Shooting Producer on the Song Saa Collective’s Regenerative Tourism Film, Koh Rong Archipelago, Cambodia
In June I worked as shooting producer on a short film about the Song Saa Collective in Cambodia’s Koh Rong Archipelago, for Pacific Asia: Tourism with Purpose.
Song Saa Private Island from the drone
In June I worked as shooting producer on a short film about the Song Saa Collective in Cambodia’s Koh Rong Archipelago. Regenerative Tourism is part of Pacific Asia: Tourism with Purpose, a digital series that the UK production company Content With Purpose produces for the Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA).
The film looks at how Song Saa Private Island, a resort off the Cambodian coast, funds the marine conservation and community work of the Song Saa Foundation. I was on the job with Vicheka, my long-term assistant, who has worked with me on a lot of shoots.
A change of plan on Thursday evening
The shoot came together at short notice. One of the people due to be featured had returned to their home country for family reasons, so I had a call with Content With Purpose and Melita Koulmandas, the founder of the Song Saa Collective, on the Thursday evening to work out what to do. Morokot Long, the Song Saa Foundation’s marine conservation and community engagement officer, agreed to step in. A holiday was coming up and she was due to travel back to her hometown, so we had to film before she left.
We made the final decision that evening. I packed the kit that night, started prep at 5.45 the next morning, and Vicheka and I were in a taxi out of Phnom Penh at 6am. At the coast we took Song Saa’s speedboat out to the island, and we filmed on Friday 19 and Saturday 20 June.
Arriving at Song Saa Private Island
I arrived slightly discombobulated, convinced I’d lost an hour somewhere. Song Saa runs on Hong Kong time, an hour ahead of the rest of Cambodia, so the island’s clocks and mine weren’t aligned.
Working with Content With Purpose
Content With Purpose specialises in ethical production. To keep the carbon footprint of its shoots down, it hires local crews rather than flying people in, which is how the job came to me in Phnom Penh. The production manager was Amy Allport.
Three interviews, two cameras
Content With Purpose wanted a two-camera interview setup, and I ran the interviews myself. The Sony A7 IV was A camera, with the A7S III on the second angle. I lit with a Zhiyun Molus X100 and recorded sound from a Sennheiser MKH 416 on a boom and a Sennheiser G4 radio mic, both going into the Sony XLR-K3M adapter, belt and braces.
The two-camera setup for Sideth Chun’s interview at the Discovery Centre.
Melita Koulmandas, Song Saa Collective
Melita Koulmandas is the founder and CEO of the Song Saa Collective. We interviewed her in one of the island’s villas, a stilt house looking out over the sea.
“I first found myself out here 20 years ago, in 2006,” she says. “When I first arrived, you could see what on the surface appeared to be this incredible, stunning, pristine environment was very rapidly in decline. Fish stocks had been pushed close to collapse. It was becoming more and more challenging for these fishing communities to provide for their families.”
She started working with the local community and the fisheries, and the house reef around Song Saa became, in her words, “the starting point for Cambodia’s first marine reserve.” The Song Saa reserve was the first marine reserve to be registered in Cambodia.
The two islands of Song Saa and the house reef between them
“Within 18 months we saw the fish stocks start to come back,” she says. “We saw baby barracudas, we saw spotted stingrays, and I was able to witness regeneration happening in real time.”
Interviewing Melita Koulmandas in one of the villas on Song Saa Private Island.
Morokot Long, Song Saa Foundation
Morokot’s interview was shot on the beach in the late afternoon, with the sea as a backdrop. She runs the foundation’s seagrass surveys, which she describes as “very detailed, metre by metre.”
Setting up Morokot Long's interview on the beach as the sun sets.
“Seagrass bed is one of the most important marine habitats,” she says. “It sustains a lot of life. It acts as a nursery ground for the juvenile fish, protects our coastline from waves and erosion. It also acts as a carbon sink.”
Morokot Long on the beach, with the second camera on the left.
Sideth Chun, Song Saa Foundation
Sideth Chun is the foundation’s community liaison officer, and we filmed his interview at the Discovery Centre. Morokot told us he’d recently qualified as a scuba diver. “When the local community takes this as their ownership, people like to protect what they care about and what they love,” Morokot says.
Sideth runs workshops on coral species for children in the community and takes them swimming. “They see the coral growing and they’re really interested,” he says. “They said they want to be like the part of the marine science and take care of their own marine environment.”
Interviewing Sideth Chun at the Discovery Centre.
On the water and in the air
Between interviews, we went out on the foundation’s boat with Morokot, Sideth and the dive team as they kitted up. I used the A7S III on the gimbal for the moving shots on the boats.
Filming the dive team as they kit up.
I shot the aerial footage on the DJI Air 3, covering the island, its boardwalk and the house reef. I’ve written more about flying drones in Cambodia and the permissions involved.
Flying the Air 3 from the deck on Song Saa Private Island.
Tourism that pays for conservation
Six years after Melita first arrived, she designed and built Song Saa Private Island to support the conservation work, alongside an international not-for-profit foundation.
“The resort commercial business became the engine,” she says. “It provided infrastructure for the conservation work, provides housing for the marine scientists and the team to live in. It brings awareness to this area through media and PR. And then through guest donations, grants, fundraising through the foundation, we’re able to conduct data-driven research.”
