Josh Close - Close Up

An interview with Key Grip Josh Close on his remote head workflow

Key Grip Josh Close is a regular on some of the biggest productions, having worked with award-winning camera operators and Oscar-winning DoPs.

We catch him just as he’s about to move house (one of the most stressful things you can do in life), but you wouldn’t know it. He’s bright and enthusiastic, and what immediately comes across is that Josh doesn’t just love the work, he loves the kit itself.

“I’m in the middle of a picture up in Glasgow, where I’ve been all year for Apple TV, but I’m also in the middle of the house move. I’ve got my camera grip taking over as key grip along with the rest of my team. They’re running it until the end of the block. They’ve got all my equipment up there now, including both my Mo-Sys heads and a lot of Ronford Baker gear (sliders, dollies, rickshaws, car rigs, etc.). Finding new equipment is so addictive. I just love it – constantly finding new ways to expand our capabilities”

The heads Josh is referring to are the Mo-Sys L20 and the L40, but we’ll get to that…

Close to Home

So, where is Josh moving to?

“Not far - I’m staying in Newcastle. So that’s the commute I have to do – up to Glasgow or down to London every week. It was a decision whether we should move closer to the work or stay somewhere we love. I think we’ll always be in Newcastle.”

Josh was born and raised in Newcastle. It’s not just his home, though. It also served as the foundation of his career and his love affair with grip equipment.

“When they started BBC Newcastle, they called it ‘The Pink Palace’ because they needed a lot of people from London to go up to Newcastle and start it. Back then, the BBC was all in-house. My mum and dad moved up here, and he worked on all the BBC productions in the Northeast. He did every episode of ‘Byker Grove’. Every season for 18 years.”

So, Josh got in on the family business?

“I feel very lucky to have been introduced to the film industry at such a young age. I found it totally fascinating going along to watch my dad gripping on sets. When I was around 16 years old, my dad was made redundant from the BBC. He was forced to go freelance, and that’s when I started to help him out.”

North to South

From the earliest days of his career, Josh was working on high-profile British television.

“Back when I started out with my dad, we had a Jimmy Jib. It was great up here in the Northeast. We were shooting all these ITV dramas, like ‘Inspector George Gently’ and ‘Wire in the Blood’, and BBC kids shows like ‘Tracy Beaker’.”

Josh’s passion for the work and love of the equipment shone through, allowing him to step out from his father’s shadow and work independently on bigger and bigger productions.

“Eventually I got recommended to work with a great DoP – Remi Adefarasin. He’s just received the BSC 2026 Lifetime Achievement Award - he’s fantastic! He’s a really wonderful chap, and that’s how I broke into London. That was maybe ten, fifteen years ago, and since then I’ve got to work with more amazing DoPs like Danny Cohen and Claudio Miranda.”

A Hot Tip

It was working with Claudio that first introduced Josh to Mo-Sys.

“So, I’m on a film in Morocco. I’m in the desert, and it’s horrible. Obviously, it’s beautiful, but you’re better off seeing it on screen, because it’s 45 degrees. We’re walking around in the desert, recceing a film called ‘The Alchemist’, based on a novel by Paulo Coelho - the ninth highest-selling novel of all time.”

The Alchemist’s development journey had already been a rough one, with several adaptations falling through prior to this latest attempt.

“We finish the recce and I’m talking with Caludio as we’re walking and he says, ‘I’ve got a Mo-Sys/Cartoni Lambda Remote Head that I got from London, and I want to use on this production’ This blows my mind, because I’m walking around with an American (Chilean) DoP in Morocco and he knows more about this London-based remote head company than I do!”

The head Claudio was referring to is the Lambda 2.0. Was that Josh’s first experience with Mo-Sys technology? Sadly not.

“The film got shut down – again! One day it’ll make a great film… It was a real shame for me as well, because I never got to finish the film with Claudio, but as soon as I got back home, I started looking into Mo-Sys.”

Next Level

Josh heard about Mo-Sys at the perfect time, having risen up the ranks.

“By then I had become a Level 3 Grip, which is the highest accolade you can get under the NVQ system now. You have to be a Level 3 to use cranes or rig tracking vehicles, and I wanted to expand my equipment list.”

Having become a level three, Josh had swung his Jimmy Jib for the last time, and had acquired a more senior tool, worthy of the dramas and features he was now working on.

