Female oriental pied hornbill peeks out of her nest fortress.
Planet Earth III
Series: Planet Earth III.
Episode: Episode 5 — “Forests” (hornbill nesting & bat-hunting sequence).
Production company: BBC Studios Natural History Unit
Broadcaster (UK): BBC One.
Role: Director of Photography — Borneo hornbill sequences (nesting + bat-hunting).
Awards (series): 5 nominations at the 76th Primetime Emmys (2024), incl. Outstanding Cinematography for a Nonfiction Program and Outstanding Music Composition; also nominations for Narrator, Sound Mixing/Editing.
As DoP on the Borneo hornbill sequences for Planet Earth III, I filmed nesting and bat-hunting behaviour across Borneo—natural light, long-lens, and selective high-speed to keep it truthful and unobstrusive. Working with local researchers, I installed discreet interior cameras in a fig tree above the Kinabatangan River to reveal a never-before-filmed view of life inside a sealed nest cavity, and captured high-speed bat hunting at dusk atop a sheer cliff—all delivered to the landmark standards the series demands.
