as stable, you can still capture some great footage and artistic shots.

9 GoPro Road Trip Tips

1. mix up your angles and mounting positions.

If you’re hoping to create an interesting film or vlog from your road trip, the last thing you want to do is just stick your GoPro on the dashboard and leave it there for your whole trip. No one’s going to watch hours of the same thing.

With a few different mounting accessories, you can mount your GoPro in some really creative places. There are different angles you can get within the car, as well as outside the car.

Get dashboard shots, as well as ‘from the back’ shots, ‘of the driver’ shots, and shots of the wheels rolling.

All these different angles are going to make your video seem much less amateur. You’ll look like you’re working with a whole camera crew!

2. Get some candid footage

Road tripping isn’t just about the scenery and the drive, it’s about the journey, the laughs you have on the way to your destination.

Filming just the scenery and the road is cool for a while, but after a while it’s going to make your end video pretty repetitive. So try to film some in-car footage, of the road trip dynamic. Get shots of you and your fellow road trip companions laughing, navigating, talking – it’s these shots that are going to break up your footage and give your road trip video more substance.

And don’t forget to include some shots of you arriving at, and enjoying your destination.

3. Shoot in loop mode when using your GoPro as a dash cam

If you’re more interested in using your GoPro for safety reasons, rather than to get creative, you can also it as a dash cam.

Most GoPros have loop recording modes, which basically just let your GoPro film non-stop without it using up your memory. How does it work? Basically it films and saves footage from a set amount of tmie, which could be anywhere from 5 minutes to two hours.

Let’s say you set it to 5 minutes, your GoPro would split that five minutes into chapters, so every 1.5 minutes or so would be one chapter. So when your GoPro has recorded 6.5 minutes, it will delete the first 1.5 minutes.

This way, you can continuously record your whole journey, and worst case scenario, if you’re involved in or witness an accident, you can stop your camera recording and look back over the saved footage. And because it will only have saved the latest footage, you won’t have to sift through hours of video to find what you’re looking for.

4. Create a time lapse of your journey

Filming your whole drive in real time can create hours of footage that quite frankly, is too boring to sit through and watch.

Creating a drive lapse (a time lapse of your drive) will create a more artistic video of your drive, a snippet if you like. And this snippet is going to take up a lot less space on your memory card than the full extended version.

Choose somewhere to mount your GoPro (the dashboard is the go-to place for drive lapses) and choose an interval setting.

If you want a time lapse of a large portion of your journey, choose a slower interval setting, otherwise you’ll end up with a drive lapse that’s still too long to sit through.

If you plan on driving through dusk or dawn, this is a great to create a drive lapse, as you’ll see the changing light.

5. Find a good balance between resolution and frame rate

Filming top quality road trip is about finding the perfect balance between resolution and frame rate. Lots of people make the mistake of just going for the highest resolution, and not even bothering to look at frame rate. But frame rate is what’s going to make your footage smooth and stable.

If your GoPro has the option of choosing 60fps, go for this in the highest resolution. The newer models will have 60fps at 4K, but with the older models, you’ll need to go for 1080p, 1440p, or 2.7k at 60fps. So as a general rule of thumb, go for the highest frame rate with the highest resolution.

6. Pack extra batteries and memory cards

If you’re planning on driving for more than a few hours, you’re going to need to take a few extra supplies with you. GoPros don’t have the best batteries, so you’ve probably only got up to 4 hours of battery life on one battery. Pack extra batteries and a car charger so that if your GoPro dies, you can charge it right back up again. A car charger or a battery back can also allow you to film whilst charging.

Just as important as battery is memory, storage space. If you haven’t got enough memory on your memory card to film any more, your GoPro may as well be dead. So pack extra memory cards (don’t worry, you can get really cheap ones), and you’ll have all the storage you could need for your videos.

Using multiple memory cards is also a great way to organise your footage, especially if you’re going on a multi-day trip. Sifting through footage to find a certain clip can be a nightmare, so why not allocate a different memory card to each day or so of your travels?

7. Use auto for most settings

When you’re on the road, the light and your surroundings are constantly changing, so rather than having your white balance, exposure and other settings set to manual, just keep them on auto for the majority of your trip.

You don’t want to be playing around with the settings every ten minutes, so leave it on auto and your GoPro will adjust automatically to your surroundings.

8. Get a variety of different accessories

If you want to make the best possible road trip film, you’ll need a few different accessories. Different mounts mean you can mount your GoPro on different parts of your car, and get really creative with your angles.

Below are some of the best GoPro accessories to take on your road trip:

• GoPro extendable pole With the extendable pole  you’ll be able to get shots of the moving car from outside the car. All you have to do is get one of your passengers to stick it out the window – just make sure you’re on a fairly deserted road when you use this one!

• GoPro auto charger This is a car charger for your GoPro , so you can charge it using your car’s cigarette lighter. This is a must-have for anyone going on a long-ass road trip.

9. Play around with the shutter speed

Generally, a shorter shutter speed, or whatever the default on your GoPro is is great for ordinary clips.

But a longer shutter speed will blur moving objects in your time lapses, which can give them a really artistic feel, especially when shooting a time lapse at night. This is how you can get oncoming cars to look like light trails.

10. Use different clips and effects in your final film

When it comes to putting all your clips together and creating a final road trip film, make sure you keep it interesting by using different clips, angles and effects.

The chances are you’re creating this film or vlog for an audience, so you want to make sure it’s not going to send anyone to sleep.

Edit your clips: slow some down, speed some up, and make sure they all tell a story of your journey.

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GoPro: the best setting to make a travel video

When talking about action cams, it is impossible not to mention the GoPro, the first action cam on the market and undisputed leader in this category. I often come across people who claim to have bought a GoPro when they’ve actually purchased a simple action cam.

The GoPro plays a pivotal role in two main sectors: travel and sport .

So, we all know that many people own a GoPro, but how many of them can actually use it to its full potential ? How many can set it up properly and benefit from all the functions it offers? I guess not that many.

Don’t get me wrong, by writing this post I do not want to sound like a GoPro expert because, I myself, still have a lot to learn about how to use this amazing video-camera. Having said that, I’d like to give you a few useful tips I’ve learnt on how to use your GoPro when travelling . My suggestions may also be interesting for people who actually own a similar action-camera, even though of a different brand.

In this post, I want to purely focus on how to make videos. If you’d like more information on how to use your GoPro for taking photos, I will translate soon this article from my italian blog version: “ Taking photos with a GoPro: timelapse, burst and continuous mode ”.

Indice dell'Articolo

What GoPro should I buy for travelling?

Travelling requires much less looking at the rear display compared to shooting action sports. However, in order to check if you got the perfect framing for the photos and videos you’ll then edit, a GoPro with an LCD screen (a GoPro 4 or 5) becomes essential. A black or silver GoPro? It doesn’t matter. Go for the colour you like the most as the action cam is perfectly identical for this terms of features.

If you just want to buy an action camera to take simple photos and videos when travelling, I’d recommend buying the GoPro 4. If, on the contrary, you are looking at something a bit more professional for elaborated video editing, consider buying the GoPro 5 which comes with an integrated video stabilization mode.

Obviously, as the two GoPros come at a different price, your choice ultimately depends on your budget . I guess that if you’re thinking about buying a GoPro, then you already know you’ll have to spend quite a bit of money.

Why should I use a GoPro when travelling?

One of the most important features of this video-camera is being very tiny. With only a few centimeters in length and height, you’ll be holding a small piece of technology able to take spectacular photos and videos where any other device would not. What’s more, the GoPro is not cumbersome at all and therefore, it is very handy and easy to be carried around.

With its integrated external case which protects it from sand and water, the GoPro is the perfect camera to take with you to the beach , the sea, the swimming-pool as well as on the ski slopes. And, let me tell you, with its great handle floaty backdoor , the GoPro becomes the ideal companion to snap some photos whilst doing snorkeling.

As you can notice, the GoPro has an incredible number of accessories which can be used in many different situations, above all when practicing a sport activity rather than simply travelling.

For both photos and videos, the GoPro has a 170° wide angle lens that enables you to take amazing panoramic shots and breathtaking selfies with gorgeous landscapes behind your shoulders when mounted on a selfie stick.

Last but not least, the WiFi connection offers the possibility of remotely controlling the camera as well as download the photos and videos you’ve taken directly on your smartphone. You can then immediately share the snap you like the most on the social networks or send it to a friend.

Video with GoPro: how to do it and to set the camera

I personally use my GoPro to take videos which I then edit with Adobe Premiere. I personally aim at making short quality emotional videos containing the best memories of my travels, rather than video blogs or excessively long videos which bore people easily.

If you are looking for a professional stabilizer to shoot even better videos, I’d then recommend buying the  Feiyu FY-G4 Ultra 3-Axis or the Neewer® G4 QD 3-Axes with Handheld extrension .

If you want more information on how to stabilize your GoPro or any other action cam with a 3-Axis Gimbal, I’ll give you them soon on this blog.

When taking a video there are some basic concepts you should know about:

• Video resolution and frame rate
• Video width

Video resolution and frame rates on the GoPro

The term “resolution” refers to the dimension of the photogram, basically the image itself. Let me explain myself better: a video is practically a series of photograms that are put together in a sequence to render the movements. The resolution is therefore the dimension (both in length and height) of the photograms in pixels. You can find more information about image resolution on Wikipedia (click here ).

The available resolution settings for the GoPro 4 Silver are: 720 (HD), 720 super view, 960, 1080 (FULL HD), 1080 superview 1440, 2,7k and 4k.

The higher the resolution, the higher the dimension of the format and file that gets recorded on the memory card. For this reason, you must figure out what you will most likely shoot and the use you intend to make of your video-camera. If you want to record your videos in 4k , for example, you should purchase a memory card with a bigger capacity and transfer speed.

As for what regards my personal memory card, I use a   Micro SDXC Lexar (128GB )  with a transfer speed up to 95 MB/s. At the beginning I was using a  32 GB Sandisk Extreme  but I soon realized that it wasn’t enough for the huge quantity of datas I was recording on my GoPro.

When talking about image resolution, it is impossible not to mention the frame rate , meaning, the frequency at which the image frames are displayed in an animated display.

You might have heard people asking you “at how many FPS do you record your videos?” more than once.

FPS is the acronym for “Frame per Second” that is basically the frequency, or rate at which your camera will shoot a series of consecutive images (frames) which are displayed in your video.

Depending on the PAL or NTSC setting, you can record at 25/50 fps or 30/60/120 fps.

Obviously talking about fps might get a bit too technical eventually. So before it gets too complicated, just remember:

• High frame rate (high FPS) = smoother image quality and possibility of creating slow-motion videos. On the other hand, the faster the frame rate, the less time the camera has to capture each frame. As a consequence, the images are going to be much less brighter.
• Low frame rate (low FPS) = the videos cannot be slowed down excessively, as the mind of the viewer will no longer be convinced that the images are continuous. On the contrary, the video will seem to “jump” as each frame will be easily recognizable by the eyes of the viewer. Plus side, the images are brighter than videos taken in high frame rate.

As a consequence, before recording your video, check the brightness of what you’re going to film and the environment surrounding you, if the scene is bright enough, then opt for the high frame rate. If, on the contrary, you’re in poor lighting conditions, I’d recommend recording with low frame rates.

