SDM's SESSIONS FILM SERIES...
Now featured on SDM is our Sessions series of short films from our adventures. We begin bringing you the behind the scenes stories on the making of our short films. Stories on the how and why these films were created...I hope you enjoy this series.
Film; A Mother's Love.
Filmed; June 4, 2011
Location; Undisclosed, (kept secret for the safety of the gator and her offspring.)
I made this short film after visiting my brother in law, Andrew 'AJ' Moore, a wildlife Biologist who lives in Kingsville, Texas. He took me to this flood zone, a spot where he had seen a mother alligator with a bunch of babies. It was exciting to see a mother with her babies, and to be able to film them. Trying to film alligators up close is hard, unless you live in Florida. 95% of the alligators you find in the wild are very shy and will run and hide as soon as you get near them. So to have a gator that did not run when we approached her was an opportunity I did not want to miss. Plus filming a mother with babies was also a great opportunity
Mother gator and babies hiding in the reeds.
THE STORY...
I was trying to get a close up of the mother gator, but she was hiding in this flood pipe, and I could not get a really good close up of her, because she would either drop below the surface and hide or disappear into her pipe. As I was bending down to get a better shot, she snapped at me, (of course because I was violating her personal space.) I was not able to capture the snap, and the thought of having her grab my EX1 camera was just not something I was willing to risk, so I decided to break out the GoPro and see if I could get a good shot of her from both underwater and right at eye level. The visability was really bad, (because this was a nasty mud hole), so I did not get very good clips of underwater footage. I almost fell into it while trying to angle for a shot, which could of been interesting, for sure funny. Anyway, for the GoPro shot, AJ was helping me set it up and then it hit me, let me grab my camera and film what we were doing. So I grabbed the EX and started interviewing AJ. I was not really sure why I was filming it, I just thought it would be fun. Again most of the time, gators run and hide, and this gator despite having babies there was very well behaved and not at all snappy. The only time she did snap was when I voliated her personal space by trying to shove my camera in her hole. (that sounds dirty.)
Filming Mother gator peeking out of her hiding hole.
SO AJ had just set himself up for the shot, and put the GoPro in the water. The gator dropped underwater, and I decided to angle for a better shot. Before I could get into position, she had moved, (while underwater, where we could not see her moving in closer). She popped up right next to the camera, and grabbed the camera into her mouth. It happened so fast, we never saw it coming. After seeing the damage she inflicted on the camera, I decided one take was enough. I love my GoPro and still have the rest of our shark season to shoot...It was fun and a real eye opener at the power of a gators bite force. I have mad respect for these beautiful animals and I am looking forward to returning to the mud hole to continue filming this family of gators and watching them grow and move on....I hope you enjoyed the film.