“I had got myself a lovely lightweight GFM jib arm – they’re modular, not telescopic. They’re great – more for Jib owners than for renting on a production, because you can have one of those packed in the truck and it doesn’t cost the production anything, as opposed to a telescopic crane, where you’ve got to plan, and probably go with a stabilised head, because of those bumps you get.”

Having discovered Mo-Sys, Josh quickly fell in love, not with the Lambda, but with the next generation of Mo-Sys 2-axis remote heads.

“Anyway! I get my GFM, and to go with it I think to myself – right, I’m going to look into the L40! So, obviously, I had a little play around with some of the operators I was working at the time, and knew straight away that it would work really well – hand-in-hand with my GFM. The response of it was fantastic! The settings, the power of it, you know, it took our breath away.”

Wheels Turning

Josh loves the kit, but he also has a deep sense of reverence for the talents of the operators who use his equipment.

“Watching some operators when they’re working with the hand wheels - it’s amazing. I worked with George Richmond, and he’s fantastic on the wheels. There’s a reason why they’re still used so much - because if you can use them well, you can create gorgeous shots. Vince McGahon is another magician on the wheels – he loves the L40. He’s operating with an L40 on Harry Potter at the moment.”

The L40 has been the go-to 2-axis remote head in Hollywood for over a decade, thanks to its strength, robustness and ease of use – an obvious choice that can support almost any high-end camera package.

“I can tell the camera department which head we’re going to be using, but I can never pick the camera. The two cameras I always end up working with are the Alexa35 and the Sony Venice. I don’t know what they put in the Venice. 
Is it concrete?! They’re big beasts! Anyway, I took the leap about five/six years ago now - I bought the L40 and took it straight on to a show called “Slow Horses”, shooting seasons 2 to 6 with it. The L40 is fantastic; it’s got all that power, so you’re never really worrying about the lenses. We had five great seasons there, and around about the time we were wrapping up on Season 6, I hear about the L20…”

Connections

Josh has developed a strong working relationship with Mo-Sys throughout his ownership of the L40.

“It’s great working with Ben (Tilbrook) and the team. Whenever I have had a problem, it gets dealt with. Mark Seaton (Senior System Engineer at Mo-Sys) is always happy to down tools to assist me with any problem straight away.”

Josh got in touch with Ben (Global Business Development at Mo-Sys), eager to get his hands on the L20 as soon as possible.

“The L20 seems like the next natural step up, because the L40 is fantastic, but it’s also quite heavy – 18 kilos. So, you know, I’m looking for the next thing just to bridge the gap for those hard-to-reach places, so I can go from having static, fixed shots ‘up there,’ to mounting a lightweight head.”

Ben and the Mo-Sys team were happy to help.

“So, I got given a prototype to try out, and I took that straight onto a film. It’s Jane Austen’s 
250th anniversary, so they’re re-adapting a lot of her work. I took the L20 onto the new Working Title feature of “Sense and Sensibility”.

The Weight of Expectations

Josh had his prototype L20, but there was a hitch…

“We were shooting on these 35mm Panavision XL2 cameras, which we couldn’t run on the L20, not because of the weight – it can take up to twenty kilos – but because these cameras are huge!!” Josh laughs.

Josh did, however, get to run the L20 through its paces.

“We also had a little Arricam with 200ft shoulder mount mags. Now, those things do go on the L20, so we ended up doing shots with the L20 on a jib arm. The reason why we needed to go with the L20 instead of the L40 is that when I swing the jib arm around at full length, there’s a twelve-kilo difference between the two heads, and that gets magnified! Those extra twelve kilos at the end of a 25ft length? To counterbalance that perfectly? To be neutrally balanced? You have to multiply that! So you’re looking at an extra forty or fifty kilos, just to counterbalance. It makes such a difference – you really feel it when you put the L20 on.”

Slow Horses, Quick Changes

The initial prototype testing would be the start of Josh’s new remote head workflow…

“With our game it’s all about how quick you can get something set up. Like, on dramas, they’ll suddenly think of a new shot, and it’s all about how fast you can set up what they want. Obviously, you want to have as many eventualities covered as possible. There’s nothing worse than being on set, with the cast and the 1st AD and everyone waiting… Oh my God! You literally can’t let that happen! I mean, some of these productions, like ‘Slow Horses’, they’re spending £500,000 a day. It’s a lot of money, right? So, the heads come out to set on the trolley – not out in the open, mind, because there’s moisture and wotnot, but they’re there, in their cases, ready to go.”

Josh uses the L20 in tandem with his L40, able to switch between the two heads fast, to meet the needs of the shoot when the plan changes.

