No Ordinary Monday
The No Ordinary Monday podcast brings you the most incredible tales from people's working lives. Each week, we meet someone whose work is anything but ordinary - they may be clearing landmines, blowing up movie sets, or exploring uncharted caves.
We dive into the how, the why, and a life-defining moment they’ve experienced on the job. Whether it’s spine-tingling, hilarious, or just plain jaw-dropping, their stories will challenge what you thought a “career” could be—and maybe even change the way you think about your own.
No Ordinary Monday
Filming the Impossible (Keith Partridge)
Emmy award-winning cinematographer Keith Partridge takes us behind the scenes of adventure filmmaking, revealing the extraordinary skills and mindset required to capture footage where few dare to venture.
From dangling 3,000 feet off Angel Falls in Venezuela to filming on the summit of Everest, Keith has made a career of putting cameras in places that seem impossibly dangerous. What's remarkable is how his journey began – not scaling mountains from childhood, but working in a factory making pressure switches for electric showers after failing his A-levels. His path changed forever when he spotted a BBC job advertisement at 18, beginning a journey that would eventually lead him to resign without another job lined up, simply because he felt called to adventure.
The heart of our conversation explores a particularly harrowing moment during the filming of the BAFTA award-winning documentary "Touching the Void." Keith recounts finding himself on a hanging sheet of ice just an inch thick in the Peruvian Andes, where his guide could only mouth the words "don't fall." This story perfectly illustrates Keith's approach to extreme filming – it's not about recklessness or being "gung-ho," but rather about preparation, situational awareness, and team trust.
What comes through clearly is how Keith views fear as a positive force – a natural pause button that makes you assess situations carefully. For anyone fascinated by adventure, filmmaking, or how people perform under pressure, this conversation offers rare insights into a truly extraordinary career. Keith's journey proves that sometimes the most remarkable lives begin with simply being open to opportunity and saying "yes" when adventure calls.
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Hello and welcome to another episode of no Ordinary Monday. Thank you so much for joining us. I am your host, chris Barron, and each week I sit down with a guest whose job is far from ordinary. We explore how they got there, what it's really like behind the scenes, and then we'll deep dive into the single most unforgettable experience of their career. Today I've got a fantastic guest and someone I've actually had the privilege of working with several times over the years. He is Emmy award winning cinematographer and filmmaker, keith Partridge.
Speaker 1:Keith is basically the guy that people call to film something in a place that seems absolutely crazy to put a camera. He has spent decades capturing jaw-dropping moments in places like the summit of Everest and underground rivers in Papua New Guinea, and then also with me dangling off the world's highest waterfall in Venezuela waterfall in Venezuela. In Keith's big story, he relives a terrifying moment while shooting the incredible, award-winning documentary Touching the Void, when he and the crew found themselves hanging perilously off an ice wall in the Peruvian Andes. It's the sort of place where one wrong move could have been fatal for he or the crew, but it really shows the skill and sort of teamwork and commitment that keith and other guys in the crew. Uh, need to capture these moments on film. With all that said, I'm absolutely thrilled to bring you my conversation with keith. I hope you enjoy. You're listening to no ordinary monday. Let's get into the show. Cool, all right, keith? Welcome. Welcome to the podcast. How are things today?
Speaker 2:Good to see you. Actually, the last time, of course, was on the west coast of Alaska that we spent time together. I believe, if my memory serves me right, that was a fun shoot, wasn't it?
Speaker 1:And we said right, that was a fun shoot, wasn't it? It was indeed. That was a couple of years ago, I think. Now we were having a jaunt on an archaeology shoot on the west coast of Alaska.
Speaker 2:That's right. Far too many body parts being washed out of the crumbling permafrost as it melts from these low muddy cliffs on the Alaskan coast. Yeah, it was good fun.
Speaker 1:It's very fun. Um, so just give us, uh, I guess, before we get into things, just kind of tell us what you do for a living okay.
Speaker 2:So most of the time if say, if I was in a bar and so. So what do you do for a living? I say I. I film really scary stuff. Most of the time that seems to be like, oh, what does that mean? I say, well, I go on these wild adventures and expeditions all over the world with a camera in my hand and try and capture the action as it unfolds. But of course that's led into all manner of other stuff. So be it feature film work or feature documentary work, and a lot of it is sort of specialist factual documentary style stuff. But basically, basically, I would describe myself in a very simple way as an adventure filmmaker and obviously you and I know each other pretty well.
Speaker 1:We've done a few projects together in the past, um, over the last seven, eight years or so. I was working as a director, producer or producer in some of those roles and you were the cinematographer on a lot of those. So you say you're an the cinematographer on a lot of those.
