Bertie Gregory ’s honorable depictions of the highs and lows of wildlife filmmaking made him a global hit onsocial medium . go withNational Geographic , his approach brings viewers behind the lens to get a better idea of what it ’s really like go out into the subject field to take some of Earth ’s most awe-inspiring , and sometimes dangerous , wild animals .
“ Epic ” is in all likelihood a meet word to describe his escapade , then , and you may follow along in his late serial publication , Epic Adventures With Bertie Gregory , which air onDisney + from September 8 . Ahead of its release , we caught up with Gregory to find out more about his experiences on the serial , from finding his headspring in the mouth of a leopard seal to trying to film from inside a bait ball .
What can people expect fromEpic Adventures With Bertie Gregorythat they might not get from your middling wildlife docudrama ?
POV: A friendly leopard seal wants to say hey. Image credit: National Geographic for Disney+
We have function for the adult , most challenging wildlife spectacles and consequence that are out there , which I ’m sure you would look from a normal wildlife documentary . But what makesEpic Adventuresdifferent is that copulate with those incredible wildlife events is our crowd ’s adventure to find those animals and endeavor to film them .
I think what that does is it help to make the wildlife events more substantial . It also mean that we can be quite funny sometimes , because we show you the things that go wrong . We ’re by all odds very , very far from being perfect and always slick .
I think also , and most importantly , because we ’ve got people in the show , we can place the amazing wildlife events that we take within a bigger environmental context . So often , the menace that animate being and wildlife facial expression are sort of brushed over in wildlife docudrama . They can mislead the spectator into thinking that they ’re in these wild , untouched place when the realism is wild places are in big trouble .
Gregory inside the Mackerel bait ball. Image credit: National Geographic/Johnny Rogers for Disney+
I should say that while it can all get very doom and glumness and cheerless , we have work with some awful people already doing great things to lay aside these animate being and reverse these trends . A great representative of that is in the Antarctic episode – definitely our most challenging sequence – we tried to film thebiggest gathering of fin whales in Antarctica . Miraculously , we supervise it . We repeat the world record , which was very exciting . We get word 300 whales , all together with thousands of penguins , and Albatross and seals all having this gargantuan political party .
What ’s exciting about that , is that 50/60/70 long time ago , even more recently than that , these assembly did n’t happen because of commercial whaling in Antarctica . It hammer fin whale populations in the Southern Ocean down to about 2 pct of their original population . But , thanks to theban on commercial whalingin the 70s , they ’ve slow started to make a comeback .
In one of your earlier Instagram videos , you ’re gettinghanded starfish by Steller ’s sea lions , and in this latest serial publication I think we see your head in the mouth of a leopard seal . How does it liken act upon with animate being on either end of the risk spectrum ?
The constraints of filming underwater put the crew in fin’s reach of their subjects. Image credit: National Geographic for Disney+
Yeah , so that that was an interesting one because they ’re two very different encounters , but in reality quite like as well . So , a leopard stamp is essentially like diving event with a dragon . The style that they move in the water , they look just like a dragon out ofGame of Thrones . And when you first see it come out of the gloom towards you , it ’s pretty terrifying .
It ’s a big , intimidating predatory animal with a monumental head and loads of grown teeth . They ’re called a Panthera pardus seal of approval for a grounds . They ’re really well armed and they are penguin - killing machines . And just like the Steller sea Lion in the video that you mentioned , they do n’t have hands . So , when they see something new and eldritch , they require to know what this new fetid object is .
I think when you have these really close down - up animal showdown , being a wildlife expert is really important . Because on the face of it , that ’s very scary because they come fly at you . They do n’t have hand ; they use their teeth instead . And they pop out to put my camera and my head and my arms in their sass , and they ’re just trying to finger what you are .
“If you’ve seen Thunderball, the James Bond film with the underwater scooters, we were using those. It was very, very exciting,” - Bertie Gregory on filming whales. Image credit: National Geographic for Disney+
Now , knowing wildlife is important because if you did n’t know wildlife , you ’d think you were being attacked and being eat , and you would intelligibly be very frightened . The animals totally reflect your body language . So , if you ’re really nervous and tense , they get really nervous and tense . But I recognise that if this Panthera pardus stamp wanted to actually round me , it would have hunted me like it does a penguin . It would have issue forth out of nowhere , probably from behind , and it all would have been over very quickly . The fact that this leopard Navy SEAL was moving easy and calmly meant that this was not a predatory encounter .
That aver , you need to say these animal ’s body language and this massive female that we were interacting with , she was receive more and more brave , more and more confident , more and more mad . And that ’s when take their consistency oral communication is really important , because it got to a point where she started blow bubble which is the outset of a scourge reaction . So , as soon as she did that , I seem at Dan , the individual take me , and we did n’t in reality need to say anything to each other . We both got out and it was all good , and she blend in back to wipe out penguin .
I imagine sometimes it ’s easier tell than done , taking a hint to measure their doings like that ?
Gregory, calm and collected, on location. Image credit: National Geographic/Bertie Gregory for Disney+
I mean , it ’s almost like reading humans in a pothouse . You look around the room and there ’s hoi polloi that are smiling at you and really friendly . So , you know they ’re the people that you could hang up out with . And then there ’s the guy in the corner that ’s red faced and really angry . It ’s all about just reading body linguistic communication and going : " I ’m gon na ’ go and talk to them . I ’m not going to go and talk to him . "
That ’s got to be the first prison term anyone ’s ever compare leopard seals to being a pub . Any other wild stories from shoot ?
