A few months back I posted a short video clip with the introduction to North-eastern Diaries. I’m pleased and excited to announce that the first chapter titled: Kaziranga – Land of the Rhino and the Tiger has been nominated for a Green Oscar Panda Award at the Wildscreen Film Festival which happens once every two years in Bristol, UK.

The Wildscreen Festival is internationally acknowledged as the most influential and prestigious event of its kind in the world. Its aim is to celebrate, applaud and encourage excellence, and responsibility, in wildlife and environmental filmmaking – films which increase the global viewing public’s understanding of the natural world, and the need to conserve it.

The short documentary is about 20 minutes in duration and captures unique aspects of tiger behaviour. At the same time that this documentary was completed, it was announced that Kaziranga supports the highest density of tigers in the world – nearly 32 tigers for every 100 sq. kms. But this doesn’t mean that seeing a tiger here is easy! The dense grassland combined with the secretive habits so inherent of tigers, makes them nearly invisible.  With the use of camera-trap technology and patient waiting in the hide I was able to document first-hand not one, but several different tigers coming to feed on a rhino carcass. Here’s a short video compilation of my days sitting in a hide and being a spy in the jungle…

The Team: Working on documentaries usually involves a small crew of people in the field and another group of people sitting and working in the studio, editing the rushes. In this case, we had what’s called a micro-crew, which involved mostly Chinmay Rane, Lahaan the forest gaurd and I working in the field to get the shots during the day, and spending the night editing the footage. It was no doubt a difficult process, but the rewards have been more than satisfactory.

The Equipment: Another unique aspect of this particular documentary is that it was all shot on the new breed of HD-DSLR Cameras. The cameras I used on this project include the: Canon 5DMarkII, the Canon 1DMarkIV,  Canon T2i, Canon 450D and the tiny but excellent, GoProHD Cam. More information and reviews about these cameras can be found in their respective linked pages on Amazon.  We did use a Sony Z1 camera for one of the sequences that was shot late last year, but that only comprises a flashback sequence about 2mins in duration.

The advantage of using this equipment, apart from the fact that they’re smaller, more versatile, and higher quality than my High-Definition Panasonic AJ-HDX900 camcorder is that they allow me to film late into the evening, when even with my naked eyes, I can’t see what’s going on. The Canon 1DMarkIV allows you to film with reasonably little noise even up to 12000 ISO. I mean the camera does allow you to go upto a 100,000 ISO, but in the tests I made, the results were best when kept within the limits. Okay, before I digress and go on about equipment, I best stop and save that for a different post.

Other Panda Award Nominations from India:

In the same catogegory as mine, which is Wildscreen’s Award to promote filmmakers from developing countries is The Wild Meat Trail by Dusty Foot Productions (India) Filmmakers – Rita Banerji & Shilpi Sharma

In the Animal Behaviour category is Krupakar & Senani’s  Wild Dog series titled – The Pack, produced for Animal Planet International (USA).  I just had the opportunity to watch the five-part series last night and it’s simply brilliant!! Some amazingly rare moments captured on camera, a testament to the two years of patience and dedication it took to produce the series.