Iain Maciver writes

Duty Office
ITV
London

11 January 2008

Sirs

I wish to make a formal complaint about the silly new filming
techniques being used on The Bill. The half-wit producers have
recently started a particularly annoying ’shakey camera’ method
of shooting the actors particularly when they are in small
groups.

One must be charitable. So I shall assume that this is just some
kind of ill-conceived and blitheringly daft and vain attempt at
creating an atmosphere of unpredictability at Sun Hill. It would
have been decided on a Friday afternoon - just before pub time. I
know how these guys work.

They may also wrongly believe that they have achieved some kind
of knack of making the action seem more realistic by deliberately
inducing a wobble in the poor soul who is shouldering the camera.
Whether he or she is forced to drink trawler rum - it produces
the same effect in myself - or is occasionally just kicked in the
shins is not immediately clear to the bewildered viewer.

In any case, it doesn’t work. It makes me sick. Living on a
Hebridean island, I am already forced to endure sea sickness on
the ferry to the mainland. The last thing I want is my staple
fare of cops and robbers being used as some half-baked experiment
by programme makers who have either worked too long on
tuppence halfpenny arthouse projects or are so fond of
hallucinogenic substances they think having the whole cast wobbling
is normal.

The same producers have only recently stopped the equally
ridiculous technique of shooting dialogue between two people in
an open space while they are circled continuously by a single
camera. Unfortunately, that nauseous technique has been picked up
by other programme producers with tight budgets and absent
imaginations.

Stop the shakey cameras. It begins in subtle fashion but once you
notice it there is nothing you can do to avoid the serious
distraction. Think of the viewers. It is not clever. It looks
pathetically amateurish and makes the whole programme a nasty
experience waiting for the next stomach-wringer.

You will, I expect, want to address my complaint with a full
explanation, an apology and an assurance that behinds have been
firmly kicked. I will, of course, then include such grovelling on
my blog - www.maciverblog.co.uk.

Yours faithfully