/ 059quick to point out that successful filmmaking
is about much more than camera wizardry
and technical tricks. ‘The number one thing
is how you tell your stories. You can have the
best footage in the world and it can fall flat on
its face if you don’t tell the story beautifully.’
As far as Alice is concerned, Jo’s input has
been invaluable. ‘The encouragement you get
from somebody looking at your work, the
feedback, is key,’ she says. But it’s a two-way
relationship, as Jo points out: ‘You can never
sit still for a second: any creative industry
relies always on the strength of fabulous new
people coming in with fresh ideas.’
Ideas are something that Alice has no
shortage of – she says she often wakes in the
night, brain buzzing. And awakening others
to the natural world, especially back in Kenya,
is now her main aim. Her finals film will tell
the story of a young Kenyan man whose
father was killed by a buffalo, but who has
gone on to be a wildlife ambassador through
Wildlife Works. And she’s keen to highlight
lesser-known conservation initiatives, too.
‘There are some small projects doing amazing
things in Kenya, but nobody knows about
them,’ she says. Nobody, that is, until now...Wildlife hero I have two young children,
so Steve Backshall. (Alice)
Favourite nature-watching spot It has to be
Tsavo, Kenya, and watching the sun go down
over Mount Kasigau. (Alice)
Favourite bit of kit The Steadicam. We had fun
with it recently, pretending we were filming
The West Wing in the UWE corridors. (Alice)Pets I had Jack Russells in Rukinga in Kenya.
They would warn you when there was a
scorpion under your bed. (Alice)
Resolutions for 2017 I made a resolution
never to make resolutions, because I always
break them. (Jo)
Advice for budding filmmakers Go for it,
work hard and keep a sense of humour. (Jo)| SHORT CUTS |
Alice’s mentor
Jo Shinner has
worked on BBC
wildlife films
since 2011Words: Stephanie Cross. Photographs: iStock, UWE
a 10-minute-long
mini-documentary.
And that’s where
her mentor,
NHU executive
producer Jo
Shinner, comes in.
Like Alice,
Jo didn’t hit
on wildlife
filmmaking straightaway. Having studied
French, she pursued her passion for African
music as a radio DJ, while also making music
and arts documentaries. Then, after a number
of years with Tigress Productions, she joined
the NHU in 2011. With credits including
Animal Super Parents and Monkey Planet to
her name, she’s a mine of information – not
to mention cautionary tales. ‘After 28 years in
television, you pick up a few things along the
way,’ she says. ‘You learn by your mistakes,
so at least you can forewarn other people!’
Jo has mentored two previous UWE
students, both of whom have gone on to work
with the BBC unit. In fact, the course has an
astonishing track record, with a graduate
employment rate of 90-100 per cent. But Jo isOne to watch
Future filmmaker‘You can have the
best footage but
the number one
thing is how you
tell your stories’
‘Y
b
t
t
t
nya.ays,
o)sometimes it’s very hard to explain why
things need to be preserved.’
Of course, getting the message across is
something that film and TV do brilliantly.
But in Africa, wildlife documentaries are
themselves a rare species, a fact that Alice
says hit home when she moved to the UK. ‘It
was amazing how much people knew about
our wildlife here,’ she recalls. ‘I was working
in Amboseli with lions and I didn’t know half
the stuff that my sister-in-law knew sitting
in her flat in London watching Big Cat Diary.’Conservation work in Africa is viewed as a
‘white thing’, she says, something for tourists.
Alice realised she could help change all that.
Nevertheless, family commitments and a
job at the Soil Association seemed to rule out
a full-time, and expensive, return to education.
Then Alice spotted the Stephen Lawrence
Charitable Trust bursary. The Trust, which
was created in 1998 by Baroness Lawrence
OBE in memory of her son, offers bursaries
to students of architecture, journalism and,
now, wildlife filmmaking. ‘I thought, this is it.
This is my big opportunity,’ says Alice.
She is now beginning her second term
at UWE and planning her finals project: