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David Attenborough has travelled
the globe countless times

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to film the living
world in all its wonder. A-ha.

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In a career that spans the age of
television itself, he has pioneered
new filming technologies, 

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produced some of the most iconic
moments in broadcasting,

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and inspired a generation.

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The blue whale!

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Now, in his 80s, he's
on the road again, travelling across

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continents and oceans to shoot
the latest instalment in his
epic account of life on earth.

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This is a film about the life and
evolution of a very rare species,

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caught on camera
in HIS natural habitat.

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David is making an extraordinary
journey around the world

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to film his latest landmark series,
the story
of the origin of life.

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David Attenborough's First Life
is the series that will fulfil

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his ambition to document and film
all the stages of life on earth.

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Over the last 30-odd years
I've been filming

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the range and variety
of animals and plants
that live on the world today.

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What has been missing is the
very beginning of the story.

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We've always started at chapter two.

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So, I just want to go back and
show where this whole thing started.

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When I was a boy, that was
regarded as totally unknown.

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There was no evidence of how life
started and today there's evidence.

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The first piece of evidence
was unearthed just 100 miles
north of David's London home.

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This is the Charnwood Forest
in Leicestershire.

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As a schoolboy, I grew up near here.

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This was where, in the 1930s,
David first developed a passion
for the natural world and fossils.

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This is the beginning
of the journey for David.

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This is where, as a young boy,

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he looked and found fossils
that got him fired up

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and it really started
his career.

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It's 70-odd years since
David was walking these woods

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and cycling around them
and now, we're back here.

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When I was a boy, growing up
in the Midlands, in Leicester,

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the rocks and limestone we found
in the east of the county were
full of the most magical things.

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You hit a stone and it suddenly fell
open and there was this amazing coil
shell - beautiful and extraordinary,

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and nobody had seen that for
150 million years, except you.

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So, I thought it was very romantic
and exciting.

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It appealed to the small boy's
instinct of collecting things

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that, to be honest,
I don't think I've really lost,
but I certainly had it then.

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I was a passionate fossil collector.

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But I never came to look for them in
this part of Charnwood and then a boy

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from my very own school, just
a few years after I left it,
made an astounding discovery.

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I can't remember where I heard about
the discovery of a Charnia,

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but I certainly kicked myself
and I thought
"I could have been part of history.

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"I could have discovered that.

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"Why didn't I bother to look?"

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And this is it.

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It's called and is known around
the world as Charnia,

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after the forest
in which it was discovered.

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David is as passionate
about fossils today as he

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was as a boy, an interest that was
nurtured by his academic parents.

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He was the middle of three sons,
born to Mary and Frederick.

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The family lived in a house in the
grounds of what is now Leicester
University,

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just half a mile down the road

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from the museum
where he is filming now.

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Yes, there we are.

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That was University - well, it
was, as the press were quick to
point, out a lunatic asylum.

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It was taken over by the
University College, you see.

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And we lived in that which
was the superintendent's
house, College House.

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There was the big park,
Victoria Park.

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There's my father.

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He was principal of the University
College in the 1930s

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and there he is,
looking younger than me,

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though he didn't have any hair. But
not since he was about 28, I think.

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David has two brothers - John and
Richard, with Richard growing up

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to become an actor
and Oscar-winning director.

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So what was the inspiration that
drove the boys to such success?

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Perhaps it was their sense
of adventure, as they explored

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the building that was once
a psychiatric hospital.

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There were great areas of it that
were still in the condition of them
being a Victorian lunatic asylum,

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and that included padded cells.

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We, as boys,
used to wander around there,

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getting in in various ways, which
I suppose we shouldn't have done.

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My elder brother Richard took me into
this padded cell and shut the door.

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That was horrible because inside it
was all quilted and where the door
shut there was no handle on the door.

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So you couldn't even see where
the door was

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and you knew that you could scream
to your heart's content,
or as loud as you wished,

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and nobody could possibly hear you.

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That was not a pleasant sensation.

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I must remind him of it some time!

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David went to Cambridge
to read natural sciences
and that enabled him

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to indulge his growing fascination
with the natural world.

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It's a passion that still drives
him on today.

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David's journey to discover the
origins of all life is going to
take him around the entire planet,

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encompassing four different
continents and 40,000 miles.

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First stop, Morocco,
in North Africa.

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We're here for trilobites.

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Trilobites are the most
extraordinary, wonderful fossils.

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Here are some of the
wonderfully prepared specimens.

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Happily, and very, very fortunately,
the world's greatest expert
on trilobites -

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or certainly one
of the first three - Richard Fortey,
an old friend of mine,

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is here to show us around,
so we should be in
for a very privileged time.

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I think they are just about as good

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as you can get with preparation.

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They look stunning.

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Trilobites
are principal characters in the
story of the first life on earth.

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They were one of the most successful
kinds of animal in history.

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There are 50,000 species
that we know of, and probably
many more undiscovered.

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They were the first animals
to see a fully-formed picture,

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using lenses in their eyes,
made of rock.

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In their heyday, they dominated
the globe for 250 million years.

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Humans have been around
for just two.

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What's that ridge there?

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That is rock still in.

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That is the system we use.

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He very carefully left these
for us to see the process
in development, you see.

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You're an artist. Thanks very much.

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You really are.
Thank you very, very much.

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Before filming begins tomorrow,

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David has a chance to pick out the
best specimens for the programme.

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He's also on the lookout
for a few pieces to add to
his private collection.

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What sort of price
are we thinking about?

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I have reserved all for a long time,
for you, more than three months.

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Thank you again very much.

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You are welcome any time,
no problem. Thank you.

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If I was Mr Moneybags, I would
have bought the Ordovician ones,
the new ones, on the spot.

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Which was the one that
really blew you away, David?

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That was 15K.

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The fossils David has just seen
are the best there are.

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But other trilobites are widely
prepared and sold in the towns and
villages of this part of Morocco.

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But, to an expert eye, there is
something about some of these
fossils that doesn't quite add up.

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It's a nice little specimen.

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Well, I've never seen a trident
bearer with a great long flared

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median prong on its stripe,
so either it's true,
in which case it's weird,

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or it's been, let's say nature
been helped along a little bit.

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If it's fake, it's carefully done.

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I've seen lots of
different ones in my time.

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I've never seen that before.

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Or maybe it's pathological.

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A diseased trilobite.

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We don't want one of them,
not round these parts!

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You don't want anybody
catching anything.

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A-ha. Thank you.

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Thank you. This one?

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This one I like but it's too much.

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Give me 1,000 dirham, it's a
good price. It's a good price.

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750?

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No. 1,000.

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800? 800? 90.

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850?

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90 dirham.

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850?

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90.

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It's very sad.

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How much? OK. OK.

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OK? Yes.

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Shake on it. 850?

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OK.

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Thank you very much.

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At 850 Moroccan dirham, David's
got a bargain - that's roughly £70.

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20, 200, 400, 600, 800 and 50.

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With the shopping spree over,
work begins.

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David is filming
at a local museum

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where there's a collection
of some of the strangest

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and largest trilobites
in existence.

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Action.

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The shape of these eyes can in
themselves tell us a great deal
about the way the animal lived.

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Some of these - we're talking...

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thousands of pounds of some of
these things,

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if not tens of

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thousands of pounds,

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of something
that's completely unknown to
science and spectacular to boot.

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There is a sort of a standard rule
about this, that when you see
a really lovely thing -

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and you're silly enough to say
that's a really lovely thing -

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the person concerned said, "Of
course, private collection".

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I have some for sale,
but that one is my collection.

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I think every time you ask whether
it's a private collection or not,

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it goes up by another multiple,
you see. This one is my collection.

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Are the other ones curled up?

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Are they as
beautifully prepared as that?

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Nice.

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What sort of money?

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OK. Until I show it to you,
I can't tell you.

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David Attenborough is a name that
is synonymous with television.

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First Life will be his
50th series as a presenter.

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But surprising as it seems, his long
career in TV began quite by chance.

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I saw an advertisement in The Times
for a sound radio job which I applied
for and didn't even get an interview,

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but a week or so afterwards,

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I got a letter from someone who said
they'd got this new thing called
television, would I be interested?

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Then they said they would pay me
£1,000 to go on the training course.

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That was three times what I was being
paid at the time in the publishers
so I thought I would give it a go.

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Television in the '50s
was brand-new, with the BBC

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providing the first public
service programmes in Europe.

