THIS IS BURNLEY: Produced by Matt Knight / Knight Sky Films

The freelance TV world slows down to a crawl around Christmas. This finally allowed me to pursue extra projects outside of TV. Television is a real team project from start to finish with dozens of people involved from concept to sending it off to broadcast. This Is Burnley is a real solo filmmaker’s passion project. The drone, camera, edit, writing and voiceover all done in house.

This is Burnley addresses the age old preconceptions that people from outside of the area have about the town.

Like most places, it has good and bad, but historically the focus tends to be on the latter when appearing in news and media. People not from Burnley think they know what it’s like but to those of us who live there it’s much more than what the narrow spotlight of the media often portrays.

We’re not an idyllic chocolate box village in the Cotswolds. We’re a town in Lancashire with undesirable areas that have fallen on hard times. People seem to know that bit. But what about the industrial heritage, the moors, hills, football club, countryside and of course the warmth of the people.

Hopefully the film opens a few eyes about what the town has to offer.

REACTION:

I decided to release it first on Facebook. It’s a great platform to attract a niche audience this film was aimed at with easy ability to share and spread. These things live and die on people sharing and spreading the world on their own social media and I was overwhelmed with the reaction. At last count I’m seeing 1000 people shared it, 50,000 watched it. Considering Burnley’s a town of roughly 90,000 people it’s absolutely outperformed by expectations.

Then I posted it on YouTube which is a very different audience and the engagement there has been terrific too.

Thanks to everyone who has watched it, commented, sent messages and shared it. And thanks to Turf Moor and Towneley Hall for granting me access to film.

PRESS:

I did a live interview on BBC Radio Lancashire and will post that asap.

Lancashire Telegraph: “Burnley filmmaker writes viral love letter to home town”
https://www.lancashiretelegraph.co.uk/news/23341944.burnley-filmmaker-writes-viral-love-letter-home-town/

Burnley Express: “A TV director is proving there is more to Burnley than meets the eye”
https://www.burnleyexpress.net/news/people/burnley-filmmaker-behind-bbc-one-show-scarletts-driving-school-and-channel-4s-find-it-fix-it-flog-it-clocks-up-50000-facebook-views-with-video-celebrating-the-town-4036097

But by far the best review is here: