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Features / Case Studies (Stories from around the wildlife film-making world!) Page 4
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Wildscreen festival 2014

Wildscreen Festival 2012 Panda Award Winners!
by Jason Peters
19th October 2012


  • Animal Behaviour Award – Jungle Book Bear – Gulo Films Ltd, NDR ARTE ORF BBC Nat Geo Wild ZDF 
  • Films @ 59 Sound Award – Frozen Planet - To the Ends of the Earth – BBC/Discovery Channel
  • Earth Sciences Award – How to Grow a Planet - Life from Light – BBC Scotland
  • Panasonic Cinematography Award – Frozen Planet - Winter – BBC/Discovery Channel
  • Theatrical Award – African Cats – Disneynature
  • Music Award – Last Lions – Dereck and Beverley Joubert. National Geograhic, Wildlife Films and National Geographic Entertainment
  • Short Film Award – Secret Life of Plankton – Tierney Thys, Parafilms Christian Cardet
  • Campaign Award – TRUST Alaska – Witness, Children's Trust & iMatter Campaign
  • Script Award – How to Boil a Frog – Fools Bay Entertainment
  • Disneynature Innovation Award – Hippo: Nature's Wild Feast – Tigress Productions
  • 3D Award – Flying Monsters – Atlantic Productions for BskyB
  • BBC Newcomer Award – Water Brothers - Valley of the Damned – SK Films
  • The Nature Conservancy Environment & Conservation Award – Saving Rhino Phila – NHU Africa
  • Editing Award – The Green Universe – Natural History Germany/NDR Naturfilm/Doclights
  • Discovery People and Nature Award – My Life as a Turkey – – Passion Pictures for BBC /WNET
  • Presenter-led Award – How to Grow a Planet: Life from Light – Professor Ian Stewart/BBC Scotland
  • Award to promote filmmakers from developing countries – Ganga - Ribbon of Life – Cinema Vision india / History Channel
  • UWE Popular Broadcast Award – Meet the Sloths – Blink Entertainment/Pink Tree Frog Prods
  • Series Award – Joint winners - Frozen Planet & Human Planet – BBC/Discovery Channel
  • Jury's Special Selection for Screening – Hummingbirds: Jewelled Messengers – Terra Mater Factual Studios/Free Spirit Films 
  • New Media Award – XBox Kinect - America the Wild – Grizzly Creek Films/ Microsoft X-Box Studios/ Nat Geo WILD/Relentless Software
  • Children's Choice Award – Super Smart Animals – BBC/Dicovery Channel
  • WWF Golden Panda Award – My Life as a Turkey – Passion Pictures for BBC /WNET
  • Outstanding Achievement Award – Alastair Fothergill. Outstanding Achievement Award: Alastair Fothergill

Well done to the organisers of the Wildscreen Festival for another successful, inspiring and entertaining event in Bristol. Huge congratulations to all of the winners and especially to our members who were involved in the winning films... We are so pleased that NHU Africa won the Environment and Conservation award for Saving Rhino Phila, executive produced by Vyv Simson and Sophie Vartan... A very worthy winner and we hope it does wonders for the organisation. The Campaign Award went to TRUST AlaskaWitness, Children's Trust & iMatter Campaign, which was supported by the MFA in Science and Natural History Filmmaking and accepted by Dennis Aig... A fascinating and powerful short film abou17-year old Nelson Kanuk who explains why permafrost melt, floods, erosion and intense storms threaten homes, communities and culture. Through Nelson's story we begin to understand the complexity of human and environmental damage caused by climate change and their hopes for a livable future. The ever effervescent and wonderful Oliver Goetzl and the quieter but equally marvelous Ivo Nörenberg from Gulo Film Productions were favourites of ours to win the Animal Behaviour Award for Jungle Book Bear, so we are thrilled for them.

Friend and member Gaby Bastyra was the AP on the fantastically innovative and beguiling film My Life as a Turkey, which won both the People and Nature Award and the WWF Golden Panda Award, and a hugely popular win it was too.. Well done Gaby and all of the team at Passion Pictures!! (The film also won an Emmy last month for Outstanding Cinematography and Outstanding Nature Programming, this added to a plethora or other awards, including one for Best Writing at Jackson Hole Wildlife Film Festival 2011! See: www.planet.passion-pictures.com)

Also, congratulations to Alastair Fothergill for his Outstanding Achievement Award... Presented by surprise guest, Sir David Attenborough, the award is given to an organisation or individual that has made a globally significant contribution to wildlife filmmaking, conservation and/or the public's understanding of the environment... Alastair has contributed more than many, so it's well deserved! (And he was very nice to me (Jason) when I did work experience at the BBC NHU many years ago! :)

Check out some of the fabulous photos from the night - and the rest of the Festival by going here.

