London Event Gives Insight Into How Nature Photography Borrows From Military

The International Moving Image Society's annual awards ceremony Tuesday in London offered rare insights into the world of nature photography and revealed the extent to which it now depends on declassified military technology. “Because animals can’t be directed like actors, we now shoot in 5K or better and pan and track within the frame area at the post-production stage,” said Julian Hector, who heads the BBC’s Natural History Unit (NHU). Very-long-focus telephoto shots from a helicopter are now possible only due to a recently declassified, gyro-stabilized camera pod, mounted outside the cabin and remotely controlled from inside, he said. The NHU is starting to use drones developed for military surveillance, and Ultra HD cameras are now small enough to be mounted on animals, he said. Since “nighttime is the right time for wildlife shooting,” the NHU uses declassified image intensifiers or thermal imaging cameras developed for nighttime military operations, but resolution is very poor, he said. Asked about the possibility of shooting color at night instead of the black and white captured by infrared image intensifiers or thermal imagers, Colin Jackson, innovation producer at the BBC, said: “It’s almost there, but I hope we don’t do it because what we humans see at night is monochrome.” Hector totally disagrees, he said. Color would “let us tell the story from the animals’ point of view,” he said.