Article Summary:

The Washington Post has reviewed and commented on Chris Palmer’s book; Shooting in the Wild. The article cites examples from the book, and from the wildlife film industry, wherein animal behavior has been manipulated to get the filmmakers desired outcome. It cites the proliferation of channels and communication media as causing much tighter deadlines, which in turn forces filmmakers to come up with footage in a much shorter time. Maggie Burnette Stogner, an environmental filmmaker who works with Palmer, says:

“When I first started at [National] Geographic, filmmakers were in the field for three years,” and goes on to say “Now it’s compressed to ‘Go out and get it in a month.’ Well, it doesn’t happen that way. The sharks don’t show up.”

The Post article also mentions the genre of “reality” nature programs, where the traditional documentary emphasis on animal behavior is replaced by showing a persons interaction with nature, and points out that this shift tends to give program makers more latitude about how they use animals. In many cases the animals being portrayed as wild are tame, and the human “hunting” activities are staged by pre-positioning the prey. Palmer feels that this should be pointed out to the audience, but as the article states:

“Who wants to watch a tame nature film?”