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.
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 fun little stint of filming as part of a larger team. I was to film (with Camera and drone) Hank (James Lowsley-Williams) and Mark Beaumont as they raced from Lands End to John O’Groats while trying to break the record. Always very interesting seeing these elite athletes doing these challenges. I filmed the Edinburgh to Inverness leg while a group of other individuals and teams filmed the other legs.
Link below to the film:)
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
Here we headed into the wild with humungous rucksacks to go snow holing for several days in what would be (very lucky for Beluga Lagoon filming) four of the best weather days in the Cairngorms this winter, and there have been a few!!
It took a while getting landowner permissions and general covid go ahead etc so most of the lower snow had gone but luckily there is so much snow up top it didn’t matter.
The guys, Andrew and Mark would dig and live in a snow hole for three nights while I stayed in my tent as they are a shared household (Mark does a good bit of baby sitting in the O’Donnell household). I have to say it was absolutely amazing to be out of my house for longer than a day trip and with zero wind and sun each day life was great.
Here we would document our time up high and even I had to pop in front of the screen as snow holing is not the best activity to do without some guidance as depending on the conditions it can be a bit dangerous. Plus there are avalanches, weather, navigation, route choice etc to add to the winter experience. So luckily being a cameraman and MIC (now called WMCI) (Highest national qualification in summer/winter walking, climbing and mountaineering) and having spent many winters working and training people in the Cairngorms it was useful for this trip.
We got in some lengthy ski tours once we dumped the big bags at our base camp/hole. I leave those stories for when the episode airs though.
A few pics from the trip below.
Andrew returns from a toilet break:)
The snow hole and tent area from the drone:)
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:)
As people (by people I mean road engineers) can’t get out on mass to see where new roads will go and walk the path, if you like, then I have been doing a few fly throughs, so people can watch in isolation in their houses what the landscape looks like and get a better idea of how to quote for jobs and what is feasable.
An old oak for a launchpad
A fun week seeing how a massive 10km fibre optic cable is taken off a ship and coiled onto a carousel ready to be coiled onto another ship. I was filming drone for aerial shots and ground camera for some more close up shots. Unusually here just filming and handing over the footage to be edited by the in-house media department at the company. Always interesting to see the lives of other people in different industries and the technology going into these things.
An inversion one morning:)
A few days filming a Gin advert for Walter at Inshriach. We had some fun here making a drinks advert using the Anamorphic cinema lenses and a drone for our opening aerial scenes.
The natural ingredients all from within the national park look super nice and obviously taste good once made into the Gin.
We had a finishing film scene with the shot below. We were going for a festive vibe without any of the Christmas decorations, and an axe obviously? haha. Have to see the advert once I edit it to find out why that is in there. You can see the still in the the Distillery in the background.
Buy some Inshriach gin here: www.inshriachgin.com
A few days aerial filming on a series called ‘The worlds great rivers’ this one being the Spey. Handy being on my doorstep.
The first day was filming with Dave Craig and Jerry Craig, two local canoeists. Lots of tracking shots from the air. Andy Robbins was directing this and was shooting ground camera. The following day I was off on my own to capture different parts of the river including Spey Bay and many Distilleries. Few pics below.
Craigellachie
Cragganmore Distilery
Spent several day filming today turbines and the loading of a ship in Nigg Bay, near Invergordon, north of Inverness. Great to see these turbines being built in Scotland. Time and tide wait for no man, as they say so a guaranteed power source once in position. With Scotland having some amazing tides, probably the fastest and most extensive in Europe then its a good place to have them. this one is heading to Japan and is made by Atlantis (aptly named) and is being shipped using DShip:)
I was working for www.haraldhohenthal.com to get the footage for Harald to put the film together. Handy being close to these docks for this.
Pretty interesting to see how these 200+ tonne items get loaded on and how they balance the ship by pumping water into one side, as they lift on the other side to stop it tipping over.
The ship we were loading with some unrelated legs for wind turbines behind.
Nigg Bay and Invergordon in the background
The ship almost loaded from above
A day by myself filming lots of aerial shots to be used in amongst the live broadcast of Autumn watch. I was filming at Tentsmuir near St Andrews. Lovely place and saw a few red squirrels (not while flying just while walking) and some seals far out on the tidal flats.
The wee drone out for some flying, 9 batteries of filming:)
Headed off on my fourth job with the Global Cycling Network this summer to film a documentary about the Outer Hebrides and presented by Jenny Graham (fastest women round the world on a bicycle). We were a team of four with Hugh Farrow directing, Jenny presenting, Jason driving the follow truck, setup up specifically for following cyclists. Then myself as 2nd camera and doing the aerial cinematography.
The Islands were amazing and we travelled to 7 different ones and met many locals with interesting stories. Jenny did a great job presenting with her outgoing and very positive approach to life. We started in shorts and t-shirts getting a tan then finished with the horizontal rain trying to give us a skin exfoliation:)
As always great fun working with Andrew and Mark from Beluga Lagoon films as we make another episode of their ‘Roaming in the Wild’ for BBC. This time to the borders and with hiking and stand up boards involved. I was filming them on there journey with camera and drone. Andrew would be getting wildlife shots with his big lenses as we went. Do enjoy this work a lot when you get to take part in the trip (behind the camera) with the team. Carrying camping stuff, stove, tent, sleeping bag, and Camera, tripod, drone and all the batteries makes for a heavy load but good bit of exercise:)