Speaker 2:So you say you're a venture filmmaker, but on a lot of these projects your primary role might be cinematography, director, photography that's right, because my speciality really is getting cameras into places where not many other people can get them into by usually rope access techniques or mountaineering techniques, caving techniques, all of those sorts of stuff which you know as an adventurer is one thing, but then you stick a camera in it in the mix it takes it to an all-new level really of complexity and sort of head stress.
Speaker 2:But actually head stress, I mean, is in a good way, you know, because I love problem solving and um, but yeah, being an adventure uh, filmmaker, adventure, cinematographer is about as much fun as you can have in a toy shop and a sweetie shop combined, and that goes inside. Where we first met was, of course, dangling off the angel falls of venezuela, so, and if you got it wrong there, it's a full 22 seconds to think about it before you splat into the river below. So you know a full 3 000 foot, 1 000 meter drop, and so you know it's great to work with people who have that element of understanding about the environment and where you're going, and that's where the team is super important.
Speaker 1:Venezuela. A thousand meters, as you say, 3000 feet off the ground, which was an extraordinary experience. But you said you know it's about as much fun as someone can have, but there's probably a lot of people out there that that might be their worst nightmare. You must've dealt with that before.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, it's not everybody's cup of tea, is it? But of course I haven't really dealt with acute levels of what you might describe as fear. So you have to be super motivated to go into these environments. Of course you do. But the other thing is you have to be super prepared and you can't just rock up and go and hang yourself off a 3000 foot high waterfall. That is just craziness. That is absolutely where it's all going to go wrong. So, starting small, adding elements into the mix, which increases the complexity, the complexity, the exposure, the seriousness of the situations that you're going into understanding the risks, mitigating those risks it's all part of this. Very, very fun that's what I describe it, but very, very complicated game I want to take it back, sort of.
Speaker 1:That's a great intro, I think, but I want to take it way back to the beginning. And what did you want to be as a kid growing up?
Speaker 2:I had no idea what I was going to do when I was growing up. I had absolutely no idea. I was djing from the age of like 14. I was djing just as a hobby but actually became a really successful little business. Actually, and myself and my business partner we ended up at a three night a week residency at a nightclub when we were old enough, so that you know. But we, we built, we built a lot of our own equipment.
Speaker 2:So I had an interest in electronics and but the problem was I spent so much time djing that my studies went out of the window as all my a levels were a disaster. My studies went out of the window as all my A-levels were a disaster. So university went out of the window and I ended up working in a job in a factory making pressure sensing switches for electric showers, which was, you know, it paid some but it wasn't exactly very entertaining. I would say, was it your dream job? Exactly very entertaining? I would say, was it your dream job? No, I wouldn't say it's my dream job. But you said, yeah, but somebody's got to do it. You know, somebody's got to make pressure sensing switches for electric showers and that was me. What was your dj name. Oh no, it was a day. It was days before djs had names. I was just keith oh, jake keith dj keith.
Speaker 2:But then, of course, after that, uh, so university went out the window and I was working in this factory and on a Friday the local newspaper was published and they had the job section and the BBC were advertising for what they called at that time a technical operator and they said you know, they should be interested in hi-fi, sound lighting photography, sound lighting photography. And I just went down all of the little you know, the tick list, and thought oh.
Speaker 2:I'm interested in all of those. Photography was another hobby of mine, and so I applied, and at the age of 18, the mad fools at the BBC gave me the job. Ha.
Speaker 1:God. So you were working in the factory and were you actively looking for stuff, or did you just happen to open the? You know?
Speaker 2:you know, to be honest, I wasn't actively looking for stuff because at that time I had no idea what I wanted to do. I had this bombshell that I've failed all my exams. That for me, was a kind of an impasse which I didn't know how to get over that. So as far as I was concerned, at that moment in time it was a kind of like, oh, is this me? But of course it never really is, because it's about the opportunity and it's about realizing when an opportunity presents itself to you and go, I can do that and so I I do know a little bit about the bbc um, the workplace game.
Speaker 1:It's brilliant because they basically throw you into all kinds of stuff and you've got to kind of get your hands dirty with a bunch of different things, but kind of just run us through that experience and then how that sort of threw you in a particular trajectory sure, well, well, I was based initially at bbc norwich, which is where I grew up.
