It delivered 13 hours of footage, over 13 weeks, covering the history of life on our planet. Breaking new groundĪlthough Disney's nature films began the genre and Jacques Cousteau continued to enthral audiences with the natural world, BBC's Life on Earth documentary broke new ground in 1979. And as cameras get smaller, crews can set up fake rocks and model animals to house cameras designed to capture behaviours never filmed before. Light, agile remote operated drone technology means footage can be taken of a bird in flight, high up in the rain forest canopy or over the ocean's surface to capture whales and dolphins without disturbing them.Īnti-wobble technology means filming is smooth and new techniques and gear deliver a 360-degree shot with water droplets suspended in mid-air, as a whale arcs majestically above the ocean. Now there's no need for a camera person to hang out of a helicopter to take aerial shots of migrating herds or birds. In addition, drones have revolutionised wildlife photography. The technology has also allowed for incredibly smooth footage. In contrast, today's cameras are much smaller and lighter, allowing crews to get into tighter spots and travel deeper into an animal's habitat. In the good old days film makers lugged heavy cameras about, running after their subjects, resulting in some shaky hand cam effects and glimpses of blurry animals racing past. The technologyĪdvances in technology have changed the way nature documentaries are made and the types of footage they can capture. The development of the wildlife documentary means viewers seek more intimate shots, but sometimes the things we want to see just aren't practical or would disturb the animals. The BBC came under fire during its 2011 Frozen Planetseries, when the press and public discovered that a polar bear cub birth scene was actually filmed in a zoo in the Netherlands, rather than an actual den in the Arctic. However, controversy still follows wildlife film crews and production teams. In addition, behind-the-scenes footage has become part of the joy of the nature documentary, showing us the gear, the hardship and the reward when they get that crucial shot. Today's wildlife documentaries take years to make, with natural history film makers spending months at a time in inhospitable conditions to try and film snow leopards or other rare creatures. The filmmakers shipped in lemmings and pushed them off cliffs in attempt to get the footage they needed to tell their chosen story! Most infamous of all is the White Wilderness, which aimed to show the migration of hundreds of lemmings. Infamously, some nature documentaries have manipulated the truth in order to deliver the drama and tension that makes for a memorable wildlife sequence. The nature documentary began with Disney's White Wilderness in 1958 and it has come a long way since then. It's this connection that makes it easy to see the appeal of great apes, which is why wildlife photographers and documentary makers keep focusing on these beautiful animals. Looking into the deep brown eyes of a gorilla or chimpanzee feels like looking into the eyes of our ancestors our living relatives. Natural history television's love for gorillas & great apes
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