Belfast director Aoife McArdle is not one for the limelight, but quietly and diligently she has amassed a body of quality work that speaks for itself.
"I really immersed myself in those worlds of shooting, editing and lighting and you had to do that for everyone else's work too, so it kind of threw you in at the deep end in a great way. "That was about 2010 or 2011 - the videos for smaller artists were good because they were very narrative-led and you got creative control, the beauty of them is that you really learn to conceptualise and come up with ideas.
The dystopian series explores the idea of severing your work and personal personas, so that one has no memory of the other and the complications and dilemmas that come with that. "The themes of what it means to be a work drone, working for this faceless machine, I think a lot of us feel like that way a lot of the time, especially any one of us who has done a job we don't like.The show has been a runaway success, garnering 14 Emmy nominations for its first season and the Directors Guild of America , nominating Aoife in the Dramatic Series category for her directorial work.
"I want to work with people I respect and I've said yes when those opportunities come up and sometimes you say no when opportunities come up.Aoife said it helped that she lives in Belfast and can afford to pursue projects she is truly passionate about, rather than worrying about having to take on extra work to pay the bills that would exist in a pricier city.