When you’re a student, we know how important it is to get some hands-on experience of what exactly the job is gonna be like once you’re out there in the big ol’ world.

That’s why for the next few weeks, we’ve teamed up with the University of South Wales and have a bunch of students staying with us and getting to grips with what it’s like to work in a production company.

This week we’ve been graced with the presence of Dan Whitehouse, an MA Student in Documentary Film. I got the chance to sit down with him and chat about what his week has been like.

Firstly, how did you hear about us? And I guess more importantly, why did you want to apply for work experience with us?

Earlier this year, Nick came in to talk to us about Storm & Shelter, well, by ‘came in’ I mean he did a presentation on Teams.

As a documentary student, I was keen on gaining some experience with something a lot more commercially focused to see what that’s like and if it’s something I’m interested in. I was drawn to Storm & Shelter over some other production companies mostly because I just really liked your vibe as it was a good mix of professional and friendly and it seemed like a cool place to work, so I applied!

What kind of projects do you like working on?

Factual over fiction, definitely. I don’t consider myself much of a writer and I like the goal of documentaries is to capture real-world events.

That’s also why I liked Storm & Shelter’s work as you do a lot of stuff that has an element of documentary to it by capturing real stories and real people, even if it is for a commercial client.

What’s the biggest thing you learned this week?

I think it’s mostly that even when you are capturing real life there is still a lot of curation that goes into it.

When you have hours and hours of footage but you’re creating a very short end film then there is still a lot of creative freedom and thinking that goes into creating that story and finding the right parts of the rushes that go into making up that final product.

Were there any particular highlights?

I think working with Mac on some early creative development for a potential project. It felt great to be able to help out on something that was going to be impactful and it was pretty useful to see how those ideas are created before the project even starts.

Also setting up the kit with Liam for a shoot was pretty cool too.

Any lowlights?

None really, other than the band that MK showed me that he listens to when he’s editing. He’s an editing wizard but has some questionable taste in music.

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Interested in applying for work experience with us? Head over to the form on our website and we’ll see what we can do.