Demelza sent through this article after the pitch so I've read it and taken some quotes that sounded cool/might translate visually.
Quotes from the article ‘Treading Water’ by Jo Croft:
"‘imagining the sky weighing down on the sea and the sea holding up the atmosphere," - where the sea meets the sky, mirror images
"ebb and flow" - in and out, contrasts
"The sight of water, even if it is through the glass walls of the Leisure Centre, seems like an invitation: ‘Come on in. The water’s lovely." - just like this phrase
"And so the Liverpool Bay Tide Timetable becomes my slightly off-kilter metronome, replacing the boundaries set by my local pool’s opening times (‘public swim – 12 to 3pm’) with another equally insistent timeframe" - metronome, routines
"forms of oscillation – patterns of feeling involving a kind of affective ‘back and forth’ – between movement and stasis ... states of dissipation, hesitation and ambivalence."
"idea of the swimmer as abject spectacle" - want to avoid making the camera into a voyeur
Photos from trips to Portabello beach, taken Nov. 2021
Quotes from 'swims', a long poem by Elizabeth Jane Burnett:
"-Swimming is continuous, only the rivers are intermittent."
Other feedback on the pitch:
water is connected to femininity in so many cultures
water is connected to motherhood, "water of the womb", we're making a film about Peer's mother
With all this stuff in mind, I wrote a poem which has nothing to do with Wild Swimming accept the title. Although I guess it does deal with the intersection between womanhood and water. Too embarrassed to post it here so you'll just have to take my word for it.