Kirk Watson films
I am a freelance filmmaker, based in Scotland. I can self shoot promotional, documentary, educational and narrative content and edit into a final film. I am also a fully licensed, CAA approved drone pilot and cinematographer. Perfect View Productions has all their own equipment to complete a project.
Whatever your story be it commercial, documentary or fictional we can help you get your message across in a high quality and professional manner.
So a few days with the drones for an Amazon Prime TV show called Car and Country. Nice bunch of people and we did a bit in the snow in the Cairngorms then headed up Struy estate (A place I actually made 31 films for a few years back lol) to do some Landrover driving and staying in Eagle Braes lovely Log Cabins.
So these months just got so busy I just couldn’t fill in my blog or take on anymore work. Which was great. This year became my busiest year yet even though it started slow after covid lockdowns. I think winning a BAFTA for Aerial Cinematography under factual Photography was the reason for this.
As I’ve been busy this year too I’ve decided just to skip the rest of 2021 and try and catch up with 2022 lol.
Heres a few pics from some jobs:)
Glasgow University standing tall:)
Back on ‘Europe from Above’ for the Nat Geo program. This time filming with Hoods Honey to film the moving of the bees all from the air apart from a couple of go pro shots and interviews. A fun day out that started very early in the pitch dark before the bees waken up. A few screen grabs. All in log so look a bit bleached out:)
The bees being released next to the Honey
Bees covering my camera:)
The bee taxi from the fields to the hills:)
A day filming the Aluminium smelter in Fort William. Pretty interesting to see around this place after passing it a few hundred times over the years. Thankfully I was fore warned by management that the main melting plant gives off a huge magnetic field and has in the past shot drones off into the distance which later crashed in the surrounding forest. I thankfully only had the occasional compass warning as I stayed well away from the central plant building lol.
Here we were filming with the presenter for a few pieces to camera to sync and a few walking shots then I was left to get a bunch of shots to help introduce the different parts of the factory and to head up the slopes of Ben Nevis to get shots of the hydro system:) A fun sunny day to be out.
Fort William Smelter
My High Vis and a helmet to be up in the woods on my own lol.
Well today back in Glencoe for the National geographic program being edited by Windfall Films. Today we were filming history with the archeologists at a dig site and returning to The thatched roof with Brian for some extra shots as it moves on. And a few shots from around the area to show some history for intros.
The dig was super interesting and fun trying to make a dig look interesting with each shot all from the drone. then a talking head interview to work as a voice over. Oh and a few go pro shots to get a close up as they revealed a old artefact from the dig. The sun was out too:)
Quick selfie while flying;)
Kilchurn Castle
The Buichaille Etive More:)
A day trip to North Uist to film the final episode for a BBC education animated series. Wild going just for the day. A mix of ground camera plate shots and shots from the air with drone. Occasionally a moving shot but mainly static. Fortunately I got everything done by 1:30pm as by 2pm it was pouring with rain for the rest of the day. Always amazing getting out here though and such lovely beaches.
Such great beaches
:)
Had a great weekend visiting Isle Martin for an episode of Countryfile all about islands. An island I’ve never been to before so always good to visit. Stayed overnight in the house there and was looked after by the Island caretaker. Arose the next day before sunrise to catch the sunrise with Oli helping me with shots. This started a very busy day with interviewing people about the sea and seaweed, and seaweed tasting, interviewing the island guardian, doing some conservation, boat riding, scallop free diving and then a cooking show bit at the end. Not sure if it would be possible to pack more into a day. Fortunately with a good director, sound, assistant camera and all my light mobile kit we got it all done.
The team
In Glencoe filming ‘Europe from Above’ well the Scottish section which I’ll be doing several pieces on throughout the summer with ‘Windfall Films’ who are making it for National Geographic. I met Brian Wilson here thatching the reconstruction of an old Glencoe house with Mark who was also thatching with him. Brian ha s written a few sea kayak books that I have read. We got badly rained off so I headed home and returned another day the following week and took my two sea kayak books to get signed haha. We ended up with much nicer footage and I will return to see it a further time and see it finished. Few pics below of the house and also shots from around the area I got for the intro to the area.
Thatching going on before the rain
Lovely light for my shots on the Buichaille Etive More:)
Another great week with Andrew and Mark, although not in quite the same weather as the previous week lol. This week was going to be a pedalo along Loch ness but it changed a bit and you’ll need to watch it on BBC player to see what happened or on BBC Scotland if you catch it going out. Great crack again on this trip:)
The pedalo and team
Fort Augustas, the beginning of our journey
I have the pleasure of filming on all 6 episodes of ‘Roaming in the Wild’ Andrew and Marks TV show that is now on prime time 8pm slot on BBC Scotland. Great fun working on these episodes and this one takes us sea kayaking down Loch Sheil from the Harry Potter viaduct down onto the sea and round to Arisaig. We start in the mist and midges and finish in calm 25 degree sunny weather. Was a superb trip and lots of lovely filming. Andrew films all the wildlife in these episodes and often chat between the guys if I am away getting ahead to set up a drone shot or the likes. I look forward to these trips each time.
