I’m one half owner of the production company Silver Sloth Productions. We make short films about adventure and anything outdoorsy whilst living the #vivelesloth lifestyle! Before I went to Uni I was an avid downhill racer and dabbled in film and photography when I was off from injury. This sparked my love for capturing the adventure in everything outdoors. I went on to study Adventure & Travel Media at the University of Cumbria. To be able to show off so many feelings that happen in our lifestyle in one photo, or motivate people to get up off their couch and go for a walk is something I feel very strongly towards.

When you woke up this morning did you scroll past a promo video of someone surfing the perfect wave in Hawaii or someone kayaking through a beautiful fjord in Norway? Did you think ‘I wish that was me’? Well, aren’t you in the right place! If you want to travel for as long as you can and pretend what you do isn’t really work then you should look at adventure production. Below is, what I believe, the perfect recipe to get into it. Of course, like anything else, it isn’t easy, but, its a journey and an adventure that has countless rewards and amazing opportunity along the way.

Top Tips Adventure Filming

1. Get Your Hands on a Camera!

By this I don’t mean spend every single penny you have on a shiny new DSLR with a handful of lenses. Smartphones have cameras and pretty decent ones at that. Take it out your pocket and get inventive, forget about the selfie, play with the self timer, the slow-mo settings, the time-lapse settings. If you don’t have these settings there are app’s you can download to get them. Get on eBay and get yourself some attachment lenses and get crazy! If you want to get a proper camera you don’t have to get an SLR, there are a selection of compact cameras that are sharp and inexpensive.

Check out our guide to the Best 5 Cameras for Adventure Filmmaking.

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2. Immerse Yourself

Once you’ve got a camera, you need to immerse yourself into it. Get to know that camera better than you know yourself. Get to know the landscape and sports better than your parents. And get to know the athletes, their personality, how they ride, how they run, how they climb. Everything you need to get a better shot. Expect little sleep, wet rainy days, scorching hot days, days where you forget food and days where parts of you are so cold you don’t even know if they exist anymore!

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If you have chosen to focus on specific sports, get involved with them. Find out what it takes to tackle the route the climbers are trying, find out how hardcore you have to be to run a ultra marathon! Be a part of the community, ask people to pose in front of your camera in return for free photos to get your experience up.

3. Be Inventive!

‘Dude did you see that sick climbing film?’

‘Yeah, where they traversed that sweet ridge?’

‘Yeah bro it was so gnarly!’

Heard this conversation before and wondered which climbing film they where on about?! Yeah, me too. So you saw a film that really inspired you to be behind a camera and make a film just like it. Don’t do it! Instead, get inspired to create, not copy. Watch it again and again and again ’till you are sick of it, look at the characters, the storyline, the shots, the angle, the structure, what made it so special? Answer these questions and you can create your own film that could be pretty special!

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4. Social Media is Your Best Friend!

Not only for sharing your work and showing the wonderful world wide web you’ve got something to scream about. But instead to learn. Three years on a film course and I learnt more about film making from watching youtube tutorials for editing and camera techniques! You got a question about how to make a 2D picture 3D, ask Google. How do I stabilise my footage, hey, Google, you got this.

Share your work all over social media. Instagram is my favourite, my life looks seriously cool on Instagram, in real life it is very different, but who cares! My photography, behind the scenes, trailers of my work everything ends up on there. Don’t be ashamed to hashtag, it’ll get your work seen out there in the scary internet world.

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5. Get Out There!

By reading this you are now sat with your camera, outdoor gear on and looking at the weather forecast for the sunrise so you can show off that you got up at 4AM for one shot of the sun rising from a hill. Because that’s the final bit, you need to get out there! Go have an adventure, go explore you’re local countryside, go for a sunrise hike, go for a swim at midnight, go camping in the woods alone, hitchhike from London to Skye, go for a stand up paddle board naked, whatever floats your boat. Just make sure your camera is surgically attached to you so you get all the footage you need to create the media you want and be creative about it.

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Stay tuned for more in the adventure film series….. learn how you can improve your shooting through composition, lighting, sound and editing.

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