Speaker 2:The flattest part of the uk, I mean, I think the highest point is something like 60 meters above sea level and I think it's called beast and bump or roman camp or something like that, you know, and it's basically just an ironing board. So that was me, anyway. So I started at BBC East doing the local news, which actually was great fun. I really enjoyed that. But then at the training course, which is brutal an exam every Friday and if you didn't pass well, did you come back on the Monday? Who knows, probably not. So it was boot camp and the guy that I was sharing a room with, a guy called Howard Ray, and he was talking about Newcastle up in the northeast, and it sounded like a right wheeze. And then BBC Newcastle were looking for technical operators to come up on a short-term attachment. So I went up for six months and never returned.
Speaker 2:That got me very, very close to the mountains, so the Lake District and also the Scottish Highlands, and I dabbled a little bit in after my A-levels when a couple of good friends and myself we took off up into Scotland on a road trip and I was kind of blown away by this mountain landscape, having grown up in North Norfolk, which is, as I described, very, very flat. Having grown up in north norfolk, which is, as I described, very, very flat, and um, moving to newcastle, I met a great bunch of people who were very interested in getting out into the mountains and, to be honest, as a hobby it became utterly all-consuming. And then there was one day I was reading a book by an eminent filmmaker adventure adventure filmmaker called Leo Dickinson. I think I was doing the Breakfast News that day and I was reading this book called Filming the Impossible by Leo, and I just thought that's me. So I just resigned.
Speaker 1:Wow, we resigned from the BBC scheme.
Speaker 2:Yep, I'd done six years by that time. Nothing to go to. But all I knew was that being part of that Manson community was what I really wanted to do in some shape or form. And having read Leo's book he's got a lot to answer for, isn't he book he's got a lot to answer for, isn't he then? Then that was me, so I just resigned and that the day I handed my notice in, I went over to the lake district with james, my very dear friend from six form, who was then renting a room off me. It moved up to newcastle as well and, um, we spent the day running around the lake district just blowing off. Basically, it was a very difficult decision to make. You know, it's almost like jumping off a cliff with no landing.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And no parachute, nothing, no safety net. But I thought there's only one way you're going to make this work and that's if you try. And so it was about following the dream. At the end of that day day, we were in the climbing champanamble side and there was a notice board as we left and there was a scrap of paper on it. Anybody fancy coming to iceland this winter? I need an expedition partner paul walker on a phone number and I thought well, I'm out of a job because I've just resigned. I gave him a call and a few weeks later we were on a plane together with a bunch of kit and we did a two-person expedition onto europe's largest ice cap in southeast iceland, the vatnjokl ice cap, in winter, which was brutal that was the first time of anything of that level, I'm guessing from you.
Speaker 1:You kind of threw yourself into it, thought I have no idea, I'm sure I'll make it work yeah, exactly, so it's I.
Speaker 2:How can I do this? I can do this. I'm not sure I can do this really. Ah, yes, I can, so that's like a greater process, right there it is a bit really.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So you go through this sort of full gamut of the emotions on those trips. And I literally came back to newcastle, dumped my rucksack in the flat that I was renting and um, went across to the bbc social club and was going across the car park, there was this shadowy figure, came out of the gloom, you know, and it was a guy called richard richard else, and he was a producer director and he stopped me and he said oh, what have you been doing? I heard you'd left. And I went aha and he said oh, by the way, you look like total Cause.
Speaker 2:I literally, just, I literally just walked off the plane. You know, it was like no chance for anything. Wow, you know, lips all cracked up, you know. And, um, I told him about the expedition and literally the next sentence was do you want to come to the Himalaya this autumn with Chris Bonington? Oh, my God. And it was just like do I get paid? Oh, that sounds great. Then I'm on. So that was it. And so that was the start of a great relationship professionally with, uh, with with Richard.
Speaker 1:What were you doing on that? Was that as a cameraman, or?
Speaker 2:No, I was doing sound, but I was there also. So the guy shooting it was another hero of mine, goal, a guy called jim curran who was on k2 in 1986 filming, and for me to be working alongside jim curran was again it's like oh my goodness, I don't believe this. And of course, with bonneton, who is my all-time mountain hero, and I was so excited but so utterly terrified. I was doing sound. So when I was at the BBC we were trained to do everything Camera, sound, lighting, editing, the full gamut so that didn't really worry me too much, but I'd never been really further than Mallorca, so to find yourself in Northern Pakistan was a little bit of a culture shock, I would suggest serendipitous those sequence of events.
Speaker 1:Do you do you see it that way that you were incredibly lucky, or do you just sort of see it as there was you were able to recognize opportunities and and took them. Or how do you see it? Because it sounds to me from where I'm sitting, like that you sort of like just fell into each one of those steps and they were got bigger and better that's very true.
