jon gilbert

2022 started as 2021 ended, in the cold, wet and windy yard at Diddly Squat Farm with Jeremy, Lisa, Kaleb, and all the gang. Clarkson’s Farm is probably my favourite show to work on. I live on my own farm, so it’s an environment I’m very happy in. This photo was taken on an unusually sunny day, I seem to remember a lot more rain, wind and snow!

After a few months on the farm, I started work on the drama reconstructions for another Amazon show called The Confession, a true crime series about a historic crime in West Yorkshire, watch it here:

Later in the spring, after a much needed holiday, I started series 4 of the award winning show Meet The Richardsons, this kept me going, off and on until the middle of summer. I loved every second of it, it’s a great cast and crew, we had some incredible special guests, and I got to catch up with some spooky old friends for the Halloween special, I wonder if you can guess who?

Shooting a scene for MTR with Adrian Chiles, I took a photo of him that got published in the Guardian. All in a days work….

On a week off from MTR, I had a dream job, recording Johnny Marr, ex of the Smiths, in his studio in Stockport, he’s an incredibly nice man, and I really enjoyed meeting him, we recorded a few tracks, and an interview, all of which can be seen here. I’ll always regret not being able to take him up on his offer of joining him and the band on an American tour with The Killers, but I’d got jobs already booked, shame!

Through the year I was working as second unit mixer on a Sky drama called This England, chronicling Boris Johnson through the pandemic, directed by Michael Winterbootm. Here’s the trailer.

Late summer, into Autumn, I spent a couple of months in Sheffield, with the amazing A.J. Odudu, shooting a competition format property show for Channel 4, where the lucky winner won a £250,000 apartment that they’d designed themselves, that’ll be on mid 2023 I think.

These are the main highlights of the year, I’ve done lot’s of other days here and there, and met some wonderful people, and counted myself lucky to have the job I do. 2022 was my busiest year yet, which after almost 30 years in the business is something I’m very pleased with.

In other news, we got a new dog, he’s called Momo and he’s ace, he was one in January, here he is 🙂

After a rather slow 2020, 2021 has been all systems go with some really interesting projects, and unusually, I seem to be doing more drama than docs, I’ve always done a mix of the two, but drama seems to be winning this year.

All the way back in March I shot a commercial for the online store ‘Very’ featuring the classic song Our House by Madness, here it is, if you can bear to be transported back to lockdown days….

I spent all summer shooting series 3 of Meet the Richardsons, with the amazing Jon Richardson and Lucy Beaumont. Many laughs were had, and I got to meet some amazing people, the crew, and guest stars were all pretty cool, and it was a brilliant way to spend the summer.

The comedy theme continued with a pilot shoot for the Chris and Rosie Ramsey show, which involved a lot of swearing, and me building a microphone mount made from an imitation T-Bone steak, for a segment called ‘What’s your beef’

I’ve also, since April been shooting various second unit, and main unit cover days on This Sceptred Isle, A Sky drama, directed by Michael Winterbottom, which follows the events surrounding Boris Johnson and his government in the face of the first wave of the global pandemic. Sobering stuff, given the fun of Meet The Richardsons.

When the production team of This is Going To Hurt (the dramatisation of Adam Kay’s secret diaries of a junior doctor) needed to shoot a scene with a Paternoster lift, Sheffield Arts Tower was the only possible location, so I spent the day with Ben Wishaw jumping in and out of the lift (if you don’t know what a Paternoster lift is, google it, you’ll be amazed they’ve not been banned)

Inbetween the big jobs, dailies on cooking, property and consumer shows seem to have been big this year, including Nadiya’s Fast Flavours. Joanna Page, George Clarke and Simon O’Brien being some of the other presenters I’ve worked with.

I’ve also spent more than enough time in the COVID wards of Liverpools Prescott Hospital for GMB broadcasting live, which is always a challenge, even more so dressed in full PPE and double masked.

And now, at the end of the year when it’s chucking it down, and freezing cold, I’ve started working on Clarksons Farm. Why couldn’t I do that in the Summer?

I’ve had a productive couple of months, getting used to new ways of working, meeting some new clients, and trying to find solutions to problems that didn’t exist a few months ago.

This month and last, I’ve been making training films for Covid19 nurses in the Nightingale hospitals, it’s been challenging, but rewarding too, I’ve not been able to mic anyone up, so finding ways to recored voices cleanly, when the people talking are in full PPE is a challenge, but anything is doable with the right kit and enough experience.

I also entered a different world for a few days, the world of the YouTube content creator, I spent a few days at Morgz house, with him and his Mum, preparing for a huge live show raising funds for the NHS, so a lot of fun, and a worthwhile aim.

