As a passionate sportsman and skier he contacted the Mountain film-pioneer Arnold Fanck who made a film in the Tyrolean area of Arlberg in 1927.
Together with other already famous actors like Leni Riefenstahl, Hannes Schneider, Rudi Matt, Gustav Diessl and the pilot Ernst Udet Walter Riml played also in Abenteuer im Engadin or S.O.S.
Walter Riml played the tall carpenter "Fietje" from Hamburg together with his petite carpenter-partner "Tietje" Guzzi Lantschner, both in the traditional black woodworker costumes.
Walter Riml was interested in becoming a professional cameraman and very soon into his career he got his visual education from two famous cameramen Hans Schneeberger and Richard Angst.
Because of his visual talents Leni Riefenstahl committed to him as her still-photographer and as a second cameraman for her first movie Das blaue Licht (The Blue Light).
In 1962 the American director John Sturges engaged him as a second cameraman for his film The Great Escape [1] with stars like Steve McQueen, Richard Attenborough and Charles Bronson.