Philip Johnston (HD Warrior) has been in professional video production for the last 27 years, 21 of them running my own video production company (Small Video Co Ltd).

As I was growing up my father had a 8mm cine camera, unfortunately he did not have a clue how to use it and we sat upside down through many a darkened room watching what can only be described as a fly with a camera, he would zip and zoom all over the place. At the tender age of 12 I was given my own Super 8mm Kodak XL cine camera this was indeed progress, the film was enclosed in a single cartridge and had 2 flavors 125 ASA and 400ASA. The XL part of the title meant for the 1st time you could film in existing light this was a major advancement, no glaring cine lights. I produced well in excess of 100 various 3min films and the odd 400ft epics.

During my teenage years I got a Super 8mm Chinon sound camera and I was the sole archiver of all my secondary school trips in both silent and sound film. needless to say I have transferred these wonderful days into a DVD and considering no one had taught me how to use a cine camera I done a fine job if I say so myself. I started my working career as a draughtsman, I knew my higher Art would help with some part of my career.

My first video camera (1983) was a Sony HVC-4000 linked to a portable SL-F1 Betamax recorder this was the dogs bollox in it’s day,… 260 lines resolution and a good old videcon tube…the smear was very noticeable in low light. My first professional camcorder was the Panasonic F10 one of the 1st cameras to have a CCD chipset (The Birth of CCD), this was a great workhorse, one of it,s poorer features being the iris adjust, a small wheel near the back end of the lens that opened and closed the iris with the precision of a sumo wrestler plucking daisy petals.

My first real job in the industry was with Flashback Video, a production company specializing in corporate, training and television work. Chris who was the boss, left a good job with Scottish Television as a senior cameraman to start Flashback now runs a very successful bed and breakfast on the isle of Arran. He recently bought my Sony EX-1 and is still making various documentaries around the island. I left Flashback to join a cable TV company, Clyde Cable Vision as a video editor this took me through till 1988 when after a blazing row with my boss I told her to stick her job where the sun did not shine I decided to go it alone and formed in 1988 The Small Video Company.

I started with a Panasonic F10 and after various JVCs, Sony’s, Panasonic’s and Canon’s later I now have a Sony PMW-350K. I am one of the stranger animals in this business I do not stick with any single manufacturer, so many of my colleagues swear by Sony etc. but I tend to buy what’s best for me at the time, this time it happens to be Sony.