(Image: CHANNEL 4)
Amanda Owen has revealed there are "no scripts" and "no second takes" when cameras follow her family, recalling how her children once flatly refused a production crew's request to repeat a scene.
The Yorkshire Shepherdess has opened up about how Our Farm Next Door: Amanda, Clive and Kids is filmed ahead of the programme returning for a fourth series.
Amanda, former husband Clive and their nine children originally became familiar faces to millions through Channel 5's Our Yorkshire Farm, which documented their unconventional family life at remote Ravenseat in Swaledale.
Their lives are now followed by cameras for Our Farm Next Door, which combines everyday life at Ravenseat with the family's ambitious restoration of neighbouring farmhouse Anty John's.
Clem, Nancy and Annas at Ravenseat (Image: CHANNEL 4)
But Amanda insists what viewers see is not recreated for the cameras.
Speaking at Our Farm Next Door: A Behind-the-Scenes Celebration at Everyman Northallerton on Wednesday, September 30, she explained just how important authenticity is to the programme.
Amanda said: "What you see is what you get on the screen. What's happening on any given day on the farm is what's on your screens.
"There's no script, no reruns, no second takes, it's authentic and raw."
She then recalled one incident from the early days of filming at Anty John's which put that approach to the test.
Amanda said: "I remember when they first started filming at Anty John's and the kids disappeared up this tree, and the production crew said to them, 'Could you do that again?' and the kids said, 'No', and that was that."
Amanda Owen explains why trust matters behind the scenes
Amanda said the relationship between her family and the team making the programme is crucial to allowing cameras to capture their lives naturally.
She added: "I think it wouldn't work if there wasn't that trust with us and the production company or if it was scripted.
"It's unashamedly us and we will always do that, and I think that's why it resonates with all of the audience."
The comments came during a Royal Television Society Yorkshire event devoted to the making of Our Farm Next Door.
The programme is produced by Leeds-based Wise Owl Films, with the RTS event bringing together Amanda and members of the team behind the series to discuss how the family's life in the Yorkshire Dales is captured for television.
The approach means events on the farm cannot necessarily be recreated simply because a camera operator missed the perfect shot.
It also means the Owen children, several of whom have spent much of their childhoods appearing on television, are not being asked to repeatedly perform moments from their everyday lives.
That is set to continue when cameras return to Ravenseat and Anty John's for the new series.
Filmed across winter 2025 and spring 2026, the fourth series follows the family from Christmas through to the busy Easter lambing season.
Viewers will also see the Anty John's restoration enter its third year, with painting and flooring beginning inside the farmhouse and the family attempting to bring a piped water supply across the moors.
But despite the increasingly ambitious project at the heart of the programme, Amanda says the principle behind filming remains straightforward.
"What you see is what you get on the screen," she said.