James Boag's

My latest work trip took me to Tasmania for four days, filming for Qantas and James Boag’s. The trip was all about harnessing the best of Tasmanian produce with chef James Viles, who as well as meeting producers and growers, does a lot of foraging for raw ingredients.

“Tasmania is a one-of-a-kind food experience. On a four-day gastronomic tour of this ruggedly beautiful island, we meet the farmers and producers harnessing its bounty.” (Qantas Travel Insider)

We met Wagyu beef farmers in Cape Grim, visited the James Boag’s brewery in Launceston, waded out into the chilly waters of Coles Bay to taste oysters straight off the leases, we met a sea salt producer, honey producers, butter and cheese farmers and lots of other amazing producers. We even harvest fresh seaweed and sea urchin out of the waters south of Hobart and ate them in the boat, well James did anyway.

We criss-crossed Tassie in a small convey of cars, marvelling at the beautiful and rugged landscape and the constantly changing weather, a combination of freezing winter temperatures and warm sunny days, the cherry blossoms were blooming in parts while it snowed around Hobart. James would constantly leap out of the front car and run into the bush, or the ocean foraging around for sea lettuce, onion weed, salt bush and all sorts of other native foods, with a stills photographer, journalist and film crew chasing after him. He was like a kid in a candy shop, returning with handfuls of wild produce to use in plating up his next dish.

I shot everything on my Sony F5 using Schneider Xenon FF primes wherever possible and Canon L Series zooms for the run and gun moments. The primes performed beautifully, flaring when the winter sun poked through the dark dramatic clouds (Dramatic clouds is a term I learn from Melbourne based photographer Sean Fennessy who grew up in Tasmania). I shot at 25fps, 100fps and 150fps at 2k in sony’s Cine EI mode.

Special Thank you to AC Joe Hell for all his help on the trip, including the awesome, yet slightly cheesy photos of me operating.

Nicholas Price is a director/dop, working in Sydney, London and Japan. He makes TVC’s, documentaries, films and music videos.