Garrreth Bird The unique perspective of a Birds eye view

NEWS

An amazing opportunity shooting for National Geographic, deep underground in the Cradle of Humankind. I was the ‘underground’ DOP, and spent my days in a cavern 200 meters into the earth as a team of excavators chosen for their scientific skills as well as their nimble physiques uncovered newly discovered early hominid remains from the tiny recesses of the Rising Star cave system.

The image below, pulled from the underground stuff I shot for the full documentary, leads to a video introducting the excavators, and got over 100 000 views in its first 4 days! I shot all the underground stuff.

A highlight for me was shooting the ‘cavers discover fossils’ sequence that will most likely open the doccumentary. Working with just the two cavers in the super-constricted underground environment was extremely challenging, but the footage looked great!

More info on the expedition can be found here. Also, read this article by team leader and world renouned paleoanthropologist, physical anthropologist and archeologist Lee Berger, or this news summary.

Here I am in a little opening whilst decending the super-squeezy chimney that leads to the final fossil chamber.

What a wild past few weeks! I’ve been shooting a climbing documentary on some of Southern Africa’s most awesome cliffs. Big thanks to Alex Honnold and Hazel Findlay, two of the worlds foremost rock climbers, for their patience as we got our stuff.

Read an article Hazel wrote about the experience for a UK climbing mag here. Read an article on Alex’s next big adventure - soloing the worlds second tallest building, the Taipei 101 tower, live on TV - here

Below, Alex re-opens ‘Green Peace’ by hanging from a one-finger lock and a terrrible hand jam as I hold him in frame. My facial gymnastics are because I thought he was going to pop at any moment… but he calmly got his feet back on and sent the route!
(pic by Jono Joseph)

Very cool experience working as director of a splinter unit on a short for Inspired Minority’s new feature film project. Simon Hansen keeps raking in the plaudits after wide praise for his work overseeing the digital effects on last years worldwide hit Chronicle. I can’t wait to see how this project develops.

Been shooting with Fresh Air Crewon this short of Jimbo Smith opening a new route on Table Mountain.

An unusual view of the top of Table Mountain, taken from a glider whilst shooting on the above project:

Some incredible times on a climbing trip to Namibia.

Some close encounters during the shooting of the latest Swatch commercial! See the full ad here

Covering the latest campaign for Mudo clothing.

Records tumbled as I covered the running of the demanding 3 Peaks Challenge 2012. See the film here. The race includes nearly 3000 meters of altitude gain over the 50 km course and sees participants summit Devils Peak, Table Mountain and Lions Head.

Editing a film for UNAIDS to be released for World Aids Day on 1 December. Brilliant to finally be hearing positive news comming from those fighting HIV/AIDS in our country.

An image of mine in the Argus newspaper

Joe peels off Victims of Comfort, a new grade 29 rock climb on Magnetic Wall, Table Mountain, while shooting for The Mountain in the Sea

I am hard at work on the script for a longish short film called AFTER THE ACT. It is a crime-suspense film that takes on social and political hot potatoes in the guise of a riveting identity theft mystery…something like what might happen if MULHOLLAND DRIVE took over the persona of THE TALENTED MR RIPLEY, and then hid out in South Africa as things came apart. Cant wait to get it to a point where I can start showing it around.

There has been some confusion created by the documentary format of the Animal Planet film MERMAIDS: THE BODY FOUND after its screenings. The mischievous blend of fact and fiction lead many to take the production at face value. I made a ‘Making Of’ film for Animal Planet explaining how it was done. See excerpts here.

Related articles: US federal boffins insist that mermaids DON’T exist

A teaser for THE MOUNTAIN IN THE SEA, a documentary about rock climbing and its history on Table Mountain, recently declared a ‘Natural Wonder of the World’, that I have begun shooting on.

Have a look at some more video and images on the subject here

Been shooting pre-production material for MAD MAX: FURY ROAD feature film. With a budget of over $100 million, the Warner Bros. film is unusual in that, alongside stars Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron, the vast majority of people appearing on screen will be stunt performers who all need to be super fit and capable in a wide variety of stunt diciplines. Significant measures are being taken to safeguard the production’s secrets…hence the absence of anything I did there on this site!