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David had never seen a
television programme before,

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but nevertheless began work as
a trainee at Alexandra Palace.

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I was apprenticed to a producer
who was regarded
as a very experienced man

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because he'd been there for
three months and he had already
produced one programme, you know,

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so he knew where everything was, so
I joined him and we worked on a quiz
called Animal, Vegetable, Mineral.

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David's obsession with mysterious
objects of the past was put to
good use behind the scenes.

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Lovely, isn't it? A very...

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It was his job to source
artefacts to be identified
by a panel of esteemed academics.

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..and there, what my Hungarian
colleagues would call...

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David's academic background
and his analytical mind

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gave him an affinity
with scholars and scientists
that endures to this day.

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I've known David
for rather a long time

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and we certainly share certain
aspects of humour.

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Somebody should make a proper
feature movie,

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about trilobites
called Thoracic Park!

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This horse is unfit for heavy work.

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One of the great privileges is having
an expert like Richard Fortey, who is
a world authority on these...

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particular animals and
who knows this locality very well.

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Richard is now stomping
around on the horizon.

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It will be very interesting - I bet
you he comes back and he'll say,

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you know, there was a nice one and he
shows you this, that and the other.

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What do you think of the chances
of this being a piece
of worked jasper?

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In other words, you think
this is a spear point?

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I think it is. I think it's got a
broken tip and probably was thrown
away, or discarded, do you think?

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I do. It's jolly old because it's
got this polish on it, wind polish.

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Yes. I think also that that is
probably a xerophytic horsetail,
which I didn't know existed.

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I was just going to borrow your
lens to have a look to see if it
has got the characteristic joints.

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I've got the characteristic joints!

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Certainly falling to bits,
the way they always do.

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David's appetite for knowledge
is insatiable.

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And in the 1950s, that hunger drove
him to come up with a programme idea

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that would provide the perfect
opportunity to travel and film
in the remotest parts of the world.

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I had a friend in London Zoo
and he and I cooked up an idea

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that the London Zoo should
send out a collecting expedition,

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which of course we
wouldn't conceivably do now, but
in those days it was possible.

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And the idea would be that
I would accompany this chap,

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who was an expert on snakes, and I
would see him pouncing on a snake
and then from that film sequence,

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we would go to him in the studio
live with the same snake and he
be able to talk about the details.

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That was the basis, called Zoo Quest.

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The series didn't quite turn out
as planned for David the producer.

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Jack Lester was the man from the zoo
and he acquired a tropical disease,

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he collapsed after the first show

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00:17:25,920 --> 00:17:31,840
and the head of my department, or the
head of television said, "Oh look,
if Jack Lester can't do it,

226
00:17:31,840 --> 00:17:35,200
"the show's got to go on - the only
other person there
who could do is Attenborough.

227
00:17:35,200 --> 00:17:40,320
"Tell him he has to leave
the producer's gallery and go
down on the floor and do it."

228
00:17:40,320 --> 00:17:43,640
We spent the first part of our
trip in Paraguay...

229
00:17:43,640 --> 00:17:46,440
From those first moments
in front of the camera,

230
00:17:46,440 --> 00:17:50,080
David has had plenty of time
to hone his distinctive
presenting style.

231
00:17:53,600 --> 00:17:58,960
His 50-year career in television
spans the life
of the industry itself.

232
00:18:02,240 --> 00:18:05,760
The First Life shoot
has moved to Australia

233
00:18:05,760 --> 00:18:08,320
and this morning he's performing
the same ritual

234
00:18:08,320 --> 00:18:14,400
he has gone through
hundreds of times before.

235
00:18:14,400 --> 00:18:16,520
What is the piece in your head now?

236
00:18:16,520 --> 00:18:19,000
Very good question.

237
00:18:19,000 --> 00:18:22,840
You've got to convey something,
some fact, you've got to
get it right.

238
00:18:22,840 --> 00:18:28,240
In 1946, geologist Reg Sprigg found
fossils here in the Ediacara Hills...

239
00:18:28,240 --> 00:18:33,960
Once having got it right
in your mind, you then try
and put it into words.

240
00:18:33,960 --> 00:18:36,400
..Which, until that moment...

241
00:18:36,400 --> 00:18:39,600
had been, until... no...

242
00:18:39,600 --> 00:18:47,400
And the first words that come out of
my lips at any rate are jumbled,
and confused, and...

243
00:18:47,400 --> 00:18:51,760
circumlocutory,
and fumbling for exactitude.

244
00:18:51,760 --> 00:18:55,760
It was the discovery of, in the
Charnwood Forest,

245
00:18:55,760 --> 00:19:00,200
the creature in what
was undoubtedly pre-cambrian...

246
00:19:00,200 --> 00:19:06,280
And then you decide that that will
distil into the following sentences.

247
00:19:06,280 --> 00:19:08,400
That is the gist. OK.

248
00:19:08,400 --> 00:19:12,480
Very difficult to think about it when
someone is fumbling in your genitals!

249
00:19:12,480 --> 00:19:15,280
It's sort of tricky.

250
00:19:15,280 --> 00:19:19,360
It was a discovery in 1957...

251
00:19:19,360 --> 00:19:24,960
I have to walk up and down and
say it to myself and hope I'll
be able to say it to the camera.

252
00:19:24,960 --> 00:19:33,840
In 1946, an Australian geologist,
Reg Sprigg, working here in the
Ediacara Hills of South Australia...

253
00:19:33,840 --> 00:19:40,600
David's trademark delivery has
endeared him to millions
and the producers of Zoo Quest

254
00:19:40,600 --> 00:19:46,240
saw that talent grow.
He was given the job of presenter
on a permanent basis.

255
00:19:46,240 --> 00:19:49,080
I explained to the men as best
I could that I had come to their

256
00:19:49,080 --> 00:19:52,720
valley to try and get some of
the birds of paradise alive.

257
00:19:52,720 --> 00:19:58,520
But they explained to me in gestures
that they shot the birds
with bows and arrows.

258
00:20:01,720 --> 00:20:05,640
Making a documentary isn't
all about talking to camera.

259
00:20:05,640 --> 00:20:11,320
David understands better
than anyone else that some
sequences are a necessary chore.

260
00:20:11,320 --> 00:20:13,360
We're going to do some
tracking shots,

261
00:20:13,360 --> 00:20:15,240
vehicle to vehicle tracking shots.

262
00:20:15,240 --> 00:20:18,760
We're going to have Pete in the back
of this vehicle, leading vehicle,

263
00:20:18,760 --> 00:20:22,000
shooting backwards and we've got
David and Jim in this vehicle...

264
00:20:25,400 --> 00:20:30,440
It's one of the rewards that you
get, the real joys of driving up
there and then they say,

265
00:20:30,440 --> 00:20:34,760
would you drive back, and then they
say, we think we'd like it
a little faster

266
00:20:34,760 --> 00:20:37,080
and then they say, we were wrong.

267
00:20:37,080 --> 00:20:43,680
It was better a little bit slower,
so would you go back again? So it's
actually not the pits of filming,

268
00:20:43,680 --> 00:20:48,720
the pits of filming is when
you have to walk through the
forest looking interested.

269
00:20:48,720 --> 00:20:53,640
And not only interested,
but eagle-eyed.

270
00:20:53,640 --> 00:20:57,800
You say, "Where will
this experienced traveller

271
00:20:57,800 --> 00:21:02,640
"suddenly spot the...
My goodness, there it is!"

272
00:21:02,640 --> 00:21:04,240
That's hard doing.

273
00:21:04,240 --> 00:21:07,920
There are variations - you can
give them the John Wayne, which

274
00:21:07,920 --> 00:21:12,960
is tight-buttocked like that -
that is one of my specialities!

275
00:21:12,960 --> 00:21:18,120
I'm not allowed to do it much these
days. I have to be a bit more
slouched and relaxed, you know.

276
00:21:18,120 --> 00:21:21,880
But of course intelligent,
which is the tricky bit.

277
00:21:21,880 --> 00:21:22,920
That was lovely.

278
00:21:22,920 --> 00:21:27,440
I loved it, when he asked us to do it
again slightly faster, what a thrill!

279
00:21:27,440 --> 00:21:30,240
We only had your enjoyment in mind!

280
00:21:38,480 --> 00:21:44,160
David is filming with a team
of palaeontologists in the Flinders
Ranges of South Australia,

281
00:21:44,160 --> 00:21:50,160
unearthing fossils that
describe how early animals evolved.

