A FORMER BBC camera operator who had to give up the job she loved due to ill health has poured all of her passion into photography and is now set to showcase her works in Gourock.

Roseann Murdoch, who lives in the town, enjoyed an exciting and varied career filming for the BBC and as a freelancer before spinal stenosis forced her to give it up.

The 60-year-old former Glasgow School of Art student has worked at the Oscars, filming interviews with big names such as Robin Williams and Geena Davies, and was part of the camera crew for golf's European Tour and for the Ryder Cup.

Roseann began her career in 1984 after a friend told her about a newspaper advert for a BBC job,

After a rigorous recruitment process, she started as a camerawoman with BBC Scotland, where she worked on a huge range of programmes including dramas, news and sports broadcasts, comedies and theatre.

Following an 11-year stint at the BBC, Roseann was made redundant, but she stayed in the industry, working as a freelancer for a further 12 years.

She told the Telegraph she had a number of wonderful memories and highlights of her time as a camerawoman.

(Image: George Munro)

She said: “When I was freelance, I went over to Los Angeles to do red carpet interviews for the Oscars.

“I met Robin Williams and he was so lateral and fantastic, as well as Geena Davies.

“It’s was an incredible experience.”

Roseann also filmed Bill and Hillary Clinton when they paid a visit to Belfast, and even had the unique opportunity to film open heart surgery.

She added: “I had it in my head it was going to be a foot operation. Myself and two other cameramen I knew from BBC days turned up, and it was open heart surgery.

“I was up on a small step ladder looking down into the cavity and it was being transmitted to a lecture theatre and recorded for teaching purposes.

“There were different operations, but it was all to do with heart surgery. It was really fascinating.”

Unfortunately, Roseann had to bring her career behind the camera to a halt when she was diagnosed with spinal stenosis, a condition which results in pressure on the spinal cord.

She said: “I had spinal stenosis, which caused me to give up cameras.

“They said I could carry on, but it would get to the stage where I couldn’t pick up even a cup of team=.

“I thought I had to stop. I finished the contracts I had and then sat at home.  

“The European Tour, wonderfully, asked if I could job share with the man that was doing their floor managing, and I had been around floor managers all my life, so I didn’t have to retrain.”

Roseann worked in her new floor manager role until 2019, when a previous heart issue recurred.

At the time, Covid was beginning to hit the headlines and Roseann was wary about travelling abroad.

Fortunately, she was allowed to scale back her work covering golf, and she now covers only Scottish tournaments.

And as Roseann stepped further away from film, she moved more towards photography.

She added: “It’s allowed me time to go to my back catalogue and do what I’ve wanted to do but have never been allowed to, which is concentrate on my photography.”

Last year Roseann held her first exhibition at the Royal Gourock Yacht Club, which, much to her delight, was a big success.

She is now planning on exhibiting and selling her works at Medineli’s Pop Up Shop on Kempock Street for a week starting on October 20.

She hopes locals who come along will take a liking to her work.

Roseann said: “Since I was a child I’ve carried a camera everywhere we went, even at school whenever we were out it was always me that was taking snaps.

“With my spinal problems and heart problems carrying equipment can be difficult, so a lot of my stuff if I see an image the iPhone does an amazing job.

“The subjects of my photos are just random, they’re images I see and I think ‘oh that’s lovely’.

“I love the way light plays on water, the patterns and the light.

“There’s nothing beyond that so far but whether it goes on and I develop into one little thing is another thing.

"I’m excited to see where it goes.”