Walking with Beasts

The final episode of Walking with Beasts, Mammoth Journey, was filmed in Yukon, Canada[5]

After the success of Walking with Dinosaurs, the executive producer Tim Haines conceived Walking with Beasts as a sequel. The intended goal of the series was to introduce the general public to the fascinating mammals (and other animals) of the Cenozoic era, typically less represented in popular culture than dinosaurs.[6] The budget of Walking with Beasts was £4.2 million,[1][lower-alpha 1] one of the most expensive documentaries ever made[1] but much lower than a feature film with comparable visual effects needs. Tim Haines attributed the completion of the series despite this to solid planning.[7]

Research in preparation for Walking with Beasts was conducted full-time for nearly two years by the geologist Paul Chambers and the zoologist Alex Freeman. Like Walking with Dinosaurs, Walking with Beasts was set to consist of six episodes which meant that six suitable settings had to be chosen for the programme.[8] Chambers and Freeman picked the six settings of the programme based on the amount of good fossil evidence, position in the time line and number of interesting animals.[8][9] The settings of some episodes had been picked already before any research was required, such as doing an episode on woolly mammoths and an episode on indricotheres. For much of the process, Chambers and Freeman were considering more than six settings, which meant that some potential episode ideas were forced to be abandoned. Among the abandoned ideas were an episode set in Australia, based on fossils from the Riversleigh World Heritage Area.[8] After the selection had been narrowed down to six settings, selecting which animals would appear in each episode was a straightforward process.[9]

After Chambers and Freeman had decided upon suitable settings for the programme, the filming locations for Walking with Beasts were chosen by the assistant producer Annie Bates over a nine-month period. Bates first spoke with palaeobotanists to figure out suitable locations that were sufficiently similar to the intended ancient landscapes. After determining a comprehensive enough selection of possible filming locations, Bates traveled to the different sites with a video camera to shoot test footage, which was then viewed by the producers to get an idea of the terrain.[8] Filming locations for Walking with Beasts included Florida, Mexico, Java, Arizona, Brazil, South Africa and Yukon.[10]

In order to write the storylines for the series, producers Jasper James and Nigel Paterson watched numerous nature documentaries on modern animals. They wanted to avoid episodes simply becoming "lists of animals and how they lived" and instead wanted them to draw viewers in and make them want to know what would happen to the animals next.[9] Chambers and Freeman also worked on the storylines, with the goal of ensuring that as much inferred behaviour as possible of each animal was showcased in the series.[8] In the end, each episode of Walking with Beasts ended up with a different type of story. Next of Kin (episode four) for instance follows a group of Australopithecus going through rough times and Land of Giants (episode three) follows a young Indricotherium[lower-alpha 2] for the first few years of its life. Details of the plot and how animals behaved were guided by fossil evidence; James maintained in behind-the-scenes material that no details in the storylines of Walking with Beasts were based on fiction.[9]

Maquettes of Deinotherium (left) and Australopithecus (right), used to create the computer models in Walking with Beasts

Chambers and Freeman worked with sculptors to create accurate reconstructions of the animals in the series. Relevant specialist palaeontologists and other researchers were consulted for each animal to gather advice on behavior and appearance. For some of the animals featured in Walking with Beasts, no models had ever been made before.[8] The model makers also worked based on drawings and photographs of fossil material. Each maquette took several weeks to create. The finished maquettes were scanned into computers with 3D.[11] The textures of the animals were designed by skin designers, with advice from researchers. For some of the animals in Mammoth Journey (episode six), cave paintings could give an idea of real life colors but for most others the patterns were educated guesswork.[8]

As in Walking with Dinosaurs, the computer graphics for Walking with Beasts were created by the visual effects company Framestore.[12] Animators worked closely with researchers; experts were brought in to look at the movements of each animal to ensure that they moved accurately and advice was gathered on what behaviours each creature could have exhibited.[8] Animating the animals in Walking with Beasts was more difficult than in Walking with Dinosaurs owing to mammals having more moving bits than dinosaurs, such as whiskers, eyebrows and various floppy and wobbly parts. Additionally, the production team believed audiences would be more critical of the movements of mammals than they had been of dinosaurs since viewers would be more familiar with how mammals move; it would thus be easier to spot inaccurate movement.[12] The most difficult creature to animate in the series was Australopithecus, which in terms of their movement had to appear "more than an ape but less than a human".[12]