282
00:21:50,160 --> 00:21:54,080
How and why did animals
first begin to move?

283
00:21:57,120 --> 00:21:57,960
There is a great thrill

284
00:21:57,960 --> 00:22:01,040
of being alongside these people
who know what they're doing

285
00:22:01,040 --> 00:22:04,920
and know what they're looking for
and know how to look for it.

286
00:22:04,920 --> 00:22:08,480
And of course, you naively think it
would be wonderful

287
00:22:08,480 --> 00:22:11,960
to turn over a rock and say,
"Ah! It's a new species!"

288
00:22:11,960 --> 00:22:18,040
Well, looking for fossils
is not like that, except
that it actually happened.

289
00:22:18,040 --> 00:22:19,640
That's just contributed about...

290
00:22:19,640 --> 00:22:21,920
Have a look! Have a look!

291
00:22:25,480 --> 00:22:29,480
And there it was, and Jim took
a brush and brushed it away.

292
00:22:29,480 --> 00:22:32,840
And bless me, he said,
I don't know, I don't know.

293
00:22:32,840 --> 00:22:36,800
Look at that.
That is what I would just...

294
00:22:36,800 --> 00:22:38,560
It's the weirdest one
I've ever seen.

295
00:22:38,560 --> 00:22:41,440
I've never seen one with that...

296
00:22:41,440 --> 00:22:43,200
It's the relief...

297
00:22:43,200 --> 00:22:45,360
It has to be a footprint.

298
00:22:45,360 --> 00:22:51,200
And we're still waiting as to
hear whether in fact that was the
discovery moment of a new species.

299
00:22:51,200 --> 00:22:53,280
I think it probably was.

300
00:22:57,400 --> 00:23:01,280
The mud on the sea floor
can tell us a great deal

301
00:23:01,280 --> 00:23:05,480
about these animals and not just what
they look like, but how they behaved.

302
00:23:05,480 --> 00:23:08,720
One appears on the telly and 
everybody thinks you're an expert,

303
00:23:08,720 --> 00:23:15,280
but I had, last Christmas, some new
neighbours came over

304
00:23:15,280 --> 00:23:19,120
and I'd ever met them
before but the lady said,

305
00:23:19,120 --> 00:23:27,120
Oh just the person I want to meet
because little Julian is so excited
about natural history, thrilled,

306
00:23:27,120 --> 00:23:33,040
"He'll be thrilled to meet you and
he's got some questions for you,"
and I thought oh, dear, oh, dear.

307
00:23:33,040 --> 00:23:40,840
Come along, Julian, ask Sir David
the questions. Julian said,
"How long is the komodo dragon?"

308
00:23:40,840 --> 00:23:44,040
Big relief.
I said, "Well, as a matter of fact,

309
00:23:44,040 --> 00:23:51,200
"Julian, I can tell you the answer
to that. I said, I've been to Komodo
three times.

310
00:23:51,200 --> 00:23:56,640
"And I've actually measured them
and they can grow
to 12 feet long."

311
00:23:56,640 --> 00:23:58,360
And he said, "Wrong!"

312
00:24:04,240 --> 00:24:07,920
He'd been reading too much
Guinness Book of Records.

313
00:24:07,920 --> 00:24:10,600
This is a side-necked turtle.

314
00:24:10,600 --> 00:24:15,200
Over six series of Zoo Quest,
komodo dragons were just one of the

315
00:24:15,200 --> 00:24:18,480
many species David encountered,
collecting animals for London Zoo.

316
00:24:18,480 --> 00:24:23,080
They couldn't take them all
so David stepped in -

317
00:24:23,080 --> 00:24:29,880
his home became a menagerie with
his wife and children helping
with the upkeep of the animals.

318
00:24:29,880 --> 00:24:36,240
We had a pair of lemurs at home and
some lovely birds called blue-crowned
hanging parakeets,

319
00:24:36,240 --> 00:24:41,880
which we brought back from Borneo,
and chameleons. We
had a breeding colony of bush babies.

320
00:24:44,240 --> 00:24:47,280
They had an unfortunate habit
of peeing on their hands

321
00:24:47,280 --> 00:24:52,240
and then rubbing their hands
together and patting everything
around to make them smell good.

322
00:24:52,240 --> 00:24:57,160
Friends coming to dinner would
arrive and open the door and you

323
00:24:57,160 --> 00:25:00,560
could see them dilate their nostrils
and think,

324
00:25:00,560 --> 00:25:05,840
That's not mulligatawny
soup, what are we going to have
for dinner tonight?

325
00:25:05,840 --> 00:25:11,200
I regret to say
it was bush baby urine so, after
a bit, my dear wife thought this

326
00:25:11,200 --> 00:25:17,680
was not compatible with domestic
hospitality and one thing and
the other so we got rid of them.

327
00:25:17,680 --> 00:25:21,720
David, of course, is famous
for his love of animals.

328
00:25:23,600 --> 00:25:26,000
To help tell the story of the
first life on earth,

329
00:25:26,000 --> 00:25:30,360
he's in a rainforest in north-west
Australia filming
living fossils,

330
00:25:30,360 --> 00:25:33,200
animals with evolutionary links
to the past.

331
00:25:33,200 --> 00:25:35,880
David, we're going to be on
close-ups on the animal,

332
00:25:35,880 --> 00:25:38,640
but it might help us
if you deliver your line anyway.

333
00:25:38,640 --> 00:25:43,840
I think for me the highlight was
in the rainforest when David was

334
00:25:43,840 --> 00:25:51,200
there with this little velvet worm
on his hand and his connection with
animals just really came through,

335
00:25:51,200 --> 00:25:57,360
you could see he adored this
little creature, this weird worm
crawling on his arm.

336
00:25:57,360 --> 00:25:58,560
Action, David.

337
00:25:58,560 --> 00:26:01,400
And this is what I was looking for.

338
00:26:01,400 --> 00:26:10,440
This extraordinary and enchanting
little creature, sometimes
called a velvet worm...

339
00:26:10,440 --> 00:26:15,040
He just, you know, he gave
it personality and he was
in awe of this thing.

340
00:26:15,040 --> 00:26:22,480
Just to see that was such an
enlightening thing, sitting in the
middle of a rainforest

341
00:26:22,480 --> 00:26:24,920
with fireflies popping off
all around you,

342
00:26:24,920 --> 00:26:29,760
you have to pinch yourself because
it had a dream-like quality to it.

343
00:26:29,760 --> 00:26:36,920
It has one further attribute
which Ayesha could not have had.

344
00:26:36,920 --> 00:26:41,960
It has tiny little holes all along
its flanks which enable it

345
00:26:41,960 --> 00:26:44,480
to breathe air,

346
00:26:44,480 --> 00:26:49,040
so this is one of the
first creatures

347
00:26:49,040 --> 00:26:51,760
that moved on to land

348
00:26:51,760 --> 00:26:55,960
540 million years ago.

349
00:27:10,480 --> 00:27:12,160
Nice one. Yes.

350
00:27:12,160 --> 00:27:14,400
Yes, it's the ring tailed gecko.
What's your favourite gecko?

351
00:27:14,400 --> 00:27:17,520
The tokay gecko.

352
00:27:17,520 --> 00:27:22,120
It goes to-kay, to-kay.

353
00:27:22,120 --> 00:27:27,960
And in Indonesia most people
are terrified of it and they
said one bite, certain death.

354
00:27:27,960 --> 00:27:35,120
And I caught one once and I said,
Look, they're absolutely harmless,
you see, and I pointed my finger,

355
00:27:35,120 --> 00:27:38,560
Nothing to be afraid of,
and the gecko went like this,

356
00:27:38,560 --> 00:27:43,880
and I said, nothing to be frightened
of, it's not poisonous at all.

357
00:27:43,880 --> 00:27:46,240
But I couldn't get it off.

358
00:27:46,240 --> 00:27:54,760
I put it on to a tap, I pulled it,
it just hung on and hung on
and it was on for...

359
00:27:54,760 --> 00:28:00,080
After about five minutes, you get
quite bored with it, and it was quite
upsetting, it was a very long time.

360
00:28:00,080 --> 00:28:03,880
I didn't come clever dick again
for quite some time.

361
00:28:05,880 --> 00:28:08,040
Ten minutes, maybe!

