Ice Wild Cameramen at Work

Scotland...

A paradise for wildlife,

and a cameraman's dream.

This country, with its rugged mountains and endless coastline,

has produced a generation of the best wildlife cameramen

in the world.

For decades, five filmmakers, all rooted in Scotland,

have travelled the globe to bring home incredible images,

shaping our understanding of the natural world.

How did these men learn the incredible skills needed

for catching the natural world in action?

What prepared them for travelling the globe

and enduring the toughest of environments?

In this series, these five cameramen

will share their extraordinary stories

and the secrets of their trade.

Secrets often learned filming wildlife

in the wildest parts of Scotland.

But this time, the camera is on them.

The polar regions

are amongst the most hostile environments on earth.

Filming wildlife in these frozen wastes

is a challenge unlike any other.

If you think you are good,

then go to the Antarctic and the Arctic and try it there.

There's just so much else to think about,

and mostly it's trying to stay alive.

Cameramen working in the polar regions

have to contend with potentially lethal conditions.

So we've got to now venture out and go about a mile up this valley

which looks like it's got about 80-mile-an-hour winds

blowing down it.

Bit frightening though, really.

And for film-makers,

it's not just the weather that can be hazardous -

it's the wildlife, too.

She is enormous.

Jeez!

There are people that have been that close to a polar bear before

but they're not around anymore.

It was - yeah - prolonged fear.

Capturing animal behaviour in this extreme and sometimes hostile place

takes a very special kind of wildlife cameraman.

And for me they don't come much more special than Doug Allan.

I must be mad!

I've had the extraordinary luck of working with Doug over many years.

There's just no-one else who knows these frozen worlds

and their unique wildlife as he does.

Every time I think, "This is it. Never again!"

"Next shoot - Caribbean."

But there is something special about this that keeps pulling you back.

Over his long career in the polar regions,

Doug has captured some of the most memorable wildlife images

to have ever appeared on television.

And this is one of his personal highlights -

and one of my favourites, too -

a polar bear filmed swimming from underwater.

We had a small camera on the end of a pole

and, eventually, after a lot of persistence,

we managed to find the bear

which we could go alongside with the boat,

and then slowly move in on it and just take that

little mini camera and literally put it right between his legs.

This polar bear was SO handsome.

I mean, look at that lovely shape of head,

and he was so laid-back,

and I love the way his bum just came up in the air,

as he slides down underneath.

And, the magic of this sequence was,

look at the reflection of the polar bear,

above the polar bear swimming.

It was so calm,

and he was so laid-back,

that we could go right in close.

You know, that combination of calm weather

and that accepting bear,

you could try, you know, 100 days

and not get a bear in those conditions again.

Working in the polar seas is the ultimate underwater challenge.

Water temperatures here can reach minus two degrees Celsius,

and there's the ever-present danger of getting trapped beneath the ice.

But for underwater cameramen like Doug Allan and fellow Scot Doug Anderson,

this is also a place of extraordinary beauty and strange fascination.

It's just breathtaking.

You can see 2,000 feet in one direction

and 2,000 feet in the other direction. It's like air.

It's ethereal and beautiful and magical

and so cold, you wouldn't believe it.

But although it's hard, you know, it's like a drug -

the first thing you want to do when you get home

is organise your way back there.

Diving underneath the ice is very special, very special.

It's completely calm,

there's no swell,

it's often very, very clear.

You see the seals just swimming lazily across...

illuminated against little shafts of sunlight coming down there.

It's like a second home, really - it's where I feel comfortable.

Slipping underwater, that's back where I belong, so to speak.

For Doug Allan, the journey to the earth's most extreme places

began on the east coast of Scotland.

It was here that he learned to dive.

Back from his latest polar expedition,

Doug is catching up with his old instructor

and diving buddy, Gordon Downie.

It's been a while, since I've seen you.

Remember this photograph, Doug?

Look, it's me with hair!

That must've been a long time ago!

-How old was I?

-You were probably 16.

Well, you were 16, cos you said, "I'm 16".

You were crazy about Cousteau,

you used to talk about Cousteau all the time.

-What, even back then?

-Yes, even back then.

You were always very interested in the sea life.

You were always trying to educate me as to what was what.

The diving was pretty tough, back then.

Yeah, yeah. I think it probably gave you a good grounding

for your Antarctic diving.

Well, certainly, the water around Scotland never gets very warm,

-and we dived all year round.

-Yeah.

I had a pretty rubbish, thin wetsuit.

It was like wearing tissue paper round about you.

And then we took on these.

-This was a big breakthrough, wasn't it? Getting dry suits.

-Aye.

Remember we had... Somebody used to steal them for us from the dockyard?

And then sell them onto us, that's right.