Been shooting the EPK (Electronic Press Kit) for HBO and the BBC on a feature film called THE GIRL, starring Toby Jones, Sienna Miller and Imelda Staunton, about the relationship between Alfred Hitchcock and one of his leading ladies Tippi Heddren, being shot around Cape Town. As often happens, finding time in the schedule to get the interviews done was a tricky business, but the cast were unanimously gracious about it. The studio was filled with an wide assortment of filmic gadgets…just amazing the stuff they were using in those days. Many layers of reality, with my camera providing me with one more even than the rest. All very undercover still of course, so unfortunately no images to post.

Been working in the rarefied air surounding Ferrero Rocher chocolates. With the Making Of I was alowed to use a great operatic track (secretly a Mike Patton cover of a 1960’s Italian love song), that makes the whole thing vibrate a little! Its kinda, well…tasty! See it here

Phew…ahem…is this thing on?…Lost signal for a while there…Sure been on some adventures!!

A camera team can be seen on the ridge where this helpicopter dropped them. I was working for friends at I-Rigging, securing camera positions for a Vodafone base jumping commercial.

See me attacking the lunch box in a Making Of (that someone else made) featuring bunches of the actual footage captured here. How close those guys come to that ridge is just phenomenal!

The ad itself can be seen here

I took some pictures while busy there, so click your way through a few at THE CLIPPERING TWIST

Been shooting a story for the Associated Press about a local operation testing the viability of breeding flys so that their larvae can be harvested and used as a replacement for fish meal when feeding chickens. The hope is that this protien rich foodsource will decrease pressure on ocean stocks whilst lowering the industries’ carbon footprint, as fly farms can be developed in the agricultural areas themselves. Not only that, but the fly larvae act as a barrier to disease, so can be fed on waste from abbatoirs. It is very difficult and costly getting rid of abbatoir waste as when burried it affects the groundwater with the microbes that break it down. So the system means increased efficiencies in multiple areas, with chicken raised on these larvae performing as well or better than their fishmeal-raised siblings in meat-on-the-bone comparisons. Seems like a future-proof idea to me.

Shot and edited the Making Of featurette for THE DINOSAUR PROJECT, a found-footage feature film set in the most remote parts of the Congo jungle. It is based on the legend of Mokele-Mbembe, Africa’s version of the Loch Ness Monster. Much adventure and many scary creatures later…everything remains under wraps!

Ecover is a cleaning product that uses only plant-based ingredients, thus providing a non-petroleum based option for the household duties…surely an idea whos time has come. The ad was inspired by the fact that a huge percentage of people apparently put loud music on and dance as they clean. Making Of here

My short film HIVE will play as part of the Shnit Short film fest at 7pm on 6 October 2011 at the Labia on Orange, along with a collection of other new local shorts. It will also play at the Shnit tent at Rocking the Daisies music fest.

Be sure to check out Shnit around Cape Town during 6-9 October…there are a stupendous amount of brilliant shorts on offer, of both local and international origin. Doenit!

Working with the Remix Dance Company, a dance group who who strive to bring together people with different body histories, body types and abilities, covering the creation of their latest production. Find out more about their trailblazing work here

Been shooting the video component of the upcomming GQ/Axe calender for 2012, with angelic models winging their sensuous way into our mental erogenous zones. Not the worst days at the office.

Managed to survive late night hyenas and -6 degree camping while shooting a pilot for a TV show in Botswana. Back home and diving with flickering scissors into the depths of an invigorating edit.

Being interviewed by One Small Seed about HIVE and On the Boil!

What an amazing turnout at ON THE BOIL! The Fugard Theatre was packed to the rafters as a wide variety of new Cape Town short films played on their fantastic projection system. Filmmakers gave a little insight into the making of their films, while an overflow crowd watched on a big screen in the bar area. Unfortunately, Health&Safety regulations meant we still had to turn a few people away… super cool to see local film demanding a bigger venue!

Between organising, managing the oversubscription and leading the discussions on the stage I had my hands full, but the evening was a success, and HIVE made its intergalactic debut along with two other films. After the screenings the party kicked off, with Karlind making us proud doing his famous leprechaun in a laundromat impression. Noice!

A newspaper article about me, HIVE and ON THE BOIL!

Patrons queue as the evening gets going.

The ground tier during a discussion.

Jon Day, Pieter Hugo and Michael Cleary. Their film Control won them the Young Directors award at Cannes recently.

Dale Yudelman, recent reipient of the Ernest Cole award, Ronnie Belcher and Thomas Doorman from BlackMilk, Garrreth Bird and Karlind Govender.

Sean Drummond and Michael Mathews from Be Phat Motel.

Fugard photos by Neil Burton

Some framegrabs from various jobs

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