Behind the Scenes: Survival in the Sea (continued)
BAILER SNAIL
by Mark Conlin, cinematographer
We filmed the Baler snail sequence at night. Many of the reef's animals lay low during the day, waiting for the cover of darkness to hunt for prey. You might have noticed bugs" in many of the shots. The bugs are plankton, the tiny plants and animals that drift in the water column. They are the bottom level of the ocean's rich food chain.
Capturing natural behavior on film takes time. These sequences rarely just happen. We usually spend many dives scouting out an area. A dive or two watching an animal's movement patterns. Then, we're ready for an actual filming dive. We were encouraged because the last few nights we had seen the baler snail feeding. They regularly tracked down and ate smaller snails. I said to Howard, "This should be easy!"
When we jumped into the water that night, we noticed the movie lights were attracting more than their usual share of plankton. In fact, we felt like the Pied Pipers of Plankton. They followed us everywhere. We were having good luck and bad luck, as usual. The Baler snail seemed intent on eating the tongue snail (that's good). But by the time the baler snail found the slime trail of its prey and closed in for the kill, the plankton were so thick around the movie lights Howard could not see to film (that's bad). The swarms of plankton had reduced 1,300 watts of movie lights down to a weak flashlight beam. No small feat, if you're a plankton.
So, Bob and I got together on one side of the camera, cupped our hands and gently fanned the bugs away from the lights. Sort of like two servants trying to keep Cleopatra cool. When we fanned gently, the swarms stayed put. When we fanned too hard, we would jostle the camera and get "the look" from Howard. "The look" is universal. It always means the same thing. Whatever you are doing, stop it, because it's wrong.
In a stroke of underwater brilliance, Howard gave me the lights and motioned for us to go swim far away from the scene. I could now just barely see Howard sitting alone in the dark, with a very dim flashlight, watching the baler snail crawl closer and closer to its prey. Then, he motioned frantically and we raced over with the lights, mounted them on the camera, took a focus, framed up the action and started rolling film, fast. We managed to get the shot. But, from then on Howard made me promise never to say "this should be easy!" It's always the things that seem easy to film that turn out to be the hardest.
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