FILMING GREAT WHITE SHARKS IN 360°
South Africa, 2019. Ten days. One rubber seal called Donner. And what we believe to be the first ever 360° footage of great white sharks breaching from below the surface.
The Project
In 2019 I travelled to Mossel Bay, South Africa with my partner Jackie. She had absolutely no idea what she was getting herself into. We were there to work with Oceans Research, founded by Dr Enrico Gennari, a marine research, education and conservation organisation based in Mossel Bay, offering aspiring marine scientists and conservationists the chance to work alongside leading researchers studying the incredible marine life of Southern Africa, including great white sharks. Sharks have always been a personal passion of mine and when Oceans Research heard through a mutual contact that there was a 360° filmmaker who was also genuinely obsessed with sharks, they got in touch. It felt like a project that was meant to happen. We were there to make a promotional film showcasing their vital work, but within the first few days on the water it became clear that what we were also capturing was genuinely unprecedented. Nobody had filmed great white sharks in 360° like this. Certainly not from below the surface as they breached. We made the decision to capture absolutely everything we possibly could alongside the promotional film. Best decision we made.
Donner, Our Secret Weapon!
Allow me to introduce Donner. Donner was a rubber decoy seal used by Oceans Research as part of their great white shark research programme. We named her Donner because, mounted on a pole that we had unceremoniously rammed through her underside, she bore an uncanny resemblance to the vertical rotating spit you see in a kebab shop. We meant it affectionately. Donner became our primary camera platform. We mounted cameras on poles attached to her, buried cameras inside her with lenses poking through the rubber and tried every configuration we could think of to get the shot. Donner was remarkably good at her job. The sharks hit her with extraordinary force, which was brilliant for the footage and absolutely catastrophic for our camera housings. We went through several during the ten days. The sharks' teeth scratched lenses repeatedly. Donner took everything they threw at her. She was, without question, the unsung hero of the entire project. We miss her.
The Challenges
Nobody tells you how much of wildlife filmmaking involves sitting around waiting for the wildlife to show up. Some days the sharks simply didn't appear. Other days the weather was too rough to go out at all. The camera housings fogged up constantly because it turns out cameras and salt water are not natural friends. SD cards corrupted. Equipment failed. Jackie was seasick. I was probably seasick too but I'm choosing not to remember that. Every evening was spent back at Oceans Research data wrangling, archiving and backing up a significant volume of footage, knowing we had to be up early the next morning to do it all again. It was cold, unpredictable, exhausting and genuinely one of the best experiences of my life.
The Outcome
We delivered the promotional film for Oceans Research as planned, showcasing their vital marine research work and the extraordinary environment they operate in. Some of the wider footage went on to be licensed for use on major VR platforms including Oculus, placing viewers directly inside the experience of being in the water with one of the ocean's most powerful predators. To our knowledge this remains the only 360° footage ever captured of great white sharks breaching from below the surface. It is the project I am most proud of in twelve years of 360° filmmaking. Oh, and Jackie later became my wife. So all in all, a pretty good trip.