It’s the same link between visitors and conservation that I saw on the Tonle Sap, where protected bird sanctuaries bring income to communities through eco-tourism. Melita summarises this perfectly at the end of the film: “Tourism has to move from extraction to contribution.”
Staying on the island
It’s not often I get to stay somewhere like Song Saa, and I think Vicheka enjoyed it even more than I did. We didn’t have time to make much use of the island’s facilities, but we did eat at the restaurant. My highlight was an Asian-style confit duck salad with green mango, where the acidity of the mango cut through the saltiness of the duck.
The overwater villas on Song Saa Private Island.
Handover and release
At the end of the shoot, I uploaded all the footage to Content With Purpose’s Drive for the edit. Pacific Asia: Tourism with Purpose was previewed at PATA Travel Mart 2026 and launched in Bangkok on 8 September 2026. The films are free to watch on Content With Purpose’s site, alongside partners including the Hawai’i Tourism Authority and Travelife.
Thanks to Melita, Sideth and the Song Saa team, and to Morokot for stepping in at short notice. If you’re after a shooting producer for a travel or conservation story, I’ve also produced, directed and shot segments for the BBC Travel Show. You can see more of my work as an NGO videographer in Cambodia.
Working on something similar? Drop me a line, I’d be happy to discuss how I can help.
In the field as a cameraperson and drone pilot at the Elephant Valley Project, Mondulkiri
Angelo got in touch with me and wanted me to work as a cameraperson and drone pilot for him to film at the Elephant Valley Project (EVP) in Mondulkiri, Cambodia.
Angelo is a Portuguese actor who recently starred in the Brazilian Netflix drama Lady Voyuer. He was in Cambodia to shoot part of a pilot for a travel show. Having seen my work on Last of the Elephant Men, he asked me to come along for the ride.
It was great to catch up with some people I hadn’t seen for a long time and to be back in the jungle filming elephants. It was also great to meet Gee Pich (Diamond), the latest addition to the EVP family.
Gee Pich was born at the project after a heard of wild elephants entered EVP. Pearl ran away with the heard and 21 months after she came back she gave birth to Gee Pich.
While the staff at EVP would love to rewild elephants, this is not one of the aims of the projects as most of the elephants have lived in captivity for most if not all of their lives and simply don’t have the skills to survive in the wild.
Although the outcome is largely positive, unfortunately, this kind of encounter is becoming increasingly common as the wild elephants natural habitats are being destroyed. This changes their annual migration routes.
The heavy rain made for an interesting shoot - it was a challenge keeping all the kit dry, but it gives the jungle a wonderful enclosed atmosphere and makes for some great images.
Hopefully Angelo is successful in pitching the show and it’s coming to a screen near you!
You can see the trailer of the feature-length documentary about elephants I worked on as a cameraperson in Mondulkiri here and you can see other examples of my documentary work here.
Below are some frames from the footage I shot. All the images were shot in log and haven’t been graded.
On Location as a Camera Assistant and Drone Pilot for CNN in Cambodia
Work as a camera assistant and drone pilot on the Cambodia episode of CNN’s Nomad with Carlton McCoy for the second series.
It’s not often that you get a call from CNN at 2pm and by 4pm you’re onset, working for one of the most established production companies in the game. Zero Point Zero are the company behind Anthony Bourdain’s shows. If you haven’t seen the closing gambit from the Cambodia episode of a cook’s tour, it’s a testament to Bourdain’s writing and humanity.
The camera assistant / drone pilot who had travelled with the team from the US tested positive for Covid on arrival, so they needed someone to step in at short notice. Shortly after receiving the call, I was in the back of the van going over the kit with camera team.
On the evening of the first day, the DP tested positive, so we travelled to Siem Reap as a camera team of 2 before flying back to Phnom Penh less than 24 hours later.
When we got back to Phnom Penh the camera operator tested positive for Covid. Fortunately, CNN had flown in a DP from Thailand. We were the camera department for the next couple of days before the original camera assistant and drone pilot thankfully returned to the fray for the last couple of days.
It was an incredible learning experience to work with such an experienced team and a great crash course in lots of camera and lighting kit (and techniques) that I hadn’t used before.
Once again thanks to Nick at Hanuman Films for the recommendation. I look forward to sharing the show once the episodes airs. Below are a couple of drone photos I managed to snap along the way. You can see more examples of my drone videography here. Please get in touch about any video projects you have in Cambodia, SE Asia or the rest of the world.
Aerial Drone Photography of salt flats in Tamil Nadu, India
Looking back through the archives, I found some drone photography of the salt flats outside Pondicherry in Tamil Nadu, Southern India. I was lucky enough to get to travel there while working as a videographer for Wild Frontiers. I like the lines and the geometrical shapes of the salt flats when seen from above.
I often use the drone to shoot video and take photographs as a afterthought. I plan to spend more time looking at the creative possibilities and using drone to focus solely on aerial photography.
Photographs from the road, shooting with prime lenses
One of my favourite things to do in Cambodia is to cruise around the countryside on my ‘moto’ taking photographs. Here are a few snaps from the first couple of trips I’ve been on since arriving back in Cambodia.
Over the past few months, I’ve invested in several compact cine prime lenses to improve the production quality of my videos. In order to learn the capabilities of the lenses, I’ve started travelling with primes with the same effective focal length as the lenses I have for my cine camera, to learn the lenses and to get used to the creative possibilities of shooting with primes.