All Wildscreen Delegates get a whopping 67% off a years full membership of Wildlife-film.com – Go here to get it: www.wildlife-film.com/wildscreen-delegates

 

Wildlife Film-making: Looking to the Future

The Secret Life of the Sparrowhawk
by David Culley
12th October 2012

After three years of studying the secret lives of sparrowhawks, I needed someone to film it all and as I was not a cameraman, I approached Piers Warren, who kindly advertised it for me on Wildlife-film.com hoping someone may want to do the camerawork for me – It would be a world first. I did not want to film falconers birds but the footage was to be entirely of wild birds.

I had no replies from anyone, so I rang a few of our best cameramen who were either not interested or said it’s virtually impossible to do, so I set out to do it myself! I sold everything I could, even my car, so that I could buy the equipment needed to film the sparrowhawks.

I had to learn fast and my first three years were spent filming every day from first light until dark for ten months of the year from November, when the male returns to his territory, to August, when all the hawks disperse. I also had to film nineteen songbird species that choose to nest right next to their killer and discover what the reason was for them to do this.

Another four years of filming took place plus traveling up to Scotland to capture some necessary moments. Studying the hawks’ lives, and consequently filming them, has taken 10 years. With help, I could have achieved the film in two seasons, with other cameramen scattered around the copse in different locations, but on my own I would sit in one place for a few months and all activity would be happening the other side of the copse. I would move and the hawks would go to where I’d just moved from and if you missed a particular behaviour, you have to wait another year! I learnt their every movement and knew where they sat, ate, did courtship and could predict when eggs are laid and even knew when the first egg was due.

The sparrowhawk is Chris Packham’s favourite British bird of prey, especially the male, and he was flattered to be asked to narrate my film. I’ve had some great help and advice along my mammoth journey from Sir David Attenborough, David Cobham, Professor Ian Newton and Chris Sperring MBE and I’m producing limited edition DVDs with signatures on the front cover of:

  • Sir David Attenborourgh - Need I say anything about this amazing man.
  • Chris Packham - TV Presenter, Broadcaster and good friend.
  • David Cobham - Famous for Producing and Directing Tarka The Otter.
  • Professor Ian Newton - Wrote the book The Sparrowhawk and spent many years studying there lives.
  • Chris Sperring - Of the Hawk and Owl Trust
  • David Culley - Filmed, Directed and produced The Secret Lives of The Sparrowhawk.

These will be auctioned off to raise money to be split between the Hawk and Owl Trust and Hawk Conservancy. (This will also be a first having all these hand signed signatures together on the DVD cover of a film.) Bid on one of the signed Limited Edition DVD's of The Secret Life of the Sparrowhawk

The DVD will be available from around the 28th October, this is a world first and all of my footage is of wild birds and animals nothing faked by using pet birds or animals.

Praise for the film:

Chris Packham
“Watched your film . It is absolutely fabulous! It looks superb and reveals such extraordinary intimacy. I love the pace and for me the sparse commentary works well because the story tells itself so beautifully. There are too many special moments to list but what I like most is the private lives of this one pair of birds combined with so many new revelations about the species. And most of all they look stunning. Dave, it is a triumph. Stunning. Brilliant.”

Professor Ian Newton
“I enjoyed our talk and your film, which I have watched another twice since you left. It really is a cracking film, and deserves to do well. You have done a great job.”

Steve Greenwood, BBC, Natural World
“David Attenborough has passed on your sparrowhawk film to me. Congratulations! It has the making of a really first class film. You have captured some great behaviour that is very insightful and you also have a great eye for a composed shot. I also love the other wildlife in the film and the sympathetic way that you have put it together.”

Chris Sperring MBE
"Just back from filming the barn owls. Had a look and wow I'm stunned this is absolutely brilliant!!!! The Sparrowhawk needs friends and boy these shots are stunning to say the least."

African Conservation Foundation - World Rhino Day


Get your copy by going here - www.sparrowhawk-island.co.uk Only £20.00 (including P&P)


Festival de l'Oiseau et de la Nature

Filmmakers For Conservation

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Wildeye

Environmental Investigation Agency

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