Now that you’ve understood the concepts of FPS and high/low frame rate, let’s try to talk about image resolution and frames .

It is not possible to record with the same FPS for all the resolutions. For example, with 4K on the GoPro Silver you can get up to 15 FPS, 1080 up to 24/30/48/60 FPS and 720 up to 120 FPS. You can easily get why recording in 4K with this amount of FPS is pretty much useless, unless you then what to get a photo out of the video you made.

Be careful when choosing what resolution and FPS to use -> This is because you need to set a minimum resolution: indeed, if you decide to record a few minutes in slow motion at 720 and 120FPS, and then switch to 1080 at 60FPS, you’ll later have some problems when editing your video. This is because the image at 720 is smaller than 1080, so you’d have to zoom in the video at 720, inevitably loosing image quality.

Go Pro Field of View (FOV): narrow, medium and wide

Apart from being a very versatile action-cam, the GoPro has detached itself from other similar products because it offers the possibility of setting it up on a Wide FOV . This view is perfect when you want to shoot with a larger field of view and the fisheye effect surely enhances the image quality.

The narrow and medium FOV (measuring 90 and 120 degrees respectively), “zoom-in” your photos and videos, but in both of these settings, there is no lens distortion and no loss of image quality.

The choice of the FOV depends all on the type of video you’re shooting. In this video you can better appreciate the difference I’ve just tried to explain to you using words.

Go Pro Low Light Footage

This low light setting can be used only when recording at 30 fps or more. This mode can be easily turned on or off from the GoPro menu, where you can also set at what resolution and fps to shoot. The GoPro Low Light Footage is perfect when you are in poor light conditions : indeed, it maintains an ideal brightness in the images you record by working on the fps. That’s why it must be used at over 30 fps. Some of the best moments where to benefit from the Low Light Footage offered by the GoPro are at night or in close and dark environments.

Have a look at this video to better understand how the Low Light Footage works and when it is best to use it.

The spot meter

The spot meter on the GoPro basically works to find the automatic exposure of the image. If the spot meter is turned off, the GoPro calculate the exposure in function of the brightness of the entire scene hitting the sensors of the camera. On the contrary, with the spot meter turned on, the GoPro makes use of a very small area in the centre of the frame to get the right exposure.

To put it simply, if you’re driving and you point at the road with the GoPro with spot meter turned on, the camera will get the correct exposure for the road and a under-exposure for the inside of the car. If the spot meter is turned off, the GoPro calculates the exposure (opening the shutter) in function of the inside of the car as well. The image will result in a brighter inside of the car, but overexposed road.

The Protune on GoPro

Anybody, when handling a GoPro for the first time, has probably asked themselves: what is Protune on GoPro? How does it work and when to use it? Well, these are just some of the questions I asked myself when I bought my GoPro, but after a few days of usage, I can definitely say it wasn’t hard to get the idea across. The Protune is basically the “raw” of a photo , a set of features that enhance the quality of the footage (both video quality an colour) taken with your GoPro.

When you turn the Protune on, the GoPro produces larger files than what you’d record on normal settings and they take up much space on your SD card.

If you turn on the Protune Flat, you’ll get more details in both shadows and highlights of the images recorded. Not only will the images and videos look better, but they will also be easier to edit, as you’ll be able to balance out darker and brighter areas without affecting the image colours.

If you wish to understand better how Protune works, have a look at this video — the guy who recorded it explains clearly its multiple usages so you can make the best out of your GoPro.

Careful : when using the Protune, the files recorded are much larger than what is shot with normal settings. One of the major downside of the protune is the fact that it takes up a lot of juice — therefore the battery of your camera won’t last long.

Which GoPro accessories to use when travelling?

To be perfectly honest, I believe expensive kits including 500 different tools for your GoPro to be excessive for travelling. Indeed, you’ll never find yourself using all those tools and you’ll probably never use each one of them to its full potential.

The GoPro is an extremely customizable camera, you can also buy polarize filters to reduce glare and improve colour saturation. As for what concerns taking photos or filming with a GoPro whilst doing a sport activity, I do believe the many different accessories to be fundamental in this context. But when I’m travelling, I always try to do so as light as possible, so I tend to bring what I’m sure I’ll use.

All the accessories mentioned below can be bought on Amazon.

My GoPro Accessories Kit:

• GoPro Newer or Feiyu Handheld Gimbal Stabilizer : without a tool as such, the video you take with your GoPro would inevitably be very blurry. The GoPro 5 has a built-in video stabilization, so buying a Feiyu handheld stabilizer would be useless. If, instead, you own an older GoPro, a stabilizer would be a good solution to improve the video quality. The Feiyu stabilizer works on 3 Axis and provides excellent stability for your GoPro footage. The battery life is very good, but you may need to balance the stabilizer quite often as it easily goes out of balance. On the market there are stabilizer to suit everybody’s tastes, so you could even decide to buy a cheaper one which will do a great job anyway — it all depends from your budget and needs. If you opt for a 3-Axis stabilizer, I’d definitely recommend having a look at the GoPro Newer or Feiyu stabilizer. Before purchasing it though, make sure it is compatible with your GoPro.

• 128 GB Lexar microSDXC Memory Card: that’s the memory card I mentioned a few lines above. I’m not used to record in 4K because it’s not the ideal option at 15fps, but with the new GoPro when you record at 60fps, you do so in 4k as well. If you wish to record 4k videos, you’ll then need a professional Memory Card with high capacity, just like the one I use.
• GoPro Standard Housing (included with your camera) : it’s fundamental! It helps guarding the camera from dirt, dust and scratches, but above all it’s waterproof! With this case you’ll be able to take gorgeous photos and record fun videos under water.
• GoPro Border Frame Mount Protective Housing Skin + Tripod Adapter : whenever I take photos or record videos without the standard housing included in the camera when you purchase it, I always tend to use a frame mount to protect my GoPro. This is the only way you’ll get the best quality images without the protective housing shell getting in your way. What’s more, you can even use the touchscreen to set the camera.The Frame linked here, comes with a tripod adapter so you can mount your camera on a monopod suction cup, or any other holder with 1/4 screws (compatible with the Hero 3, 3+ and 4).

• GoPro rechargeable battery (non-original) : I believe one of the worst aspects of the GoPro is its battery life. The original battery lasts for about 1h and 50 minutes when recording at 30fps in 1080p? The non-original ones I purchased last about 1h and 40 minutes, maybe even less than that. A good option is to carry some extra batteries with you at all times. You could even buy a battery pack, which is much less handy. You can find the original GoPro batteries at this link.

• Floating Handle Grip : this is a simple piece of plastic which will actually become your best friend when you’re in the water and using the GoPro at the same time. It basically prevents your GoPro from ending up on the seabed to keep the fishes some company. It comes with a high quality wrist strap which is really handy.

• 3-Way Grip Arm Tripod : there is a wide variety of tripods from which to choose from, but the one linked here is the one I personally believe to be the best as it’s very versatile. You could either go for an original tripod or buy one of a different brand. It depends on how much you want to spend, the choice is yours!

• GoPro camera and accessory carrying case : basically, just a small and handy case where to fit all the accessories of your Go Pro. Be careful if you’re buying it on the Internet — most of the times the case is actually much smaller than what it looks, so make sure you’ve got room enough for all the accessories you want to carry around with you.

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25 Essential Road Trip Movies of the Last 25 Years

We’re looking down the horizon and beyond for some of the best road trip movies that defined the genre over the last 25 years! To rev up this list, we selected American movies movies, journeys that begin in the States (where they actually finish is part of the fun). The movies celebrate the sights and sounds of the country, or at least will inspire you to pull out that camping gear, putting the convertible top down, and hitting the open road. These rides can be cross-county ( Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle ), on the freeway ( Dog , Sideways ), trekking across a few state lines ( Little Miss Sunshine , Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas ), hitting a new time zone ( Road Trip ), or even runnin’ coast-to-coast ( Rat Race , Transamerica ). Even the Academy has felt the need for reasonable speed, awarding Best Picture to both Green Book and Nomadland . Carpool lane? Of course: we’ve got an Oscar strapped in the passenger seat!

So whether you’re looking for a map to a long summer drive or fixing a flat in your life, turn to these essential 25 road trip movies of the last 25 years (in chronological order)!

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998) 51%

The Straight Story (1999) 95%

Tumbleweeds (1999) 82%

Almost Famous (2000) 91%

Road Trip (2000) 57%

Rat Race (2001) 45%

Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle (2004) 75%

Sideways (2004) 97%

Transamerica (2005) 77%

Little Miss Sunshine (2006) 91%

Cars (2006) 75%

Zombieland (2009) 89%

Away We Go (2009) 67%

Paul (2011) 70%

We're the Millers (2013) 48%

Chef (2014) 87%

Grandma (2015) 91%

Mississippi Grind (2015) 91%

Pee-wee's Big Holiday (2016) 83%

Green Book (2018) 77%

Nomadland (2020) 93%

The Mitchells vs. the Machines (2021) 97%

Bad Trip (2021) 79%

Dog (2022) 77%

Joy Ride (2023) 90%

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GoPro Motorcycle Guide: 11 GoPro Tips, Settings, Mounts, Composition

By: Author Bryan Haines

Posted on Last updated: February 17, 2023

Categories GoPro Tutorials

Do you want to film your ride with a GoPro camera? In this post, you’ll get 11 GoPro motorcycle tips , including settings, mounts, and accessories for shooting on your next ride. The four videos in this GoPro motorcycle guide will help you get set up and shooting.

Prefer bicycles? Check out our GoPro Biking Guide – it covers both road and mountain bikes.

The GoPro motorcycle settings include resolution, FOV, frame rate, Protune, white balance, and more.

Table of Contents

11 GoPro Motorcycle Tips

Here are some tips and tricks for getting the best out of your GoPro while on your bike. Don’t waste time or money trying to figure this out alone. This guide will get you well on your way.

With these tips – and a bit of practice – you’ll be shooting ride videos like this in no time.

Okay, now on to the guide!

1. Best GoPro for Motorcycle Riding: Hero11 Black

There are a few different models of GoPro on the market and what you want to do is buy the one that will handle high speeds.

You may not want some of the fancier specs but want a great picture. Or you may not want a high-level image, but want something easier to carry and handle.

This might not matter when you’re used to a helmet already, but it’s worth considering.

• Hero11 Black: It is my custom (and recommendation) to always buy the current model of camera.

Get your GoPro Hero11 Black on Amazon , B&H Photo , or Best Buy .

If you don’t, you’ll find that accessories and support might run out before the camera wears out. Plus, the current model takes the best images and footage – and isn’t that what you really want?  

Do you need all the features these cameras have? For most riders, I doubt it.

But there is one feature you will want: Voice Activation . As you’ll see further down, that’s going to be an invaluable feature to have on the road.

And the new Hero10 Black has crazy good image stabilization (Hyper Smooth 4.0). And I don’t need to tell you that this matters in motorcycle footage.

More reading: The best GoPro handlebar mount

2. Plan your GoPro Motorcycle Videos

Just riding and filming is easy and can be fun – that’s pretty much all you need to do if your videos are just going to sit on your hard drive for you to watch.

But if you have ambitions of sharing videos of your rides on YouTube, you might want to consider exactly what you’ll be recording and the conditions.