Puppet heads of various animals used for certain shots in the series

Filming Walking with Beasts took four or five weeks.[9] Filming was usually a matter of gathering location shots where the computer-generated animals would then be inserted later. Sometimes it was necessary to replicate the impact the animated animals would have on their environment—such as footprints left in the snow by a woolly mammoth. Not all parts of filming the series were entirely imaginary, as Walking with Beasts also made extensive use of animatronics and puppets for close-up shots.[9] The animatronics and puppets in Walking with Beasts were created by special effects company Crawley Creatures, the same company responsible for the animatronics in the preceding Walking with Dinosaurs. On account of many of the animals in Walking with Beasts having fur or hair and requiring more complex facial expressions, creating the animatronics for Walking with Beasts was more difficult than for the previous series. During production, the animatronics team grew from seven to eighteen and additional support was brought in through hiring specialist out-workers.[10]

As with the computer graphics, experts were also consulted for some of the practical effects. Among the scientists consulted were archaeologist and anthropologist Michael Bisson, an expert on Middle Palaeolithic tools, who helped craft some of the tools shown being used by Neanderthals and anatomically modern humans in the series.[1]

The animatronics were created and used over a period of one-and-a-half years. In total there were over 40 different animatronic elements used, most of which were animatronic heads of animals. The broad movements of the animatronics were controlled by puppeteers, while their more subtle movements were remote-controlled and operated via servo motors.[10] Australopithecus was in some close-ups portrayed by actors with prosthetics. Neanderthals and anatomically modern humans were consistently portrayed by actors also in non close-up shots, the Neanderthal actors wearing prosthetics.[10][13] The prosthetics used by the actors were also made by Crawley Creatures.[10]

The sound design for Walking with Beasts was done by Kenny Clark. Clark and his partner Jovan Ajder began the process by recording foley sound effects, such as footsteps. Then, Clark and Ajder began constructing a sound library through recording their own sounds and contacting web-based FX companies as well as companies around the world. After a great collection of different animal sounds had been assembled, different sounds were mixed together, cut up or played backwards to create creature sounds. The noises of Leptictidium were otter noises, pitch shifted and reversed, and the sounds of Gastornis were made by a monkey and a rattlesnake, slightly edited. Megatherium was voiced through goat noises, though considerably lowered in pitch, Embolotherium were voiced by walruses and rhinos, Macrauchenia by donkeys, Indricotherium by bears and rhinoceroses and Chalicotherium by a hippopotamus. Australopithecus was initially planned to be voiced through harmonised human voices, an idea that was abandoned in favour of monkey sounds. The Woolly Mammoths were voiced by elephants and Smilodon were voiced by lions and tigers. The final sound mixing was done by Chris Burdon, who combined a total of 64 sound tracks (including narration, music, animal sounds and background noises) to produce one final stereo mix for the series.[14]

Ben Bartlett, who had previously worked on Walking with Dinosaurs, composed the music for Walking with Beasts. The composition process began with Bartlett and the directors (Jasper James and Nigel Paterson) viewing the different episodes together without sound and determining specific scenes that stood out as especially requiring music. Bartlett approached Walking with Beasts differently than he had Walking with Dinosaurs; the score in the previous series often included sophisticated themes and orchestral sweeps to reflect the grandeur of the dinosaurs. When it came to the Cenozoic, Bartlett found the era much harder to characterise, concluding that the "beasts" were less "refined" than the dinosaurs before them. As a result, the score of Walking with Beasts intentionally disobeys standard rules of sophisticated harmony, focusing on simplicity but also at times having "big blocks of sound [crashing] in uninvited".[15]

BBC One aired the series weekly on Thursday nights, with a regular of repeats the following Sunday afternoon. In 2010, the series was repeated on BBC Three in omnibus format, as three-hour-long episodes.[17]

A two-episode companion documentary, The Science of Walking with Beasts, aired in November 2001 on BBC One. This series featured interviews with palaeontologists and explanations of how the fossil record and modern day descendants have informed what is known about the animals depicted in Walking with Beasts, as well as brief sections showing the development of the CGI and animatronic animals used in the series.

