IF you have ever drooled over sultry shots of Nigella Lawson's cooking or hidden behind the sofa as a battalion of Daleks wreaked havoc, then you may be familiar with Neville Kidd's work.

His cinematography has helped shows such as Sherlock and Doctor Who leap off the small screen and into our homes. Kidd made Glasgow look stunning in BBC Three drama Lip Service and did likewise for Edinburgh and East Lothian in the TV adaptation of Kate Atkinson's Case Histories.

His work on A History of Scotland - as Neil Oliver strode the length and breadth of the country, raven locks blowing in the breeze to dramatic effect - was a powerful love letter to Kidd's homeland. Most recently he showcased Scotland's scenic charms in breathtaking fashion as director of photography on US television series Outlander, based on the best-selling books by Diana Gabaldon.

"I try to make people want to be where I am, that's probably the best way to describe it," says Kidd, when asked the secret to his unique perspective through the lens.

His knack for the visually sublime has unsurprisingly made him much in demand. Testament to his groaning schedule, it has taken an email exchange of equivalent length to War and Peace to set up the interview at all. Kidd is a moving target, a man in perpetual motion.

When we meet at his home on a leafy street in the West End of Glasgow, the 48-year-old has newly returned from six months in Australia where he was filming the television series Childhood's End, based on Arthur C Clarke's science fiction novel.

With little pause to draw breath, Kidd is due to begin shooting the second series of Outlander next month. The show will be filmed on location around Scotland as well as in a purpose-built studio in Cumbernauld which was converted from a former factory by Sony Pictures Television.

Outlander presents an opportunity to not only show off Scotland's dramatic landscapes but its wealth of home-grown talent of cast and crew. Yet, Kidd believes there is more which must be done if Scotland is to truly become a world-class player in the lucrative global film and television market.

"The productions go where the tax breaks are and they go where the studios are - it is as simple as that," he says. "If you have a studio and a tax break combined, then people will come. England is completely full, Wales is taking up a lot of the work, Ireland is full and Northern Ireland has Game of Thrones. Scotland needs to strike quickly and build a studio."

His words echo criticism from leading figures within the film and television industry in recent months that Scotland is lagging behind other parts of the UK and losing out on business because of a lack of studio facilities.

Kidd cites the example of Victoria in Australia, where he recently worked on Childhood's End. "The population of Victoria can't be too different from Scotland but yet it has built its own state-funded studios that bring in productions through tax breaks," he says.

"I do believe Scotland is missing a trick. We all know the Games of Thrones story. They shot the pilot here but there was no studio so they moved to Northern Ireland. That slipped through the net and it shouldn't have."

Kidd studied photography and film at Napier Polytechnic (as it was) in Edinburgh before cutting his teeth as a freelance cameraman for BBC news in 1989. "It is a great learning curve for filming because if you get it wrong, you are sacked - simple as that," he says.

From news he diversified into lifestyle, documentary and drama racking up an impressive body of work that includes Nigella Bites (he shot the pilot episode back in 1999 and has continued to film the gourmet guru over the past 15 years), A History of Scotland, Case Histories and Lip Service. Kidd has also shot some of the famed M&S food ads that had us salivating on our sofas.

Like many of the great and the good within the Scottish film and television industry, Taggart features on his CV. Kidd worked with producer Marcus Wilson on the iconic cop drama in 2010 and when Wilson moved on to Doctor Who, he introduced Kidd to director Nick Hurran.

Kidd and Hurran have forged a strong creative partnership, going on to shoot several episodes of Doctor Who (including the brilliantly chilling Asylum of the Daleks and the show's 50th anniversary special) then later teaming up on hit BBC series Sherlock and most recently Childhood's End.

"Doctor Who was fantastic because I watched the show growing up and was terrified by the Daleks," says Kidd. "The first episode I did was Asylum of the Daleks. When you are in a creepy, dark corridor, and it is just you and a Dalek, it is very funny because you suddenly become a nine-year-old child again. I was in heaven because we had every single Dalek that ever existed in that episode."

He worked with David Tennant, Matt Smith and Peter Capaldi, but Kidd professes that Jon Pertwee remains his favourite Doctor Who. "He was the one I grew up with," he says. "I remember being a bit upset when Tom Baker took over from him. I did grow to like Tom Baker but my memories are of Jon Pertwee as the Doctor and hiding behind the sofa at the scary bits."

The second youngest of four children, Kidd was born in Edinburgh and grew up in Lenzie. His late father, George, worked as a heating engineer and his mother, Lesley, was a housewife.

Kidd describes his formative years as being blessed with the enviable freedom that came from growing up in 1970s. "It was a case of opening the front door, out you go and then disappearing off for the rest of the day," he says. "I remember cycling up the Campsies and going on adventures. The freedom of seventies children was that there was a fraction of the cars on the roads."

It was during his childhood - on family holidays to North Berwick no less - that Kidd's passion for film first blossomed. "Our big treat was to go to the cinema on North Berwick high street," he says. "I would see films like James Bond, Planet of the Apes, Jason and the Argonauts. As a child I thought: 'This is the world I want to create.'"

It is a love which is arguably also in his blood. "My grandfather was part of Edinburgh's standard 8 movie society and my dad would play those family films when I was a child. He then carried on the tradition and filmed us growing up on super 8. I have such happy memories of watching those. It is such intimate and honest film-making."

Kidd is married to Carolynne, 47, a TV and film producer who worked on The Acid House, High Times and Cracked. The couple have four children: Romi, 23, Leon, 17, Millie, 16 and Eliza, 11. Around the living room fireplace, interspersed with photographs of his children, sit a clutch of awards including an Emmy that Kidd won for cinematography on Sherlock last September.

His chosen career path, however, has not been without some mishap, including being bitten by a venomous caterpillar in Jamaica and a dramatic hospital dash while filming Hooked on Fishing in Florida.

"I fell through the live bait well on the boat," he says, recalling the latter incident. "Someone forgot to close the hatch. They caught a sailfish and I picked up the camera, stepped back and disappeared down the hole.

"I fell five feet into around a foot of water. I went into shock and they thought I had punctured my lung. I wasn't able to breathe." He pauses. "This was a week before I got married."

Kidd's memories of subsequent events are hazy, drifting in and out of consciousness as he was stretchered off the boat at Florida Keys and taken to hospital for a battery of tests and X-rays. In one lucid moment he remembers being asked: "What's a ceilidh?"

"The doctors and nurses said: 'You keep asking if you will be able to dance at your ceilidh but we have no idea what a ceilidh is?'" he laughs. "They told me that I was extremely lucky. I didn't have any broken bones but did have an internal bruise that went from one side to the other. It looked like I had been bitten by a shark."

Still bearing his war wounds, Kidd flew home to Scotland a few days later. But a pertinent question hangs in the air: what happened at his wedding? He smiles. "I was able to dance at my ceilidh," he confirms. "I even came off morphine for the day."