To up your video game, I recommend How to Shoot Video That Doesn’t Suck . It will help you to think like a director and immediately improve your footage. It’s the best book I’ve read about improving your videos.

Think about the scenery and the route you’ll take and how this will be filmed . Take into consideration the lighting, weather, and even the purpose of your video.

Are you showcasing the scenery or the speed? Do you want people to focus on your ride or your bike?

These points will change everything from where you mount your camera to what settings you use.

If you’re telling a story you need a beginning, middle, and end . You should consider knowing why you are filming this, why you’re telling this story? Is your end goal to share your ride with friends or make some money on YouTube?

Thinking about these things beforehand can make a difference in the end result and how much editing you may need to put into it.

3. GoPro Motorcycle Settings: Frame rate (60fps vs 30fps)

Let’s talk about frame rate. When it comes to high speed captures more is more .

GoPro Motorcycle Frame Rate: For the best footage on your bike, you should shoot at 60 frames per second (60fps).

60 fps has less motion blur, and makes for better footage and special effects.

You want a high frame rate so you don’t incorrectly record the video and cause distortion in the image. This can be an excellent effect but isn’t something you want in every video. Here’s what the  stroboscopic effect looks like.

For slow-motion edits, you need to remember that the slower you want the film to be, the higher your frame rate needs to be.

This means in editing when you slow down the play rate for film, images aren’t recycled – which gives you a proper slow-motion video.

4. GoPro Motorcycle Settings: Video Resolution and FOV

You can shoot 4K resolution with both Hero5 and Hero6. This will definitely capture the most detail of your ride.

You don’t always need to film at 4K though. 4K is great to film in if you’re going to watch it on a screen with that capability. However, if you don’t have a computer monitor or TV with 4K then this may not be important to you.

It’s also going to take up more space on your SD card, your computer, and need a little editing too.

But YouTube does have the option to upload and watch films in 4K so depending on what you’ve filmed it may be worth considering.

Best GoPro Motorcycle Settings: Video Resolution and Field of View

• 1080P Resolution: Good standard resolution. Anything less will likely be disappointing.
• 2.7K or 4K Resolution: Great for travel blogging, and shooting for commercial use. The higher resolution allows video to be cropped and still retain decent quality.

Shoot either Wide or SuperView Field of View: These will give you much more view of your surroundings. The narrower field of view options will not give much context as to where you are.

Remember: The higher the resolution and frame rate, the larger the video file – and the faster your sd card will fill up.

You will need to choose your resolution carefully – higher is not always better, but you want to film in at least 1080p if you want something to share online. 1080p is a good resolution for simple film and share videos.

The GoPro can film at a 1080p resolution at various frame rates, so you can record at high speed without distortion and even record slow-motion clips .

How do I turn off my GoPro? Check out our guide to all models

5. GoPro Motorcycle Settings: White Balance and Color Temperature

So what other settings should you consider while filming on the road?

Well, luckily the GoPro has great automatic white balancing so you don’t have to worry too much about the color of your video.

For those who want that control though it’s not hard to change the settings to suit the environment of your ride.

This video explains white balance and color temperature in more detail.

6. What about the weather?

The Hero models come with Protune shooting mode which allows for significant editing (it’s like shooting in RAW with a DSLR).

With some of the features, you can set it to film perfectly in whatever lighting conditions and capture great color in every frame.

This is also where you can change those fps – frame rate and resolutions settings too.

To avoid ruining your footage with water drops get a glass treatment spray that is water repellent such as Rain-X or something similar.

Some funny things can happen with water drops. Here’s how to prevent this water drop distortion .

It can get windy on the road. Here’s how to reduce GoPro wind noise while on your trip.

7. Mounting the GoPro on your Motorcycle

Mounting a camera on your bike might sound complicated but is actually very simple. There are a couple of ways you can mount a camera to your bike.

Each GoPro camera comes with mounts, including adhesive plastic mounts. While many riders use these, suction cups and clamps will offer more protection.

Clamp mounts won’t all have this ability but may feel more secure than suction cups.

Delkin are well known for their mounts – the Fat Gecko Mount  has a strange name but it’s an excellent product. I’ve used this mount many times and it is rigid.

It’s a good idea to test mount locations before heading out on a long trip. This can also help you find the best place on your bike to mount a camera – including your preferred perspective. Here are some more GoPro suction mounts .

One problem you will encounter while filming is bumps and vibrations. You want as much stability as you can get.

Any shaking of the camera is going to ruin footage by making everything shaky and distorted.

It would take more powerful editing software than the average rider might have at home to fix that sort of problem, so the best thing to do is stop the problem at the source.

Here are some other action camera brands to consider for your next ride: Guide to the Best Motorcyle Helmet Cameras

8. Mounting the GoPro on your Helmet

There are a couple of ways you can mount a camera to your helmet . You’ll get a few adhesive mounts with your camera.

Here’s how to mount your GoPro with the SoPro helmet mount – then you can check out this video:

You could also consider mounting the camera to your body with one of the accessories below.

9. Still Shots

The quality of the GoPro means that it can take some great photography too.

But how do you take photos while on the road? Easy. With voice activation. Since Hero5 (and up to the current Hero8) GoPro has several voice commands, including:

• GoPro, start recording
• GoPro, stop recording
• GoPro, take a photo
• GoPro, turn off

Here’s the full guide to GoPro voice commands .

So you can start recording at any point during the ride without having to stop. And even better you can take still shots on the move.

It’s a great feature to have – and again you don’t have to get off your bike and remove your GoPro to take the picture.

When taking pictures at speed you need to consider a few factors, images will come out blurry if you don’t have the settings right. It’s always best to experiment, and with some trial and error, you’ll find the settings that work for you.

As a guide, though, for high speed, the best shutter speed is around 1/1000 to 1/4000. These settings can be found in Protune which gives you the best way to play around with the settings.

The best thing to do when it comes to taking still shots is to experiment. Try it on corners, when you’re at the traffic lights, and while at top speeds.

Try different settings and different images. Some will be bad but there will be some gems – and you’ll learn what does and doesn’t work for you.

10. GoPro Power and Storage

If you’re going on long rides there are two vital components you need to consider – the battery life of your GoPro, and its storage capacity.

Anker portable chargers are popular and can charge up big energy eaters like Macbooks. However, they do take a little while to charge themselves.

You probably already have an SD card. But you really should have at least two, more if you’re going on a longer trip or just want to take more footage.

SD Memory Cards for GoPro Filming: I suggest getting a few 32gb cards rather than ones with larger capacity. Better to stop and change the card than lose everything you’ve filmed.

11. Cleaning your equipment

It’s important to keep your camera and mount clean, and worth doing so both before and after a ride.

Everything is going to get dirty on a ride, and when you’re cleaning your bike and equipment you should consider the GoPro as part of that routine.

Take care when cleaning the lens as they can scratch easily. A microfiber cloth or a lens cleaning solution is usually your best bet.

Your mount needs cleaning and storing too, to make sure it’s always in top condition and so no dirt or dust transfers to the camera lens. If you’re serious about your videos a lens cleaning kit will contain everything you need.

GoPro Motorcycle Accessories

Along with mounts, there are some great accessories that can really make your filming easier and a more enjoyable experience.

• If you wear a backpack, you might consider mounting your GoPro directly to your strap.

Learn more differences between GoPro cameras in the GoPro Comparison Guide .

Get Filming

With these eleven tips you’ll be making spectacular videos in no time, and getting the best out of your GoPro on every ride. Share your own tips with us below!

• About the Author
• Latest Posts

Hey, I’m Bryan ! I’m a content creator and co-founder of Storyteller Tech .

Experienced GoPro Videographer: I’ve been shooting with GoPro cameras for over 11 years. My first GoPro was the Hero3 Silver, bought for a Galapagos work trip in 2012. Today I own 20+ action cameras, including GoPro, DJI, and Insta360 cameras.

Professional Creator: Dena and I have developed video and content marketing plans for numerous international travel brands. And we also run several content businesses.

Bryan also creates at  Storyteller.Travel  and is co-founder of  Storyteller Media , a Canadian-based publishing company.

• Insta360 X4 vs Insta360 X3: Compared Side by Side (6 Things to Know)
• GoPro Operating Temperature: Max/Min Temp Tolerances
• GoPro Keeps Powering Off? 8 Reasons and How to Fix

AdalfredoAngelo

Wednesday 9th of December 2020

I loved the article "GoPro Motorcycle Guide: 11 GoPro Tips, Plus Settings, Mounts, Composition…". You present a informative and well decorated post. Thanks for helping us! Keep up your good job.

Sunday 13th of September 2020

Hi Bryan, great info you share here, thanks. I want to use Hero 7 White on my motorcycle and wonder if the voice control is working through an external mic placed inside my helmet.

Tuesday 5th of May 2020

Hello I hope you can answer this. I am filming some rides on my motorbike and they look fine when I edit them (and when I watch them play back on my GoPro Hero 7 Black) but when I upload them to YouTube, they look choppy and pixelated. Any suggestions? Thanks

Joshua D. Mattie

Sunday 24th of November 2019

A well-described post. Thanks for sharing all these amazing tips.

Gary Hildenbrandt

Thursday 11th of April 2019

Useful info Bryan. I have some questions though. 1: how many video minutes does the GoPro7 Black store on the internal memory? 2: Should I get more memory with an SDHC card? If so what kind of card do you recommend? I will be using this for dirt bike riding. I appreciate your feedback.

Thursday 30th of May 2019

Gary I just did 3 days in Vermont filming with 3 hero 7 blacks and a hero 6 black. I have a 128gb in 6 and 64gb cards in the 7’s and never filled them filming on and off all day. Beware however I did tons of filming and edited it down to about 3 minutes of finished film so you’ll be filming a lot to turn out a decent project Rob

The Challenges of Writing a Road Trip Film: Interview with the Writers of 'Half Brothers'

This is an exclusive ScreenCraft interview with Half Brothers writers Eduardo Cisneros and Jason Shuman . Half Brothers is currently in theaters.

Half Brothers tells the story of Renato (Luis Gerardo Mendez), whose father, Flavio (Juan Pablo Espinosa), abandoned him and Renato’s mother in Mexico two decades prior when he left to find work in the United States and never returned. When Renato, who’s now a successful Mexican aviation executive, gets a call from his dying father in Chicago, Renato reluctantly goes to America to reconcile with his dad. He’s shocked, however, when he discovers he has a half-brother, the quirky and sensitive Asher (Connor Del Rio). They are forced on a road trip together, tracing the path their father took from Mexico to the U.S.

Table of Contents

How to write a road trip film

Written by Eduardo Cisneros, known for 2013’s Instructions Not Included , and Jason Shuman, the film is a heartfelt road trip movie about a broken family trying to heal. The film blends its often very broad comedic tone with an authentic immigrant experience in a way that feels fresh and often quite funny.

The story uses Cisneros’ own immigrant experience as a jumping-off point. Cisneros was born and raised in Mexico but then spent a few years in the U.S. adjusting to the American culture.

“There were things that surprised me, being away from home,” says Cisneros. “It got me thinking about when I was a kid growing up in Monterrey, Mexico. My dad had to move to Mexico City for a job where he spent a few years and it was a challenge for our family, but he had to do it to provide for his kids. I’m the youngest of five. At the time I didn’t understand why something like that would happen. When I became an adult, also on my own, away from home, I started to think what it felt like for him. That was the seed, the kernel that got me thinking about the subject of empathy. It is the central piece of the architecture of the comedy and journeys,” he says.

