Florida Bay. Muddy, hot, full of mangrove and funky critters and plenty of mosquitoes… Still, I like the place.

So, I check the low tide: it’s in the right time, nice afternoon lights. I need shallow water as I am going to stand in it for 4-5 hours and I prefer it to be knee-deep than up to my hip (thanks god, that it’s not Siberia this time…).
I leave from home in time, had only a coffee, I thought to stop somewhere on the road to pick up some food and of course one more cup of black.
Stop: a gas station. Grrr, forgot my wallet… quick check if I can make it back and forth with the remaining fuel, yes I can.
Well, then this will be a tough day out in the sea without food and water…

I need to use a kayak to reach the location as there is no other way. Not a long paddle but it’s a bit windy out there. I don’t mind it only that the salt water is not a big friend of the camera…

I am on the way to film Ospreys in the extensive mangrove habitat around the Keys.
A couple of days ago we scouted the area and found some nice nests and this is the first time that I try my luck with them.

I decided just standing in the water, no blind. If they don’t like me they won’t come to the nest after all.

But they did a couple of times while I was there, standing in the 2ft/60cm water for hours. I am not sure whether they’re going to be the right ones for the film, they seem to be a bit undecided about the nest, but tomorrow I will give it a try once again.

Well, with proper supplies…

Well, it’s shocking to see that my last post is dated February 2012… and soon the year is over! It has been a busy one with the usual ups and downs of wildlife fimmaking. Plus a family moving from Sweden to Florida to shoot the Everglades film that I am working on until 2014. I was thinking about restarting the blog a couple ot times but somehow I have been waiting for a big thing to post. But what the heck is a big thing?? Missed a couple of opportunities for sure…

So, instead of waiting and always postponing the next post I just start again right now. And I promise regular updates in the coming new year…

Here we go. Deer carcass story.

I heard from a biologist, who is a great photographer as well, that iguanas eat carcass. It was hard to beleive as they are herbivorous lizards, the kind of salad eating beasts. But he has even documented and published it!

Well, I immediately started to vision a scene with vultures and iguanas competing for the carrion… or at least the two species interacting. It’s always cool to have such behavior in a wildlife film.

Here are the preparations, remote camera, dead deer, blind.

I have spent two days in the tent and I was lucky enough to have an iguana already in the second hour! Well, then for one and a half day nothing, only vultures and of course the nice smell of the dead animal (I was under the wind) and warm beer. I have a feeling that I know the secret how to really enjoy holidays!

And here are some shots from the blind, raw footage. Turkey vultures and a Black spiny-tailed iguana at a Key deer carcass.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

I am often wondering especially after two weeks of packing, just like now, that hey, come on we are making “only” some pictures!!

But devil is in the details and every piece of kit must be checked for instance such nuance things like safety pin (to attach curtains  hanging in the windows of the blind to cover the lens) or the perhaps more obvious new viewfinder of the camera (had to donwload a new firmware from Sony’s website…)

So, this has been going on for quite a while but now the stuff is about to be shipped to FLA, USA… The shoot starts soon and I’ll be back in the swamps feeding the mosquitoes again! Hurrah.

We are delighted (and pretty amazed) to see how much the audience and jury members love our film “Wild Hungary – A Water Wonderland”. It has been awarded already on eight festivals, please check the list in the Awards menu. I am upgrading it regularly.

And we have just received the fantastic news about being nominated in the Best Habitat Program category in Jackson Hole! I have never ever expected to be a finalist in such a strong competition… We are competing with ORF’s thrilling film about the radioactive wolves of Chernobyl and BBC’s blockbuster production about Madagascar.

Honestly, quite different ones than our lovely small swamps back in Hungary…

Before starting to post about new projects and until our website develops please read two ”flashback posts” below. Learn about our adventures with a reindeer herder family in the heart of Siberia and the struggles with the elusive otters of the Carpathian Basin!

The sun has gone down, slowly, as it should on the North. Last glance at the thermometer: -37C. Clear sky, it is going to drop to -40C by the morning. Not the weather for camping, I think, when I enter our run-down Russian-style military tent. For a couple of weeks this is my home that I share with a lovely Evenki family, the nomadic people of the Siberian taiga. They have traditional reindeer skin tent too, but prefer to use this leaky ugly tarp, because this gets dirty slower. This is a practical decision, like everything else here… Read more…

I thought this was going to be the easiest film project I have ever made: a portrait film with some wildlife in my home country, Hungary.
As a wildlife filmmaker I used to travel to the most remote places of the planet with enormous equipment. This time it was only jumping into my car and driving to a relatively close place that I knew pretty well. It seemed to be an easy task especially that in this case I had plenty of time: almost a full year!
Well, I just could not have made a bigger mistake… Read more…