“Wild Yellowstone” is not your father’s natural history show.
Debuting Dec. 6 on the cable channel Nat Geo Wild, this two-hour documentary uses state-of-the-art technology to capture the geographic beauty and wildlife battles of the world’s first national park.
“You don’t just go out there with a tripod and shoot a geyser. That isn’t good enough anymore,” said photographer Ryan Sheets, who worked on the award-winning film. “You have to use a lot of the same cutting-edge techniques you see in action movies, or people are going to get bored and start looking at their phones.”
High-speed and infrared cameras, drones and stabilizers are a few of the tools that helped harness captivating images, such as a super slow-motion shot of a fox diving into snow to fetch dinner and bighorn sheep duking it out in a head-butt battle royale.
“Wild Yellowstone” is divided into winter and summer. Filmmakers spent the better part of two years lugging heavy equipment around Yellowstone and nearby Grand Teton national parks, shooting high-stakes stories of the animals that call this diverse, unforgiving terrain home.
