4 Seasons in Trout Fisherman Magazine!

We had a nice surprise this week when we discovered that our latest DVD of Hywel Morgan  - 4 Seasons Stillwater Bank Fishing had received a fantastic review in the February - March edition of Trout Fisherman.

Over half of page 47 has been dedicated to the programme and features editor Jeffrey Prest has done a great job in describing the DVD. Hywel has been labelled as "the perfect host" and even our camera work gets a mention being described as "excellent". But by far our favourite quote has to be: "just watching him try to tempt a fish onto a nymph at close range makes you want to grab you rod" Say no more... :-)

A few of Hywel's essentials range also feature, and are reviewed, on page 40 and the complete range can be seen and bought from www.hywelmorgan.co.uk.

We're also pleased to announce that the cover photo, and no less than six pages of the magazine feature the fishery of our good friends at Garnffrwd Country Holidays where we filmed our 'Summer' section of 4 Seasons - Stillwater Bank Fishing

That's it for now on the fishing side of things until the beginning of March when we will be heading up to Glasgow Angling Centre to meet up with Hywel Morgan, Ant Glascoe Jr and many others for the big open weekend.

Heavy Metal Sunday

Last weekend was a very busy one for us at Bearleft.tv. After a late night of Aaron gigging at a party we were up at 5am on Sunday to head up to Northampton to shoot a promotional film with heavy metal rock band Sixpounder.  On location at The Music Lab in Millennium Studios the guys rocked out in the live performance space.  The band gave it their all, and with us using our full range of camera equipment, we can now create an awsome promotional video that the group will use to advertise their loud music!

One of our friends: Paul Mockford, of Shears Mockford Photography, was also on hand, and the image below is just one of the great shots he captured that day. (Paul has also set himself a challenge to take a photo every single day for a year and you can follow his growing portfolio of work on his personal blog)    

Jim belting out one of Sixpounders tracks

In the meantime all of our footage has now entered the post-production stage and we’ll post it on the blog once it has been completed.

Bearleft.tv on target!

Well, January has come and gone and as I write this we’re already halfway through February as well! As usual, we have been busy getting on with various exciting projects so we thought we would take a few moments to update you on the latest from Bearleft HQ.

Just recently launched is a website for our clients at DBCLeisure. Based in St. Briavels, Lydney  DBC Leisure is Forest of Dean’s premier shooting ground and offers clay pigeon shooting, air rifle and archery, which can all be pre-booked with experienced coaches. 

In developing the site we paid several visits to the ground and participated in a few of the activities, under the supervision of owner Dave Brown. Eagle eyed visitors may notice a picture of Aaron on the finished site ‘dusting some clays'. We had a great experience down at the shooting range and urge anyone who fancies having a go to get down there and give it a try. You can view their new site at: www.dbcleisure.co.uk

Over the last few days we have done so much, so there will be a few blog posts in quick succession to keep you upto date. There may also be some prizes up for grabs so keep following!      

Filming & Photography in Public Places - You and the Law.

For all of you in the media, or have a keen interest in video and photography it will come as no surprise to tell you that you have the right to film and / or take photos in a public place. However, over the last few years this has become somewhat difficult to prove as members of the public, officals and police have disputed otherwise with a sentence roughly like "You can't film here unless you have a permit." Usually at this point there is nothing you can do but pack up and move on as you have no proof to the contrary. 

Until now....

Fortunately here at Bearleft.tv we've happened to stuble upon an open letter written by Chief Constable Andrew Trotter, Chair of the Association of ACPO Communication Advisory Group. Originally for the use of officers and colleagues it contained information regarding Guidance for Photographers.

The letter is full of useful information and clearly states that members of the media or public should not be stopped when taking pictures or film in a public place. Having emailed the staff officer he has kindly given us permission to reproduce the letter in its entirity and it can be seen below. If you are activily filming / photographing in areas likely to attract attention I would suggest familiarising yourself with its contents and even go as far as to keep a copy in your kit bag.

I must point out that this letter does NOT give the holder "access all areas" and applies to areas that are considered to be public places and not privately owned. (Even here you must not film anything that could be seen as unfairly infringing on a person's privacy) It is imperative that everyone should know and fully understand their rights when taking pictures or filming in a public place. (For instance the police can still seize your camera, or obtain a court order to do so, if they believe that you have captured evidence relating to a crime.) 

