One Step Ahead…..

I am lucky at the moment – I am working on two projects involving two great national institutions! I am shooting a new garden series with Alan Titchmarsh and I am taking a behind the scenes look at life in Salisbury Cathedral. The thing is as Dop/ cameraman whatever you want to call me – time keeping and in particular planning is not only essential but it is the key asset I can bring to a shoot. At Salisbury the other day we were shooting GV’s, we had planned to be there early morning, I placed the camera to the West so that the sun was not quite behind the cathedral but more three quarters as we say, providing me with a halo (no pun intended!) of light around the great building, highlighting it from everything else – a little bit of planning can add a lot to your shots. In the gardens the first thing I do is walk around with the director and as long as we have sun we work with it, in other words as Alan appears in different areas of the garden I know that the sun will be there – we chase the shadows if you like. I always for example look out for trees in the garden to the West – I know in the late afternoon the sun will start dropping behind them so I shoot in that part of the garden earlier – and don’t forget you can always use (and I do!) the sun as a backlight – as I have mentioned once or twice before in this Blog! You will be a hit with production for being on the case and nothing worse than starting to shoot a long scene and see the shadows starting to race up the Presenter’s legs!

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