7 hard 10 hour days, no gaffer, no focus puller, no S-Log2, just the good old way it used to be…baked-in as you go along.

All the sound is transmitted from the sound recordist into the camera as “scratch sound” which is lower quality but is there as a guide track for syncing later in post production. I must thank Dave from DSM Broadcast Power who supplied me with a third DSM-U84 battery for my Sony FS7.

At the initial negotiations I insisted on having a sound recordist but 28 soundmen were already being used at the St Andrews golf tournament leaving a rather large hole for anyone decent. Rory the director finally sourced Merlin Bonning a top man by any standards.

Merlin was the cream of the crop and an asset to the production.

Even the clapper board looked drunk at one point “Fdradour”, our clapper, Sam was new to the job and is studying sound at college, what a great week he had watching Merlin at work.

A classic window shot…the faces are lit with 2 camera top LED lights gaffer to the inside of the window.

Outside the camera is gaffer with black tape and a deep black lastolite is positioned behind the camera, the chap holding the umbrella over the camera was also doused in black material, you do not want any reflections in the window.

Then in post you can add a reflection, all adding to the magic.

Angel (Dave Finnegan) with Donna (Georgina Blackledge)

The Sony PXW-FS7 was the right camera for the job with hired (PROCAM) 4K Canon EF glass using a CAMBO pull focus unit.

The hair and makeup girls latched onto the 502 smallHD monitor using it for continuity and taking JPEGS.

At the end of the week Holdan sent me the new smallHD sidefinder which came in very useful when the camera was perched on a Whisky barrel. The picture quality was better than Sony’s LCD.

The lads !

Clanadonia are a Drums & Pipes band with a difference – their music, passion, culture, history, people, ancestral bloodlines – are all bonded within the music…they are the dogs bollocks.

The local paper came to take a picture and featured on page 7 of the Courier next day.

As you can see the cast and crew were not insignificant.

My final thoughts are with a very good friend of mine Watt Nicoll who wrote the initial draft for the Spirit of Edradour alongside Rory the director. During 1973 Watt wrote an episode for Norman Wisdom “Nobody is Norman Wisdom”…now thats impressive on anyones CV.

The week was hard and days were long but friendships were struck amongst cast and crew…but it was a good laugh in-between all the hard graft.