Of course, the half-brothers in the movie are polar opposites, a trope that is often seen in road trip films , with Renato being the closed-off, uptight brother and Asher being the goofy, free-spirited one. The two struggle to find empathy for each other, creating a tension that helps propel the story when the plot sometimes feels contrived.

But Shuman admits, writing a road trip film is deceptively difficult.

“I think there’s always huge challenges for screenwriters in doing road trip movies,” says Shuman. “It seems like it would be easy, the plot is always moving forward because the actual characters are moving as opposed to sitting in a room – they’re always on the go. We actually found in our research those can be the most complicated movies to write. You have to be very specific with what you throw at them and what the beats of the journey are. If you have a false beat or a stop that doesn’t feel organic to the movie it can throw the whole pace and tone off.”

Cisneros agrees, adding, “Every stop [on the road trip] has to have a purpose in terms of revealing information but also provide a good, fun set-piece and bonding of the brothers organically.”

How to set the tone of your script

“Eduardo,” says Shuman, “would show me a lot of Italian cinema that influenced him – Cinema Paradiso, Life is Beautiful – being some of the influences behind Instructions Not Included,” says Shuman. “So we were really inspired by movies that could shift and have these funny set pieces and then five minutes later, 30 seconds later, get very serious and somehow shift back again. It’s a difficult tone to keep juggling between but felt when done successfully, can be a fun journey for the audience . Audiences today try to stay ahead of the story, trying to see where things might go. We wanted to take them on an emotional journey that would be fulfilling with some twists and turns they didn’t see coming – so that means changing up the tone when you’re least expecting it .”

When the scenery is a character

Shuman and Cisneros shared this advice for screenwriters:

“We have a lot of little mantras we say to each other all the time: Don’t get it right, get it written first ,” Shuman says. “We find that rewriting is always more fun to us and is a lot easier than staring at the blank page. We always encourage writers – wherever they are in the process, to just fight through and get that first draft done so you’ve got a script and then you can go back and change it. But we’re also big structure professors. We don’t start our screenplay until it’s well ironed out. A good structure, like a good home, you want to build that foundation. But don’t spend a year writing one draft. Get it written and then go back and do your work.”

How to write a road trip movie

Cisneros’s advice is not to chase the marketplace. Instead, he says, “Write the story that excites you because it’s really tough to write. I’ve trained as a musician and done other forms of art, but I find that writing is the most difficult as you’re doing it. I think the reward comes more after you finish.”

Shuman and Cisneros are currently writing the script for a Latinx remake of 1986’s Short Circuit .

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Directed by Todd Phillips

The greatest college tradition of all.

From the director of the Hangover trilogy and Joker, Road Trip is a raunchy college comedy classic. After an Ithaca college student films his one-night stand with a beautiful sorority girl, he discovers one of his friends has accidentally mailed the homemade porn tape to his girlfriend. In a frenzy, he must borrow a car and hit the road in a desperate bid to intercept the tape. Featuring a talented cast that includes Breckin Meyer, Rachel Blanchard, Seann William Scott, Amy Smart, Fred Ward, Tom Green, Anthony Rapp, Andy Dick, and Ethan Suplee.

Breckin Meyer Seann William Scott Amy Smart Paulo Costanzo DJ Qualls Rachel Blanchard Anthony Rapp Fred Ward Tom Green Andy Dick Ethan Suplee Horatio Sanz Rhoda Griffis Marla Sucharetza Ellen Albertini Dow Edmund Lyndeck Jessica Cauffiel Kohl Sudduth Wendell B. Harris Jr. Rini Bell Jaclyn DeSantis Aliya Campbell Kim Fox Patricia Gaul Richie Dye Mary Lynn Rajskub Tim Ware Julia Wright Paula Claire Jones Show All… Richard Peterson Phe Caplan Avery Kidd Waddell Omar J. Dorsey Preston Wigasi Brant Mia Amber Davis Jimmy Kimmel Bethany Sacks Charlie McWade Todd Barry Bill Rowell Bill Gribble Guenevere Rodriguez Al Wiggins Lisa Chyn Daniel Emery Taylor Rachel Marinacci Bob Place Frank Girardeau Marla Malcolm Matt Walsh John Ross Bowie Cristen Coppen Cleo King Lori Beth Sikes Kellie Garrigan Michael Cornier Frank Cooper Mark Bez Andrew Fowler Paul Simpson Krew Keth Marc Gordon Tharon Johnson Raymond DeLoatch Will Aklin Calvin J. Wilson Benjamin Booker Bridgett Wise Aerica D'Amaro Todd Phillips Deborah Zoe Johnny Genius Moses Tom Peyton Ben Kramer Eric Tobias

Director Director

Todd Phillips

Producers Producers

Daniel Goldberg Joe Medjuck

Writers Writers

Todd Phillips Scot Armstrong

Casting Casting

Ann Goulder Nancy Nayor

Editors Editors

Sheldon Kahn Peter Teschner

Cinematography Cinematography

Executive producers exec. producers.

Tom Pollock Ivan Reitman

Production Design Production Design

Clark Hunter

Art Direction Art Direction

Set decoration set decoration.

Traci Kirshbaum

Stunts Stunts

Tina Mckissick

Composer Composer

Michael Simpson

Costume Design Costume Design

Peggy Stamper

Makeup Makeup

Harriette Landau

Hairstyling Hairstyling

Joani Yarbrough

DreamWorks Pictures The Montecito Picture Company Ivan Reitman Productions

Releases by Date

19 may 2000, 07 jun 2000, 17 aug 2000, 24 aug 2000, 21 sep 2000, 22 sep 2000, 13 oct 2000, 18 oct 2000, 26 oct 2000, 28 oct 2000, 07 aug 2000, 08 sep 2000, 22 nov 2001, 27 feb 2009, 16 may 2003, releases by country.

• Theatrical MA15+
• Theatrical 15+
• Theatrical U
• Theatrical 12
• Theatrical 16

Netherlands

• TV 12 SBS 6
• Physical 12 DVD
• Theatrical M/12

South Korea

• Theatrical 18

Switzerland

• Theatrical 15
• Theatrical R

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Popular reviews

Review by CosmonautMarkie ★★ 36

I’ve decided to watch every 90s/early 2000s boner comedy I can find. In this one a character looks straight into the camera and says “Boner time.”

Review by Jizzmonkey ★★★★ 4

Apparently this movie is for moronic immature assholes. I can't see how that can be true, coz I loved it.

Review by goncaloacosta ½ 1

The director of Joker, Todd Phillips, bringing us another masterpiece portrait of mental illness, with an Oscar worthy performance by Tom Green.

Review by Eli Hayes ★★★½

"Tiny salmon swimming in a stream. Tiny salmon chasing that impossible dream. The mynah bird says, 'Caw. Ca-Caw.' The chimpanzee says, 'EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!' The friendly owl says, 'Hoo, hoo-hoo.' But the salmon can only say, 'Bloobloobloobloo. Blooboloobloobloo. Blooboloobolooooo-Blooblooo-Bloobloobloo.' And it's sad."

Review by Will Sloan

In a framing device that screams "Tom Green became very, very popular sometime between filming and postproduction," a minor character played by Tom Green narrates this movie.

Good? Bad? What ultimately matters about this movie is that the nude scene featuring Amy Smart was discussed in hushed and reverential tones on the schoolyard when I was in sixth grade.

Review by Zayn Nafi ★★★½ 2

Fun fact, the guy licking the Amy's foot on the bus is Tod Phillips, the director on this movie, and also the director of movie Joker

Review by megan ★★★ 1

“i would die for tom green.” - only me

Review by Justin Peterson ★★★½ 5

Time to gather up the raunchy teen humor of 'American Pie', and hit the road for this charming, punchy, but disposable comedy.

"Take your situation for example: it's not cheating. It's never cheating when you're in a different area code, not to mention a different state ... That makes no sense."

I had nearly forgotten about this little college sex comedy that I did check out numerous times during my early High School years. As a whole, Road Trip is one of those typical teen movies that you would randomly go see with a bunch of friends for some laughs. But on this rewatch it was amusing to remember all the wild moments that do make Road Trip stand out.…

Review by Dan Abel ★★★½ 1

"Invested!? Who are you, Charles Schwab!?"

"Socrates. He was like the Vince McMahon of philosophy. He started it all."

Barry is leading a group of possible new enrollees and their parents on a tour of the grounds for the University of Ithaca. He's a slacker that has been a student at the campus for eight years so he knows the ins and outs. When the group becomes uninterested in the history of the establishment he tells them the tale of a student he knew years ago named Josh Parker. Josh dated his best friend, a girl named Tiffany from when they were kids all the way up through high school but they ended up going to different colleges, Josh in…

Review by ☆ maria ☆ ★★★½ 3

rubin carver looks like a curly-headed version of aaron taylor-johnson. basically what I'm saying is that I have a crush on rubin.

Review by Justin Decloux ½ 1

If this were a just world, Todd Phillips would not be allowed within 100-yards of a camera.

It is not a just world.

It is hell.

Review by bearwalkr ひ ★★★½ 4

The French toast scene literally makes me afraid too correct people on my orders at restaurants

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10 Black Travel Movies That Capture the Beauty of Summer

This summer when you're looking for a good film to watch, check out this list of 10 Black travel movies that capture the beauty of Summer.

Jasmine Osby • May 9, 2022

There are dozens of Black films that showcase the beauty of Summer travel. Whether the protagonist is on the run from the cops or a wholesome father is embarking on a road trip with his daughter to check out colleges, there are plenty of movies that capture Black culture in the midst of traveling from point A to point B. This summer when you and your family are looking for a good flick to unwind and watch, check out this list of 10 Black travel movies that capture the beauty of Summer.

1. Are We Done Yet? (2007)

The sequel to the 2005 family comedy Are We There Yet? , Hip Hop legend Ice Cube reprises his role as Nick Persons in the 2007 film Are We Done Yet? In the film, Ice Cube is surprised that his wife, played by Nia Long, is pregnant. The couple realizes they need more space to accommodate their now family of five and embark on a journey into the country to find a new home.

Unlike the original film which is set during the Christmas season, Are We Done Yet? takes Ice Cube and his family through the summer-draped countryside to a rundown house that Ice Cube spends the entire film trying to renovate. The family encounter wild deer in the forest, gigantic fish, and beautiful sunset backdrops as they commute from their cramped city apartment to a spacious countryside mansion in the middle of the woods. 

As stated by Ice Cube during the movie, Are We Done Yet? is filled with fresh air and open spaces from beginning to end with witty banter between the characters, extreme comedic edge, and the love of Black family all tied into one.

2. Poetic Justice (1993)

Directed by John Singleton, Poetic Justice became an instant Black classic when it was released in 1993. Not only does the film capture the beauty of summer, but it also features an all-star cast including Janet Jackson, Tupac Shakur, Regina King, and Joe Torry. 

Centered around a young, Black woman named Justice played by Jackson, Poetic Justice follows the young woman’s struggle with depression after the loss of her boyfriend to gun violence. To cope with the murder, Justice can be heard reciting her poetry throughout the film. Hoping to cheer her friend up, King invites Justice to join her boyfriend (Torry) and his friend (Shakur) on a road trip from South Central LA to Oakland in a mail truck. Needing to head to Oakland for a hair show but with no transportation, Justice obliges and their adventure begins. 