Speaker 2:There is a serendipitous element to that. But at the same time, I think you have to be open to opportunity. You do have to realize, when opportunities come your way, that you can make them work. They're always going to be a bit of a stretch, they're always going to be outside what you're comfortable doing, hopefully. But that's where the greatest learning takes place. And so you get this escalatory idea of one project leads to the next and the next, hopefully, will be that much more challenging. Again, I've always realized that opportunities and doors open if you allow them. If you are open-minded about chatting to people, then you never know where things end up and who you're going to bump into and what they do. And so I'm very I mean gregarious is I wouldn't put myself in that camp, but I don't mind striking a conversation with pretty much anybody, and it pays dividends.
Speaker 1:Climbing these cliffs, and getting to these places is one thing just even getting your body there but you've got to get there with the equipment and then work, you know. So I think you've been doing this for so long when you first started these. There's a lot of equipment. It's a bit easier now because equipment's smaller, but you're still getting to these places and having to work and film people doing this sort of easy thing in some ways. What's what's that like? In, in, in as a, as a to get it right, the pressure of you know, getting into these spots and getting the shot, kind of thing sure.
Speaker 2:Well, so there was what there was one. There was one shoot we did in peru and it's like the islamity of peru, it's called the paran valley, these big granite walls, and we had a planning meeting between myself, the riggers, the rope riggers, mountain guides that I work with a lot, so we speak the same language and the two climbers that we're filming in, who I think you know, of course, federico pisani and evan from venezuela. Yeah, so they were. They were climbing on camera for us and we had this. It was literally two hours inside the tent at base camp and at the end of it it felt like I'd been through like a physics exam or something. It was very, very intense talking about the people, movement, the rope management, how we were going to rig so that we could actually get camera, my camera, me into certain positions, and at the end of it I asked the director how does that sound to you? And he went I have no idea what you're talking about. I mean, which is fine, it's completely fine. But so they have to put a lot of trust in us and it was incredibly, incredibly complicated. So at the start you kind of like go down this idea of right plan. Where do we actually want to get the camera to? Okay, how do we get the camera there in terms of where does the anchor point need to be? So where do we need to put the ropes in position for then we look at if we then get that camera in that position, where's the next one? But we have to plan ahead before we even get there, because that may well impact on the first camera position, of course.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and so on that job, we ended up with a multiple rope system. So, and I could end up going up and down and left and right across the cliff. So by putting in multiple rope systems, you can jimmy up a rope, you can abseil back down, you can tension backwards, you can abseil forwards on that back rope and by doing that we could move almost in. Well, we have done it. Where I move in three dimensions, you know, in in midair, and that's very, very cool, very complex. So then when you're actually on the day itself, you might start with a hour hike, two hour hike, with all the kit on your back, and so you're pretty tired before you get there.
Speaker 2:Hopefully, by that time, the the rope riggers and the the ace climbers far better climbers than I will ever be are there. They put some anchors in above. They drop some ropes down. I'll then harness up, hook onto the ropes, start shimmying up the ropes and I'll be. I'll have my safety hat on at that point, metaphorically speaking. So I, yeah, I'll be looking at angles. Of course I will be, but hopefully when I stop I'll go.
Speaker 2:This is where the camera actually needs to be right, we're on it now. This is an amazing angle. We've got it now. We've got it dialed here, yeah, and then I then I stop onto my sort of more creative hat and there, and then I'll make sure that I'm totally safe, solid in position that I've, I'm comfortable. When I'm being comfortable, I mean usually contorted, with a lot of weight in very stressful positions, but I'm comfortable mentally, yeah, and then that frees your brain up to think about the creative process and about following the action and anticipating the action and learning to listen to what's going on. And are the climbers getting stressed? Uh, if they're getting stressed, then usually something's going to go down and that could be. That could be a good moment in the film. You know, if you're learning to listen to what's going on, you pick up an awful lot of the way those performers climbers, whatever feeling in front of the camera, and you can react accordingly, and that's a very, very useful tool.
Speaker 1:Absolutely Now. Before you agreed graciously to jump on this podcast, I asked you to sort of think of a significant moment that kind of stands out in your career. You've mentioned so many things so far, but which one stands out the most?
Speaker 2:I mean, I think, in a career that's now spanning 80 film projects on all seven continents across 35 years. You know, there are lots and lots of moments. Of course there are, and one of them does stand out, actually, and it was a day that we were working high up on Sula Grand in Peru on the film Touching the Void and I was climbing with Paul Moore's ace mountain guide, totally unflappable, and Rory Gregory and Dave Cuthbertson was stunt doubling for Joe Simpson and Simon Yates. So we we headed off from base camp that morning very early and, uh, joe simpson, of course, whose accent we were recreating in that film.