“It’s directly interchangeable with the L40, which is fantastic. So, I got my console set up, my wireless set up, and I can literally just unplug the L40 out of the end of the loom of the arm. I can put the L20 on, plug in, and it works straight away. The settings from the head are saved in the console. When you switch heads, the console knows which head it’s using, and the second you power on, it changes automatically – it’s fantastic. It’s a real nice touch.”

Interchangeable

This interchangeability isn’t just convenient for Josh. It’s a big hit with the operators he works with, as well.

“Being able to switch straight from a jib shot to another rig, I can have the wheels set up with this nice pop-up tent. Everyone’s comfy, and I can just switch over to the other head, without the downtime – bosh! Plug and play. It works with the wireless system and also has back-pan. The back-pan is fantastic on the L40, and now the L20 can do it as well.”

Josh leans in, with a naughty twinkle in his eye…

“Quite often, operators will ask me which head is my favourite, and I’ll say, “this one”... What is quite fun is, when I switch them between the L40 and the L20, they’ll ask me, “Which one are we on now, Josh?”, because the difference is almost imperceptible, even with all their years of experience with those hand wheels. It’s really exciting, because you might think that, because of the size difference, that the L20 would be in some way inferior to the L40, but it’s not – it’s really, really good!”

Scorpio Rising

The L20 is now an essential part of Josh’s workflow, but the L40 is no less important.

“After ‘Sense and Sensibility’ the prototype went back to Mo-Sys, but I had my L20 delivered in time for my next feature, called ‘Red, White & Royal Wedding’, which is an Amazon romcom. We were shooting a big scene in Suffolk Cathedral, that was standing in for St. Paul’s Cathedral. It’s an incredible building with these beautiful, vaulted ceilings that we were allowed to go up into.  We had cranes, long tracks, a 45ft Scorpio - all sorts going on.”

Josh reflects for a moment on his crane work, his ‘addiction’ creeping up to the surface again.

“With the older, telescopic technocranes, they rack in sections, and you get a bit of a kick with each section, so I would never put the L40 on one of those, because you need stabilisation. For that, you might want to think about the G30, but the Scorpios are the hot thing in town. The Scorpio 45 is now the ‘bread and butter’ crane in the UK, and that is sooo smooth! The L40 works a treat on it! So, I’m thinking of getting myself a Scorpio 23, because they work so well together.”

It’s not just cranes Josh has had his eye on…

“I got a wireless, remote-control slide, so on ‘R,W&RW’ I put the L20 on it, and I could actually fire it out over the rafters at the very, very top of the cathedral and get into some really interesting places. I had to counter-lever, so I couldn’t have done it with the weight of the L40. For moments like that, the L20 is just brilliant.”

Stepping Up

Since then, Josh has been working on Apple TV’s ‘The Buccaneers’.

“It’s set in the 1870s - based on the true story of a group of American women who come to England. It looks beautiful, and it’s shot in such a lovely way, and we really give a beautiful look to London… even though we shoot it in Glasgow!” Josh laughs. “It’s bright colours, beautiful dresses, gorgeous sunsets. It’s just beautiful. It’s a glorious thing to work on.”

Of course, the L20 has come with him.

“I’m using it in all those really hard-to-reach places. On Jib arms. Hanging it off of balconies. We had a lovely one shooting at Ghislain Castle where we did a beautiful spiral staircase.”

The ultra-compact L20 shines, not only when you’re trying to get to those difficult positions, but when you want to keep a low profile.

“The L20 is so handy on a dolly on a dance floor. Often, we’ll do these dialogue scenes and sweep around a dinner table. People start seated - maybe someone gets up, and we go with them before we jib back down. It could be a Steadicam shot, but sometimes that can be distracting, so we’ll put the L20 on the dolly and just run it remote, super-smooth on a nice dance floor laid by the carpenter.”

The Next Acquisition

With the L20 firmly established on the equipment list, what’s Josh’s next equipment fix?

“At the moment I only have the one console, but I’m getting a second one so that I could use both heads simultaneously. That probably wouldn’t happen too often on one of my jobs, but because it’s such a nice, easy plug-and-play system, I could also then potentially rent one of them out to people as a dry hire as well - because it is quite simple to set up. There’s just so many options…”

Josh’s L20/L40 workflow gives him the flexibility to cover all the bases, keeping setup times down, whilst being adaptable to last-minute changes and new ideas, always delivering precision, responsive control that his camera operators love. We can’t wait to find out what Josh will do with that second console!