Poetic Justice is a beautiful film that captures the essence of Black culture in the 90s and the magnificence of Summertime on the West Coast. The journey from South Central to Oakland takes viewers through some amazing scenery in California and glimpses of mountain ranges and ocean views can be seen throughout the film. One of the most iconic moments in Poetic Justice is the family reunion scene. A nostalgic moment for viewers, this scene takes you back to that time when life was simpler and when family mattered. Poetic Justice is the West Coast travel film you must have in your collection.

3. How Stella Got Her Groove Back (1998)

Based on the best-selling book by Terry McMillian, How Stella Got Her Groove Back was an iconic film for Black women everywhere when it premiered in 1998. The film starred Angela Basset, Whoopi Goldberg, and was Taye Diggs’ film debut. The story follows a successful stockbroker (Basset) in desperate need of a vacation. Pressured and stressed, she joins her friend (Goldberg) on a trip to Jamaica where she meets a young man (Diggs) 20 years younger than her who reshapes her perspective and gives her a fresh outlook on life and living. 

How Stella Got Her Groove Back brings viewers face to face with the fresh blue waters of Jamaica. The main character travels from San Francisco to the islands and as her location changes, so did her mindset. This film showcased the beauty of Jamaica during the warmer months and will entice anyone looking for days filled with beaches, laughter, dancing, and fun to visit the island.

4. Ride (1998)

Known as the wildest trip of the year back in 1998, Ride takes viewers on a journey from New York City to Miami. The movie follows the story of an NYC film student working as an assistant for a big shot music video director. When budget cuts are made, the student nearly losses her job until she agrees to escort a group of showbiz wannabes to Miami for a music video shoot. 

Ride takes viewers to the dirty south on a rinky-dink bus and on an adventure with an all-star cast that includes John Witherspoon, Fredro Starr, Malik Yoba, and Snoop Dogg. As the aspiring musicians, singers, and dancers travel south, you can catch views of the country going past through the bus windows as they take the commute of a lifetime to fulfill their dreams.

5. Girl’s Trip

Another classic American comedy, Girl’s Trip is the ultimate friend’s reunion tied together with some of your favorite actresses in Hollywood. Produced by Will Packer, Girl’s Trip tells the story of four female friends from college who reunite for a long overdue girl’s trip to New Orleans for Essence Fest. The movie stars Queen Latifah, Regina Hall, Jada Pinkett-Smith, and Tiffany Haddish as the ladies get into all types of mayhem and fun in the streets of the Big Easy. 

With Essence Fest being in the heart of the Summer months, Girl’s Trip perfectly captures the wonder that is New Orleans during the warm season. From dance battles in nightclubs to enjoying the inspiring Essence Fest festivities, Girl’s Trip is an excellent depiction of the fun and friendship while traveling during the Summer.

6. Queen & Slim

A tragic love story from screenplay writer Lena Waithe, Queen & Slim is an American road crime drama that touches on topics like racial injustice, police brutality, and equality in America. Although they are never named until the end of the film, Queen & Slim follows two young Black millennials who are on the run after shooting a cop during a traffic stop. The movie takes the pair on a life of death journey that begins in Ohio. They also travel through Kentucky, New Orleans, and Florida as they fight to make it to Cuba so they can find refuge. 

Queen & Slim is a multilayered film that transcends travel. A modern-day story of Bonnie and Clyde, this movie takes viewers on a thrilling ride through southern America during the Summer. Despite the plight that has befallen the lead characters, viewers still can see highlights of summertime in the US throughout the film even until the very end of the saga.

7. College Road Trip

In College Road Trip , comedian Martin Lawrence stars as Officer Porter whose high school daughter preparing to graduate and attend college in the Fall. Unfortunately, Porter is extremely overprotective and interrupts his daughter’s plans by taking her on his own, specially crafted college tour to Washington DC. 

Although his daughter, played by Raven Simone, keeps her heart set on attending Georgetown throughout the film, that doesn’t stop him from taking her across the country on a road trip she’ll never forget. A wholesome, family travel movie, College Road Trip shows the good, the bad, and the ugly of traveling by car in the Summer heat.

8. Coming 2 America

The sequel to the Eddie Murphy 1988 classic Coming to America , this movie shines a light on the beauty of traveling during the Summer to Africa as the long-lost, American son of Prince Akeem of Zamunda travels there to meet his father. Beautiful safari scenery can be seen surrounding the African palace and much exotic wildlife is also found throughout the film. The voyage from Queens to Zamunda is a life-changing journey for the son and sets him on a trajectory toward royalty. 

If you want to take a trip to Zamunda right from your living room, Coming 2 America is the perfect film to check out this Summer.

Life came at Eddie Murphy and Martin Lawrence fast in the 1999 comedy-drama Life . The film follows two New York City men who have gotten in trouble with a local gangster. To save their lives, the pair agrees to travel south to Mississippi to illegally transport bootleg liquor back up north. Unfortunately, misfortune befalls them, and the two land in prison for life. 

Life tells the story of the two men traveling south and their journey through their prison sentences. During their commute to Mississippi, viewers catch some great glimpses of the southern United States during the Summer.

10. Soul Plane

If car rides aren’t quite your style, then Soul Plane may be the perfect Summer travel movie for you. Starring Kevin Hart, Snoop Dogg, and Monique, Soul Plane follows the lives of multiple passengers having different experiences while traveling Nashawn Wade Airlines.

Check out Soul Plane if you’re tired of the traditional road travel films and take to the skies for a plane ride you’ll never forget.

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27 Road Trip Movies Every Traveler Needs To Watch

The road is one of the most enduring images in film history because it can be used for so many different purposes. It can mean the freedom of adventure, or adventure's inevitable dead-end. Road trips can result in meeting interesting new characters, or they can be the worst kind of isolation or even the worst kind of forced bonding. Filmmakers from all over the world are continually drawn to the road movie and specifically the road trip movie, where a simple car or bus ride can become something much more meaningful. It offers plenty of opportunity for unexpected change, and it often does so in front of beautiful, overwhelming landscapes. They'll never stop making movies about road trips because people will never stop taking them, always wanting to see the sights and maybe become a little wiser in the process.

The 27 films in this list all take their own approaches to portraying the road trip cinematically, emphasizing its best and worst tendencies and playing them for both comedy and drama. But even the worst trips taken here offer something to appreciate, sometimes deep thought about the meaning of the road and sometimes a laugh at the expense of the poor fools stuck in the car.

1. Easy Rider

One of the most iconic road trips in cinematic history was taken by Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper in Hopper's 1969 classic "Easy Rider." The legendary image of Fonda and Hopper riding their motorcycles while Steppenwolf's "Born To Be Wild" plays remains people's main association with "Easy Rider." But the movie itself is more complicated than just the thrill of riding down wide-open roads. The tagline tells of a man who went looking for America and "couldn't find it anywhere," and that's a good summation of the cynical eye this takes toward the country it explores.

Fonda and Hopper encounter some friendly people in their travels, most famously Jack Nicholson in his breakout role as a drunken lawyer. They encounter just as much resistance as they do support, from people with no tolerance for their countercultural attitudes and long hair. In one scene, Nicholson tells Hopper that people are scared of him because "what you represent to them is freedom," and the film's bleak ending offers little hope that freedom can be maintained in the face of such strong opposition. But the power of the film's images of freedom and joy is still enough to keep this as one of the beloved road movies.

2. Lost in America

Despite its cynicism, "Easy Rider" inspired many Americans to go out on the road themselves, even ones who couldn't be further away from Fonda and Hopper's biker lifestyle. This is the subject of writer, director, and actor Albert Brooks's 1985 film "Lost in America," in which a middle-class yuppie couple (Brooks and Julie Hagerty) hits the road and quickly realizes they can't handle it. By the end of the trip, they've destroyed their lives and their savings, and they've rid themselves of any romantic notions about traveling America without a plan.

Brooks' directorial work is defined by bitterness and discomfort as much as by laughs, and "Lost in America" can be particularly caustic. Brooks and Hagerty sink to some miserable depths during the course of their trip, reduced to begging for the money they just lost gambling or treating each other with naked hostility. A trip to the Hoover Dam doesn't offer scenery, instead serving as a backdrop to the couple's most vicious fight. "Lost in America" is a satire of the waste and excess of the American '80s, but it's also a reminder to make sure you've carefully thought through your road trip before you embark on one. Some people aren't ready for the road, and Brooks and Hagerty learn that too late.

3. The Color Wheel

Getting stuck with someone annoying on a long road trip can be a miserable experience, so spending the entirety of the 2011 comedy "The Color Wheel" with two annoying people on a road trip can make it a tough sell. But the film's writer-director, Alex Ross Perry, has an uncommon talent for writing people who only seem to be awful and irritating so that they're both funnier and more tragic than they would be in real life. That skill serves him especially well for the two leads of "The Color Wheel," an obnoxious brother and sister (played by Perry and Carlen Altman) whose road trip through New England leads them to meet strangers and old friends who are all even more awful than they are. The scenery offers little comfort when every scene becomes a passive-aggressive argument.

"The Color Wheel" is above all else a comedy, happy to laugh at its main characters for their abysmal social skills and undisguised contempt for each other and everyone around them. But as the trip goes on and they keep meeting hostile exes and classmates, their situation starts to seem a little sad, like they've been molded into hateful jerks by the whole world around them. Their final attempt to escape the cycle of anger and venom is shocking, but it's also unexpectedly tender, because Perry respects his characters even as they embarrass themselves.

Even the awful road trip of "The Color Wheel" can't compare to the nightmare trip taken by the title character of "Zola," and hers really happened. "Zola" was adapted from the famous Twitter thread detailing a disastrous trip to Florida taken by a part-time stripper (Taylour Paige) and a woman she just met (Riley Keough). There's not much time to enjoy Florida on this trip, the scenery consists of strip malls and different men's hotel rooms, and the business Zola has been dragged into quickly spirals into exploitation and violence.

"Zola" is about very bad events in a woman's life, but like the Twitter thread, it believes those events to be hilarious above anything else. The band of fools Zola winds up with can seem dangerous, particularly Colman Domingo's ambiguously accented pimp, but mostly they're all bluster and no brains. When they encounter people who are actually dangerous, they escape by the skin of their teeth. There's tension but never fear in "Zola," and that helps to make it a wonderful comedy even once the blood starts getting shed.

5. American Honey

"Zola" isn't the only movie where Riley Keough is a uniquely awful road trip presence. There's also the 2016 drama "American Honey", where Keough enlists a young girl played by Sasha Lane into a crew of door-to-door magazine salespeople. They travel blissfully across the Midwest, and Lane falls in love with a member of the crew, played by Shia LaBeouf. But their peaceful, off-the-grid existence is threatened by Keough and the precarity of their jobs.

A common thread across many of the great American road movies is that they're not directed by Americans, with international directors often looking at American landscapes in a different way than their American counterparts who've grown up with them. English director Andrea Arnold joins that group of directors with how she films America here, pushing the colors of the landscapes to such extremes that the emotions associated with them are also heightened, whether they be romance or danger. Her beautiful imagery is accentuated by her pulsing soundtrack, which switches between big-name pop hits and obscurities that perfectly match the mood of youthful excitement and negligence that defines "American Honey."

