Chasing Light is our own film, shot in a single day on the winter solstice in the far north west of Scotland. We climbed Ben Hope in the dark, then raced the setting sun to play nine holes at Durness before the shortest day ran out. Here is how it came together.
Why the shortest day?
The idea was a constraint. On 21 December the far north of Scotland gets only a few hours of usable light. We wanted a film that lived or died by that clock. Pick the hardest day of the year to see by, then try to do two things in it that both depend on seeing. A mountain and a round of golf. If we pulled it off, the day itself would give us the story.
Climbing Ben Hope in the dark
Ben Hope is the most northerly Munro in the UK. We started up it by head torch, two and a half hours of darkness between us and the summit, into wind, ice and mist. Filming in that is its own problem. Your hands stop working, the lens fogs, and the only light in the frame is the one strapped to your head. We shot it as we climbed, because there was no version of the day where we could come back and do it again.
The one decision
The decision that shaped everything was to commit to the single day and let it be real. No staging, no second attempt, no waiting for better weather. If the cloud never lifted, that was the film. That is a risk, and it is also the whole point. The jeopardy on screen is the jeopardy we actually felt. You cannot fake a race against the light. You can only run it.
From the summit to the fairway
Off the hill and straight to the coast. Durness Golf Club is the most north westerly course on the British mainland, nine holes on the edge of the North Atlantic. By the time we reached the first tee the light was almost gone. The last of the round was played in the blue dark, the ball lit on the green, the sea somewhere behind it. Then the shortest day was over.
Why we call it chasing light
Every choice in the film comes back to one thing, the light, and how little of it there was. That is the idea the whole company is named for. The held focus in the moment that decides everything, on the hill and on the fairway. Read more on The Quiet Eye, and watch the film on its page.