It could have been so different

Rain stops play

For my sins, I decided a while ago that I wouldn’t fix myself to my a-roll desk.

That’s the desk at which I sit for most of my YouTube videos on the Mark Ellis Reviews channel. Most of us tech reviewers have an a-roll desk of some kind; it rarely changes location in the studio, the background is always the same, and the angle from which one shoots never changes.

This is fine - it works. But I often have the urge to be a little more adventurous, which is why I have a bunch of filming gear that enables me to leave the studio and film ‘in the field’, as they say.

Sometimes, this tactic goes horribly wrong.

I’m sitting writing this newsletter in a shepherd’s hut somewhere in the middle of the Peak District. No, really. It’s a beautifully appointed little thing with all of the amenities one could hope for during a brief getaway from the hustle and bustle of normal life. Apart from a shower. But the view more than makes up for that - as does the fact there’s no phone signal to be had.

From my writing position, I can see the rolling Peak District countryside with sheep grazing, the remnants of Victorian outhouses, and birds swooping majestically past. At least, that’s what I would be able to see if a force nine gale wasn’t blowing so much driving rain horizontally across that picturesque scene. It hasn’t stopped raining, in fact, since yesterday morning when I set off on this brief expedition.

The reason I’m out here is to shoot a video which features lots of expensive battery-powered tech. My steed is a £115,000 BMW i5 M60 with a £2,600 Cowboy Classic e-bike placed carefully in the boot. Also along for the ride is the M4 iPad Pro on which I’m writing these words, my Samsung S24 Ultra smartphone and the Garmin MARQ Commander watch I’ve been wearing for the last couple of months.

The idea was to find out which of these lavish pieces of tech is the easiest to keep charged while heading out into the wilderness. Spoiler: it’s the watch, obviously - it has around five days of battery life, at the very worst. The car has been, predictably, the most challenging to keep charged, although the UK charging network hasn’t let me down. Yet.

Back to the shepherd’s hut. This location was chosen by my team because of how remote it is, but also because of the potential for filming. They smashed it. Mother Nature... well, she hasn’t. At all. As I type, I’m fairly sure the weather is getting worse. You’ll see this in the video and in the behind-the-scenes vlog that will soon appear on my creator diary channel. It’s so bad that the hut is gently rocking from side to side as the wind cascades through the mini valley in which I’m located.

I cannot film in this weather. Not outside, at least. This means I can only really shoot inside the car - or back at the studio. The latter is, I’ll be honest, feeling rather favourable at the moment.

This is such a shame. I had grand ideas for this video. Swooping drone shots of the surrounding landscape during sunset and sunrise. Filming myself, Mat Watson style (although Carwow does admittedly give him a camera operator), walking around the car talking about its styling and many features. Then, I’d jump on the bike and get some miles under its wheels to give the battery a test and to grab some equally picturesque footage of it against the stunning backdrop of the Peak District.

Now, I’m considering simply heading back to the studio to sit back at my a-roll desk and finish the video there. Oh, the irony.

Thankfully, we decided to film some b-roll of the car and the bike a couple of days ago in sunnier weather. I also shot an unboxing of the bike a couple of weeks ago, which means we have plenty of footage in the can to compensate for the un-shootable conditions in which I now find myself.

If you get into this content creation game and decide to do as I have done by removing yourself from a fixed location and heading outside, be prepared for the weather to completely ruin your plans. This episode is the worst example of Mother Nature stopping play for Mark Ellis Reviews - I’ve never experienced anything quite as bad as this while out in the field (literally) - but I’m always prepared for this eventuality - as gutting as it is. That’s why we have that b-roll in the can already, and it’s why I know I can still make something of this video.

It hasn’t stopped me cursing multiple times this morning though, as you can imagine.

Wish me luck as I make my way from this hut back to the car, please!