6. Stranger Than Paradise

While road trips can be fun and exciting, they can also be tedious, especially when there's not much scenery to look at. Writer-director Jim Jarmusch expertly captured the boredom of a bad road trip in his 1984 breakthrough "Stranger Than Paradise," in which the three leads take off in search of new experiences and don't find them anywhere they look.

Two of the leads are Hungarian émigrés hoping to find more from America than they did from their home. But the America portrayed in "Stranger Than Paradise" is just the most unremarkable areas of New York, Ohio, and Florida, presented so that the camera is just as unimpressed by them as the characters are. And only the most monotonous aspects of the road trip are shown, like driving through the endless expanse of Pennsylvania or arguing about who has to sleep on the cot when they get to a motel. Despite its tedium, "Stranger Than Paradise" is a very funny study of how the myths of the road can collapse in the face of the realities of going out on the road.

7. Badlands

Not all road trips start from good intentions. The one undertaken by Kit (Martin Sheen) and Holly (Sissy Spacek) in 1973's Bonnie and Clyde story "Badlands" starts after Kit murders Holly's father and burns down their house. That's where the journey begins, and eventually Kit is responsible for much more than one murder. But there's still an innocence to young Kit and Holly's trip, where they create their own society out in the wilderness and encounter all kinds of gorgeous nature. "Badlands," writes Sheila O'Malley for Criterion , is based on the 1958 murder spree of Charles Starkweather and Caril Ann Fugate, but its power doesn't come from its killings so much as its troubling naivete, where the blinkered teenage attitudes of its protagonists and the pastoral beauty of their surroundings say nothing about the horrible violence occurring right in front of them.

"Badlands" was the debut of writer-director Terrence Malick, who would go on to develop a reputation for his eye for natural landscapes. That's present even this early, shooting trees and sunsets so that they appear magical more than natural. But that magic here comes with a terrible price, and Malick seems as disturbed by nature's non-reaction to the evil committed all around it as he is entranced by its power.

8. My Blueberry Nights

Wong Kar-wai has directed some of the most beloved films of all time in his native Hong Kong, but to date, he's only made one movie in the United States. That was 2007's "My Blueberry Nights," which explores the unique geography of America through a road trip starting in New York and ending in Las Vegas. Wong is renowned for his intensely stylized movies, and "My Blueberry Nights" is no exception. Wong's America is beautiful in a way it isn't in real life — only Wong's oversaturated colors and beautiful golden light could make it look this gorgeous. In this way, Wong captures the feeling of a great road trip, of falling in love with every location you pass. And Wong ties all these stunning locales to his usual themes of heartbreak and melancholy, showing beautiful places inhabited by sad, lonely people.

"My Blueberry Nights" is held back from the levels of Wong's best movies by a weak script and inconsistent performances. Otherwise talented actors like Natalie Portman and Rachel Weisz go over the top, while even strong performances from Jude Law and David Strathairn have to go against the bland lead performance from singer and first-time actor Norah Jones. But such flaws don't matter too much in light of how enchanting Wong's vision of the world is. This is the kind of movie that makes people want to keep taking road trips.

9. Alice in the Cities

Few directors are as synonymous with the road and road movies as Wim Wenders, the German director who's made several of the best-loved movies about the road ever made. His most overt takes on the road genre are the three movies that make up his "Road Trilogy," starting with "Alice in the Cities" in 1974. "Alice in the Cities" concerns German writer Philip (Rüdiger Vogler), who follows a disappointing assignment by meeting a woman (Lisa Kreuzer) and her young daughter Alice (Yella Rottländer), then agreeing to go on a trip through Amsterdam. Their trip is marked by complications, boredom, and a lot of music, including a Chuck Berry concert and a jukebox playing Canned Heat. And all the while, Philip and Alice begin to develop a friendship.

"Alice in the Cities" is one of the most lasting Wenders movies, inspiring the work of filmmakers like Allison Anders and Mike Mills, particularly Mills' own adult-and-child road movie "C'mon C'mon." "Alice in the Cities" holds special power for its tale of unexpected companionship, where the road has the magic to bring together people who never would have even met under different circumstances. Even when the sights aren't exciting, getting to experience those sights with someone new can be a rewarding experience.

10. Magic Mike XXL

The success of the male-stripper comedy "Magic Mike" left star Channing Tatum and writer Reid Carolin with the duty of following up a movie that seemed to neatly wrap up at the end. Rather than repeat the first one's formula, Tatum and Carolin decided to go in another direction, turning 2015's "Magic Mike XXL" into an exuberant road trip movie about friends and the joy of performing. "Magic Mike" was an often melancholy movie about the recession, and while there are still economic worries all over "Magic Mike XXL," they mostly take a back seat to just enjoying the chance to escape from them for a few days.

The first film's director, Steven Soderbergh, didn't return to direct "Magic Mike XXL," but he did serve as its cinematographer, and he deserves special credit for how beautiful he makes the film's Southern locations look. Even an ordinary gas station comes to life with Soderbergh's golden light, to say nothing of the beaches and palatial estates Mike and his friends visit on their journey. The beauty of these locations also represents the simple beauty of hanging out with people you love, and this is where "Magic Mike XXL" separates itself from its predecessor. Mike's fellow strippers barely had personalities in the first one, but here they're best friends who love each other's company even as they razz each other. It's a unique pleasure to go on the road with such a tight-knit group.

11. Y tu mamá también

After making 2001's "Y tu mamá también," Alfonso Cuarón stuck to making large-scale spectacles and big-budget blockbusters. But in "Y tu mamá también," Cuarón applies his usual technical excellence to a simple story of a woman and two teenage boys going on a road trip. The Mexican landscapes they drive past are beautifully shot by future Oscar-winning cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki, and their conversations are profane and hilarious, especially as delivered by Diego Luna and Gael García Bernal in their breakthrough roles. But a serious side creeps into "Y tu mamá también" as it goes on, eventually taking it over entirely.

As the three take their trip, they pass by political strife and Mexican culture soon to die out entirely. The characters may only be passing through these areas, but there are people living in the areas whose lives will be very difficult long after the leads are gone. Despite its main characters' immaturity, this is a surprisingly thoughtful road trip movie, understanding that even the most pristine locales are burdened by troubling history. That also turns out to be true about the main characters' dynamics, where the teenage leads eventually realize the depths of sadness and desperation they and their traveling partner carry with them. But before they get to that point, they have a great time, and so does the viewer watching them.

12. My Own Private Idaho

Gus Van Sant's "My Own Private Idaho" opens with River Phoenix's character, Mikey Waters, saying that he's traveled so much down so many roads that he can recognize the roads just by sight. His life on the road is a beautiful but lonely one until he finds someone he can briefly share it with, a senator's son, Scott Favor ( Keanu Reeves ). Their journeys across deserted roads and rocky landscapes are sometimes silly but mostly poetic and sad, showing two young men as lost in the scenery as they are in their own lives.

Van Sant makes a lot of odd digressions in "My Own Private Idaho," including a sequence with talking erotic magazines and an entire plot loosely adapted from Shakespeare's "Henry IV" saga, writes Amy Taubin for Criterion . But the heart of the film is the relationship between Mikey and Scott, one where Mikey may be the only one of the two to realize how special and intimate it is. A heartbreaking scene at a campfire sees Mikey get tantalizingly close to professing his love to Scott and not quite doing so. While Mikey may have lived his life by the isolation of the road, he needs Scott to share that life with him, and the film offers little hope that this will happen.

13. The Straight Story

The films and TV of David Lynch are usually filled with the darkness and violence that lurk beneath the beautiful landscapes of America. But Lynch still loves those landscapes and the people who inhabit them, and never is that clearer than his only movie to get a G rating, 1999's "The Straight Story." He tells the story of a real-life road trip, where an elderly, almost blind farmer named Alvin Straight (Richard Farnsworth) drove a lawn mower from Iowa to Wisconsin to see his ailing brother (Harry Dean Stanton).

There's not much dialogue in "The Straight Story," especially for the long stretches where Alvin is on his own out on the road, but it's not necessary when Lynch is working with the wide-open expanses of the midwest. He finds magic in the crop dusters and near-empty roads Alvin encounters, setting the sights to a moving Angelo Badalamenti score and making them even more powerful. And when Alvin does meet other people, their encounters are simple and touching, showing the hard lessons Alvin has learned about family over the course of a long, difficult life.

Channing Tatum and Reid Carolin made their directorial debuts in February 2022 with "Dog," which followed the "Magic Mike XXL" model of a road trip encountering lesser-known sections of American life. "Dog" is a sadder movie than "Magic Mike XXL" because the trip's ultimate destination is a military funeral, and along the way, Tatum and his dog co-star must contend with the trauma they've suffered as soldiers. This makes the bond of friendship between Tatum and the dog even more important than it is in "Magic Mike XXL," as it provides both of them life-saving help when they need it the most.

The most impressive aspect of Tatum and Carolin's first directing job is how well they film the landscapes encountered over the course of the trip. They make them symbols of the beauty of everyday life without making them overly stylized. The duo learned well from Steven Soderbergh's visual excellence without merely copying it. While "Dog" has its faults, including some awkward comedy at the beginning and a too-brief attempt to deal with the racism instilled into Iraq War soldiers, the strength of Tatum and Carolin's filmmaking and storytelling suggests that they could have a good future as directors.

15. Kings of the Road

The third film in Wim Wenders' Road Trilogy, "Kings of the Road" is a three-hour opus combining two of Wenders' favorite subjects: the road and cinema. The two titular "kings" are a movie theater projector repairman (played by "Alice in the Cities" lead Rüdiger Vogler) and a depressed psychologist (Hanns Zischler), who band together on a road trip after the psychologist has experienced a life-shattering breakup. They drive across what was then the East German border, touring worn-down movie theaters so that Vogler can make repairs.

"Kings of the Road" offers even less of a plot than "Alice in the Cities" does, also offering one of the purest, simplest depictions of a road trip on film. There's no inevitable endpoint for the characters to reach, just a sprawling journey where they come to slightly better understand each other and themselves. It encompasses all the joy and melancholy of road trips in one package, people searching for more from life hoping that they'll find it behind the wheel.

16. Having a Wild Weekend

1965's "Having a Wild Weekend," also known as "Catch Us If You Can," is technically a vehicle for The Dave Clark Five, the British group that came into popularity at the same time as The Beatles . "Having a Wild Weekend" would seem to put the band in a comedy just like "A Hard Day's Night," but director John Boorman instead made a lovely, melancholy road movie, showing two people trying in vain to escape their confining lives back home.

Dave Clark plays a stuntman who takes off on a road trip with a model (Barbara Ferris) dissatisfied with her position as the face of ad campaigns for meat. On their journey, they encounter the youth who will soon become the counterculture and the old men still obsessed with the imagery of old Hollywood. Everywhere they go, Clark and Ferris are reminded of the culture they're trying to fight against, but they're powerless to stop it. The two have impressive chemistry together, but their relationship is a sad one, one that can only last the length of the road trip even though they're the only people who could possibly understand each other. Even once the remaining four Dave Clark Five members show up to do some slapstick, the tone is more elegiac than silly.

