How Another World Media Filmed the King’s Birthday Honours for the Government

Working on the King’s Birthday Honours was one of those shoots that looked simple on paper but demanded total focus on the day. Another World Media was trusted to support creator Henry Calvert on a Government-facing assignment tied to the 2026 honours announcement, filming recipient interviews and shaping them into a short social-first piece that could work across official channels once the embargo had lifted.

For a job like this, the approach had to stay lean. Because the day was built entirely around interviews, there was no need to turn up with a huge production setup. The team arrived super early, got settled in ahead of the press activity, and kept the kit intentionally minimal: a Canon R7 and Rode microphones. That small-footprint setup made it easier to move quickly, stay unobtrusive and focus on what mattered most, which was capturing clear, authentic answers from every recipient.

A fast-moving interview day

The brief centred on the King’s Birthday Honours press event in London, where a group of recipients were available for interview after the official announcement activity. Another World Media interviewed all seven people available on the day, asking each of them four questions designed to draw out the essentials: what they had been recognised for, what the honour meant to them, and why their work mattered in the real world.

Every interviewee brought something different. Alice Eloise Outten was there after receiving a BEM for services to young people through Prom Ally, her scheme providing free prom dresses and suits for families who cannot afford them. Alexander Rigby received a BEM for services to charity, recognised for extraordinary ultra-marathon fundraising efforts supporting families affected by domestic abuse. Claire Marie Robinson received a BEM for services to foster care in Birmingham after stepping in to care for children in her family and creating a stable home for them through immense personal commitment.

Michael Akers was recognised with an MBE for services to special educational needs, reflecting his campaigning and fundraising work linked to speech and language therapy and support for young people living with verbal dyspraxia. Sali Hughes and Jo Jones were both awarded MBEs for services to the alleviation of hygiene poverty through Beauty Banks, the charity they co-founded to get essential hygiene products to people who need them most across the UK. James Brown received an MBE for services to Saving Lives Scotland and to the community in Airdrie, recognised for life-saving volunteer work and the operational systems he helped build around blood bike services.

Condensing 30 minutes into 3

What made the job challenging was not getting the interviews. It was deciding what could stay in. Across seven contributors and four questions each, the shoot quickly became around 30 minutes of strong material, full of heartfelt answers and genuinely brilliant people. The problem was that the final film needed to land in roughly three minutes, which meant most of that footage had to be reduced down into its most powerful and useful moments.

That kind of edit is where social filmmaking becomes editorial work. The task was not to include everything, but to preserve the emotion, clarity and variety of the day while building a piece that still moved quickly enough for online audiences. Each contributor had a story that could have carried far more time on its own, so the final challenge was finding the lines that best explained the honours, celebrated the winners and kept the pace engaging from start to finish.

Why this mattered

This project is a strong example of how Another World Media works on bigger jobs. It was a Government-linked brief with real timing pressures, public-facing sensitivity and a clear communications objective, but the production still needed warmth and personality to succeed on social media. That is exactly why creator-presenter Henry Calvert trusted Another World Media on the shoot: the company could keep production simple, work quickly, and turn a tightly managed interview window into a polished final video

Another World Media’s wider work already spans social media campaigns, branded films and event content, so this project sat naturally within that skill set. What made the honours film special was the mix of trust and restraint behind it: turning up prepared, using only the kit that was necessary, interviewing everyone efficiently, and then doing the harder job afterwards by shaping half an hour of material into a concise film that audiences would actually watch.

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