The Team

We first met on a British Council project in Austria, organised by two dear friends and mentors, Paul Oxborough and Leo Kaserer. Stier was there to document the event, while Copson led a small team of young journalists running the live element of the project. We connected immediately, drawn together by a shared visual aesthetic and a mutual desire to tell ambitious, human stories on the international stage.

That collaboration sparked a friendship and a creative partnership that grew over years of filmmaking. Copson later supported Stier’s award-winning feature The Last Fisherman, while Stier brought his cinematography to Anattic, Copson’s fast-rising production company. Together they shaped the visual language of campaigns for clients including Metropolis, Porsche and F1 legend Daniel Ricciardo — bonding over challenging shoots, from freezing Cornish boats to sleep-deprived adventures across America and cultural missteps in Japan.

Those shared experiences forged trust and a deep creative shorthand. Even as their individual careers evolved — Stier learning from Oscar-winning cinematographer James Friend BSC ASC, and Copson expanding Anattic’s commercial footprint, they kept reuniting for the occasional project.

When life changes brought Stier back to the North, the timing felt right for James² to take shape. It was born from a shared frustration that too often in film production, budgets disappear into overheads and bureaucracy rather than onto the screen. We believed there was a better way: to combine the visual ambition and emotional truth of high-end documentary and narrative filmmaking, delivered in a lean, collaborative way that puts every pound of value into the client’s final frame.

That belief still drives us. Two filmmakers, one shared instinct — to tell stories that matter with people who care.