WILDLIFE filming and photography runs in the family for Sam Kirby, and so he was well prepared for a four-week placement in India filming badly-behaved monkeys for the National Geographic channel.

Mr Kirby, 21, of Chase Road in Upper Colwall, travelled to Jaipur with Bristol-based company Off the Fence, which employs his brother Adam.

While there he worked as a camera assistant filming the antics of the area’s notoriously naughty macaque monkeys for the third series of National Geographic’s award-winning Monkey Thieves.

One of the main challenges faced by Mr Kirby and the crew was to film the macaques swimming underwater.

This was done by attaching cameras to rocks which were then positioned under the water.

“It was not actually all that difficult in the end, it was more simply the fact that it was not something that had been done before,” he said.

Mr Kirby’s father is also a wildlife cameraman and his mother is a photographer, and he is keen to pursue a full-time career in the industry.

“The trip to India was an amazing experience. It was a bit of a culture shock at first as it was just so colourful and there was so much going on everywhere,” he said. “It was a fantastic opportunity.”

Mr Kirby is now looking forward to travelling to Peru for a fortnight next month (August), where he will be filming with Off the Fence for a programme called Wildest South America.