-You'd have to go to a museum to see it now, wouldn't you?!

-THEY LAUGH

Doug's pastime soon developed into a professional career.

But his first ever paying job as a diver was a rather unusual one.

Today, Doug is back in the dark waters of a highland river.

He's searching for the elusive creature

that once provided him with a livelihood -

freshwater mussels.

These bivalves are now a rare and protected species.

But 40 years ago, they were far more numerous

and prized for the treasure they sometimes contained - pearls.

Ah, now, those are nice pearls.

Aye. They're the two pride of my collection.

I kept them back since it became illegal.

Any of the pearls I'm showing you

were all fished before it became illegal, you know?

They're really bonnie.

Aye, they're a perfect match, you know.

Bill Abernethy was Scotland's last traditional pearl fisherman.

He used centuries-old methods to hunt for mussels in river shallows.

To search deeper and more dangerous waters, however,

he needed an experienced diver willing to take risks.

Someone like Doug Allan.

It was hard. It gave you a big...

a sort of high level of fitness,

it was hard work working around these rivers

and the currents and things...

Remember that morning we went to the... I said to you that morning,

I says, "We'll go to Stanley Dam" - that's on the River Tay -

and I says, "There's a bit there, we could get a pearl or two".

So we went down and you got in at the bottom of the dam

and now I said to you, "Doug,

"there's sluice gates just up there," and I says, "Keep clear of them

"because if you go right in, you'll get pulled underneath."

I remember that.

I remember, actually, I was underneath the sluice gates

and the water was rushing over my head,

-and the net got taken kind of over my head...

-Aye! Aye.

..and I was down below trying to pull it out - yanking it like this -

and I couldn't get rid of it, at all.

I had no idea you were so worried!

Aye! And then when you come up, you told me, you says,

"I'll go down and try again."

I says "Don't bother going down and trying again!"

Well, I tell you, the pearl fishing was a great springboard.

Oh, well, I used to say to myself, "Well, he's never looked back

"since he give up the pearl fishing!"

You know, he's definitely made a name for himself.

Long dives in the cold, fast-flowing rivers of Scotland

were ideal training for Doug's future career.

In the mid-70s, Doug joined the British Antarctic Survey as a diver,

helping scientists with their underwater research

at the remote Signy Base.

And it was here that our paths first crossed.

'There are only two flowering plants that can manage to survive

'in this bleak, icy country.

'One is a kind of thrift...'

While filming for The Living Planet series,

I visited Signy Research Station

and Doug volunteered himself as a guide -

invaluable help for us, and a turning point for him.

By the end of that four days, I thought "This is some job.

"These boys are, they're having a great time, obviously,

"and look what they're doing, all the things I enjoy -

"they're diving, they're travelling, working with animals.

"They're doing something which I think is clearly worthwhile,

"making these high-end programmes."

I began to think, "Right, I've done a good lot of stuff with the British Antarctic Survey.

"Now, I can maybe just head off in a different direction."

On Doug's next visit to the Antarctic,

he captured remarkable footage of one of the region's most

charismatic animals - Emperor penguins.

I think I've made maybe seven or eight trips to the Emperor penguins

over their eight-month breeding cycle. That was just so amazing and lovely.

It's actually the male who does the whole 60-day looking after the eggs,

and that's through the winter darkness

when the temperatures can go down to minus 50, 55,

and they huddle together for warmth.

But you go back down in August

and for the first time you hear the little chicks.

It's still so cold that they're staying on their parents' feet,

tucked underneath the feathers.

Then, occasionally, you'd see their little face peeking out,

and that was the magic moment for me, watching the chicks.

Emperor penguins are the largest of all the penguin species.

But you wouldn't think they would present much of a hazard to film-makers.

However, when Scotland-based cameraman John Aitchison

attempted to film super slow motion footage of the birds,

he got rather more than he bargained for.

I'm getting run over by penguins!

Whoo!

I was there right by the hole with the slow-motion camera

and all the cables and stuff,

and there'd be an explosion of big slippery penguins.

They'd go through my legs,

they'd knock the camera over, sometimes they'd pull on the wires.

'Being hit by one of those is no joke - they're very heavy!

'It was just complete chaos.'

I think I'm in the way!

'And the camera works so fast, it shoots so many frames a second

'that you really don't know if it's worked until afterwards.

'You know there's been penguins in the shot,'

but you can't tell if they're in focus, they're through the picture so quickly.

It was only when we started playing back,

which you can do in the field so you can actually see it there

and know that you're getting these extraordinary images, really,

I mean, beyond anything I'd ever hoped was possible.

It was such a treat, visually,

and in terms of the whole experience going there and doing that.

I loved it. It was one of my favourite things ever.