362
00:28:11,480 --> 00:28:13,560
Action. Cue David.

363
00:28:13,560 --> 00:28:17,520
As the oxygen levels rose,
so eventually they reached

364
00:28:17,520 --> 00:28:22,400
a level when it was possible for
air-breathing animals to live.

365
00:28:22,400 --> 00:28:23,760
Crikey.

366
00:28:27,160 --> 00:28:28,760
As they say in Australia,
got the bastard!

367
00:28:30,560 --> 00:28:35,400
They only come in ones, do they?
Limited edition. Two wafers.

368
00:28:35,400 --> 00:28:37,280
I think one of the great things

369
00:28:37,280 --> 00:28:38,640
about working with David

370
00:28:38,640 --> 00:28:40,800
is that he fits in with the team
around him

371
00:28:40,800 --> 00:28:43,120
and is interested
in everybody in the team.

372
00:28:43,120 --> 00:28:45,080
Being part of a team is one
of the pleasures.

373
00:28:45,080 --> 00:28:50,120
It takes some time to
become a team, you can't just slot

374
00:28:50,120 --> 00:28:55,680
in like that because it depends
upon knowing the personalities

375
00:28:55,680 --> 00:28:58,280
of the people
you're involved with.

376
00:28:58,280 --> 00:29:03,880
I suppose in one way if you
going on long journeys together
with people, you ought to be,

377
00:29:03,880 --> 00:29:10,040
to do a job, you ought to be
sufficiently professional to be
able to get on with anybody.

378
00:29:10,040 --> 00:29:13,480
And if you find that the
way they comb their hair or

379
00:29:13,480 --> 00:29:17,640
something is irritating, then you
learn to suppress that irritation.

380
00:29:17,640 --> 00:29:22,960
But one of the ways,
once you begin to sort that out,

381
00:29:22,960 --> 00:29:25,840
you do begin
to develop jokes between you.

382
00:29:32,080 --> 00:29:34,800
To illustrate the evolution of
backboned animals,

383
00:29:34,800 --> 00:29:38,480
David is on his
way to a zoo to film a white rhino.

384
00:29:39,600 --> 00:29:44,160
He'll be delivering his lines just
inches from the two tonne animal,

385
00:29:44,160 --> 00:29:47,040
so even David must be
briefed on safety.

386
00:29:51,320 --> 00:29:53,520
HORN BLARES

387
00:29:53,520 --> 00:29:56,600
Well, you can hand feed him
if you are happy to do that,

388
00:29:56,600 --> 00:30:00,400
otherwise you can just pop
that leaves in over the log.

389
00:30:00,400 --> 00:30:04,240
There's no danger of him giving
me a nip with his front teeth?

390
00:30:04,240 --> 00:30:06,840
He won't be able to nip you.
He won't do that.

391
00:30:06,840 --> 00:30:09,680
Obviously, as you
know, the lips are very muscly.

392
00:30:09,680 --> 00:30:13,280
Accustomed as I am to
rhinoceros feeding,

393
00:30:13,280 --> 00:30:16,800
the problem
is a trivial one, really.

394
00:30:16,800 --> 00:30:21,240
Just you might lose in your hand at
the wrist, that's all, you know?
Nothing to worry about, really!

395
00:30:21,240 --> 00:30:23,480
The lips are very muscular,

396
00:30:23,480 --> 00:30:26,160
so you might lose a finger or two,

397
00:30:26,160 --> 00:30:31,120
but nothing really to worry about,
you know, I'm told!

398
00:30:33,640 --> 00:30:36,840
I was driving through Kenya once.

399
00:30:36,840 --> 00:30:44,600
The chap I was with was a very
knowledgeable biologist
and an expert on elephants.

400
00:30:44,600 --> 00:30:47,640
Suddenly he said, "Did you
hear that pitter-patter?"

401
00:30:47,640 --> 00:30:51,600
And I said, "No, what?" He said,
"Well, we were charged by a rhino."

402
00:30:51,600 --> 00:30:55,800
I said, "We were?" "Yes", he
said, "but it was a dummy charge."

403
00:30:55,800 --> 00:30:58,760
There was another pitter-patter,
but this time it didn't fade away.

404
00:30:58,760 --> 00:31:02,360
This time, wallop, hit the back end
of the Land Rover

405
00:31:02,360 --> 00:31:05,040
and actually
lifted it up and shook it.

406
00:31:05,040 --> 00:31:09,760
And I remember seeing his hands
on the wheel

407
00:31:09,760 --> 00:31:13,920
showing white at the knuckles as the
thing came a second time.

408
00:31:13,920 --> 00:31:16,840
Crash! Bang! And it shook.

409
00:31:16,840 --> 00:31:23,360
And then he backed off, and I said,
"Hell of a dummy charge that, Roy."

410
00:31:23,360 --> 00:31:27,920
He said, "Don't joke!" He came in the
third time, wrecked the back wheel,

411
00:31:27,920 --> 00:31:31,840
ripped up the tyre

412
00:31:31,840 --> 00:31:34,880
and by the time he'd finished,
the car was undrivable.

413
00:31:38,720 --> 00:31:44,560
David can't go anywhere without
being recognised by someone. His
popularity spans the generations.

414
00:31:44,560 --> 00:31:48,240
Please keep it up. It's the only
stuff on telly worth watching!

415
00:31:54,200 --> 00:31:57,520
And this level of fame is
something he's had to get used to.

416
00:32:00,880 --> 00:32:04,880
By the mid-Sixties,
David Attenborough had
become a household name.

417
00:32:04,880 --> 00:32:07,160
Mr David Attenborough, here.
Bless his heart.

418
00:32:07,160 --> 00:32:11,840
Then, still in his thirties, an
unexpected opportunity came his way.

419
00:32:13,240 --> 00:32:19,360
The BBC needed young blood to run
their brand-new channel, BBC Two.

420
00:32:20,600 --> 00:32:24,360
I remember deliberately saying to
myself, "Now, you've got to make up

421
00:32:24,360 --> 00:32:29,400
"your mind, Attenborough, are
you a television man or are
you some kind of scientist?"

422
00:32:29,400 --> 00:32:35,960
I decided at that time that I was
really at heart a television man.

423
00:32:35,960 --> 00:32:37,960
Therefore, if I was a
television man,

424
00:32:37,960 --> 00:32:43,520
there could not be a more interesting
job in television than that
one that was being offered to me.

425
00:32:43,520 --> 00:32:46,920
We shall continue to look for the
new stars, the experimental stars.

426
00:32:50,280 --> 00:32:54,760
As Controller of BBC Two, David
introduced a new wave of programming

427
00:32:54,760 --> 00:32:57,440
that would stand the test of time.

428
00:32:57,440 --> 00:33:02,880
He also pioneered a whole new era
of television as the BBC raced

429
00:33:02,880 --> 00:33:07,800
to make Britain the first nation
in Europe to broadcast in colour.

430
00:33:07,800 --> 00:33:10,880
Then, of course, we discovered that
in fact Germany

431
00:33:10,880 --> 00:33:14,200
was preparing to
going into colour and this,

432
00:33:14,200 --> 00:33:17,160
you must remember,
this was in the Sixties

433
00:33:17,160 --> 00:33:21,760
and so there was still a sort of
feeling about Germany, you know?

434
00:33:21,760 --> 00:33:25,080
We'd just won the war, after all,
and I was thinking,

435
00:33:25,080 --> 00:33:28,640
"Come on, the BBC should
be the first in colour in Europe."

436
00:33:28,640 --> 00:33:33,120
And it suddenly dawned on me we could
use colour cameras in Wimbledon

437
00:33:33,120 --> 00:33:37,320
and with just four or five colour
cameras, which is all I
think we had,

438
00:33:37,320 --> 00:33:40,760
we could get hours and
hours and hours of colour television.

439
00:33:40,760 --> 00:33:44,200
We would launch as soon
as we could do at least

440
00:33:44,200 --> 00:33:49,160
50% of the programmes in colour
and Wimbledon allowed us to do that.

441
00:33:49,160 --> 00:33:53,040
And what is more, it allowed us to
get on the air before Germany did!

442
00:33:53,040 --> 00:33:58,960
David's challenge was to promote
the virtues of colour TV.

443
00:33:58,960 --> 00:34:00,440
He came up with a new concept,

444
00:34:00,440 --> 00:34:06,080
a series of big budget programmes
designed to showcase colour
in all its glory.