17. Wild at Heart

For a more representative David Lynch road trip movie, there's "Wild at Heart," which manages to be funny and romantic as well as frightening. Sailor and Lula, the giddy young couple played by Nicolas Cage and Laura Dern, hit the road only after Lula's mother has unsuccessfully tried to kill Sailor, and on their journey they'll deal with more killers and more victims. But their love may be strong enough to keep them safe every step of the way.

The giddy energy of "Wild at Heart" is unusual for Lynch movies, which usually have a more deadpan tone. Cage and Dern are balls of energy in this, engaging in grand romantic gestures and, in Cage's case, frequently falling into Elvis impersonations. The world around them has gone mad with rage and violence, the road bringing as many terrors as beauties, and they seem to have adapted to that madness by matching it. The title doesn't lie — these are two wild kids who will let nothing, not even a horrifying figure like Willem Dafoe's psychopathic Bobby Peru, stand in the way of their love. And for all the darkness of the rest of the movie, Lynch is still kind-hearted enough to give them a happy ending.

18. Two For the Road

All the good and bad feelings associated with going on the road are present in 1967's "Two for the Road," and they also represent the ups and downs of a marriage. The good and the bad are shuffled together in a nonlinear style, where pieces of the beginning, middle, and end of Audrey Hepburn and Albert Finney's characters' relationship are presented as a series of out-of-order road trips. There is some beautiful European scenery over the course of the trips, but the fractured editing means that the destinations of the trips are less important than the trips themselves, and how they function as both bonding exercises and sources of arguments.

The film's most hilarious section is when Hepburn and Finney commit the error of going on a road trip with another couple, an obnoxious American family that makes the two sure of the mistakes they don't want to make in their own relationship. But of course they end up making those mistakes, and by the end "Two for the Road" is a bittersweet movie about how difficult and tricky it is to stay close to someone, whether that means marrying them or staying with them on a long car ride.

19. Don't Come Knocking

Wim Wenders and playwright-actor Sam Shepard first collaborated on the 1984 road movie "Paris, Texas," one of the most acclaimed films in the genre. Their decades-later second collaboration was 2005's "Don't Come Knocking," another road movie that couldn't match the critical success of its predecessor. But "Don't Come Knocking" is a very good movie in its own right, finding a lot of power both in western vistas and the tragic figure passing in front of them.

Shepard wrote and stars in "Don't Come Knocking," playing a washed-up Western star who ditches the set of his new movie in favor of driving to Nevada and then Montana, where both cheap thrills and old family await him. As with Wenders' other films, he makes the western settings of "Don't Come Knocking" look incredibly beautiful, shooting casinos, small-town squares, and vast deserts with the same level of vibrant color and light. And it also shares with Wenders' other work a tremendous sadness, where Shepard has abandoned the people who need him most and has only realized this too late to do much of anything about it. This trip may not be able to redeem Shepard, but it can get him one step closer, and that's better than he's done yet.

20. Highway 61

Canadian director Bruce McDonald followed in Wim Wenders' footsteps and made his own trilogy of road movies through the 1980s and '90s. The middle film in the trilogy was 1991's "Highway 61," a joyous comedy about American rock 'n' roll. Highway 61 is the highway named in Bob Dylan's legendary "Highway 61 Revisited" album, and one of the two leads (Valerie Buhagiar) is a rock-obsessed drug dealer trying to smuggle a dead body from Canada to New Orleans. Her partner (Don McKellar) is a nervous, shy barber who prefers jazz. Their odd-couple dynamic is very charming, and it only gets more charming as the trip brings them closer together.

"Highway 61" is led not just by romance and scenic views of all of North America, but by a great soundtrack at every step of the journey, often from obscure local bands McDonald is kind enough to introduce to his audience. And there's also plenty of oddball humor, particularly with a character who may or may not be the devil (Earl Pastko) chasing the two leads. "Highway 61" doesn't have much of a reputation outside of its native Canada, but it's a blissful film that deserves more attention.

21. Get On the Bus

One of the least commonly filmed ways of going on a road trip is taking the bus, perhaps because getting stuck with many unfamiliar people is not the most romantic way to see the country. But Spike Lee found a lot of drama, comedy, and political relevance in a story of a bunch of guys trapped on the bus. That story is 1996's "Get On the Bus," following a group of Black men en route to the famed Million Man March. Lee believes that every one of those million men has their own story, and he fits as many of those stories as he can into one bus.

As usual with Lee, "Get On the Bus" has an impressive cast, including Ossie Davis, Charles S. Dutton, Andre Braugher, and Bernie Mac. The characters touch on social issues, including homophobia and the anti-Semitism of Million Man March leader Louis Farrakhan, but mostly they have frank and funny conversations that naturally reveal their prejudices and moral stances rather than shout them out. Lee didn't write "Get On the Bus" (that was Reggie Rock Bythewood), but it shares the perceptive dialogue and unexpected comedy of Lee's best screenplays, including his beloved "Do the Right Thing." "Get On the Bus" is a smaller movie than "Do the Right Thing," but its confined setting doesn't mean it's any less riveting.

22. Thelma & Louise

The road trip that runs through 1991's "Thelma & Louise" is most famous for where it ends, with Thelma and Louise's car in the middle of a jump off a cliff. But their journey shouldn't just be defined by its endpoint, as the entirety of "Thelma & Louise" is a rollicking ode to female friendship and the healing power of the road trip, showing it as a rare opportunity for two women to take their lives into their own hands.

A few things remain consistent throughout Thelma (Geena Davis) and Louise's (Susan Sarandon)'s road trip, namely the beauty of the southwest locations as shot by director Ridley Scott and the appalling behavior of the men both women meet along the way. "Thelma & Louise" is today best-known as the breakthrough film for breakout film for Brad Pitt , but he's only one of the film's parade of awful, often violent men, including the rapist who begins the journey in the first place. With such overpowering adversity, it's no wonder Thelma and Louise are so tight-knit — they must make their bond as strong as the forces united against them. And their bond can sustain even the steepest fall from a cliff.

23. Little Miss Sunshine

"Little Miss Sunshine" was the sensation of the 2006 Sundance Film Festival (per IndieWire ), its story of a dysfunctional family trapped in a Volkswagen van on the way to a child beauty pageant in California proving irresistible to both critics and audiences. The famous images of the film, like the family chasing after the bright yellow Volkswagen, suggest the kind of quirky, Wes Anderson-inspired comedy that was all the rage in the 2000s. But like actual Wes Anderson movies , "Little Miss Sunshine" deals with real pain and hurt, trapping several very fragile people in a small space where they might all combust.

It's helped by having such a sturdy cast playing those fragile people, including Steve Carell in one of his first dramatic performances, a silent Paul Dano, an Oscar-winning Alan Arkin, and most of all an Oscar-nominated Abigail Breslin as the girl all this trouble is in service of. The movie might have collapsed into road-movie cliches without a strong presence anchoring it, and Breslin, then 10 years old, proves more than capable of being that presence.

24. Two-Lane Blacktop

The most existential of all road movies might be 1971's "Two-Lane Blacktop," where driving is the only way of life for its main characters. But they aren't driving with any destination in mind; they're driving because it's the one thing they know how to do. Car culture was a big part of the '60s and '70s, and "Two-Lane Blacktop" has a supporting part for Dennis Wilson, whose work with the Beach Boys helped to cement cars as the ultimate symbol of cool and independence. But it's not all fun for the characters of "Two-Lane Blacktop," with the emptiness of the road ahead of them also representing the emptiness of their own obsessions and personalities.

Shot on the famed Route 66, with minimal dialogue to distract from the scenery, "Two-Lane Blacktop" is not short on great shots of cars in motion. But "Two-Lane Blacktop" also decries the hollowness of making cars the centerpiece of one's life, showing that a lifestyle based solely on speed and appearance cannot be sustained. The film's most famous line is "Those satisfactions are permanent," but the pleasures prove to be a very impermanent, fleeting bliss that doesn't disguise much deeper troubles.

25. The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert

In addition to being one of the great road trip movies, "The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert" was also a breakout LGBTQ film when it was released in 1994, offering such a sunny view of its group of drag queens that it would be pointless to resist. The next year, America was already attempting its own "Priscilla" with the fellow drag-queen road movie "To Wong Foo, Thanks For Everything! Julie Newmar," but it couldn't compete with the original, particularly regarding the gorgeous vistas passed by the central trio. The stunning deserts of the Australian Outback prove to be an ideal setting for a story with outrageous outfits and colors, offering a plain brown backdrop on top of which every outfit and character pops out.

Not that the characters need any help standing out, especially when they're brought to life with such exuberance and talent. Only Terence Stamp, playing the transgender matriarch of the group, was an internationally known actor at the time of the release of "Priscilla." But the film also catapulted its other two leads, Hugo Weaving and Guy Pearce, to their stardom. Even as all three actors are now almost three decades out from "Priscilla," it remains one of their crowning achievements, as well as one of the most infectiously cheerful road movies yet made.

26. Pee-Wee's Big Adventure

One of the goofiest, most enjoyable road trips ever taken on film was the one taken by Pee-Wee Herman (Paul Reubens) as he searched for his lost bike in Tim Burton's feature directorial debut "Pee-Wee's Big Adventure." Pee-Wee would later become famous for his television show, where he created his own wacky universe, but in "Pee-Wee's Big Adventure," he travels through the real America and finds that it's just as silly as he is. Whether visiting dive bars, Hollywood backlots, or even The Alamo, he bends every place he visits to his own indescribable wavelength.

Burton has made flashier, more expensive movies since "Pee-Wee's Big Adventure," but he's rarely made anything better. His work becomes so defined by production design and special effects after this that it's a shock to see him working mostly with real locations, making the natural world ridiculous rather than creating ridiculous worlds from scratch. And the road movie proves an ideal match for his love of middle-American eccentricity, where every new character Pee-Wee meets on his travels is an oddball in their own way. This remains Burton's funniest and sweetest movie, free of the bitter edge that distinguishes many Burton movies and instead celebrating the goofiness of life.

27. Something Wild

Jonathan Demme's "Something Wild" takes a sharp turn around its midpoint, turning from a joyous road comedy to something scarier and more intense. But all of "Something Wild" is united by Demme's love of the road and of the people you can meet along the way. Sometimes those people can change your life, like how Melanie Griffith's free-spirited Lulu gets Jeff Daniels' yuppie businessman Charlie to admit that he has a wilder side than he presents to the world. And other times they can threaten that life, like Ray Liotta as Lulu's malevolent ex-husband, Ray, who resolves to force Charlie out of Lulu's life and win her back.

Even as "Something Wild" gets dark, Demme still finds something magical in every location visited, and often in places that seem perfectly ordinary. A friendly convenience-store employee, a dog on the back of a motorcycle, and a waitress singing outside of a New York greasy spoon — these details all come to vibrant life in front of Demme's camera. Few people have taken a road trip involving this many wacky, endearing characters, but the world as Demme portrays is a better, brighter place than it is in real life. It's a joy to experience a road trip in this world, even if only for two hours.

• Cast & crew

Five friends go on a roadtrip to visit the wake of a friend. Five friends go on a roadtrip to visit the wake of a friend. Five friends go on a roadtrip to visit the wake of a friend.

• Andoy Ranay
• Candy Pangilinan
• Janice De Belen
• Gelli De Belen
• Carmina Villaroel

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Filmed in Utah

Utah's remarkable scenery has always inspired great storytelling. Stories are etched into the walls of the state's red canyons, in the journals of its early explorers and in the hearts of the locals and travelers as they road trip and recreate. So it's no surprise that Hollywood has turned to Utah landscapes and locations time and again.

In 2024, a significant milestone will be reached —100 years since the premiere of the first movies filmed in Utah, "The Covered Wagon" and "The Deadwood Coach." Simultaneously, it will honor the 50th anniversary of the Utah Film Commission, established in 1974. To celebrate, the Utah Film Commission will host a year of exhibits, events and film screenings across the state. Add a touch of film history to your Utah itinerary, or plan your trip around these celebrations and iconic cinema locations. You'll soon discover why we say Utah. America's Film Set.®

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2024 will mark 100 years since the first movies filmed in Utah premiered and also the 50th anniversary of the Utah Film Commission, formed in 1974.

Pictured: "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" (1969) / Twentieth Century Fox

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Ryan Reynolds says 'Deadpool' was pitched as a road trip film

Hollywood star ryan reynolds recently revealed in an interview that the deadpool films were initially pitched as a road trip movie. 'deadpool 3' will release on july 26..

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• Ryan Reynolds feared he might not play Deadpool again
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• Final story features Deadpool teaming up with Wolverine, releasing on July 26

Hollywood star Ryan Reynolds recently opened up about how he once feared he would never get to wear Deadpool costume again. The actor also revealed that the franchise was initially pitched as a road trip movie.

Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, Ryan Reynolds said, "I didn’t know if I’d ever be playing Deadpool again. It’s not something I would’ve said necessarily publicly, but I didn’t know."

The actor also mentioned how, in the early days, the films were pitched as an indie road-trip comedy.

“Literally, it was a $5 or $6 million budget with no special effects. It was just a talkie-talkie road trip with me and [Karan Soni’s character] Dopinder and some of the things we collected and saw along the way. It wasn’t meant to be an event movie. If we’re on our way to Point C, it was meant to just get us to Point B. That was the weirdest one. I liked it. I thought it was kind of fun,” Reynolds shared one of the initial pitches for the franchise.

Ryan Reynolds, Hugh Jackman & Shawn Levy Hit The Road For ‘Deadpool & Wolverine'; Thank Shanghai "From The Heart Of Our Bottom"

Making the most of the fact that Deadpool & Wolverine is the first original film of the franchise to land a China release date, stars Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman, along with director Shawn Levy, appear to have had a grand time promoting the Disney/Marvel pic in Shanghai this week.

During the trip, which was the first stop on the overseas promotional tour, the trio met with a packed house after 35 minutes of the movie was shown, and shared stories about how the project came together, which "elicited constant laughter and applause," per local media.

Reynolds wrote on X, "Shanghai was the first stop on the #DeadpoolAndWolverine tour - and we thank you from the heart of our bottom. What a city and what a welcome."

The trio was also spotted in front of a 10-meter-long giant Deadpool alongside the Huangpu River while the Marvel Weibo account noted the actors visited a Deadpool & Wolverine -themed pop-up store on Wukang Road in Shanghai which will be open until July 7.

As we reported last month , China's Film Bureau approved a July 26 release for Deadpool & Wolverine , day-and-date with the U.S. This will be the first time the Merc with a Mouth is going to China in step with the rest of the world. 

The first Deadpool did not release in China while Deadpool 2 , completely refashioned as Once Upon a Deadpool with new scenes to create a PG-13 version, was released there in early 2019, many months after the original DP2 had its run elsewhere.

Some minimal trims have been made to Deadpool & Wolverine , but we hear that no cuts were made that impact the integrity of the storytelling and that the movie remains authentic to the Deadpool spirit - unlike Once Upon a Deadpool . 

Reynolds, Jackman and Levy are continuing the tour, also making their way to Korea this week where they attended a baseball game. Wrote Jackman, "Ending day 2 on our #DeadpoolAndWolverine promo tour with two of my best mates at a baseball game in Korea?! If this is a dream, I don't want to wake up anytime too soon."

International rollout on D&W begins July 24. Domestic (and China) join on July 26. As Anthony reported yesterday, D&W hit three-week-in-advance box office tracking predicting a domestic box office opening at $160M-$165M, which would not only be the best opening year-to-date but also a record start for a R-rated movie.

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Lily Gladstone's 'Fancy Dance' is a road trip worth taking

Aisha Harris

Sam Yellowhorse Kesler

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Lilly Gladstone in Fancy Dance . Apple TV+ hide caption

Lilly Gladstone in Fancy Dance .

The new film Fancy Dance offers something all-too-rare on screen: contemporary Indigenous perspectives, front and center. Lily Gladstone plays a woman trying to keep it together under stressful circumstances. Her sister's gone missing, and she steps in to look after her young niece (Isabel Deroy-Olson). The pair take what turns out to be a rocky road trip and a unique bonding experience.

Ukraine war latest: Putin says he will take Trump 'seriously' on ending war

Vladimir Putin has said Russia takes Donald Trump's declaration that he could end the war "completely seriously", although he doesn't know the details of the proposals. The US presidential candidate previously claimed he could create peace in 24 hours if he makes it to the White House.

Thursday 4 July 2024 22:05, UK

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We'll be back soon with more updates on the war in Ukraine.

Russian strikes killed two people and wounded 26 in Ukrainian regions stretching from the south to the east and northeast today, local authorities have said.

A missile strike in southern Odesa region killed a woman, injured seven people and damaged port infrastructure, regional governor Oleh Kiper said on Telegram.

Meanwhile, in the northeastern Kharkiv region, a second woman was killed and a man wounded in a strike by a Russian guided bomb on the village of Ruska Lozova, according to regional governor Oleh Syniehubov.

Nine others, including four children, were wounded in a drone attack and shelling in the town of Novohrodivka, in the frontline Donetsk region, governor Vadym Filashkin said.

Elsewhere, Dnipro regional governor Serhiy Lysak reported seven wounded in the southern town of Nikopol. 

All the affected regions have been subjected to repeated attacks since the start of Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022.

Russia denies targeting civilians or civilian infrastructure, but thousands of people have been killed and wounded.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has told his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping that he wants Turkey-China ties to continue improving.

He has also said steps taken to improve such ties would benefit both countries.

Both the Turkish and Chinese leaders met at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in the Kazakh capital Astana today and discussed the Russia-Ukraine war and the fighting in Gaza.

During the meeting, Mr Erdogan called for "effective measures" by the international community to prevent either conflict from spreading.

One civilian has been killed after a ballistic missile struck the southern port city of Odesa.

Governor Oleh Kiper said at least seven others had been injured after the attack on the region and houses and port facilities had been damaged.

"The civilian port infrastructure is under attack," Mr Kiper said on Telegram .

Odesa has been a frequent target of Russian forces in the war, with many attacks aimed at the city's port facilities. 

Russia denies targeting civilians or civilian infrastructure.

The Hungarian prime minister will meet Vladimir Putin in Moscow tomorrow, according to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) . 

Viktor Orban will be accompanied by Hungary's foreign minister Peter Szijjarto, the outlet reports, citing an unnamed Hungarian government source.

The reported visit comes days after Mr Orban urged Volodymyr Zelenskyy to consider a ceasefire to accelerate an end to the war with Russia.

Mr Orban, who is an outspoken critic of Western military aid to Ukraine and has the warmest relations of any EU leader with Mr Putin, held talks with Mr Zelenskyy during his first trip to Kyiv in more than a decade yesterday.

Mr Orban said he asked the Ukrainian leader to think about a ceasefire before the follow-up international summit Kyiv hopes to hold later this year.

Apple has removed 25 VPN mobile apps from its AppStore in Russia, following a request by Russia's state communications watchdog Roskomnadzor, Interfax reports.

Demand for VPN services soared in Russia after Vladimir Putin ordered troops into Ukraine in 2022 and the authorities restricted access to some Western social media.

Russian communications watchdog Roskomnadzor has already blocked access to some large VPNs, but others remained available.

Images are emerging of the damage inflicted on Chasiv Yar in eastern Ukraine after months of Russian assault.

The Ukrainian army said today they had retreated from an area on the outskirts of the strategically important city in the Donetsk region after a 10-month battle there.

Months of relentless Russian artillery strikes have devastated Chasiv Yar, leaving homes charred.

Ukrainian commanders in the area say their resources remain stretched, largely due to a months-long gap in military assistance from the US which threw Ukraine's military onto the defensive.

Around 190,000 recruits have signed contracts to join the Russian military so far in 2024, the state-run RIA news agency reports, quoting former president Dmitry Medvedev.

Mr Medvedev, who is deputy chairman of Russia's Security Council, said the current average recruitment rate was about 1,000 people a day.

For context : Russia is encouraging people to sign up for the war in Ukraine by paying them above average wages. 

Vladimir Putin has said Moscow has no need to enforce a new round of compulsory mobilisation because so many men are signing up on voluntary contracts.

A duo of Russian pranksters who often target and compromise people the Russian state is interested in have been given a top state award in the Kremlin, the RIA state news agency reports.

Vladimir Kuznetsov and Alexei Stolyarov, who use the aliases "Vovan and Lexus", were presented with the award by the Kremlin at a ceremony yesterday.

The award is given to Russian and foreign nationals for strengthening peace, friendship, cooperation and understanding between Moscow and other nations, among other criteria.

There was no immediate word from the Russian pranksters, who last month released footage of a video call they had with UK Foreign Secretary David Cameron after tricking him into thinking he was speaking to a former Ukrainian president.

During the hoax call, Lord Cameron thought he was speaking with former Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko.

The duo are well-known inside Russia, having duped a string of politicians over the years, including Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and, in 2022, Britain's then-defence minister, Ben Wallace.

Vladimir Putin has said his preference for Joe Biden remains unchanged after watching fragments of the debate between the US president and Donald Trump.

Asked by a state television reporter if Mr Biden or Trump was better, if his publicly stated preference for Biden had changed after the debate, and if he had seen it, Mr Putin said: "Nothing has changed."

"Did we not know what could come? We knew," the Russian president added.

Mr Putin has several times said he feels Joe Biden is preferable as the future US president to Trump, even after Mr Biden cast the Kremlin chief as a "crazy SOB".

Mr Putin said he had seen parts of the debate between both Mr Biden and Trump but he had other things to attend to.

"I saw some fragments," Mr Putin said. "But I have enough to do."

Asked about Trump's statements that he could end the Ukraine war swiftly if he won the presidential election, Mr Putin said Russia took him seriously but had no sense of the details of any of Trump's peace proposals.

"The fact that Mr Trump, as a presidential candidate, declares that he is ready and wants to stop the war in Ukraine, we take this completely seriously," he said.

What else did Putin say today?

The Russian leader also reiterated that Moscow would not declare a ceasefire in Ukraine until Kyiv takes steps that are "irreversible" and acceptable to the Kremlin.

He said it was pointless for Russia to attempt to appeal to the Ukrainian parliament when it came to Moscow's ideas to end the conflict between the two countries.

Mr Putin said last month that Russia would end the war in Ukraine only if Kyiv agreed to drop its NATO ambitions and hand over the entirety of four provinces claimed by Moscow, demands Kyiv swiftly rejected as tantamount to surrender.

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