Landing in Bergen on November 10th, the team from King of Sunshine Productions had just a week to capture footage for a forthcoming Channel 4 documentary, a shoot that would pile on the pressure for a variety of reasons. Last December, the Salford-based company delighted viewers with the visually spectacular festive documentary, Alpine Train at Christmas. With such a huge hit on their hands, a follow-up was pretty much inevitable, but where might a suitably scenic successor be found? Planning began early, and that was one of the first questions to be addressed, as Sohail Shah, MD at King of Sunshine explains. “After Alpine Train became the highest rated original on Channel 4 last year (3.7m viewers consolidated), we realised that people love trains just as much as they love Christmas. So in January 2025, we started thinking about what other places we could look at that featured exciting train journeys, but also had enough content along the route that would make exciting and beautifully complementary postcard footage. Beth White, the development and location producer of the show, investigated several options and happened upon Norway and the Bergen Line. We loved the possibility and got to looking into how viable the trip could be.”
Adopting an “if it ain’t broke” mindset, many of the people who worked on Alpine Train were brought back together for this year’s production. “As much as I could, I wanted to keep the team together from last year with some very welcome and talented new additions in Gavin and Ava,” says Shah, who took on the executive producer role alongside Gareth Fielding as series producer director, Basilio Longo as shooting producer director, Beth White as producer, Sam Webster as PM and Chloe Eckersley Bell as coordinator. “We also had Nat Bullen as DOP and Bill Bartlett as Sound. On this show, every production team member was always on location,” he adds.
Show post production was completed in just 14 days, with work split across two edit suites. Offline editors James Clayson and Gavin Weaver were joined by edit assistant Ava Dagnall. The colourist was Jamie Parry with online finishing completed by Robert Douglas-Reeves. Miles Wimbleton, who received his first RTS nomination earlier this year for his work on Alpine Train at Christmas, handled audio dubbing for the production.
There was never any question about where to turn for post production, and Shah was keen to praise their efforts. “The post production team at dock 10, led by post producer Kirby Dunlop, are the absolute best and are always my first port of call.”
Covering a distance of almost 500 kilometres, the Bergen-Oslo line presented the team with a very different proposition. “As the train journey was a lot longer this time round, almost double the length, we had to work smarter and also, be a bit more discerning as well as practical with what we shot,” explains Shah. “It would be very easy to just shoot everything for safety, but in reality, with the resources and size of the team, that just isn’t an option.”
However, despite the obvious differences between the locations, they were able to apply many of the lessons learned from their earlier experience. “Most of the learnings were technical really. The mounting of the GoPros on the train, the capturing of the audio for the train announcements, the best way to shoot vox pops en route. We also had more of an idea of what line of questioning would help the film work better visually. Seeing what sort of reactions and comments worked in Alpine Train certainly informed what we wanted to get this time.”
Repeating the same problems is never ideal, but filming in the wintry Norwegian wonderland it was clear the weather was always likely to lead to an occasional pitfall. Once again, the King of Sunshine crew was able to fall back on what they had learned before. “The main problems were things that were out of our control; namely, the weather, and the train route which obviously is immovable. Shooting travel documentaries is always dependent on weather but with limited time and opportunities, you can only go with the amount of trips you have on the train itself. Like last time, we filmed two journeys on the train. The first journey was covered by all three cameras and the full team: I stayed with the conductor throughout the journey with Nat as my cameraman. Gareth filmed with the drivers and also got POV footage from the cabin, as well as extra shots throughout the train; and Basilio filmed contributors with Beth doing the interviews. The second train journey had two cameras internally whilst the third camera team was catching drone and tripod footage of the trains as they went through various points of the route.”
In addition to the arctic conditions, the northerly location meant the available daylight was severely limited. The team overcame this by filming the journey in two separate segments. Shah describes the process: “The sun rose around 8.30 am and started to set around 3.30 pm, so we didn’t have an option to cover one entire journey in daylight. Therefore, we filmed one complete journey, which started in light but ended in darkness, and then filmed the latter part of the same journey at a different time of day on a secondary filming day, so that the whole trip was covered with the sun up. Had we not done that, we would not have been able to show much of the landscape in daylight! Logistically, it was rather tricky, but with planning and splitting up of teams, we thankfully managed it.”
Selecting the right technology was obviously of paramount importance, with the main cameras shooting in HD and all drone footage in 4K. “The main reason for HD over 4K for the majority of the show was purely for ingest time in edit. We had such a tight edit, we couldn’t afford to lose time ingesting so opted for HD, but stuck with 4K for the drones as there were far less shots of those but we wanted them to look as sharp and cinematic as possible,” Shah clarifies.
Three main cameras were used, a Sony FX9 for DOP footage (GVs were shot using a Canon CN7 lens on the FX9), a Sony FX6 and a Sony A7Siii on a Gimbal. Additionally, the team used 6 Hero 12 GoPros, a DJI Mavic3 Pro Cine drone and a DJI Mini5 Pro drone. Sony G master prime lenses were used predominantly. No specialist equipment was needed for the environment although the crew made use of hand warmers, gloves, hats and “anything to keep warm” as the temperature was “especially cold.”
Minimal use of VFX was required, with none used in the show footage at all. As before graphic layered maps to illustrate the route were created by freelance VFX and motion designer Lynn Tidsey.
As ever, such an ambitious project brought challenges of its own, not least the sheer size of the location. “The biggest challenge was definitely the scale of the journey and the process of capturing all of the footage of the train itself across the route,” Shah recalls. “We drove roughly 900km across various parts of the route, driving ahead and chasing the train to get shots of the Bergensbanen hurtling through the landscape and arriving and leaving from key stations. We were tasked with positioning ourselves at various places to get drone and tripod footage to illustrate where we were and what we were seeing during the journey. The planning and execution by the team, especially Chloe and Sam, of this part of the process was absolutely amazing. Everything was timed to the minute and we were actively checking live train locations to make sure we got the right trains at the right times from the right angles. In one instance in the Hallingdal Valley, Chloe was observing the live location of the approaching train, Sam was filming it on the FX9 on a tripod, and then Chloe called ahead on the phone to say that the train would be coming into view at my location in roughly 30 seconds. I then signalled to Nat to get ready with his drone which was already in the air and being spotted by me. He then captured the train as it went through the location and we thankfully ended up with some amazing footage. I think if people knew what went into capturing shots like these for travel shows, they wouldn’t quite believe it.”
Surrounded by scenic mountains and fjords, choosing standout moments might seem like a difficult task. Not so for Shah, though. A lifelong Star Wars fan, the decision was an easy one. “The Bergensbanen train travels to a place called Finse. In fact, it is the only way to reach Finse, as it is 1122m above sea level and there are no roads leading to it. It is the most beautiful, snowy and remote stop on the whole line. It houses a lovely hotel and truly looks like a winter wonderland, and it is also the location for the Battle of Hoth in The Empire Strikes Back. I am a huge Star Wars fan, and Empire is my favourite movie of the saga. To be filming a documentary in Norway was a treat anyway, but to be filming and staying in the location of a movie I’ve loved since I was a child was an utter thrill. Our night at Hotel Finse, surrounded by snowy mountains and Christmas decorations, chatting and playing games in their library after a brilliant filming day, will be something that will always put a smile on my face whenever I think of it. An experience of a lifetime.”
Nordic Train at Christmas is on Channel 4 at 8pm on Saturday 27th December