445
00:34:06,080 --> 00:34:09,160
The first of this new genre of
landmark programmes,

446
00:34:09,160 --> 00:34:14,680
known then as Sledgehammers,
was an arts programme
called Civilisation.

447
00:34:14,680 --> 00:34:18,520
It was going to be the finest things
that Western Europeans had produced

448
00:34:18,520 --> 00:34:23,360
artistically from the beginning of
the 5th, 6th century onwards,

449
00:34:23,360 --> 00:34:26,680
which simply had
a phenomenal success.

450
00:34:26,680 --> 00:34:29,200
BBC Two was riding high,

451
00:34:29,200 --> 00:34:32,080
so we commissioned Ascent
Of Man there and then.

452
00:34:34,680 --> 00:34:38,840
Ascent Of Man was the
model for science television.

453
00:34:38,840 --> 00:34:43,640
If I'm to take the ascent of
man back to its beginnings...

454
00:34:43,640 --> 00:34:47,960
It set a trend for the
epic programming for which
David is now synonymous.

455
00:34:52,320 --> 00:34:54,960
And epic programmes need epic shots.

456
00:34:54,960 --> 00:34:58,560
So somebody needs to be up on the
hill who can give David the cue.

457
00:35:02,360 --> 00:35:08,440
'Standing by for a take.
Yes, Kirsty.'

458
00:35:08,440 --> 00:35:11,640
For here you can see fossils

459
00:35:13,760 --> 00:35:17,280
of the very first animals
that evolved on this planet.

460
00:35:23,600 --> 00:35:25,760
'That was good for us.'

461
00:35:28,840 --> 00:35:32,480
This location is a key place
in the story of the first life.

462
00:35:32,480 --> 00:35:38,320
The rocks here are covered in
600-million-year old fossils from
the same family

463
00:35:38,320 --> 00:35:41,720
as the one found in Leicestershire
where David grew up.

464
00:35:41,720 --> 00:35:44,040
OK, David, it you could gesture
towards this one.

465
00:35:44,040 --> 00:35:47,840
We're going to do a pull focus
to this one. That was fantastic.

466
00:35:47,840 --> 00:35:54,600
You know, I've grown up to believe
that that little fossil in the
Charnwood Forest that long,

467
00:35:54,600 --> 00:35:59,880
just one of them, was one of the most
precious fossils in the world,
and they are walking over them!

468
00:35:59,880 --> 00:36:03,520
Dozens of them! Well, hundreds of
them, literally hundreds of them.

469
00:36:03,520 --> 00:36:08,120
It's a good place for David to
indulge his passion for photography.

470
00:36:08,120 --> 00:36:13,440
Aren't we right in thinking that
the photograph on the front of
Life On Earth was one of yours?

471
00:36:13,440 --> 00:36:16,480
You are absolutely correct,
absolutely correct.

472
00:36:16,480 --> 00:36:21,280
I heard this terrible noise in
my ear as I lay on a camp bed...

473
00:36:21,280 --> 00:36:26,920
Not on a camp bed, I lay on the
ground in Panama, like somebody

474
00:36:26,920 --> 00:36:32,320
hitting an anvil with a mallet and
I turned round and there was this...
I went click

475
00:36:32,320 --> 00:36:33,400
and it was a frog

476
00:36:33,400 --> 00:36:37,320
and it was the front cover of
Life On Earth. Look at that.

477
00:36:37,320 --> 00:36:42,720
You see how this boy's got
talent in his fingers, he
just doesn't know about!

478
00:36:42,720 --> 00:36:45,800
THE CREW LAUGH

479
00:36:45,800 --> 00:36:47,680
What on Earth's that?

480
00:36:47,680 --> 00:36:51,000
You panicked and pressed
the button by accident!

481
00:36:51,000 --> 00:36:52,480
HE LAUGHS

482
00:36:57,800 --> 00:37:03,400
Filming moves across Canada
to the Rocky Mountains.

483
00:37:03,400 --> 00:37:10,800
The next location is a remote fossil
quarry some 2,000 metres above sea
level, and getting there isn't easy.

484
00:37:10,800 --> 00:37:14,240
David and the crew will need to fly
part of the way

485
00:37:14,240 --> 00:37:18,360
and then hike for
half an hour up a steep icy path.

486
00:37:18,360 --> 00:37:21,720
I'm going to give you a quick safety
briefing here on the helicopter.

487
00:37:21,720 --> 00:37:26,000
This one is done up, it
doesn't hang out like that.
You put your headset on.

488
00:37:26,000 --> 00:37:29,080
You don't have to press any buttons
to talk, it's just voice-activated.

489
00:37:29,080 --> 00:37:33,840
I just wish I could remember
any of these instructions.

490
00:37:33,840 --> 00:37:38,240
I mean, it's like with the
air hostesses on jets, I
can't remember a thing!

491
00:37:40,360 --> 00:37:43,920
Well, if you look above you,
there are some clouds in the sky.

492
00:37:43,920 --> 00:37:47,560
Those are getting thicker,
which means you can't fly,

493
00:37:47,560 --> 00:37:50,040
so we've got to get up there and see
if we can land,

494
00:37:50,040 --> 00:37:53,200
find the spot for the piece and then
get out before it all closes over.

495
00:37:56,840 --> 00:38:00,880
The original and best.
Thank you, sir, I do appreciate it.

496
00:38:00,880 --> 00:38:05,600
Thank you. Anybody who bought one of
my books deserves to have it signed.

497
00:38:05,600 --> 00:38:08,920
You can't say that, I'm still here!

498
00:38:08,920 --> 00:38:10,880
Every day is a highlight for me.

499
00:38:10,880 --> 00:38:14,880
Of course it is, Martin, thank
you very much. This one is
the best of far, definitely.

500
00:38:14,880 --> 00:38:17,200
What was wrong with yesterday?

501
00:38:17,200 --> 00:38:20,880
Well, we weren't filming, David.
Oh, yeah, you're quite right.

502
00:38:37,720 --> 00:38:42,240
David may be an octogenarian,
but his determination is
just as it ever was.

503
00:38:42,240 --> 00:38:44,520
We have planned
this in so many ways.

504
00:38:44,520 --> 00:38:48,840
We've discussed having
helicopters airlifting him up in
a sort of sling underneath.

505
00:38:48,840 --> 00:38:54,840
We've had the possibility of a sedan
chair to come up here, but actually
David's perfectly fine

506
00:38:54,840 --> 00:38:58,760
and perfectly willing, so all our
anxieties are evaporating away,
really.

507
00:38:58,760 --> 00:39:00,880
I may be some time.

508
00:39:00,880 --> 00:39:03,240
The struggle will be worth it.

509
00:39:03,240 --> 00:39:08,200
Near the summit, David will find one
of the richest fossil locations

510
00:39:08,200 --> 00:39:11,520
in the world, the Burgess Shales.

511
00:39:16,400 --> 00:39:19,280
Here, they're found
all over the place.

512
00:39:19,280 --> 00:39:25,240
They're called trilobites. That's
the head, there's the middle bit.

513
00:39:25,240 --> 00:39:29,840
'David is so interested in things.
He's fascinated by everybody.'

514
00:39:29,840 --> 00:39:33,200
If there's a table of people,
he'll say, "Who is
that and what do they do?"

515
00:39:33,200 --> 00:39:36,160
He's fascinated by that.
David reads endlessly.

516
00:39:36,160 --> 00:39:40,120
I mean, on the plane he read two
books coming out from England.

517
00:39:40,120 --> 00:39:44,200
He absorbs. His study is full
of books that he's reading.

518
00:39:44,200 --> 00:39:47,680
He's up to date with science. He's
reading the latest science papers.

519
00:39:47,680 --> 00:39:53,640
This is a man who, I think, will go
on and on because I think he's so
fascinated by the world,

520
00:39:53,640 --> 00:39:55,200
as long as he can walk,

521
00:39:55,200 --> 00:39:58,280
as long as he can move around,
he'll be interacting with it.

522
00:40:00,520 --> 00:40:05,480
Filming at the top of a mountain
is not without hazards, as
the weather closes in.

523
00:40:05,480 --> 00:40:08,320
Unfortunately, the cloud's come down.

524
00:40:08,320 --> 00:40:10,040
We have got a helicopter here.

525
00:40:10,040 --> 00:40:11,800
The pilot also wants to go home.

