The film was financially backed, in part, by McQueen through his "Solar Productions company," which received credit in the final seconds of the film. Some of the more dramatic shots were extreme closeup slow-motion segments of the Grand National races. From his surfing movie days, Brown was used to working with super
telephoto lenses. The budget didn't allow the expense of high-speed cameras, so Brown improvised by using 24-volt batteries in the 12-volt film cameras. The result was a makeshift high-speed camera. Brown also used a
helmet camera on some of the riders, which had not been widely attempted previously due to the bulk of film cameras of the day. Regarding his filming method, Brown said: At times I'd have a particular shot in mind. For example, I wanted to shoot a muddy motocross race and show the riders with mud all over them. First you have to be at a motocross race when it rains, then you have to find a good location to shoot. We tried and tried to get a shot with a rider caked with mud. We finally did get the shot, but for a while it seemed like we never would. At one point, Brown found a perfect location for a sunset beach riding shot—
Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton. I figured there would be no way to get approval to film on the Marine base," Brown recalls. "Steve McQueen said he'd see what he could find out. The next day he called and was told to contact some General and the next thing you know we are shooting the beach sequences. It was pretty amazing the doors he was able to open. ==Critical reception==