Please remember that the police are there to help and protect the community and its members from, besides other things, an event or incident that might constitute, or appear to constitute a breach of local or national security. For more information on the subject you can refer to the ACPO media guidelines.

We hope that you will find this helpful, and allow you to keep doing what you love - making awesome films and stunning photos. From all of us here at BEARLEFT.TV, stay safe (and legal) and we will see you all in the new year.

T'was the Month before Christmas, and all through the office.....

was non-stop, knuckling down, and getting on with some hard work!

You may have noticed that the tweets & facebook posts from us may have dried up lately, which usually happens around this time, and this year is no exception! Among creating promotional videos & training materials for private clients we've also been working on other things......

The first is of course making sure that all of our DVD's are available for the Christmas shoppers and with our Amazon shop up and running over Christmas for the first time, this has been a task in itself! In fact our last DVD Hywel Morgan's Fly Tying - Stillwater Patterns has been selling so many we have received numerous emails from Amazon warning us of low stock levels!!! Fortunately we are well prepared and have enough in storage to meet demand!

We also received this glowing review of "The Complete Cast" - "Bought this for one of my sons as he knows all I can teach him. This taught me some new techniques and ideas and I've been fishing for 50 odd years. Most informative and very easy to appreciate and learn new skills. Highly recommended."

You can find all of our products on Amazon, Ebay and of course our own website at : www.bearleft.tv  where you can also see trailers before you buy. All of the fishing DVD's are also available from Hywel Morgan's website at www.hywelmorgan.co.uk. The Lost Railway series is currently on sale in the Forest of Dean at the Dean Forest Railway, Coleford Railway Museum and the Dean Heritage Centre.

...and if that's not enough to keep track off we are currently on the brink of releasing one of our two new projects with Hywel which we have been working on throughout the entire year. It is currently entitled "4 Seasons - Bank Fishing on Stillwaters" and we hope it will be out in time for Christmas (It's being edited as I type - nothing like working to the wire)  :-)

The weekend is also shaping up to be quite exciting with us filming two very different events. At the first we will be filming an extrodinary sight as a man attempts to pull a 16 tonne lorry single handed and then it's off to North Wales to meet up with hywel at a Graling competition and hopefully film more episodes for his Webcast channel. We will also be trying out some interesting camera angles and hope to get shots several metres above the river bank - Some interesting pics to follow!

John Coppinger Interview

At the beginning of October we hinted in this blog and on Facebook that we were off to interview someone special. That person was artist,writer, designer and sculptor John Coppinger. For those of you that don't know John he has worked on numerous films throughout the years including The Dark Crystal, Return of the Jedi and The Fifth Element to name but a few. During that time he has helped create some of the most famous characters in movie history. With the opportunity to visit John in his workshop too good to miss we headed up there and  found out how he began his career and what it was like to work behind the scenes on some iconic films.....plus find out how Jabba the Hutt met his demise after filming!

Halloween Gashes & Slashes

As we mentioned in our last post we ended September by meeting some friends and managed to film some episodes of our 'Prop Shop' series with them. Well, we have now edited the first one in time for Halloween!

It features Nicole Klein who is the owner of 'The Hourglass - The Pin up Experience' which gives women the opportunity to experience a pin up and burlesque make over and photo shoot. If your interested you can check out her site at: www.thehourglass.eu. However before making women look beautiful, Nicole's role was quite the opposite as she worked as the Head of Make up on many of the horror experiences at the Warner Brother's Theme Park in Germany. Upon discovering this Nicole very kindly demonstrated her skills on Alan transforming him into one of the undead with half his face missing....

Upon our return to BEARLEFT HQ Aaron roped in the help of Erin, a friend who happened to pop around, who ended up having a massive fake gash applied to her arm. Needless to say she loved it! All of the products featured in the programme can be found online including here: www.brickintheyard.com who supplied us with the 'Gel 10'. Oh, and for some unknown reason we decided to finish the show with some stickmen zombies...why? ...because we're just like that sometimes.....;-)

So that's it for now. Hope you enjoy this episode of prop shop and we will see you all soon.