526
00:40:11,800 --> 00:40:16,280
We wouldn't mind not spending a night
on the mountain, so I guess we won't

527
00:40:16,280 --> 00:40:20,680
be able to stay here for too long,
but at the moment the mist is down.

528
00:40:20,680 --> 00:40:26,240
We're going to have to get into the
chopper, sit there ready to go and if
it lifts and if you can see the lake

529
00:40:26,240 --> 00:40:28,200
at the bottom then, with any luck,

530
00:40:28,200 --> 00:40:34,360
we might put our heads on a pillow
tonight in the warmth. Here's hoping!

531
00:40:35,400 --> 00:40:42,000
There's plenty to keep David busy
while he waits for the weather to
clear. There are fossils everywhere.

532
00:40:42,000 --> 00:40:47,000
OK, fellas, he says
it's time we left.

533
00:40:52,360 --> 00:40:54,480
There you go. Thanks a lot.

534
00:40:54,480 --> 00:40:57,360
No problem, eh? Really great.

535
00:40:57,360 --> 00:41:01,280
How was it, David? Terrible!

536
00:41:01,280 --> 00:41:05,640
Do you mind being taken up to these
far flung, inhospitable places?

537
00:41:05,640 --> 00:41:07,320
No, that's why I'm here!

538
00:41:07,320 --> 00:41:11,400
I don't mind! It's what I came for!

539
00:41:11,400 --> 00:41:15,800
Back in the Seventies,
David's passion for exploring

540
00:41:15,800 --> 00:41:20,920
far flung places was the catalyst
for his resignation from
management at the BBC.

541
00:41:20,920 --> 00:41:24,840
The success of his commissions
only served to remind

542
00:41:24,840 --> 00:41:28,200
the desk-bound Attenborough of
the life he was missing.

543
00:41:28,200 --> 00:41:35,040
I was fretting a bit and concluding
that the rest of my life was
not to be spent behind a desk.

544
00:41:35,040 --> 00:41:36,920
I couldn't bear it.

545
00:41:36,920 --> 00:41:42,920
And so I managed to resign after
eight years of administration.

546
00:41:42,920 --> 00:41:49,560
And the first thing I did on having
resigned was the head of the Natural
History Unit came to see me and said,

547
00:41:49,560 --> 00:41:51,480
"Look, don't you think it
would be a great idea if

548
00:41:51,480 --> 00:41:54,720
"we did a 12-part series about the
natural world and would you do it?"

549
00:41:54,720 --> 00:41:56,360
"Oh," I said, "What a good idea!"

550
00:41:56,360 --> 00:41:58,160
There are some four million

551
00:41:58,160 --> 00:42:01,600
different kinds of animals
and plants in the world,

552
00:42:01,600 --> 00:42:06,400
four million different solutions
to the problems of staying alive.

553
00:42:06,400 --> 00:42:10,320
This is the story of how a few
of them came to be as they are.

554
00:42:14,640 --> 00:42:21,880
Life on Earth was the series that
would define David as the world's
greatest natural history presenter.

555
00:42:21,880 --> 00:42:26,560
It gave him the opportunity to go to
the places he'd always dreamed of

556
00:42:26,560 --> 00:42:30,200
and to see the animals he'd always
wanted to see.

557
00:42:30,200 --> 00:42:32,320
But much more than that,

558
00:42:32,320 --> 00:42:39,040
it revolutionised the viewers'
perspective of the
small world in which they lived.

559
00:42:39,040 --> 00:42:44,920
It was only in the mid-Seventies that
you had really such a comprehensive
airline service around the world,

560
00:42:44,920 --> 00:42:47,640
such a reliable airline service
around the world, that you could

561
00:42:47,640 --> 00:42:50,440
go pretty well anywhere, which
meant that in the programmes we

562
00:42:50,440 --> 00:42:56,040
could hop from the Barrier Reef
to the Sahara just like that,

563
00:42:56,040 --> 00:42:58,080
if you wanted to do so, in a shot.

564
00:42:58,080 --> 00:43:02,560
And then, about 20 or 30 years ago,
people realised that they'd been

565
00:43:02,560 --> 00:43:08,320
looking in the wrong rocks and in the
wrong way. These are the right rocks.

566
00:43:08,320 --> 00:43:11,800
It had a sort of liberating effect
that somehow,

567
00:43:11,800 --> 00:43:16,320
and this was just after the
moon shots of course, that somehow

568
00:43:16,320 --> 00:43:22,680
for the first time we were getting
a vision of the natural world,
of the globe, of the Earth,

569
00:43:22,680 --> 00:43:28,320
with the zoosphere, with the animals
and plants that clothed it all.

570
00:43:28,320 --> 00:43:33,000
For the first time you were getting
a comprehensive view of that

571
00:43:33,000 --> 00:43:35,680
and people felt that quite clearly.

572
00:43:35,680 --> 00:43:38,280
So it seems really very unfair

573
00:43:38,280 --> 00:43:40,720
that man should have
chosen the gorilla

574
00:43:40,720 --> 00:43:45,600
to symbolise all that
is aggressive and violent

575
00:43:45,600 --> 00:43:50,520
when that's the
one thing that the gorilla
is not, and that we are.

576
00:43:53,320 --> 00:43:57,040
The reason we had gone to gorillas
was in order to illustrate a point

577
00:43:57,040 --> 00:44:02,840
I was making about the evolutionary
significance of climbing
primates, of climbing mammals,

578
00:44:02,840 --> 00:44:05,280
who had to grasp branches.

579
00:44:05,280 --> 00:44:07,760
And to grasp a branch you need to
be able to

580
00:44:07,760 --> 00:44:10,680
put your thumb and your
forefinger together like that.

581
00:44:10,680 --> 00:44:17,000
So on the day in question, I crawled
off and prepared to go on about
the thumb and the forefinger.

582
00:44:17,000 --> 00:44:22,800
And as I was about to say that
I suddenly felt a weight

583
00:44:22,800 --> 00:44:26,160
on my feet and there was a baby
gorilla undoing my shoelaces!

584
00:44:26,160 --> 00:44:31,400
Well, it didn't seem to be the
right moment to be talking
about the thumb and forefinger

585
00:44:31,400 --> 00:44:37,160
and while I was concluding on
that, a hand came down on my head
and there was the adult female!

586
00:44:37,160 --> 00:44:43,320
And she opened my mouth, put her
hand, a huge great hand

587
00:44:43,320 --> 00:44:45,400
and stuck a finger in my mouth

588
00:44:45,400 --> 00:44:48,800
and I couldn't talk about the thumb
and forefinger even then!

589
00:44:48,800 --> 00:44:50,920
By this time I was in a
sort of delirium, really.

590
00:44:50,920 --> 00:44:53,080
I mean, it just seemed paradisal.

591
00:44:53,080 --> 00:44:55,680
I mean, absolutely extraordinary.
Took my breath away.

592
00:44:55,680 --> 00:45:01,480
It did cause a huge sensation that
here is a presenter

593
00:45:01,480 --> 00:45:06,120
looking at the camera,
when suddenly a gorilla comes
out of the bush and sits on him!

594
00:45:06,120 --> 00:45:08,240
I mean, it's quite odd!

595
00:45:26,920 --> 00:45:32,560
Back in the UK, David is in the back
room of Edinburgh's National Museum

596
00:45:32,560 --> 00:45:36,960
filming a fossil of a huge animal
that lived 420 million years ago.

597
00:45:36,960 --> 00:45:43,000
A deadly sea scorpion, one of the
largest predators of its time.

598
00:45:43,800 --> 00:45:44,840
Gosh!

599
00:45:44,840 --> 00:45:48,920
Well, this is a magnificent example

600
00:45:48,920 --> 00:45:55,400
of just how big an animal can grow
if it has an external skeleton.

601
00:45:57,840 --> 00:46:03,640
Yeah, my friend Richard Fortey, he's
got a few stories about what goes
on in the back rooms of museums!

602
00:46:03,640 --> 00:46:09,320
Yeah, I mean, they are
strange, arcane places.

603
00:46:09,320 --> 00:46:12,800
I've seen a very old
film projector there,

604
00:46:12,800 --> 00:46:20,360
a Kalee film projector, the like of
which must have shown Buster Keaton
and things like that I would think.

605
00:46:20,360 --> 00:46:24,880
35mm. I started filming on 35mm back
in the Fifties,

606
00:46:24,880 --> 00:46:27,160
so I don't feel as astounded at that,

607
00:46:27,160 --> 00:46:34,080
but I now find
that people coming into our business
are astonished to see 16mm film.