Speaker 1:It's a drama, reconstruction, of course well, I was gonna say it might be worth mentioning, just just because some people listening might not be familiar. I mean, I know it's a very popular film but just give us a brief, a brief kind of what was the story of touching the void and joe simpson yeah sure, well, well, in touching the void, two ambitious young british mountaineers go to climb I think it's the west face of sula grand in the peruvian andes.
Speaker 2:And they do it, they manage to climb the face. They then decided that the best way down was to traverse the summit ridge and descend via a slightly easier way. The only thing was that whilst traversing that summit ridge, joe Simpson falls and breaks his leg and he feels that Simon's going to abandon him. But Simon attempts the impossible and to do a solo one person rescue. He, in a storm, lowers joe simpson over an overhanging cliff and was getting pulled off the mountain himself and ended up having to cut the rope. Now he felt that of course he'd sent joe simpson to his death and in the morning he couldn't't see where Joe had gone.
Speaker 2:Joe had actually punched his way through, in this fall through the lid of the roof of a crevasse and ended up crawling. Goodness knows how he got out of that. Well, we reconstructed it. But you know a huge, huge survival story about crawling for days across this Peruvian glacier and lives to tell the tale. And so we got them to tell the story in documentary sense and then reconstructed the the story dramatically, I mean, that's worth saying if anyone hasn't seen touching the void.
Speaker 1:It's a fantastic, fantastic uh drama documentary about, about the story and obviously, keith, you were filming a lot of the um, the scary stuff, the scary stuff, but you know it's, it's a, you know, was it bafta, bafta award-winning uh documentary and yeah, and awards as well, lots and lots and lots of other awards.
Speaker 2:But but also, if anybody follows things like rotten tomatoes, which is the film review site, I think it's like 94 very few films get above that very, very few.
Speaker 1:It's it's worth watching, but yeah, so sorry, tell us, tell us your story so we.
Speaker 2:We left base camp. We shouldered our rucksacks at base camp early one morning and joe simpson, who was I was sharing a tent with, he shouted across you be careful on that big, bad mountain up there. And yeah, he wasn't wrong. Kevin shouts across. Well, why is that? And of course Joe says, would it be the ultimate irony if those boys get killed doing the very thing that I survived and we set off up the face?
Speaker 2:In the end it's a big traverse across the glacier which is pretty sketchy, big crevasses to jump across, and I was then climbing with Paulul paul leading up above me. We're up in the flutings, these kind of very, very fragile half pipes of crumbling rotten snow and the ice was kind of okay in it. And then it ran out and you, when you whack your ice axe in with the pick, you feel the vibration in the shaft and you listen to the sound. It's kind of curious and you know that it'll hold. But this didn't feel right and it didn't sound right. So I lifted the pick out and thought, well, maybe there's some better quality ice deeper.
Speaker 2:And so I punched the axe in again and it still felt really bad, but my right axe felt okay, so I just gently pulled up on my right axe and my tippy toes and my crampon points these big spikes that stick out the front of your boots and I lifted up my left axe and realized that I was on a hanging sheet of ice about an inch thick, and then there was an air gap and then bottom was powder, snow. And that was the moment where I looked up at Paul above me holding my rope, and he just looked down at me and shook his head and mouthed the words don't fall. So I suspect that actually what we were anchored to would probably never have held. And if it doesn't hold, you you're going to take a winger, you are going to fall, and if you haven't got a good anchor point of your rope higher up, you're going to pull that partner off as well, and that's essentially you falling however far you've climbed and then potentially with ice blocks falling onto you, you got it.
Speaker 2:It would be really unpleasant. It's not. It would be really unpleasant. It would be a bad day at the office.
Speaker 1:So you were in this situation. You knew the consequences if things were to go up, if you were to fall, and you had your ice axes in the wall at this point when you were filming. I guess the was for paul to hold your weight, because I need both hands.
Speaker 2:I need both hands to film, yeah. And so I have to make sure that, paul, you know, can you hold me? Is the system going to be able to hold my full body weight, yeah, or are we going to collapse? And paul just says you just be bloody careful, son, which says to me that we're probably not attached very much, and so I very carefully took the rucksack off my back. Remember, I'm hanging here?
Speaker 2:you know, at quite high altitude, on a very big face in the peruvian andes, and I took the camera out, which is an art on a miniver which I detest, by the way, sorry, art on, I don't like it, it's so fiddly in those environments. And I shouted down to cubby and Rory, just climb In his own clamors yeah, the stunt doubles. And so they climbed and then I heard the ticker, ticker, ticker of the film has run out. It only took a five minute load, which was the big problem for me.
