I recently made a short film for the Royal Institution that tells a story of the miners safety lamp, also known as the "Davy Lamp" - invented by Sir Humphry Davy in the 19th Century. The lamp was designed to allow miners to safely light their way in the mines using candles or oil lamps - which were previously at risk of igniting flammable gases that leaked from the coal baring rocks, often leading to devastating explosions and large loss of life.
Find out more by watching the video!
https://youtu.be/rhavaxv3a40
This is the first time we've explored an archive story through the format of Andy's Tale's From the Prep Room series and I really like how the historical narrative is combined with the usual demonstration elements of the series - it's something we'll think about doing more in the future.
Riffing off the film's subject matter, I thought I'd experiment with shooting most of the film in candle light in a pitch black environment - which was made possible by the low light capabilities of the Sony A7s, combined with a very fast vintage lens (Takumar 50mm f1.4). I really love the intimate setting that this creates and it also helped to hide the fact that we shot this in a very dull location (the Ri's windowless basement lab used for school workshops).
Slow motion footage was captured on the Panasonic GH4 at around 100fps - watching the flames billowing out of the gas filled tube is particularly mesmerising!