Filming In Dangerous Places... Don't Forget Your Spare Underpants.

I've been a friend of Christian Parkinson now for a couple of years. Mainly conversing all things cameraman via web spaces such as Twitter and various blogs. And i have enjoyed speaking to him whilst he was out in deepest darkest Africa, filming news for the BBC on yet another trip to a war torn dictatorship, whilst i sip my Cafe Latte, and wait for a local interview in a sunny street somewhere in the South of England. Our professional lives could not be more different, except for the fact that we both haul lumps of news gathering equipment about in the search for a gripping picture for the same company.

Christian Parkinson in Harare, Zimbabwe. From caparkinson.com

Christian has been the BBC News Cameraman in the South Africa office for a number of years now, travelling to war zones, disaster areas, and witnessing at first hand the Arab Spring in North Africa, Civil War in the Ivory Coast and other such African nations that seem to fall apart at the drop of a hat. Not only Africa, but the middle east is also stamped into his passport with trips to Afghanistan and Iraq. Yep... Chris has been shot at, mortared and threatened by unstable liquored up soldiers the world over and still looks like a youngster fresh out of BBC College. You would have thought that he was six feet six, built like a brick outhouse, lantern jawed, with a duelling scar on the left cheek and blazing blue eyes, topped off with a rugged, slightly battered TV Camera slung all nonchalantly over his shoulder, and an undercurrent of danger when he walks into a bar... But hey, we can't both look like that.

Stay behind the men with weapons... Good advice. From imagejunkies.com

Anyway... The reason i am writing is that Chris has squeezed all that knowledge of lugging lenses around hot spots into a new E-book. Having read it, i feel like packing my camera kit and a rucksack and heading off to the desert in search of dangerous encounters with militia men and mad dictators. But Chris does that... hence the E-book, which i heartily recommend to any aspiring journalist or cameraman who wants to work in the world of news gathering. Should you wish to travel to dodgy places for whatever reason, such as a gap year, then read this E-book, because the checklists, advice and knowledge contained therein will stand you in good stead for the trip ahead... you don't have to be in the news business to realise that Chris's book is a good starting reference point for anyone travelling in remote areas where danger can lurk unseen, ready to leap up, point an AK47 at you and rob you of your valuables... or worse.

As you read this, Chris is probably up to his neck in Jungle or sand, eating bush meat and getting bitten on his unmentionables by small flies, Whilst i go home tonight and prepare for my next filming trip to London.... Any bit as dangerous in some places at the moment. 

If you wish to download the FREE E-book, please follow this link:  FREE CAMERAMAN EBOOK

Paul Martin is @ukcameraman on Twitter

www.media-attention.co.uk

Going Underground.

It's just bloody typical. I've been hauling my pasty looking skin around in the search for news for the past few weeks in the usual English Summer of rain and damp. So what happens when the temperature rises and the glowing yellow orb makes a welcome appearance...? Yep, you guessed it. The BBC in it's wisdom sends me on a filming trip into a 1.2 mile tunnel under the Hampshire countryside.





The warmth of the sun and it's lighting properties are replaced with a cool breeze and builders dust, not to mention the orange glow of sodium lights just to ruin any cameraman's day.

But seeing as the department of transport is just about to open one of the longest road tunnels in Europe, bypassing what was the biggest bottleneck in southern England, I suppose I had better be grateful for the chance to be one of the very first people to drive through it.





I must admit to being impressed at the marvel of engineering that has taken place here, allowing more vehicles to speed through the countryside and quickly arrive at the automotive hell that is London. You know, that place of freeflowing traffic and clean air...

So instead of a story chasing ice cream sales figures at the beach, or chatting with picnickers on the South Downs, I dutifully captured the mixed lighting of the underground tunnel in all it's orange glory whilst simultaneously wiping road dust from my lens. But at least I suppose, I won't burn my delicate skin like a Scotsman south of Glasgow. No... I shall return from this job looking like Gollum, fiddling with my ring. My focus ring, that is clogged with dust...

Paul Martin is @ukcameraman on Twitter

http://www.media-attention.co.uk

Flabtastic News..!

You know what? it's a wonder that when the sun does finally come out here in the UK, that i don't melt... literally. Most travelling news cameramen must be made of a substance closely akin to playdough... Being on the road and eating the crap that passes for roadside cuisine makes for a wobble around the middle that would put a Turkish belly dancer to shame. When you realise, that as you type into your laptop that is perched on top of a mound of flesh protruding from where a finely tuned six pack once resided, it's time to rethink the way in which i feed this temple of mine.