One of the most obvious challenges

of filming in the polar regions is the extreme cold.

Wildlife film-makers working in the Arctic and Antarctic

have to contend with conditions unlike anywhere else on earth.

There is a sliding scale of temperatures

that each bring their challenges.

Minus 20 is beginning to get a little bit chilly -

especially if you've got wind thrown in on top.

Then you could lose your nose to a bit of frost nip,

or your fingers or things like that.

Below minus 20, you probably want to look at your lenses,

they may need to be stripped down and the normal lubricating oils

replaced with something thinner which won't freeze solid.

Cables can be a bit of an issue.

Once you get below minus 30, they can be a bit like spaghetti twigs.

They'll start to break.

As far as the clothes are concerned, experience teaches you

what you will need.

But eventually, it does come down to gritting your teeth and bearing it.

Scotland-based cameraman Mark Smith was to discover just how

uncomfortable conditions can get at the poles

when he travelled to the Antarctic to film Adelie penguins.

Within a week of arriving on location winds of over 130mph

were rocking the tiny hut the crew called home.

The wind's so strong, it's constantly blowing out

the pilot light on the paraffin stove

so the temperature is dropping.

The wind is rising.

It's like the bloody roof is coming off.

But it was only when the storm died down

and Mark started working in the huge penguin colony

that mental strain began to tell.

It became quite wearing.

After a while, you just get totally brutalised

by the death and dirt that's around you.

There's tens of thousands of birds there,

and there is all this stuff going on all over the place -

the skuas ripping the heads off chicks, blood and guts everywhere.

And it wasn't just the penguins that had to beware of the rapacious skuas.

It's probably not good for your sense of wellbeing to go through it.

In the end, I couldn't stand being there for more than two hours in the morning

because of the noise.

I just could not hear myself think.

I couldn't think straight, at all.

Halfway into his four-month stay,

and after 1,000 hours spent amongst the screaming penguins,

Mark's grip on reality was beginning to loosen.

Here we are on the penguin super highway

where the penguins go down to the sea.

It seems that they follow the American system -

driving on the right.

Going down to the sea on the right,

going back from the sea on the left as you're facing the sea.

I'm fairly sure that yesterday they were doing the British system.

I kind of really went off penguins, in the end.

They don't really want you to be there.

As you walk past, they'll actually run out to try and peck your ankles.

You're in a place where it's quite hostile,

which sounds ridiculous, because they're just penguins,

they're only that big... But, yeah, it does get to you in the end.

Filming wildlife, especially in the challenging conditions of the poles,

can take a psychological toll.

Nesting penguins might stay in one spot

but many other species are unpredictable,

and camera crews can go for days or weeks without catching sight of their quarry.

To cope with these pressures takes a very tough mental attitude.

I think that there's only two things you need to do,

or two things you need to remember

to keep level-headed as a wildlife camera person.

The first thing to remember is

you can only be in one place at one time.

So you make the decision on where to go every day,

what to try for, based on the best of your experience.

But you ARE going to be wrong.

'You will come back to camp some days

'and there's polar bear footprints all round about your cabin,

'where you've been looking all day and not seen any.'

Brrr! 11 hours.

I feel as though these things have been glued on my eyeballs.

One bear.

But it was much too wary of us to let us anywhere close.

A long day, for not very much.

But, you've also got to remember that if you're not there,

you'll never get it, so it's no use,

if you want to film a polar bear, sitting inside your cabin looking at the weather

and thinking, "Ah, it's a bit iffy, I won't bother today."

You've got to get out there looking.

Sometimes, as even Doug would admit, sitting inside your cabin is

exactly the place to be when a polar bear comes calling.

I thought I heard something.

For wildlife cameramen like Doug,

polar bears are the ultimate Arctic animal.

Long experience has taught him to treat the world's largest land carnivore with great respect.

This is just a bit of a problem

when we get bears as close as to the cabin.

Polar bears are great because they're big, sexy, charismatic animals

that will eat you if they get the chance.

You are in their domain, their kingdom.

I can think of few people who have more experience filming polar bears than Doug.

His knowledge of these superb predators

can mean the difference between life and death.

For the Planet Earth series,

Doug had travelled to the Norwegian Arctic

looking for female polar bears emerging from their dens.

He and his field assistant were the first human beings

to visit this fragile wilderness in 25 years.

Because motorised vehicles are prohibited,

they had to travel through bear country alone and on foot.

When the polar explorers used to haul their gear like this,

they used to have names for their sledges - things like

Intrepid and Braveheart.

-I'm going to call mine "You

-BLEEP, BLEEP

-awkward, heavy object."

Despite putting on a brave face,

Doug knew this was a very risky way of tracking bears.

But it was testament to the Norwegian authorities' confidence in his skills.