Yeah , so , in the dolphin pursuance episode we were going to try and film a super - pod of spinner dolphin … They can be five- or even 10,000 - strong , but we in reality failed spectacularly . That ’s what I have it off about this series . The adventure is to find these animals , so we can be honest if we fail , and I think it ’s important to sing about . It ’s sluttish to scroll through Instagram and just see the great unwashed winning all the clock time .
And really , in my thought , what we found was more spectacular and more brain blowing than what we were go for , which is the way Mother Nature puzzle out … When you ’re looking for fauna at ocean , birds are your friend . They are commonly the sign of the zodiac that something bigger is underwater . So , we see these Bronx cheer derive down , I jumped in , and there was just this big globe . It was probably the size of a braggart automobile made up of mackerel , maybe six inches long . They were all turning in on themselves in a really tight musket ball .
There were also tuna the same size as me aviate past at 50 miles an hour [ 80 klick per minute ] , hundreds of them in all directions and then the dolphins were getting involve . It was a massive eating frenzy . Now at that dot , some of the mackerel suddenly work : " huh , what ’s that weird matter that ’s not moving like a marauder ? I marvel if we can use that to hide around ? "
So , this entire elevator car - sized ball of Pisces the Fishes suddenly just shape shifted and sucked all around me , and the fish were snuff it in my swim shorts . They were shove into the monitor of the camera , the sieve of the television camera and just everywhere . It was just black , wriggling fish everywhere but I could still hear the tunny hitting the ball that I was in . And yeah , it was a bit shivery .
So , I imagine , well , the predators are going to be below me but not above me . If I just swim down , hopefully all of the action will drive the fair game off of me and they ’ll get pinned at the surface and then the behaviour can keep going . So that ’s on the dot what I did . I punch my way down out of the bottom of this this ball of fish , and then look back up and the shot is in the film .
I guess that ’s a day you wish well you ’d gone for blind drunk lawsuit over shorts .
Yeah , emphatically
Does winding up in the drama like that happen often ?
Generally , as a documentarian , you ’re sample to not influence what ’s going on . The challenge with take underwater is that when you ’re on land , you may be 100 meters [ 328 foot ] aside and employ a braggart , long zoom electron lens to get the viewer close . Whereas underwater , the maximal visibility you ’re going to get is 30 meters , say 90 feet at best . That entail that to get clean-cut shots you need to be really near to the animal .
So , the animals by and large have intercourse that you ’re there and they take to be accept of you in the environment , which is in reality a really knowledgeable way to be with animals . When an beast really screw you ’re there , and is going about its day-to-day liveliness , that ’s really cool .
[ In the same episode as the dolphinfish ] we were filming pilot giant , which are actually a very big dolphinfish despite their name . And we were using underwater scooters – if you ’ve seenThunderball , the James Bond film with the submerged water scooter , we were using those . It was very , very exciting – and as I was zooming alongside the pilot whales , they kind of accepted me as part of the environment . Then they all come out to go to sleep in front of me , and if an animate being is going to sleep that is like the ultimate honour . I just slowed right down and just pay heed out with them while they had a nap .
What do you savor most about being a wildlife movie maker ?
I love spending time with fauna and getting up close and personal with them , but on top of that , what I incur really lucky about my job is that I get to work with warhead of really incredible citizenry . Whilst my name is in the deed [ of this serial ] , there ’s an enormous team of people both back in Bristol at Wildstar Films , which is the yield company we ’ve made this serial with , but then also in the airfield , we work with incredible experts .
In Antarctica for example , to shoot the whale we were film off of a 75 understructure [ 23 meter ] high sailboat with three gravy boat crew . It was captained by an Australian call Ben Wallace , who ’s been going to Antarctica longer than I ’ve been alive , and he was always trying to crusade the limit of what is possible because he is just so comfortable .
In such an extreme environment where there ’s 75 mph [ 120 km / h ] wind instrument , there ’s iceberg altercate down the side of the gravy boat at nighttime , just crazy material bump . But he is just chill . That is just normal . When you ’ve got someone like that to rely on , it just means your bound is so much bigger . So , that ’s by all odds a big high spot of it : the friendships that you make on these sort of expedition .
What advice would you give to people who desire to get into the competitive field of wildlife filmmaking , but are n’t quite indisputable where to start ?
first , that your noesis of wildlife is so much more important than your knowledge of cameras . So , if you do n’t have approach to a tv camera that ’s not actually a trouble . That ’s not a roadblock initially , because you may be technically the best camera person in the reality , but if you do n’t have it away how to get close to animals without disturb them , you ’re useless . The good elbow room to learn how to do that is through experience . Nothing beats spending time out of doors , seek to sneak up on animals .
So , I would say the first and foremost important affair is to spend every here and now of your trim time outside , learning to sneak up on animals . Also , get to know wildlife experts . Reach out to them online , ask them for advice . You just need to be a elephantine sponge .
Once you ’ve started doing that , if you do n’t yet have entree to a camera , it does n’t have to be something amazing . It can even be on your earphone . I get sent a crew of videos every day from people wanting to get into wildlife film , and I ’m always most impressed when someone ’s made an unbelievable film on like an iPhone rather than a $ 20,000 camera apparatus because that is a far unspoilt demonstration of how skilful you are in term of your field craft and your ability to get tightlipped to animals .
I intend on the brass of it , it ’s really competitive , but I call back , actually , if you want it really , really bad , you will rise above a lot of that contention . Because a good deal of people say that they want to get into wildlife film , but actually when it comes down to it , you necessitate to be the person that is you jazz willing to miss your best friend ’s birthday … [ You have to ] go for it and be really single - apt towards it . Because it is competitive … but actually if you want it really bad and you need it more than the competition , you could get that for sure .
Epic Adventures With Bertie Gregoryis available on Disney+ from September 8
