How I got into lighting sooner than I intended. . . . The scene is studio R2 (Riverside) on a Saturday afternoon with BBC2’s brand spanking new alternative to sport, ‘Open House’. Both Riverside studios were used to produce this magazine show hosted by Gaye Byrne, of the ‘Late Late Show’ on RTE. Stewart Morris produced the show (shudder!). There I was, a mere stripling of a lad, doing one of his first cameras. Standing behind a Pye Mk5 camera on a spring ped with a Varotal Zoom. Unfamiliar with this combination? Well aren’t you the lucky one! For the uninitiated the spring ped was a cheap alternative to the Vinten gas peds and used springs to balance the weight. They were exceedingly heavy and the column range was negligible. The Varotal zoom was a bolt on device with cable operated zoom and focus. Not the most responsive device as it seemed you had to take up the cable slack before anything happened and then overshot at the end. Well here we are on air, a fashion display. Model walks forward with your truly tracking back in front of her. Yes tracking, we didn’t really believe in zooming anyway in those days. Suddenly the ped grinds to a halt. Cameraman and model start to panic. The floor in R2 was notoriously uneven and the ped had stuck to the floor. I, a shadow of my present self, hadn’t the weight to shift it. Stu Lindley came to the rescue and with a bump we were off again, accompanied of course by the kind of sympathy only Stewart Morris can provide. So a very young cameraman, nerve totally gone, faces his next task – a black tap dancer, dressed in black dancing on a black floor! This man was like Sammy Davis Jr. on speed. Guess who had to do the close ups of his feet? Yup, and remember what I said about the zoom? Well with that combination not much was in focus of course – more encouragement from Mr Morris. Shortly after that I was called to see Gwillym Dann and asked if I would like to join the Vision Section. . . . . .