Matthew Williams-Ellis is kneeling earlier than a carpet of sea-crushed bluebells, shooting photos of puffins flying across the cliffs, and the air is a cacophony of seabirds and wind. I’ve joined Matthew on an extended and unique ride to Skomer, not most effective to glean his photo advice, but to assist movie a video along with his professional partner John Alexander. The duo is here for a four-day stint to movie their ultra-modern cinematic short video – suppose tour pictures and photograph challenges, provided with a hearty dose of Top Gear-style banter – filmed using Nikon DSLRs.
Matthew himself is a tour photographer, which leads him to shoot documentary and nature pix international, but he is first trained as an accountant after completing his degree. Driven to succeed, Matthew constructed up a portfolio in his spare time when no longer operating or reading, and led his first travel vacation in 2018. “I love exploring the sector, each on assignments and for private tasks. I’m enthusiastic about the challenges that touring offers.”
Video has ended up both greater advanced and more handy to DSLR proprietors in the latest years. However, it may require an extraordinary attitude to taking picture stills. I ask where the concept for Matthew and John’s movies, Photo Escapes, originally came from. “John knew of me from university, and got in touch several years later to talk photography.” The dynamic duo soon started out filming together – before everything protecting UK locations consisting of the Antrim coast – looking for an appropriate place to steer images vacations. During an experience in Kerala, India, in 2017, their pilot Photo Escapes film was created.
Moving lower back to the present for our ride, we’re hoping to see and shoot puffins, along with the rugged coastal scenes that Skomer is known for. The island is most effective on hand by means of ferry – and way to Storm Hannah, our first day becomes not on time, because the crossing was too rough. Fortunately, using a far-off AirBnB in Wales as a base, shooting nevertheless started to set the scene for the ride. I then commenced peering at how the magic occurs behind the curtain.
Matthew and John are continuously deliberating approaches to shape, complement, and increase their brief films.
Using cinematic digicam drone photos is a key part of Photo Escapes, however as Matthew had checked ahead for permission to fly on Skomer (unluckily now not), our more day at the mainland become used to seize lots of aerial scenics and to ride pictures the usage of the telephone-operated DJI Inspire 1 and Mavic Pro. During the next morning, Matthew kept out a digicam on our crossing to document the adventure to Skomer. He is familiar with how critical it’s far to create a narrative with video and hyperlink up every segment of the ride for the viewer. Once we’d arrived, a take a look at the island gave us the threat to speak logistics over tea, then we bounded out to shoot the island’s spectacles.
Day at the island remains overcast. However, that doesn’t prevent us from capturing our first puffins and many B-roll videos (supplemental pictures intercut with the principle photographs). There’s an excellent quantity of effort (and pictures) that is going into growing an authentic and immersive video, along with on-foot photographs from one place to the next – arriving and departing. Continuity is key, so the pair try and maintain the identical jackets and garments on during. On our closing day, the focal point is on filming the puffins in flight, which means that panning throughout the display screen with lengthy lenses and perfecting the tracking method.