Sunset on the second night near Eilean Shona
Me and the guys. Carrying all our kit for 5 days in our Sea Kayaks:)
A fun day out filming sea stacks. There was a lot of mist and sea fog today but still managed to get the plates for another animation. Also used a little stock of the Old man of Hoy from when I climbed it a few years ago:)
A mysterious Old man of Hoy just poking out as seen from the ferry
So our final episode of Dana of 6 episodes brings us to the Isle of Lewis for some hiking and climbing. I hadn’t realised the mountains were so big and rocky on Lewis. Had my first trip on an airplane for a few years and made it over to catch the rest of the team, Hamish, Kenny and Rowan on the Island. We filmed and camped and had a lovely time bar the horrendous midges at times!! out in the autumn and on player after.
Kenny packing at camp
A couple of great days in Glencoe on our Dana Tv series with the great team from SOLUS Productions. Myself on Drone and long lens again with Hamish on main camera and directing. Kenny starring and Matt along for the ride. Rowan in production with us and Andy Nelson doing Hamish’s safety on the rock route while I scrambled up curved ridge myself on the first day to get good angles for filming the team on Agags groove a V.Diff climb. The following day we filmed some running on the Devils Staircase.
Agags Groove on the Buichaile Etive Mor
A trip round Edinburgh filming the sites for plates for animations. Bit of Geography/Geology for schools today with volcanic rocks and plugs. Headed a bit further south for other bits of rock formations and Bass Rock. Beautiful sunny day although very windy. The boat I had booked to Bass rock didn’t go, so a return journey needed one day:)
Edinburgh Castle
A rushed windy day here but fun all the same. Made a short mid summers day film and also filmed a few of the golf club holes and fishing.
The wee drone in the wind
Back from Rum and after a few days off we start filming another episode of Dana. This time purely rock climbing and in Glen nevis. the sun is out again too and after a midge start they all run away from the sun thankfully. Episode out in the Autumn.
Kenny on Storm in Glen nevis. Picture from the Mavic 2 pro drone
Storm in Glen nevis. Kenny’s climbing partner climbing here.
A fantastic trip on the Isle of Rum doing some aerial cinematography while Hamish filmed with the ground camera and directed. We had some amazing weather for filming. Here we all carried our camera kit, batteries and tents, food, stove etc. This made the first day pretty big when we arrived on the morning ferry then did the whole of the Rum Cuillin filming on the way. A few pretty knackered by the end but we were rewarded with an amazing sunset from our high camp.
The next few days saw us walking, rock climbing and swimming and visiting ruins and bothies. We also got a tan:) A few pics below:) TV show out in the Autumn
Sunset Camp
Hamish filming Kenny on the Rock Climb, Rich Parker out of site doing some safety
Well this was amazing a team of us drone pilots working for Windfall films making a film for BBC won a BAFTA for our aerial filming under Factual: Photography woooohooo. It was a great team to work with Johnny Shipley as director and David Dugan as the Exec producer, both from Windfall films. Then swapping ideas with the other drone team members and seeing everyones setups was great. Most were on the Inspire 2 like myself.
If you are interested I’ve written a little bit about my own experience below on the shoot and what went in to a few of my bigger shots.
I had the job of meeting the Shepard Andrew at the top of Scarfell for the start of the gather on the main days shoot (Day 3 on site). We went up different routes as he chased sheep on the way. He arrived 30 mins early just as I had arrived and I asked for 5 minutes to set up he said “you can have 1 minute” haha. I managed just! Took off into very cloudy conditions and wind, ‘took off’ sounds a little dramatic, I basically hovered over the ground. Knowing that at 4:30am no one else would be daft enough to be up there, I was sure not to meet anyone. We could see 50m at best and had to walk with the drone just flying 5-10m ahead of me just off the ground. I got some lovely shots in the mist and extremely atmospheric and totally different from the planned shots that we agreed on two days ago on the recci. Andrew did say “not the best for gathering sheep in” just as I was shouting at him to remember and cheesily touch the top cairn for my shot, I got the impression he was only half keen to do this. But he did it anyway haha.