Speaker 2:And so I ended up with the camera on my knees, hanging sitting in my harness with the side open, trying to thread a new magazine, roll a film through the mechanism, and then the slope above avalanched and I got snow and I was pouring over the top of me, filling the camera full of snow. So I had a little one inch paintbrush in my pocket for the purpose. So you have to think of these things, you see. And I managed to clear it all out, but I got gloves off, so my hands are freezing cold. I managed to wind the tail of the film onto the take-up bobbin, slammed the magazine home, shut the side door and I just shouted down to the cubby and rory. Again I said right, I got five minutes to film, just climb, I'll shoot. When that's done, we're out of here.
Speaker 1:So that day we filmed seven minutes of film jeez so were you in that, in those kinds of situations and I'm sure you had many over your career are you just kind of going okay, that's a that kind of danger element or the fear element, or yes, you don't feel too much fear, but that aspect of like, okay, we could be in trouble. Do you just sort of package that up and sort of put it to the side for a minute so you can focus on the filming, or is it once you get down the lens?
Speaker 2:it's not hard to ignore that that's a really interesting point, because that there's there's several elements to that, one of which is that this, this one of the points is the distraction factor. So when you're looking down that viewfinder and you're filming, you can become separated from reality. That, I think, is a very, very dangerous game. What I would suggest is that when you pick up on that vibe so that sixth sense that many of us have lost or has been eroded, when the hairs on the back of the neck start to prickle, you need to start listening to them and understand that if you're feeling like that, then probably somebody else is, and then get the vibe from the other members of the team as well, see what the scoop might be and if there's a conversation that needs to be had about okay, are we about to cross the line here? Then think very seriously about continuing or not. Do we pull back? Or if we can manage to control this, both mentally, physically and technically, then let's push on, but let's be hyper aware of the situation that we're now pushing into and that one small error will escalate extremely quickly with very, very severe consequences.
Speaker 2:And so a lot of people think you know, oh, is it about being all gung ho? And it's not. It's completely the opposite of that. It's about understanding the environment that you're in, becoming very aware of the people around you, but also the situation that you're in, situational awareness. A lot of people talk about that. Things do go wrong. Of course they do, and what you hope is that you've put enough in place that you can deal with that. But that's not to say that that is what's going to happen. You know things can run out of control. I've been very fortunate at Touchwood that nothing has gone completely. You know, pear-shaped.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So in that Peru situation, obviously, obviously, you know you, you got the shots, got everything done. Said to paul right, we're good to go, packed up your gear, sling your bike back on and then just carefully descended the same way you came up yeah, exactly, there was nothing else we could do.
Speaker 2:So what I did is I actually got paul to lower me, because it saved a lot of shenanigans, um, and then he could be in complete control and obviously, if, if he needed me to, you know, use my access and get back on the ice proper, then he could just shout, you know, and hopefully it was, it would work I guess from that particular experience you kind of mentioned a little bit before there, but just on that particular experience, on reflection, I mean, what do you take from it, what have you learned from it that you kind of took through you going forward in your career, or any sort of lessons from it?
Speaker 2:I think, from that day in peru where we're up in the, what do they take from that? It's about the team and it's about trust, and without that and having confidence in each other, and without that this sort of stuff really doesn't work. Adrenaline is good, fear is good. Fear is your natural stop or your natural hang on a second. Let's just pause and see what's going on here. Let's see if there's anything else we can do. Else we can do. So all those emotions to like, think about analyzing them after days like that and how you can use them in a positive way rather than in something which actually form makes you close down. The minute you close down in those high stress situations and maybe with risk, then you cease to function effectively, I feel. But being very aware of the risk enables you to still function and hopefully retreat, get out of it effectively, stay in one bit, call it what you will.
Speaker 1:So when you look back, you've done a ton of stuff. When you look back at everything, at your career, your achievements, things you've done what kind of emotions does that evoke? Do you have a lot of pride in what you've done? Would you've done anything else with your life? You know um, you know how do you feel? Are you satisfied with your careers? Are more you would have wanted to do?
