Having worked out what we were trying to show, the next job for us was to find the people who would wish to appear in our film. We aimed to get as wide a range of participants as possible - different approaches, different parts of the UK, different specialities from across the profession. Some people run a mile at the though of having a camera pointed at them, but for others it feels the right thing to do. By the end of December a dozen people had very kindly signed up to be filmed - so then we had to decide on a day.

I chose January 15th, the date that the league tables for GCSE performance were being announced. As a filmmaker, that was very useful for me because I could use it as a way to bind together the different stories. I guessed that people up and down England would be talking about league tables - whether they loved them or hated them.

Our sort of film-making is sometimes called "fly on the wall" - but personally I think that is a bit of a daft name. Three people standing in the corner of a room with a camera and a sound boom are anything but tiny flies. The way we aim to approach our filming is through openness and trust. It's only then that people behave naturally in front of the cameras.

The best way to get that trust is to spend time with people. All our directors filmed with our contributors before the big day, getting everybody used to having a camera around. However when the filming has started we also try our best to blend into the background. We don't have lights, we don't shout action and we never call people "darling".

The actual filming day went very smoothly. I was filming David Miliband in Whitehall, and I was dreading getting an emergency call from an irate Head Teacher or a sobbing Director during the day - but all was bliss and the mobile remained silent.

The Directors returned from the length and breadth of the UK with over a hundred hours of rushes between them. Then the Editor and the Producer spent sight weeks locked away in a small dark editing room weaving it all together. Some of the stories that we filmed on the day didn't make it into the final film - I think we were rather over optimistic about how much we could squeeze into a single hour of television!

Whatever you think of our film, I would love to hear your comments. Please let me know through the Send Us Your Comments page.

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