THE beauty to be found in the landscape and working life of rural Teesdale has inspired a local filmmaker to capture it on video.

Beautiful Teesdale is named after a poem by the late Walter Dent Bayles and has the subtitle A Country Lad at Home, the country lad in question being David Rabbitts of Cotherstone.

The video, which is the fourth produced by Mr Rabbitts, aims to show the delicate balance struck between those who work the land in the upper dale and its undisturbed natural beauty. His previous work includes Sights and Sounds of the High Country, in which he concentrated mainly on the flora and fauna of the dale.

This time around he has married Bayles' poetry well with the images portrayed to give an accurate flavour of what it is like to live and work in a deeply rural area.

Included are farm diversification schemes, such as drystone waller Lawrence Staley, who produces exquisite and painstaking glass engraving, and Trevor Dixon, who reproduces miniature landscapes featuring drystone walls. Also featured is the making of Cotherstone cheese and the spinning and knitting of Val Metcalfe.

Mr Rabbitts began filmmaking in 1991 and calls this his "fourth serious one", having made others about a trip to the Falkland Islands. He has also compiled a CD of Bayles' poetry, which was released in 2001.

"I wanted to show the dale as a living thing, not just a place for tourists but a living market," he said.

The video will be shown on a big screen at the UTASS offices in Middleton in Teesdale later this month. Tickets have already sold out. But those not lucky enough to have one can purchase the video instead. It is available from UTASS, Middleton tourist information centre, the Teesdale Mercury shop in Barnard Castle, or from Mr Rabbitts on 01833 650384. It costs £13.99 for a video or £14.99 for DVD.