Career advice from David Attenborough: Getting into Television Presenting

when I joined I was a television producer I mean I was a trainee but back in 1952 and so my job was to devise programs and when it came to production I would direct cameras in the studio and then memory started making films art directed films but then as technology got better there were more people involved in the top I mean initially I made programs overseas was just myself in the cameraman I did the recording sound recording it is but later on of course you come part of a big team so if you look at Blue Planet 2 which was the last thing in which I was involved in at all they're about 50 people involved and my job was limited entirely to the words I wrote the commentaries and spoke them but I I would like to think that my happiest time was when I was totally responsible for the production from every point of view and would sit in the cutting room as it was in those days and and edit it in great detail I suppose the first thing is whether you have a natural curiosity whether you are actually inserted in things whether there's something that you really really are interested in and you think about nothing to do with television I mean whether it was chess or whether it was chimpanzees there's nothing you know there's joy incident in in continually new things and new topics and then an ability I think to see a story to see a narrative to see a way in which this you start talking about something and the viewer wants to know what's going to happen next and that's an indefinable thing it's very difficult you can't teach that in the way I mean you are the habit or you don't I think the speed at which things have changed I mean you barely learned how to deal with something before it's out of date and these days that is certainly the case and and because new equipment is coming all the time new abilities new possibilities of getting pictures turning up all the time I mean what's the latest thing driller drone so that how long have they been drones five years seven six years something like that but already drones are another drone shot you know and what's coming tomorrow you there can't be anything no that's too extravagant but but there can be a few things that are changing more swiftly than video technology both not only in creating programs but in transmitting them and make him available well I could went into television there was one television network in the whole of the United Kingdom and you couldn't it couldn't see that outside London and Birmingham and it was mashach programmes alive except one or two tiny things on film and and it was only on the air for a few hours a day and when you went to get on the air that was the only thing that television viewers could see you were it you know and the situation between that which was 50 52 53 and now 2015 2018 is huge and what its gonna be like in another decade I have no idea I'm one thing you can be quite sure it's not gonna be that's it is now I would say if someone wanted to start okay get yourself a camera home video go and make something if you're in the Natural History game make a programme about some simple animal a mouse a worm picture it's something you can be sure it's gonna be there and try and make a story about it and see whether you really want to spend your time lying on your stomach waiting for the worm to come out of a hole or whatever it is and and try and work out how you're gonna tell a story about a worm actually nobody's made the program that I'm a I'm a sequencing Lemmons made the program could be very interesting you know what happens I mean come to think of it now what about lighting can worms see are they going to be put off by a night how long will I have to wait before is there a good time when I can expect the worms to come out you know and how would I get this shot that would share it well those are the kind of questions which you can have to answer and ask in reality admittedly not with other them but nobody asked them about a mouse which perhaps there's more practical thing to do and be quite interesting you know how do I know when the mouse is going to come out how do I persuade you to come out how do I adjust the light what do I do about no light what is the story that we're talking about am I going to prove much over a period of a day or a week or fortnight or what and if you start doing that and then starting putting it together you'll begin to learn something about television and television storytelling well the event I'm constantly being reminded of of course which I can't I'm not allowed to forget was indeed a memorable one and and one which I treasure which was which was an encounter with gorillas in Rwanda and that was a long time ago and I get a lot of credit for it people say you know how wonderful if they say that's at all the credit doesn't lie with me I mean the credit lies actually in that with with a loose extraordinary I warned Dian Fossey who habituated the gorillas I mean we wouldn't have got within a hundred yards of them I mean it had she knocked on that work and we had no idea that was going to happen and and for that moment when I was thought I was going to be talking to the camera about something of the gorillas that were that were 10 yards away and when someone immediately came out of the bush next door to me I put a hand on my head it's unforgettable so that would be have to say in what would you never forget that's one but there are lots of others actually the first time I put on underwater gear and dived on a coral reef was unforgettable and that's gained is the natural history singing but but the but the big business of suddenly becoming waitress suddenly being able to drift up in the air if you want to or go down just with the flick of the fin and that you're seeing or if you're on a coral reef for the first time you're seeing a hundred different species none of which you ever seen before all of which are breath breathtakingly beautiful you can't believe how it's on every one of which you what kind of creature is that you know that's got all those