Speaker 2:I think, when you look back on the sorts of things that I've been involved in, it's been a very long, difficult, fun, complicated and at times risky journey. I don't think I'd do anything particularly differently because I've just made the most of any and every opportunity that's kind of presented itself to me, but I do think I've been very fortunate. You know, having said earlier that, is it serendipitous or do you make your own luck? So I think, as we discussed earlier, there is a little bit of that sort of you've got to be open to the luck and being able to actually just go. Actually that sounds great. Let's do that. Just go, yes, and then worry about it a little bit. I would guess it was a lot of trouble. I would say I guess it's a lot of trouble, but it's good trouble, you know it's good, a bit of trouble.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and the other thing that I really feel strongly about is the number of people that I've met. You know, every project, every project is just with the most amazing people, and that's one of the things that I feel most passionate about, because I'm not a world-class climber, I'm just willing to put myself out there. What I say is that I can suffer with the best of them. I'm happy to suffer, because usually it involves a lot of suffering on these shoots, because they're usually not comfortable, not a lot of luxury.
Speaker 1:Not a lot of sleep, not a lot of food.
Speaker 2:No, but all of the above. Very poor toilet facilities. I would suggest a lot of the time.
Speaker 1:Although there's another story, but our toilet in Venezuela I thought was quite luxurious. We even had a toilet seat.
Speaker 2:I think that sat across the toilet. Woe betide if it slipped, though. I remember it was one of the best views I've ever had in a toilet. It was pretty good actually. Anyway, we digress. What was the question? Again?
Speaker 1:I forgot it was complicated again are you, would you have done anything different? And I think the answer is no, no, no.
Speaker 2:I was like actually, and I don't think you can, and I think it's very easy to dwell on in a negative way on the past, rather than going okay, yeah, that could have been better, all right, let's not do that next time. Let's do something different and learn from that and move forwards and just keep doing that rather than going oh, that was bad, well, I won't do that again. I'll never do that again. Do you know, I'll go and sit down and give up. You know that's. That's just not me. I'd rather go okay, let's learn from that. How can we move on? Let's move on, right, let's go absolutely.
Speaker 1:I mean again, I kind of think about if it was the same question put to me, is it would do anything different? Because I found my way to what I love doing at a you know 24, you know.
Speaker 1:So it was a little bit later in my career, but if I was asking myself, would I do anything differently? I think it would be that I just didn't know that people do this for a living. You know, like I was like you can get paid to do this. If I had known that when I was 16, you know that you can do these things that you love, put the thing. I love science, I love photography stick them together and I love adventure stuff as well, because I'm a climber, and not to the level of you guys. But yeah, I love doing that kind of stuff and I was like you can do, you can get paid for it. I just wish I'd known earlier that you can get paid for it. I just wish I'd known earlier. That was my only thing. But then you can't do what ifs, you know no you can't.
Speaker 2:But the other thing is for me, yeah, sure, it's nice to get paid. Of course it is, and that's been my profession, that's been my job. But it is a job, it is hard work. There is a lot at stake in terms of people's wellbeing, but also, I think, in terms of making a film, there's a lot of money involved. Yeah, you know I'm not a brain surgeon. I don't go saving people's lives. You know I'm not at that level. But at the same time, there is a professional pride and professional pressures. Yeah, and you know, at the same time, do you get paid to fail? No, you don't. You get paid to deliver and you get paid to constantly deliver. And that is, whilst it's great to have these adventures, there's always that background there, like on Everest. That's a big deal. You don't get paid to fail on Everest.
Speaker 1:Yeah, these are massive projects and they cost a lot of money and you come back and you don't deliver the goods. You probably won't be sent out again.
Speaker 2:Well, that's the tall and short of it, isn't it? And that's the beauty, or the danger, the price you pay for being freelance. These opportunities are incredible. You find yourself doing things that you could never, ever dream of.
Speaker 1:I just want to touch on the day-to-day aspect of things, of being, as you said, this is a freelance job. You know there is no. I mean maybe some people. There's some rare opportunities where you get a jobbing cameraman kind of thing, but the sort of thing that you do is very much a job-to-job thing. There is not a lot of security apart from your own reputation and the strength of the industry. Kind of just give us a sense of that. Obviously, you've painted a great picture of the great aspect of doing this job, but there are mundane aspects to it as well. You've got to chase clients for invoices. You've got to find the next job, you've got to do this and this and this.
Speaker 2:Just give us a sense of what that side of it's like. Well, I mean, you are effectively running a business and, of course, there's all the paperwork you know. There's the accounts to keep up to date, there's oh, the customs.
Speaker 2:Documentation drives me to tears carnays oh yeah, yeah, export carnays, because you know when we're working abroad, we often we there are some projects we have a lot often. We there are some projects. We have a lot of equipment. There are some projects. We have a lot less. But there have been jobs where we go out and it's it's not unusual to have 40 pieces of luggage and each item within each box has to be itemized and it's just a nightmare. So all of that mundane stuff, I mean I really I love talking to clients and production teams. It's great fun how we work collaboratively to actually pull this thing off, all of this background stuff. I also feel it's a means to an end. You know you have to to jump through these hoops. They're part and parcel of what goes with the five-week expedition to wherever or whatever it means. So that's it. It's part of the job, it's part of what it takes.
