WI LDLI FE | SERENGET I
When we started Serengeti , for the first time ever, I started on a project with all the technological innovation I needed
SEASON’S COLOURS The production was finished at Evolutions under colourist Blair Wallace. The unvarying look of many Africa-centric productions, Downer feels, is due to a tendency to shoot at a certain time of year, something he was keen to avoid. “Most people filming in Africa film when the grass is short, when the herds are there and they’ve chopped the grass down. It’s starting to dry out and you get a more washed-out kind of look. We filmed in the rainy season, which nobody usually dares do because it’s so easy to get bogged down.” With more rain, dust is laid and foliage flourishes. “When you’ve got a lot of rain, there’s a crystal clarity to the image you don’t often see in Africa. The colours are bright and intense and the greens are intense, everything feels intense. Episode 5 is the drought, and that changes.” Downer
usually it would be four people, or five or six per vehicle, but we tried to keep it to a minimum.” Finding the action, of course, is key to any natural history production. “We’d always have a plan where we were going to go, what we’d filmed before and the characters we were following, but we’d respond to the sounds, what we’d hear and what we’d see, and that would change in an instant. You follow your instincts, really,” explains Downer. Despite the long days and unpredictability of the animals involved, Downer emphatically dismisses any thought of boredom. “You don’t get bored. You can get frustrated, after several days with very little story, but you go out on another day and you may get three bits of incredible story. It’s rewarding, because those bits help you forget the rest.”
compliments Wallace’s attention to exactly this sort of subtlety: “He was amazing, very sensitive to it. I think, for everyone, this project has been a labour of love.” Behind that enthusiasm, though, is a layer of sheer technological capability. “When we started Serengeti , for the first time ever, I started on a project with all the technological innovation I needed,” enthuses Downer. “Obviously, it improves over time, but I’d never been in that situation where everything I’d ever dreamt of, I had. If I’d tried to make it three years previously, I wouldn’t have been able to. And the crew’s amazing: Rich Jones, Michael Richards, Matt Goodman (an incredible drone operator) and Warren Samuels.” Downer’s Spy in the Wild 2 is due to broadcast early in 2020, and work on more Serengeti material was just beginning at the time of writing. SERENGETI, WITH JOHN BOYEGA NARRATING, WAS BROADCAST IN THE UK BY THE BBC. THE US VERSION, NARRATED BY LUPITA NYONG’O, PREMIERED ON THE DISCOVERY CHANNEL IN EARLY AUGUST
52 DEF I N I T ION | SEPTEMBER 20 1 9
Powered by FlippingBook