RTS West of England

The panel also highlighted the challenges freelancers continue to face during today’s testing economic climate.

Reema Lorford, COO of Gritty Talent, advised freelancers to spend time on developing their LinkedIn profiles. “It’s your living, breathing self and it may throw up new opportunities in adjacent, or even other, industries,” she said.

Sas Bonser, Talent Executive at BBC Studios Natural History Unit, added: “There will always be ups and downs. Just be willing to work across different genres – slight curveballs can be instructive in a career.”

Film-makers from the University of the West of England (UWE) won three of the four main prizes on offer at the RTS West of England Student Awards.

The Animation prize went to UWE student Léo Bournas Milazzo for The Happy Pig Brand, of which the judges said: “We forgot this was a student film – we couldn’t fault it. It had a sincere message but the right amount of comedy.” Peace Process was named Best Drama. The UWE film was “amazing, so professional looking – written, directed and acted very well”.

"Drama, drama… and more drama” is what viewers can expect from series two of Boarders, according to Myles Kamwendo, who plays Omar. The first episode of the new BBC Three series had a sold-out preview last month for an audience at Bristol’s Watershed cinema.

Series one introduced us to five black inner-city teenagers who had been offered scholarships to a prestigious private school, so the question facing the writers room for the second outing was: where do we go from here?

David Olusoga scored a double win at the RTS West of England Awards, taking home the On-Screen Talent and Factual prizes for Union with David Olusoga. In the BBC Two series, the historian investigates the origins and development of modern Great Britain. Bristol wildlife specialist Silverback Films won five awards, including the Natural History category for Netflix’s Life on Our Planet, which is narrated by Morgan Freeman. The series was praised by the judges as “amazing, gripping and epic.

When director Ashley Francis-Roy and his team set out to make To Catch a Copper, no one could have predicted what the finished series would look like, nor the cases that would emerge in Avon and Somerset Police’s Counter-Corruption Unit.

“We started with a huge amount of openness,” said Francis-Roy, following an RTS screening of episode 2 in Bristol, the city where many of the incidents in the three-part series took place.

The four-part BBC One series took home four prizes: Natural History, Cinematography, Editing and Sound.

Narrated by Sir David Attenborough, The Green Planet explores the fascinating and often bizarre world of plants. It was hailed by the judges as “ground-breaking, innovative and brilliant – an important story about our world in these times of great change”.

Two programmes notched awards two years’ running. The second series of Stephen Merchant’s BBC One comedy thriller The Outlaws won in the Scripted category, repeating its triumph last year.

Chimp Empire, which follows two rival troops of chimps, was previewed at a sold-out joint RTS West of England/Wildscreen Network screening at the Watershed in Bristol, ahead of its release on Netflix last month.

The team spent 18 months filming a four-part series that required extensive research. “We spent months analysing every detail about every chimp known to the scientists,” explained Reed, “so we had these huge backstories from every individual chimp.”

Attendees at the November event, held at the M Shed in Bristol, had a chance to have a go on a remote edit crate, courtesy of Evolutions, and get their hands on some camera kit, thanks to Films at 59. Alongside the informal networking, there was also a series of short talks.

It highlighted ways to create content that supports an environmentally sustainable society. 

Albert sustainability trainer and consultant Frankie Singler started proceedings with an overview of Albert and set the context of challenges raised by climate change. He then delved into “Planet placement”, an Albert campaign that provides practical guidance on how to incorporate climate change issues and sustainability into programme-making.  

Singler shared case studies and encouraged discussion, with a view to achieving more and better climate storytelling across all genres. 

In a wide-ranging discussion, hosted by True to Nature founder Wendy Darke, the duo talked about creating “content worth paying for”, with Reynolds commenting that the “fight for audiences has never been bigger”.

Dixon was delighted at the first 18 months of Sky Documentaries, particularly its Factual Channel win at the recent Broadcast Digital Awards.