If you don't have a snow machine,

and you have a bear that comes at you with, more than just interest,

you better know what you're doing.

Because if you don't know what you're doing,

it'll end up either eating you

or you'll have to kill it.

And, for me, the biggest tragedy would be to have to shoot a bear,

and injure a bear, simply to protect myself.

To be given that level of trust by the Norwegians

and then to come up trumps with the sequence that we got -

that sticks in my mind as being special.

This is fantastic. She's out on the slopes.

Four weeks, we've been waiting to get this one opportunity!

But now that it's happening, it's just fantastic.

The challenge of filming polar bear behaviour

is something which many wildlife cameramen relish.

Scottish film-maker Gordon Buchanan

and his team devised a novel perspex hide - nicknamed the Ice Cube -

to allow him to get dramatic close-up footage.

You have to admire the bravery when capturing these remarkable shots.

She's coming closer and closer.

Oh, my God!

She is enormous.

Jeez!

This animal wanted to eat me.

And she spent 40 minutes just looking for any weakness in the Ice Cube.

RATTLING

The door's not good.

OK, just checking the lock.

'And I just thought, this is a ridiculous thing to do.'

But, you know, it did give us these incredible shots.

She's feeling it, pressing...

She's feeling that Perspex is flexing.

She's trying to see if she can crawl through it.

She's trying to see if she can bite through it.

It's getting a little bit hairy in here.

It was then I realised really what a polar bear is.

It is one of the biggest, most intimidating animals on the planet.

Look - it's just towering above me.

If I was to be standing side-by-side with this animal,

it would be about seven feet tall.

Fortunately, Gordon's gamble paid off.

The bear lost interest and wandered off.

But it's a reminder that filming wildlife at the poles

takes exceptional courage and dedication.

The challenges fade into nothing, however,

when compared with the prize of filming rare animal events.

One of the most elusive

and extraordinary hunting techniques

in the natural world was thought to be used

by a certain pod of killer whales to catch seals.

Doug Allan spent his entire career

trying to capture this rumoured behaviour on film.

That was a 32-year holy grail.

Back in 1977, when I was in the Antarctic,

there was vague rumours came out

about killers whales taking seals off the ice floes,

but it was all second, third hand.

After several fruitless expeditions,

Doug returned south for one last attempt,

accompanied by fellow Scottish cameraman, Doug Anderson.

This time, the team met with almost instant success.

There's a killer whale at 11 o'clock.

About 200 metres, heading towards those two seals on the floe.

This could be really good.

We found a pod, we followed them, the ice conditions were perfect

and they began to do this wave-washing.

And, boy, they did it a lot!

For three-and-a-half weeks, we ran with the pack.

It felt like they were on a mission the whole time.

That behaviour had been seen six times in 100 years and we saw it.

We saw 16 kills.

A remote stabilised camera was operated by Doug Allan

from the wheelhouse.

Meanwhile, Doug Anderson followed the hunt from on deck.

We saw the first kill.

Then we saw another one, and another one.

It's all pretty intense.

Oh. Another wave.

Then we got in the Zodiac and you know, the animals kept on killing.

We were worried that they would be put off.

But we got right next to the ice floe

and got the pole camera in the water and got the seals being washed in.

Far from being put off by Doug's presence, a group of juveniles

actually seemed to show a worrying interest in him -

lining up for a run on the inflatable.

Oh!

The crew got an uncomfortably close-up view of the whales'

remarkable hunting technique.

Fortunately, it seemed to have been only a kind of practice run

and the film crew were able to continue recording some

of the most astonishing behaviour any of them had ever witnessed.

There are moments of that trip that are just burnt on my memory.

I know that when I'm 80 years old

and sitting reminiscing about my life, I'll relive that.

Over the past few decades, a generation of wildlife cameramen

have shared some unforgettable experiences with us.

They have opened up worlds unreachable for most -

and captured moments unimaginable to many.

But to do so, they have had to endure tough conditions

that few of us would happily tolerate.

Cup of tea. Stage one.

This is the life of the wildlife film-maker.

Wildlife filming is glamorous in the eyes of some,

but it involves a whole lot more than simply being in some nice location.

Brrr!

It takes a degree of tenacity

and putting up with a lot of tough things.

Working underneath the sea ice, it's a grind.

But if something you've waited for or something unexpected happens,

then, for sure, the hairs on the back of your neck stand up.

The focus that we have, the ability to spend our time doing nothing

but watching for that thing happening

means that sometimes we film things that nobody has ever seen before.

Those moments of magic,

that's what makes it all worthwhile.

Next time, our cameramen are on dry land

filming a snow leopard hunt for the first time,

using infra-red cameras,

and getting up close and personal.

Too close.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd