News Reel

In preparation for this year’s signifi cant anniversaries commemorating Charles Darwin, an Australian team of researchers and filmmakers led by Peter Donaldson of JUPE Productions conducted an expedition to the Himalayan region, retracing the steps of Sir Joseph Hooker.

Hooker was Darwin’s closest friend and played a major role in not only testing Darwin’s theories on evolution, but also in persuading him to publish them. Hooker was in his own right one of the greatest botanists and explorers of the nineteenth century, and awarded some of the highest honours in British science.

The expedition team carefully retraced the steps of Sir Joseph Hooker’s 1848 journey through Eastern Nepal and the Tibetan border, a recreation that had never before been attempted. Over the period of the 350km trek, including a 50km vertical incline, the team encountered incredibly hostile environments which would ordinarily take a toll on audio equipment.

Thankfully Peter Donaldson and his team were equipped with both the RØDE NTG-3 precision broadcast-grade shotgun and the NTG-2 dual powered shotgun, as well as the RØDE Blimp windshield suspension system. The NTG-3 was used inside the RØDE Blimp for all key audio gathering, with the NTG-2 mounted on the primary camera to capture ambience. This proved to be a great solution for quick shooting in such demanding circumstances where preplanning was simply not possible, such as fi lming a caravan of yaks on narrow mountain tracks.

The expedition team were very pleased with the performance of the RØDE equipment, capturing high quality audio despite constant movement, tropical heat and high humidity in the lowlands, and subzero temperatures and extremely low humidity at altitudes of up to 6000m.

“I cannot recommend highly enough the quality of the equipment and the fantastic cooperation we have had from RØDE Microphones” commented Peter on his return.