608
00:46:34,080 --> 00:46:37,320
"Amazing, film! Good Lord!"

609
00:46:37,320 --> 00:46:39,240
I mean, you can actually look at it!

610
00:46:39,240 --> 00:46:40,960
And they're used to videotape.

611
00:46:40,960 --> 00:46:43,520
So the world changes.

612
00:46:43,520 --> 00:46:45,720
Yielding place to new.

613
00:46:45,720 --> 00:46:50,920
And God
fulfils himself in many ways lest one
good custom should corrupt the world.

614
00:46:56,240 --> 00:47:00,920
We're in Crail in Fife and when
I came here on the recce it was

615
00:47:00,920 --> 00:47:04,280
a beautiful sunny day,
fantastically picturesque.

616
00:47:04,280 --> 00:47:07,200
Mother Nature is a difficult beast
to tame

617
00:47:07,200 --> 00:47:09,760
and I can't do anything
about how she's going to be.

618
00:47:09,760 --> 00:47:11,880
She's obviously in a bad mood today.

619
00:47:11,880 --> 00:47:13,280
How do you feel, David? >

620
00:47:13,280 --> 00:47:17,120
I just regret I haven't
brought my chest wig!

621
00:47:17,120 --> 00:47:20,760
It's just the sort of
weather you need one.

622
00:47:20,760 --> 00:47:22,560
Are you sure you need your blazer?

623
00:47:22,560 --> 00:47:24,280
It makes you look a little
uncomfortable.

624
00:47:24,280 --> 00:47:28,400
What? Are you sure you want your
blazer on? My blazer!
It's not a blazer.

625
00:47:28,400 --> 00:47:33,800
OK, your jacket from M&S! M&S!

626
00:47:33,800 --> 00:47:35,680
M&S!

627
00:47:38,600 --> 00:47:42,280
This is rather good, isn't it? 
That's a good hat. I mean,
now, be honest.

628
00:47:42,280 --> 00:47:44,000
No, that's a good hat.

629
00:47:44,000 --> 00:47:46,520
The scarf's very classy.
You can wear the glasses.

630
00:47:46,520 --> 00:47:49,160
They're meant for these conditions,
aren't they? They're titanium.

631
00:47:49,160 --> 00:47:53,120
They are titanium. Well, the problem
is they're better on than off.

632
00:47:53,120 --> 00:47:58,680
Keep them on until we do the
piece, otherwise you might walk
in the water or something!

633
00:47:58,680 --> 00:48:00,680
They haven't got screen wipers,
have they?

634
00:48:09,960 --> 00:48:12,880
Do you like coming to Scotland,
apart from the weather?

635
00:48:15,280 --> 00:48:18,120
I served in the Navy here,
hardened up,

636
00:48:18,120 --> 00:48:21,640
toughened up by life in the
Forces up on the Firth of Forth.

637
00:48:21,640 --> 00:48:23,920
It was like this all the time!

638
00:48:23,920 --> 00:48:28,200
CREW LAUGH
Yeah?

639
00:48:28,200 --> 00:48:29,800
Action!

640
00:48:29,800 --> 00:48:34,600
And on the expanses of sand that
stretch between those huge trees,

641
00:48:34,600 --> 00:48:40,240
sand that's now become this
sandstone rock, there are tracks.

642
00:48:44,920 --> 00:48:46,640
Are you RSPB?

643
00:48:46,640 --> 00:48:50,680
No, we are dissertation. We're
from St Andrew's University, so...

644
00:48:50,680 --> 00:48:52,680
What are you looking for, birds?

645
00:48:52,680 --> 00:48:56,760
The redshanks.
Redshanks. How nice.

646
00:48:56,760 --> 00:48:59,480
Are their numbers doing well?

647
00:48:59,480 --> 00:49:01,600
Yeah, they're fine.

648
00:49:01,600 --> 00:49:03,560
Doing well. Yeah.

649
00:49:03,560 --> 00:49:09,800
Well, you're shanks get pretty
red in this weather, I'll tell you!

650
00:49:09,800 --> 00:49:15,320
It was desperately cold, I must
say, and blowing a gale, but
kind friends lent me gear.

651
00:49:15,320 --> 00:49:16,920
Thank you very much, David.

652
00:49:16,920 --> 00:49:18,720
No, thank you. Not at all.

653
00:49:18,720 --> 00:49:21,000
Was it your underwear?
No, it wasn't my underwear.

654
00:49:21,000 --> 00:49:22,520
It was my outerwear.

655
00:49:22,520 --> 00:49:29,040
Your outerwear. Oh, well, that's not
quite so intimate, so I'm not going
to thank you quite so intimately.

656
00:49:29,040 --> 00:49:30,880
No shared bodily warmth!

657
00:49:34,760 --> 00:49:39,160
David has always been
at the forefront of new
filming technologies.

658
00:49:40,200 --> 00:49:44,960
His programmes have pioneered
miniature cameras, infrared,

659
00:49:44,960 --> 00:49:49,000
super slow-motion, time-lapse
and aerial photography.

660
00:49:49,920 --> 00:49:55,800
The arrival of colour brought a huge
advance as far as making natural
history programmes were concerned.

661
00:49:55,800 --> 00:49:58,360
You could now show the
splendour of bird displays.

662
00:49:58,360 --> 00:50:02,440
You could talk about how insects
would see different colours
in different plants

663
00:50:02,440 --> 00:50:04,760
and you could
see what you were talking about.

664
00:50:04,760 --> 00:50:11,760
The next big change, I suppose,
was the arrival of hypersensitive
cameras and infrared cameras.

665
00:50:11,760 --> 00:50:17,040
We maintained a fiction that
really lions were idle creatures

666
00:50:17,040 --> 00:50:21,800
that spent most of the time lying
around in the sunshine and
just occasionally hunted.

667
00:50:21,800 --> 00:50:25,880
The truth of course is quite
different and that was lions
are lying around

668
00:50:25,880 --> 00:50:28,400
during the day because they hunted
during the night.

669
00:50:28,400 --> 00:50:33,200
But with hypersensitive
cameras we were able to show
that for the first time.

670
00:50:33,200 --> 00:50:39,440
Then sensitive cameras enabled you to
put the film through the camera at a
much greater speed which meant that,

671
00:50:39,440 --> 00:50:42,160
in effect,
you could slow things down,

672
00:50:42,160 --> 00:50:46,480
so that changed, so you could
show how animals ran, for example.

673
00:50:46,480 --> 00:50:52,640
On top of that, the next change
came the other way round, in that
by use of computers and so on,

674
00:50:52,640 --> 00:51:00,120
we could slow down the speed at which
the frames passed through the camera
and at the same time move the camera

675
00:51:00,120 --> 00:51:07,120
and get pictures of, for example,
a speeded up activity when you
showed it of plants developing.

676
00:51:07,120 --> 00:51:09,600
That produced a great change.

677
00:51:12,280 --> 00:51:17,240
And then suddenly, computer-generated
imaging came along

678
00:51:17,240 --> 00:51:23,800
and to an improved degree, instead of
the rather crude and clumsy things
that had been seen in the past.

679
00:51:24,880 --> 00:51:28,240
Making First Life, David is at
the cutting edge once again

680
00:51:28,240 --> 00:51:31,520
as palaeontology and
technology join forces

681
00:51:31,520 --> 00:51:38,120
to bring the earliest animals
on Earth back to life for the first
time in half a billion years.

682
00:51:38,120 --> 00:51:40,800
OK, David, here's
the head of the unit.

683
00:51:40,800 --> 00:51:43,840
Seeing these animals
living and breathing

684
00:51:43,840 --> 00:51:47,360
is something David has
dreamt of since he was a boy.

685
00:51:47,360 --> 00:51:48,960
Oh, that's terrific!

686
00:51:48,960 --> 00:51:51,720
My old friend, anomalocaris!

687
00:51:51,720 --> 00:51:54,120
Like you've never seen it before.

688
00:51:54,120 --> 00:51:57,840
Hi! Oh, it's terrific!

689
00:51:57,840 --> 00:52:00,480
The really
thrilling thing for me

690
00:52:00,480 --> 00:52:05,360
is that by using a computer graphic
and imaging,

691
00:52:05,360 --> 00:52:10,520
you can take these tiny little marks
and with total justification,

692
00:52:10,520 --> 00:52:16,160
scientific backing, you can make
that animal really come to life,
come out of the rock and move.

693
00:52:16,160 --> 00:52:18,200
That's knock out stuff, you know?

694
00:52:18,200 --> 00:52:20,280
I mean, that is knock out, isn't it?

695
00:52:20,280 --> 00:52:24,480
Look at that!
How could you not believe in that?

696
00:52:24,480 --> 00:52:27,280
Just thrilling, actually.

697
00:52:27,280 --> 00:52:29,480
Just thrilling.

698
00:52:29,480 --> 00:52:34,880
I've been given this model and
I put some bones inside of it.

699
00:52:34,880 --> 00:52:36,480
There weren't any bones!

700
00:52:36,480 --> 00:52:40,400
It's just the... But for your point
you've got to have bones.

701
00:52:40,400 --> 00:52:43,080
Yeah, it's the only way the computer
can understand what to move where.

702
00:52:43,080 --> 00:52:45,920
I was going to say, next time
you go for a lobster supper...!

703
00:52:45,920 --> 00:52:48,040
Now I know perfectly well

704
00:52:48,040 --> 00:52:51,040
that you can see a shot of,

705
00:52:51,040 --> 00:52:55,600
say, a shrimp and a coral reef and
another one rather different shrimp

706
00:52:55,600 --> 00:53:00,440
comes round the
corner and you are very hard put
to know which is the real one.

707
00:53:00,440 --> 00:53:04,000
Once you've finished this stage
you can make it do anything.
Yeah, exactly, yeah, yeah.

708
00:53:04,000 --> 00:53:08,280
You can make it go right, left and
upside down. Exactly, yeah, yeah.

709
00:53:08,280 --> 00:53:09,520
And just direct it. Yeah.

710
00:53:09,520 --> 00:53:12,080
It sounds
like a television presenter, really!

711
00:53:17,400 --> 00:53:22,200
It's pretty exciting looking at
a piece of rock, turning it over
and seeing the image of an animal

712
00:53:22,200 --> 00:53:27,640
there, but to see that come to life
in this vivid, vivid way

713
00:53:27,640 --> 00:53:31,440
is more than
you can possibly hope for, really.

714
00:53:35,880 --> 00:53:39,520
It actually helps the scientist,
too, because when you see the thing

715
00:53:39,520 --> 00:53:43,040
you suddenly realise that
certain things are possible.

716
00:53:43,040 --> 00:53:47,360
You realise that it couldn't possibly
have done that, it must
have done the other.

717
00:53:57,760 --> 00:54:01,640
David is on his way to
the Great Barrier Reef.

718
00:54:01,640 --> 00:54:05,360
He's going to a remote island 50
miles off the coast of Australia

719
00:54:05,360 --> 00:54:08,840
where he'll be filming the most
primitive animals there are.

720
00:54:08,840 --> 00:54:10,640
How nice.

721
00:54:10,640 --> 00:54:15,760
The comfiest seat in the house!
If you hold it to the left it'll
give you up to 30 degrees.

722
00:54:17,800 --> 00:54:20,760
And they tell me you're going out
to do a documentary on sponges.

723
00:54:20,760 --> 00:54:24,920
On sponges. Well, we're not doing
an entire documentary on sponges.

724
00:54:24,920 --> 00:54:29,000
That could be a bit of a... You know?
Because sponges don't do a lot!

725
00:54:33,600 --> 00:54:40,520
Sponges are just clumps
of simple animal cells
that have stuck together.

726
00:54:40,520 --> 00:54:46,000
It's at this point that the
basic patterns of animal
form are established.

727
00:54:46,000 --> 00:54:48,680
Animals developed legs

728
00:54:48,680 --> 00:54:53,640
and arms and television shows!
CREW LAUGH

729
00:54:57,360 --> 00:55:02,880
There's another very
important sequence to film
on the Great Barrier Reef.

730
00:55:02,880 --> 00:55:07,040
Three miles from Heron
Island there's a vast sandbar.

731
00:55:07,040 --> 00:55:10,000
It's to be used for the
opening scene in First Life.

732
00:55:10,000 --> 00:55:11,640
But to get the shot,

733
00:55:11,640 --> 00:55:18,040
David must
be left on the sandbar alone in
40 degree heat with no shade.

734
00:55:18,040 --> 00:55:20,800
The team must work fast.

735
00:55:20,800 --> 00:55:24,800
Within hours the tide will come in
flooding the sandbar

736
00:55:24,800 --> 00:55:26,360
and stranding David.

737
00:55:26,360 --> 00:55:30,360
It's no mean feat for
a man in his eighties.

738
00:55:30,360 --> 00:55:35,720
Am I prepared? I've got all kinds
of electronic gear up by backside!

739
00:55:48,200 --> 00:55:52,680
I'm on a fantastic journey to
look for the origins of life.

740
00:55:55,840 --> 00:55:59,520
David seems to have this
unbelievable amount of energy.

741
00:55:59,520 --> 00:56:02,720
I don't think I'll have
anything like the energy
that he has when I'm 83.

742
00:56:05,480 --> 00:56:09,040
In a way, one of the things that
drives David on on these things,

743
00:56:09,040 --> 00:56:11,080
long after most people would
have retired,

744
00:56:11,080 --> 00:56:16,280
is not just the quest for
more things, which, of course,
will always drive someone who's

745
00:56:16,280 --> 00:56:19,440
interested in the natural world, but
also he actually enjoys getting back

746
00:56:19,440 --> 00:56:25,280
with a team of people like the old
times on some of his great series,
and having that fun and drinking

747
00:56:25,280 --> 00:56:29,480
the occasional bottle of red wine
and being in these amazing places.

748
00:56:29,480 --> 00:56:32,840
I don't think David is ever...

749
00:56:32,840 --> 00:56:37,480
I mean, I can't imagine
him ever retiring.

750
00:56:40,440 --> 00:56:42,600
I have to confess, I'm
fascinated by armadillos.

751
00:56:42,600 --> 00:56:47,360
As far as I'm concerned, they
are some of the nicest and most
curious animals in the world.

752
00:56:47,360 --> 00:56:53,600
I'm standing on the brink
of one of the most densely
populated parts of the sea.

753
00:56:53,600 --> 00:56:56,080
I am on the edge of a
coral reef at low tide.

754
00:56:56,080 --> 00:56:59,080
And top of the menu
right now is salmon!

755
00:57:02,160 --> 00:57:05,440
This programme means
a lot to me, actually.

756
00:57:05,440 --> 00:57:09,320
And, rather surprisingly, I didn't
realise how much it meant to me

757
00:57:09,320 --> 00:57:10,800
until I started doing it,

758
00:57:10,800 --> 00:57:15,800
because I have spent over the last
25, 30 years

759
00:57:15,800 --> 00:57:19,200
making a series of programmes about
different groups of animals

760
00:57:19,200 --> 00:57:21,360
as they have emerged
through evolution

761
00:57:21,360 --> 00:57:25,480
and I've never made anything
about the very beginning of life.

762
00:57:25,480 --> 00:57:31,600
Doing this programme not only
makes a lovely programme to
make that whole series correct

763
00:57:31,600 --> 00:57:36,520
and complete, but, happily, takes me
to the places to see where they are.

764
00:57:36,520 --> 00:57:43,480
And it's actually very moving,
really, you know, to see suddenly
a magnificent sheet of fossils,

765
00:57:43,480 --> 00:57:46,680
innumerable, complex fossils

766
00:57:46,680 --> 00:57:54,200
which were alive right at the very
beginning of life on this planet
500 million years ago.

767
00:57:54,200 --> 00:57:57,880
So this series, to a degree, which
are really didn't fully appreciate

768
00:57:57,880 --> 00:58:02,840
until I started working on it,
really completes the set.

769
00:58:02,840 --> 00:58:08,000
Some creatures managed
to crawl up onto the land.

770
00:58:08,000 --> 00:58:13,440
But all of us alive today owe
our very existence to them.

771
00:58:13,440 --> 00:58:16,560
Well, in a curious way, in the end,

772
00:58:16,560 --> 00:58:21,800
the end of my last sort of making
series like this, is my beginning.

773
00:58:33,720 --> 00:58:36,760
Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd

774
00:58:36,760 --> 00:58:39,880
E-mail subtitling@bbc.co.uk