Guillaume Charton, president of the Queenstown Climbing Club, has been an alpine rock-climber since the age of 5 and was taught by his mountain guide grandfather. The French language teacher at Wakatipu High School has taken photographs while climbing since he was 16 for outdoor magazines.
His guide book, Queenstown Rock, Ice and Mixed, has sold well since its release in October last year.
However, Mr Charton said he wanted to add the extra dimension of time to his pictures and began making short films two years ago.
Two of his shorts have been entered and selected for the Mountain Film Festival for the first time.
"They are a tribute to the local do-ers," he said.
Mr Charton said Hawk Wall is four minutes of climber Johann Navarian, a Frenchman residing in Queenstown, "scaling a steep and powerful route", 50m high on schist rock near Wye Creek. It is presented in the short film session, on Friday, July 3.
The 10-minute South Wye stars French climber Estelle Poiron and English climber Tony Burnell, both of Queenstown, as they scale a cliff more than 100m high, with Lake Wakatipu in the background.
"Tony describes his climb on South Wye as his masterpiece, as he was the first to ascend," Mr Charton said.
South Wye features in the Saturday, July 4 programme.
Mr Charton films while climbing alongside his subjects. He uses a HDR-HC9 camera and a monopod to film up to 2m away from the rock face.
"First is safety and second is taking footage... A minute of film is about 10 hours of post-production."
Mr Charton invited high school pupils to compose the soundtracks. DJ Philipp Schauffer, MC Dylan Berclaz and singer Micki Brown (all 17) created five original drum 'n bass tracks for both shorts.
• The New Zealand Mountain Film Festival runs at the Lake Wanaka Centre, from July 3 to 7. www.mountainfilm.net.nz