Roadside dining at its very worst...

Sometimes, it's unavoidable. whilst racing from the scene of one local catastrophic event to another,     ( For that, read minor union squabbles or courtroom steps rumpus) i may not have time to visit the nearest fine dining restaurant or purveyor of mung bean soup with which to sate my bodies desire for fresh, wholesome sustainance. No. In any case, at those prices the bean counters back at the ranch would ruin their computer keyboards with all the spraying of coffee as they read my expenses account...

My usual encounter with food is that of unwrapping tightly bound foodstuffs from a petrol station and throwing it down my neck without much thought to chewing. And anyway, chewing it may release the flavour of the said foodstuff, and you really don't want to do that. Usually a sandwich with indeterminate fillings with a few wilted leaves of green stuff that has not seen sunlight since being ripped from the earth god knows how long ago.

It's either that, or something swimming in grease in a bread roll, a slice of processed something or other and a splat of tomato sauce... Hmm, yummy. Try eating something that has the ambient temperature of the surface of the sun, with gooey shlop leaking over your finest white T-Shirt as you drive to your next location to make another deadline. I once did just that... and during a rather rash braking incident, the inside of my newsmobile resembled the carnage of a murder scene... Burger bits, Goo and red sauce spattered on the inside of my windscreen made a passer by scream in terror... But i digress.

I do try and eat sensibly, honest i do. Mrs ukcameraman makes a delightful pasta bake, with salad bowl and rustic brown bread. It makes a lovely meal for the elderly guy next door as i fail yet again to turn up on time for our evening meal... Sorry dear, they want me on the lives tonight.

So i guess that i will resume trying to find the best that i can at roadside diners, burger vans and petrol stations, and continue to sweat Piri Piri sauce from the meatball sub that has become a particular favourite of mine.

Now if you will excuse me, it's lunchtime. And in the news business that's about 3.30pm... just in time to ruin your evening meal.  

Paul Martin is @ukcameraman on Twitter

www.media-attention.co.uk

It's OK... My Skin Is Waterproof.

You all know the drill. You get booked to film one of the UK's top sporting Summer events, and you know, you just know, that as you and the team set up for outside broadcasting, the heavens will open and dump a shitload of water on you and your equipment. It's bloody typical. But hey... the big guy up there gave us waterproof skin so that the rain doesn't soak up inside you like a sponge, and he gave our muscles the power to shiver so as to keep us warm.

Unfortunately, Mr Sony invented electrical filming equipment with no such protection, only with the power to fritz out at the merest hint of H2O. Not only that, when outside broadcasting means just that... outside, you and your equipment are at the mercy of the British Summer, where the wind is slightly gentler and the rain slightly warmer. Still, we had great fun as we watched the Royal Ascot race going public getting drenched in their finery, and outrageously large hats go flying or limp in the rain.

Bloody miserable Englishman in bloody miserable English weather.

Me...? I was prepared, like the over confident boy scout, i had turned up with my wet weather gear to keep me dry, and a fleece jacket to keep me cozy warm. My camera got the same treatment, so together, we flounced about the racecourse without a care in the world whilst the unprepared got drenched. That, however, did not stop me moaning like a typical Englishman at the unpredictable British weather and having to work in it at the same time. Still, i got to watch plenty of top class Fillies as they pranced about the race course... Oh... and some horses.

Paul Martin is @ukcameraman on Twitter

www.media-attention.co.uk

I've been busy with my iphone...

I got around to thinking that this blog is primarily a behind the scenes type of blog for the life of a broadcast news cameraman. I have been doing very little of that lately, what with me wittering on about things that are not really from behind the scenes. I can wax lyrical on a wide variety of subjects as you well know, mostly bullshitting my way through random thoughts and issues that occur to me whilst travelling the highways of news broadcasting and burger outlet car parks. So here, for your delectation, are a few videos that i have filmed on my iphone over the last few weeks or so. They appear elsewhere on my various online places, but this being my main blog, they should also be here... So i hope you don't mind me repeating myself.

The first video is from behind the scenes at Bucklebury, where the press were gathered to film the celebrations during the recent Royal Wedding. Bucklebury being the place where Kate Middleton and her family currently reside.




The next video shows the not so glam side of TV Broadcasting, namely cable bashing. Anyone who has the remotest interest in the cameraman side of life will do this on a regular basis. Cable bashing is part and parcel of life as a cameraman or broadcast engineer... so get used to it, come rain or shine.



Paul Martin is @ukcameraman on Twitter.

www.media-attention.co.uk