A trip to The Island Golf Club

There is a romantic idea in filmmaking that everything must be meticulously planned. Shot lists. Storyboards. Lighting diagrams. Research documents. And sometimes that is exactly what a production requires. But this film became a reminder of something equally important: experience creates freedom.

When I arrived at The Island Golf Club, I had never seen the course before. I knew about it (of course – I am an avid golfer), but I did not know the routing, the signature holes or how the light would move across the dunes. We had one round of golf and roughly four hours to capture everything. That was the entire production.

The Island is not just another golf course. It is consistently ranked among Ireland’s finest links courses and is regarded by many as one of the great hidden masterpieces of world golf. The landscape feels untouched, almost prehistoric at times — enormous dunes, dramatic textures and an atmosphere shaped entirely by wind, sea and golf. What interested me was not perfection. It was authenticity.
I wanted the viewer to feel what it is actually like to walk there. To discover the course hole by hole. To experience the unpredictability, the scale and the silence of true links golf.

Armed with a small hybrid camera on a stabilizer, a drone and a golf cart we followed a group of Swedish golfers during one round. Yes – there are numerous shots I would have loved to have. But the point is: story always comes first – and that was captured and told. It is by no means a visually perfect film. But it is craftmanship of visual storytelling in action.

This type of filmmaking demands something different from large productions. You have no safety net. No second crew. No second chance. You react constantly — to weather, rhythm, movement, emotion and instinct. And that is precisely why I love it.
Because sometimes the strongest storytelling does not come from controlling reality. It comes from being fully present inside it.

, I had never seen the course before. I knew about it (of course – I am an avid golfer), but I did not know the routing, the signature holes or how the light would move across the dunes. We had one round of golf and roughly four hours to capture everything. That was the entire production.

The Island is not just another golf course. It is consistently ranked among Ireland’s finest links courses and is regarded by many as one of the great hidden masterpieces of world golf. The landscape feels untouched, almost prehistoric at times — enormous dunes, dramatic textures and an atmosphere shaped entirely by wind, sea and golf. What interested me was not perfection. It was authenticity.

I wanted the viewer to feel what it is actually like to walk there. To discover the course hole by hole. To experience the unpredictability, the scale and the silence of true links golf.

Armed with a small hybrid camera on a stabilizer, a drone and a golf cart we followed a group of Swedish golfers during one round. Yes – there are numerous shots I would have loved to have. But the point is: story always comes first – and that was captured and told. It is by no means a visually perfect film. But it is craftmanship of visual storytelling in action.

This type of filmmaking demands something different from large productions. You have no safety net. No second crew. No second chance. You react constantly — to weather, rhythm, movement, emotion and instinct. And that is precisely why I love it.

Because sometimes the strongest storytelling does not come from controlling reality. It comes from being fully present inside it.