In between jobs I’ve been working out solutions to a few problems, in particular, how to mic people up safely, safe both for me, and the person being mic’d up. This is going to be an essential skill over the next year, we all need to get back to work, but stay safe, so you can be sure that I’m at the forefront of ways to get the same good sound I’ve always got, but as safe as it can possibly be, given the new constraints. My other project was to find a way to record the best possible sound remotely, working with contributors who stay in their own homes, and shoot content on their phones. We all know that video shot on the latest phones can look incredible, but what good is that with dodgy sound? So, I’ve done my homework, and invested heavily in kit that can get sound quality to match the picture quality. Whether it’s for a Lockdown drama, reality show, or a doc, I’ve now got the kit to send to contributors, which is easy to set up, and gives us the results we need. So give me a call if you’ve got a project coming up that you want to talk about.

Miriam Margolyes’ Big Fat Adventure is on tonight (Monday 9th of March) and tomorrow (Tuesday the 10th) Miriam and I made this show last spring, with our usual cohorts, Simon Draper directing, and the DOP Mark North. If I could only ever work with one team again it would be this bunch, I’ve never enjoyed work so much!

Here’s Miriam and a bodybuilder, you’ll see more of him in the show.

Here’s Miriam and me, after our final shoot day, when I was leaving the team to start work on my next project.

The project I went onto immediately after working with Miriam and the gang was another BBC2 series, Back In Time For The Corner Shop presented by the lovely Sara Cox and Polly Russell.

The show started a couple of weeks ago and is great viewing, episode three is on tomorrow (Tuesday 10th of March) I spent all summer on this show, and it was a really good shoot, a great crew made every day fun.

In other news, I’ve upgraded just about all my kit, so have state of the art rigs for everything from docs, through to big reality set ups, and dramas or commercials too.

Recording music was my first love, and is something I still try and do as often as possible, so if you’ve got a music based project that I might be able to help you with, please get in touch.

Evening all! where did the last 12 months go? This year has gone by so quickly, I went to see my Mum last week and she casually mentioned that she hadn’t seen me since May. Sorry Mum. After a gentle start to the year with the Canadian womens football team, and a few corporate jobs,  I spent a week on the second unit of ITV’s Wild Bill, it was a great shoot, early starts in the Lincolnshire countryside made so much easier by the amazing skies you get down there. Spring and early Summer were spent with the wonderful Miriam Margolyes, making another series for Wild Pictures following Miriam doing what she does best, asking people things they never thought they’d get asked. It was fun, as time with her always is, and it’ll be on telly early 2020. I finished that on a Thursday some time in July, and on the Saturday went straight on to the massive shoot that is Back In Time, this time were were going Back In Time For The Corner Shop, in Sheffield, so nice and close to home for me for once. Technically it was one of the most demanding things I’ve done, lots of radio mics, a constantly changing cast, unpredictable scenes, but with the help of an amazing crew, and the wonders that are Sara Cox and Polly Russell, we pulled it off. It’ll be on your screen spring 2020 and is well worth a watch.

Since then, I’ve been mainly watching my dogs run up and down Suffolk beaches, eating fish and chips, and cooking things on my Big Green Egg.

It seems like only yesterday that I was live on your screens looking for ghosts with the wonderful Rylan Clarke Neal, but a lot has happened since then!

Rylan and  I, plus a few other folk toured France and Germany looking for spooks, fantomes, geister, call them what you will. You’ll have to watch the shows on 5Star to see what we found, but I can reveal I found a brilliant little wine merchant in France, whose calvados I’m still enjoying.

I walked an abandoned railway line between Sheffield and Manchester with the very talented Rob Bell, for a Rumpus Media show Walking Britains Lost Railways, shown on Channel 5 earlier this autumn.

Over the summer I worked on a doc about alcohol with Adrian Chiles, a history doc for Channel 4 called ‘A House Through Time’ and ITV’s Big NHS Sing Along Live, all very different projects and all really interesting to work on.

Towards the end of the summer, I thought needed a couple of weeks in the sun to set me up for what September had in store, so I boarded the MSC Seaside for a two week cruise round the Caribbean, for a Brinkworth TV shoot, to be shown on Channel 5 early next year, The Secret Life of The Cruise, I didn’t see much sun, but did get a fascinating look behind the scenes of a floating city.

On to September, and a shoot I’d been looking forward to all year, 2 months with the incomparable Miriam Margolyes, a true national treasure if ever there was one. We travelled around Europe and went coast to coast in the USA, Wild Pictures produced the show, and it’ll be on your screens in Spring next year. I’m not sure I’m yet at liberty to tell you too much about the content, but it’ll be a good watch, I saw things I never thought I’d see!

That brings us up to date, the diary is clearer than it’s been for a while, so if you have any shoots you want to talk to me about, please get in touch.

9PM, Five Star Celebrity Ghost Hunt Live.

I’m sure you’ve all been glued to the 6 episodes that have aired over the last 6 weeks, well the series finale is this Tuesday and we’re live from West London, watch it, it’ll be fun!