On Friday 19th June, I travelled to Bristol, where the British Humanist Association were holding their Annual Conference. I have been a volunteer camera operator for the BHA for almost a year now, and was more than happy to help out on this occasion when they asked.
The view from my hotel window
We weren’t required to film any events until the Saturday morning, but we arrived the day before to set up the equipment. This turned out to be a very good idea, because at 5.15pm, the Events Manager received a text saying that the tripods and memory cards he had ordered would not be arriving until Monday – after the conference had finished. 5.15pm on a Friday evening is not the best time to try to find equipment, but Jon (the other camera operator) and I knew that, without tripods and memory cards, we would be in a very difficult situation indeed! So we went into Mission Impossible mode.
Our adventure began in a camera shop that was conveniently just 200m down the road from the hotel in which the conference was taking place. There, we bought the last two memory cards that they had in stock, and the staff helpfully gave us the names of companies that might be able to lend us tripods – neither Jon and I are Bristol natives, so we were very glad of their advice! We rang around the companies and soon found Stage Electronics, who were very helpful and reasonably priced. The only problem: they closed at 6pm. It was now 5.30pm, and Google Maps told us that it would take 25 minutes to drive to the warehouse. Undetered, we ran through the streets of Bristol to the nearest taxi rank and found a cab. It was tense: the clock was ticking and the rush hour traffic hindered our progress through the city centre. But it was also quite fun – I couldn’t help but feel like a candidate in The Apprentice, rushing to complete a task! The unexpected journey also meant that I got to see parts of Bristol that I wouldn’t have otherwise – I took this picture of the stunning Clifton Suspension Bridge through the sunroof of the taxi.
We made it just in time – 5.59pm. We returned to the hotel that evening triumphant, with all of the equipment we needed.
The filming itself went well. We had two cameras, one at the side for close ups, the other at the back for wide shots. We were filming the lectures and discussions that took place during the conference – there were some very interesting speakers, including Professor Alice Roberts, Samira Ahmed, Dr Phil Hammond, and Professor Richard Wiseman.
Samira Ahmed interviews Professor Alice Roberts
I also had some free time to explore Bristol, which is a beautiful city. On Saturday, I walked to the Clifton Suspension Bridge, having driven under it during our adventure the previous evening. It really is an incredible feat of engineering, and the views from it are beautiful.
The Avon Gorge as seen from the bridge
In all, it was an excellent weekend: interesting, fun, and with an unexpected adventure to boot! The BHA are always looking for people to help film and/or edit videos for their YouTube channel, so if you’d like to help, you can find out more here. I would certainly recommend it – you can read about one of my previous experiences with them here.
Charlotte John 