For the past couple of years, cinematographer Darren McCagh has shadowed Margaret River photographer Russell Ord quietly documenting his efforts in waves of supreme consequence.

The two hit on an idea for a documentary on Ord and crowd funded enough to breathe life into the project, titled One Shot. The centre piece to the doco is Ord’s unmatched commitment in photography at The Right but also tracks his journey from fireman to family man and the friendships he’s forged along the way.

Despite crowd funding enough to breathe life into the project, both have had to continue to work to further fund the expenses associated with it, including travel, fuel, accommodation and equipment.

But after a couple hiccups, the two are set to deliver a final product this year and just released a trailer which gives a surprising insight to Ord’s commitment to his craft.

Swellnet: How did this little project come about?
I'd known Russ for a year or two and we were sitting around one day at his house just listening to his usual rant about the state of the surf industry and the difficulties he was having as a photographer. He was looking back on some of his shots and he mentioned he not been getting any satisfaction with what he had captured. It was all, "Shit, crap, coulda been getting a massage and munching on some cheese and crackers at the time I got that one"..."Too bloody easy"…"My 10 year old could take that shot". Stuff like that; he’s got a funny way with words!

So, I think he’d just gotten to a point of frustration and boredom with the same stuff. He wanted to capture a shot that he could look back on and say “Oh my god...what I had to do to get that shot”. Ultimately, I always thought Ordy was an interesting character and now that he had a mission we both kinda thought it might make a good story.

How did he react to your suggestion that you'd like to make a doco on him?
I think I mentioned it to him there and then. We're not 100% sure exactly who asked the question, but it was pretty exciting to think about the possibilities and the main thing really was getting a chance to work on something together that was our own. We didn't want outside pressures or influences, or having to please anyone but ourselves with the result. We have a lot of that with our usual work, we both just needed to do something for ourselves I think.

Footage aside, how does one actually make a doco...do you storyboard the idea or just roll with it?
I don't know mate, you tell me…

This is my first attempt at something like this and it's been a steep learning curve. But I guess you could say it’s a bit of both really. Knowing what your end goal is, and how to get there is the important thing. We know what Ordy wants to achieve so you can storyboard to a degree on what it takes to get him there. But there's a lot of twists and turns in life and you need to be open and flexible with what you originally had in mind for the story. It's those little unexpected turns that make things interesting.

Is it hard not to let it take over your life?
Mate, I wish it did take over my life…It's definitely always on my mind, but it's the other filming work that's been doing that over the past few years, which has meant a big delay in the delivery of One Shot. I would love to be able to focus solely on this one project, but I have to make a living, and we have to use what we make to buy us time to work on this doco. It's been really difficult to balance and get ahead but we will.

Have you missed anything critical and how do you deal with that?
There's definitely been moments that would have added some good drama to the story which due to a lack of budget, and the inability to hire second shooters, we just couldn’t catch. You're disappointed and get a little down at times, but that's a part of it I guess and you just have to be better prepared the next time. I don't think we've missed anything too critical as of yet, but I've got faith that it'll all work out, so long as we put the effort in.

And what equipment are you using?
The vast majority is being shot with the Canon c300 and the water footage with a Sony FS700, various stabilising gear and mounts.

So what's it going to take to get this over the line - more footage, more money?
Time and money really. We still have a lot more to film to tell this story and as I've already mentioned, I'm not at a stage where I can afford to knock back too much paid work, but this year I'm definitely prepared to take a few more risks financially to see this thing through and I've never seen Ordy more focused on this goal than he is right now.

facebook.com/ordoneshot