Behind the Scenes: Hiraeth It's My Shout: Short Films from Wales

Hiraeth was filmed in West Wales, around Pembrey Country Park

and the town of Kidwelly.

It's one of the six short dramas that It's My Shout,

a training scheme, is making for BBC Wales.

For director Nerys Wyn Davies,

the title is important.

I think the word itself explains that.

It's Hiraeth. It's not explainable, it's not translatable.

I think, as Welsh people, there's something in us all, I think,

that, when we go away, we do want to go home.

I actually directed for It's My Shout eight years ago

and I haven't really done much since then.

I've done an episode of Pobol Y Cwm,

but I've had this, kind of, feeling that's, sort of, eating away at me,

"You need to go and direct again!"

The producer of the film relishes the challenge.

Daniel Harris moved away from Wales for many years.

He is also captured by the title of the film.

Moving back to Wales and,

kind of, producing this film right away,

I did definitely have a sense of hiraeth, coming back home

and the beauty of Wales and being out on a beautiful place

like Pembrey Beach on a day like today.

It's fantastic to be back. It's such a beautiful country.

Pembrey Country Park has an eight-mile-long beach.

Locally called Cefn Sidan,

the stretch of sand is one of the longest in Wales.

The beach we filmed on the first day of filming

and the weather was beautiful,

the beach was beautiful, everything about it was fantastic.

There were different elements to it.

Really, from my point of view,

just taking advantage of the whole expanse

and every shot was beautiful.

The problem faced in Pembrey was capturing such a spectacular expanse.

The interior scenes provided a very different challenge,

with over 40 people in a confined space.

Then, filming in the pub, we had lots of supporting artists there,

a confined space,

lots of people in one room, actually,

which can make things quite difficult,

with people talking across each other and so on,

so just, yeah, two very different challenges.

The pub was all about the dialogue,

the beach was all about capturing the grandeur.

It needed some specialist equipment called a drone,

which is often used in feature films.

When I first read the script and I was interested in Hiraeth,

in my mind I'd imagined a drone,

but I never thought I'd be actually working with a drone.

We decided it'd be great

if we could use a drone for those shots on the beach.

Producer Dan also runs a company providing drones

for the film and television industry.

It's specialised equipment, as the drones are essentially mini aircraft,

which have to be operated by experts.

Air traffic control had to be informed

when they filmed on the beach.

A drone - most people call them a drone -

an unmanned aerial vehicle, a UAV, is basically a small helicopter,

a remote-controlled helicopter that has a camera attached.

A real nice, crisp image, it's quite a wide lens,

you've got quite a wide field of view.

The boys will be setting that up,

so one of them will fly the helicopter and manage the flight

and then the other person manages the camera movements.

The bird sends back the information to them on the ground,

so they can see exactly what they need to see.

The director can see it, the DOP can see it,

so they can make sure that the visuals that the drone,

the UAV, is getting is up to standard,

is the shot they want and is going to work for the film.

For Nerys, the director,

the drone provided all the shots she needed for the climax to the film.

It meant that she could convey what the writer wanted in writing Hiraeth.

As you've seen in the film...

..I think it makes it look really, really special.

The writer spoke to us, "Where is home?"

I think it's something really, really deep, isn't it?

Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau, and all that.