The drone landed and he continued onto the next set of drone pilots. I’d warned them he was early so they were ready, as we all had radios. My drone was extremely wet now I hadn’t quite realised how wet the cloud was as didn’t feel like rain. Picture below
So now I leap frogged three drone positions to set up at another spot down out of the cloud at the foot of the valley. I was there with David (exec producer) as he was keeping me company as I was a solo pilot. I got the drone setup ready to take a few GV’s as I waited for the sheep again. The drone wouldn’t record due to water in the microSD port. Then came 20mins of panic trying to dry inside it and get my drone working again!! Finally it started recording and all functions were good. So I flew up the cliff above for some GV’s. One of these formed the opening shot of the program. Then it switches to another drone pilots shot of sheep hanging out on hill side. After this into some of my shots of Andrew in the mist as the gather begins:)
On this spot I gathered a bit of a shot plan to try and create a long shot as my summit plans hadn’t come together as I’d liked (but did give a great different feel to the shots). You can only plan as best you can as the tricky bit is it’s live in essence and there is no reshoot and you don’t know exactly where or how quickly the sheep will move lol. So lots to think about. The key being to move very slow (but never stop, Johnny’s direction also had said please keep it moving) and try to keep interesting shots and develop things in a nicely framed shot. This started with a reveal over a slight knoll amongst boulders and fly over the rise and to see the sheep. As should be an easy cut if no sheep in it to start. Then the shot develops after I realise the sheep are slightly nervous of my drone (much less nervous that they are of the sheep dogs though but you can slightly tell in the film too). I move round the side and swoop round the back and down the left side then use the boulders very low to ground, notice a little turbulence in wind as drone starts moving up and down a little by itself. The low ground and boulders manage to create a bit of a second reveal then I start rising to where the crush or narrows are.
This is where the sheep come to a halt and I notice shepards standing blocking the way, I slow my rise trying desperately to keep the sheep in shot as they do not move forward into the space I had left and planned in my shot. In my head I am saying “move move” to the sheep and the shepards blocking the way, “you are about to destroy my shot!” I might have been mumbling a few swear words too but my memory is faint on that front.
Then finally the shepards clear and the sheep start running forward “thank ….!”. I’m almost as high as I can go (Drones have a legal maximum height above the ground) and fortunately I’m spinning with the shot so I can keep the spin as I stop going up and begin to come done again. This means the stop is not so noticeable to the audience but will display a change which will link with the sheep now moving on. I then lower down and stop the spin and blend it into the beginning of a tilt up to start to show where the sheep are going which we haven’t seen yet. I pull away from the sheep to show them going away from this location. Once the shot shows the sky which won’t link as well with the next shot my continuous shot stops at 7 minutes and 30 seconds. Which is my longest shot I’ve ever had on a film and the longest shot in this film.
I remember being very chuffed the next day after first seeing the film on TV that this long shot was spoken about on twitter in relation to the program lol.
There were two days filming and the first was a smaller gather from opposite side of the valley and we used several shots from this too but we had a smaller team. Johnny had bought 360 Gopros to attach to sheep etc. I got one on a dog that morning but the dog wasn’t happy with it haha. It looked like a teenager asked to wear really uncool clothing to a friends party and just feeling awkward and not at all cool.
We switched it to put it on Andrew and a sheep. One shot which it caught was when Andrew was wearing it when he got to the top of the valley about 3-400m beyond me so I’m well out of shot. Andrew sits down and starts rolling a cigarette and is speaking to his dog and taking in the scenery and as he takes the cigarette up to his mouth because Johnny had 360 cameras then in the edit he could tilt up to its lighting and tilt back down to the view as the smoke is blown out. It’s a great shot and it’s actually been directed from the edit suite which is different:)
Hopefully its back on TV sometime and you can give it a watch.
The Team:) Although many members of the team not in the shot but most of the hill going ones.
The very wet drone after the misty shots at the start of the film!
Well tonight the TV program ‘The Great Mountain Sheep Gather’ shot in a slow television fashion to show the gathering of sheep in an almost real time by shepherds on Scafell Pike in the Lake District is on at 10pm on BBC4. The Program has been nominated for several awards now and is up for some hopefully shortly.
There were about 6 drone crews working on this. As a mountain instructor I got the joy of following the main Shepard up the mountain at 4am at an incredible speed to film our first shots on the main summit, in the wind and rain with 30m of visibility. A little taxing flying and the drone got very damp/wet. Then I leap frogged the next two drone teams to set up at another spot lower down. This is where I got a shot that ended up making it in with no cuts in 7 and a half minutes I was pretty chuffed solo flying the Inspire 2 with X7 camera shooting and in RAW. We were asked to get shots as long as possible. Totally different from normal as usually 10 seconds and sometimes just over 30 seconds for a end credit shot. So going for as long as possible you need to keep looking for new shots within shots to progress a clip in an interesting way and never ever make a sudden movement. A lot of fingers and thumbs and brain overload, but very good fun:)
My filming for a BBC school education project continued as I travel down the Tay filming from up stream of Perth down to Dundee. and a bit beyond:) Lovely day for it:)