Speaker 1:You can't be precious and sit by and get people to do stuff for you. It's going to be get everyone stuck in, get your hands dirty, kind of thing. Yeah absolutely.
Speaker 2:And then the fun stuff kicks in when you're up on location. That's terrific.
Speaker 1:Yeah, two final quick things. I mean the one I wanted to ask you about is just because a lot of people listening on the freelance side of things, when, I'm sure now you know a veteran such as yourself, you don't have as much fear. But when you're first starting out you know and you realize that this is a you know I'm going to have to fight for every job, kind of thing. Were you scared? Did you have trepidation? You know? How did you sort of deal with that?
Speaker 2:Well, I do remember going to the hole in the wall, put my bank card into it and it said seven pounds. That was all I had left in the world. Wow, wow, and it was a little bit of a sharpener. But when one door shuts, another one opens. As long as you have your radar up and you're willing to say, yeah, I'll give that a whirl. That sounds like it could be good and things worked out Fortunately for me. I guess that one job did roll into the next, pretty much. Sure, there were times when it was a little bit quiet and thin on the ground, but I would say rarely. And I think at the time when I first went freelance, yeah, there were those moments when the adventure stuff wasn't around, but I was willing to do anything within film and television to actually, you know, keep a bit of cash coming in. So I think, nothing of doing an old contract here and there back at the bbc and I'd be working on kids drama shows or doing the local news, I really didn't mind it was.
Speaker 1:It was all about keeping your options open, doing whatever it took, but realizing when those golden opportunities arose that you should just take it well, and I guess the final thing I just want to say is for anyone that wants to follow in your footsteps, having listened to all this, so don't, at the end of it, don't do that for anyone still. So, oh yeah, I'd love to do that or something similar, I mean. What I mean? Is it a job you would sell to be? What advice would you give to anyone that sort of goes? Hmm, I think I'd have a bit of that.
Speaker 2:For anybody that wants to do adventure film making or getting into this sort of line of work, my suggestion is to get good at doing a multiplicity of roles, get really good, but get good at storytelling and understanding what goes in to that story so that when you're actually out there filming or working or doing your own projects they get elevated, then they get noticed and then you can start to embark upon, say, the film festival market which is exploding at the moment. We run an adventure filmmakers workshop in banff in canada every autumn. That's an amazing 10-day opportunity for anybody who wants to get into this field. So it's putting those little nuggets in place, so little bite-sized areas of knowledge and experience, so so that you are at a point where you can join them all together and suddenly find yourself on these sort of crazy film expeditions.
Speaker 2:The landscape is a little bit different now. I think a lot of it has to come from the filmmaker themselves. Now there are there are some projects which do get kind of picked up and commissioned, but I think a lot of those adventure projects now come from the adventurers themselves and having a crew of storytellers around who can actually cover that adventure. But you know, I think for anybody, and I see this every year in Banff. There's some great people who come through our workshop in Banff, hopefully blow their brains out, in a metaphoric sense, and then they come back and become award-winning filmmakers at a very, very prestigious festival. So it is possible. It is possible, you can follow your, your dream.
Speaker 1:You just have to be open to any and every opportunity that comes your way beautiful, uh, anything else that you wanted to uh to mention or add at the end of this?
Speaker 2:well, I suppose if anybody wants to hear a few more crazy stories and a little bit more of an insight as to my career, then the adventure game which is my book uh, that's been out for a wee while, but it's apparently. It's a good read. There are 60 000 words and they're not all the same, and there's some great photos in there as well 200 photographs from all over the world, so it's a really.
Speaker 1:I think it's a good insight and it it is an award-winning book, so there's something to be said for that yeah, no, it's fantastic and, um, for anyone interested, you can just google that or I'll stick it on the website as well. Uh, I'll put a link to it. So, yeah, yeah, great stuff, fantastic. All right, keith, thanks very much your time, appreciate it. Bye, all right, bye, and that is it for this week's episode. I just want to say a massive thank you again to keith for taking the time to speak with me and share all his amazing stories. It's always great speaking with him.
Speaker 1:Um, for photos, links and more about this episode, please head to knowordinarymondaycom and look for the episode page. You can also find information on our socials via link tree. Our handle is knowordinarymonday. If you have questions or want to share your own career story with us, we'd love to hear from you. Please get in touch via our socials and you can also email hello hello at no ordinary mondaycom, or you can use the submit your story page on our website.
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