Walking with Beasts was praised for its effects. Both Paul Hoggart, writing for The Times, and Nancy Banks-Smith, writing for The Guardian, concurred that the series showed technical brilliance and stunning computer reconstructions. Banks-Smith however criticised the narration, writing that it had not "advanced beyond chalk and blackboard" and that it was "so clearly addressed to a clever but cloth-eared child that you felt yourself dwindle and shrink". Jennifer Selway, writing for the Daily Express, noted that although the technology and effort that went into Walking with Beasts was "breathtaking", its subject matter did not hold the same appeal as the dinosaurs and that the production team perhaps should have made "Walking with More Dinosaurs" instead.[19]

Walking with Beasts won a BAFTA Interactive Entertainment Award for Enhancement of Linear Media, a Monitor Award for Film Originated Television Specials - 3D Animation, a RTS Television Award for Multi-Media and Interactive and a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program (For Programming One Hour of More).[20] Walking with Beasts was also nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Visual Effects for a Miniseries, Movie or a Special and BAFTA TV Awards for Best Sound (Factual) and Best Visual Effects & Graphic Design.[20]

A companion book to the series, titled Walking with Beasts: A Prehistoric Safari (titled just Walking with Prehistoric Beasts in the United States), was authored by Haines and released in 2001. The book is a coffee-table book which explores life in the Cenozoic through the same settings and animals as in the series itself and it contains sidebars with facts and is illustrated with stills from the series. A Prehistoric Safari was positively reviewed in the book review magazine Publishers Weekly.[21]

In addition to the larger companion book, there were also several children's books released to accompany the series: Walking with Beasts Annual 2002 (a longer hardback book),[22] Walking with Beasts: 3-D Beasts (with 3D images)[23] and Walking with Beasts: Survival! by Stephen Cole, with pictures from the series.[24] Walking with Beasts: Survival! was released in the United States under the title Walking with Prehistoric Beasts: Photo Journal.[25] There was also a Walking with Beasts sticker book.[26]

Gastornis models from the Walking with Beasts exhibition

Woolly rhinoceros models from the Walking with Beasts exhibition

An exhibition based on Walking with Beasts was launched by the BBC in 2007. The exhibition featured life-sized models of many of the animals that appeared in the series,[27] information on the science behind Walking with Beasts,[28] original animatronics and puppets from the series,[29] real fossils,[29] as well as various activities for visitors.[27]

The exhibition was first held at the Horniman Museum in London from 10 February to 4 November 2007.[27] It was later at the Aberdeen Science Centre in Aberdeen, Scotland, from 23 March to 30 September 2009[28] and then at the Herbert Art Gallery and Museum in Coventry, England from 2 July to 30 October 2011.[29]

Walking with Beasts: Operation Salvage is a CD-ROM video game for Windows developed by Absolute Studios and published by BBC Worldwide Ltd. on 23 November 2001 as a tie-in to the series. A top-down shooter, Operation Salvage is set in 2026 after mankind's discovery of time travel. Players take the role of an agent of the World Wildlife Bionetwork (WWB), travelling back in time throughout the Cenozoic, observing different animals and fighting an organisation that is trapping the different creatures.[30][31] The game received mixed reviews: 7Wolf Magazine gave it 4.3 out of 10 and Absolute Games gave it 40 out of 100.[31]

Walking with Beasts aired as an interactive programme during its original UK broadcast, the first time the BBC had developed an interactive service for a non-sports programme. Among the various interactive features accessible through viewers' remote controls were the possibility to switch between narration by Kenneth Branagh and Dilly Barlow, to access figures and facts through pop-ups, and to view behind-the-scenes material.[4]

An accompanying website to the series was launched in 2001. The Walking with Beasts website featured extensive behind-the-scenes information on the production of the series, information on the fossil evidence used to reconstruct the animals and their environments, fact files for the animals, numerous articles on palaeontological topics such as climate throughout the Cenozoic and the extinction of the non-avian dinosaurs, as well as various games. Games included the "Shoot the Fish experiment", where players could experiment with evolution through a simulated fish population, games dealing with topics such as camouflage and fossilisation, as well as jigsaw puzzles with different animal skeletons.[32]