pretty the million stripes extraordinary so that was about that that's not I mean that's natural history and I'm talking about that's talking about seeing the natural world and those are the unforgettable things when it comes to what what stories you do and that's a different question I don't know what I would say except that putting cameras here there and everywhere and getting new shots I mean camera traps now see they've absolutely transformed the business the business of you being able to put in half a dozen cameras small cameras and a place where you know as an alum was going to come I've not done much of that now one of the later things in that free history of filmmaking and I can't pretend that I'm expert at it and so two mics to that extent what I I do is is to say yes I can do a story about that and I would like to do a story about this is the way it would go and this is the sequences I think we would want and then you argue with the director if you're into of it you're someone who appears in front of the camera the boss should be the director and and I'm not a director anymore and when I was when I was a director yeah you you paid attention to what the talent said but a few hours director you're the boss you know it doesn't matter what he does you wait like ever been cutting you you know or in the editing suite is it now as I put my stamp on it we can't be gone most things you'll be surprised and it's I am surprised these days Natural History units and cameraman and directors are pretty skilled lot and it's a pity to say so but it's but it's true that that actually the amount of money the production of Gotti's is pretty critical I mean there was an episode in blue planet to the the annual meeting of the group has operated in tropical seas in one particular site where they assemble that come from hundreds of miles away these are big fish too and they and they come together and they spawn just at one particular moment all of them suddenly come Sergio and they went I wasn't there but they went out and did it or look for it then were told when it was would happen and then they were there in good time nothing happened they went a long way they'd gone to the other side of the world for this and the producer said oh well next year I suppose and and they did and of course it was a critical sequence and one the major jaws AG and it was worth the money but it did cost money and it costed a lot of tests Pocasset e and guts and so on from the people concerned which was not me I have I have to have chums or AB chums in this sort of game making that raspberry who actually loved the tank or the tinkle of danger you know let's get a little toast into that LARM I'm not bad I'm not like that you know I'm I'm quite cautious and so you know if I see in the animal that I'm getting near I see behaving in a uneasy way I would slowly walk backwards you know and get out of the way and and but in a way that's what this particular job is I interpreted that's what it's required you aren't supposed to be making a program about animals being frightened and aggressive you're trying to make a program about animals when they are at home and relaxed and doing what they would do in a natural way I mean I've been in I haven't really been in danger either but I've I've been in the circumstances when looking back it I thought you're pretty stupid I mean back in the 50s I mean we set off me and Charlie Lakers by Palin by a camera our cameraman he and I set off for Indonesia we didn't speak Indonesian we didn't know where we were going there were that you couldn't make telephone calls there were no things like email or satellites or they you just wore off and it you're on your own and we did some silly things I mean look back on it now I think you are absolutely out of your mind no we wanted to if you get the first shots of an animal which is now everybody sees it all the time the Komodo dragon biggest lizard in the world and we just set off and we couldn't you couldn't get to the island directly Oh couldn't nobody we've never outside of living on the island we flew and took a tiny plane to an island called Flores which was getting over 100 miles away and when the plane landed the Dutch pilot it was pouring with rain the Dutch pilots suck his heels into the grass strip on which his little plane has landed and said I looked up the skies there was a drizzling he said well I wouldn't want to stay here for three months I said well you know we only gonna be here for a week something he said well I don't I ain't gonna get back or he said why because I have to report my radio that this step is now closed for the for the rainy season and we won't be happening again till the rains finish how are you gonna get back and I said that to Charlie well we've got this far seen the pitch go back it's just those anyway nice out yeah we will find a way about her no idea how I get back I mean I'm shaky balmy and and we got ourselves in certain amount of trouble with gun runner's and reps and whirlpools inside now you do with television and none of it would ever see you really you don't idea what you've programs in the end oh that was what went on it just looked as though we were just sailed so lovely little island walk on and got a couple of coconuts keeps the drinks and went up in the film this dragon and that's what it looked like but the fact that it was difficult was of our own making and nothing to do with the technique of television [Music] you

Channel: BAFTA Guru

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Keywords: BAFTA, BAFTA Guru, British Academy Of Film And Television Arts (Award Presenting Organization), creative, career, film making, TV, gaming, actor, advice, movie, movies, movie making, david attenborough, planet earth, planet earth II, blue planet, nature, naturalist, documentary, animals, david attenborough interview, david attenborough birthday, david attenborough age, david attenborough documentary, david attenborough planet earth, david attenborough blue planet

Id: 2O12LElEXiw

Length: 14min 21sec (861 seconds)

Published: Sat May 12 2018