Hot Aches was formed in 2003 and is now a thriving film and photography business based out of Edinburgh, Scotland. Our previous production E11 won thirteen international film awards and has become one of the most commercially successful European climbing films ever.

Our photography business is expanding fast with a client base that includes equipment manufacturers, outdoor and climbing magazines (20+ titles worldwide) as well as several mainstream publications.

To find out what the Hot Aches crew have been up to recently, check our regularly updated blog.

Dave directs and produces on many of our projects as well as being an experienced cameraman and photographer. He is also a regular writer in the climbing press.

He has been a climber for 20 years now and manages by virtue of having started at a very low base to still be improving every year. Before 2006 he spent two years travelling and climbing abroad in Europe and North America.

Prior to this he had a career in business and has a long list of qualifications that are of absolutely no use in film making. He points out though that he does have a bit of paper which states that he is meant to know about photography.

Paul also directs, produces and shoots camera and is our main creative editor. To keep his creative juices lubricated he gets to hang out with the assorted musicians and show business people that we have to associate with, as well as getting to hanging out for increasingly long hours in our palatial editing suit.

‘Diff’, to his mates, has also been climbing for donkey’s years but is definitely no longer improving. He does still think he is better than Dave though.

Diff also mountain bikes, usually across Edinburgh with a camera or hard drive on his back as he commutes between our Leith and Haymarket studios. He claims that he goes further afield and gets his tyres muddy occasionally. His former career in IT has been left behind for a life of glamour and success.

On film projects our core team is supplemented by a wide range professionals with various specialisms; camera operators, sound engineers, composers and musicians, graphic designers, copy editors, animators, riggers, narrators, and even on occasions some very welcome porters.

Most winter climbers will be familiar with this affliction. In North America it goes by the more colourful name of the 'screaming barfies'.

The hot aches is a very painfully physical reaction to the cold, most often felt in the hands or feet. When exposed to the cold, blood stops flowing normally to the extremities. Later once you warm up, the blood begins to flow again; this causes the pain known as the hot aches.

Andy Cave describes it well in his fantastic award winning book Learning to Breathe:

"I had the hot aches... As the blood began to creep back into my hands I bowed my head. It felt like small shards of broken glass were being hammered into my fingertips."

As we’re rather too familiar with this condition through our winter climbing and filming, we decided to adopt the name for our production company. 'Screaming Barfies Productions' just didn't sound quite right and so 'Hot Aches Productions' was born.