The team
Photo credits : © Getty Images, Franco Origlia
Andy Byatt
Andy Byatt’s lifelong fascination with nature founded an award-winning film career, including 19 years working for the BBC Natural History Unit. Specialising in the underwater realm, he was a key player in the BBC’s landmarks, the feature film Deep Blue (2003 - grossing $34 million in the box office), “The Blue Planet” (2001) and “Planet Earth” (2006).
He left the BBC in 2007 to take his young family sailing so that they could have new experiences of wildlife and cultures for themselves, in the Caribbean and USA. They developed a healthy respect for hurricanes during long summers of waiting for the season of risk to pass.
Cyril Barbançon
Cyril Barbançon was born in 1971 in the Haute Savoie in the French Alps, he spent his early years with his family in the mountains, experiencing the joys and hardships of rural isolation.
In 1998, he made his first documentary film « The Red Dwarf » about the life of red squirrels. The film was broadcast internationally and won numerous prizes in festivals.
On the heels of this experience, he went on to direct films for Arte, France 5, France 3 and Canal Plus. At ease with camera technology and the information systems which have revolutionized digital photography, he traveled widely, as a DOP and director, filming a multitude of species from killer whales in Antarctica, to penguins, humpback whales, lynx, bats, marmots and wolves. He built up a solid experience both technical and in the field.
A meeting with Alain Derobe (the 3D pioneer in France) in 2009 offered Cyril a new challenge in the technicality of stereo images. In order to shoot his first films in 3D, he built his own 3D rig.
In 2010 a discussion in the middle of the desert on a shoot with Jacqueline Farmer marked the beginnings of making a film for cinema about the wind. « Hurricane : a Wind Odyssey » 4 years of shooting 3D imagery across the world, in the heart of hurricanes, were to follow.
Jacqueline Farmer
A childhood close to the land and nature founded Jacqueline Farmer’s lifelong interest in attempting to understand the natural world and our place in it.
Following post graduate studies in biology and broadcast journalism, she went on to work for the BBC World Service, Radio France International, and various press outlets before joining Saint Tho- mas in 2002, where she has helmed award winning science and natural history projects as a director and producer for the past 13 years, working with National Geographic, Discovery, France 2, Arte, Channel Four, NHK, TVE, SVT etc. on numerous films and series. « Hurricane » is her first feature film.
Frédérique Zepter
A film graduate in France and the US, Frédérique Zepter became a copywriter, a script doctor and script editor, a writer and in charge of scripts for various production companies. After London and Los Angeles, she moved to Brazil for various years, where she studied and filmed candomblé. She wrote the script’s basic story and structure, inspired by the 70s classic film ‘Vanishing Point’.
Artistic credits
| A film by | Cyril BARBANÇON |
| Andrew BYATT | |
| Jacqueline FARMER | |
| Written by | Frédérique ZEPTER |
| Philippe BLASBAND | |
| Olivier LORELLE | |
| Music by | Yann TIERSEN |
| Additional music | Catherine GRAINDORGE |
| Thomas TILLY | |
| The voice of | Paloma Garcia Martens |
Technical credits
| Producer | Jacqueline FARMER |
| Head of production | Jean-Yves ASSELIN |
| Production | Patrick BAQUIER |
| Philippe LEVY | |
| Caroline HOUBEN | |
| Caroline RADFORD WEISS | |
| Candice FALESSE | |
| Armelle CHEMINEE | |
| Emmanuelle MARTIN | |
| Keebe KENNEDY | |
| Co-produced by | ORANGE STUDIO |
| Olivier RAUSIN | |
| Bertrand LOYER | |
| Puerto Rico | Do More Productions PUERTO RICO (Frances LAUSELL DIAZ) |
| Cuba | In association with Cabana Del Audiovisual-ACV, chaired by Ricardo MIRANDA COSTA |
| United States of America | EXCELSIOR PRODUCTIONS (Amber Maitland) |
| Senegal | Médiatik Communication SA (Moctar BA) et Vision Communication (Babacar Mamadou SECK) |
| Philippines | Old Fool Films Inc, Joanna VASQUEZ ARONG |
| Director of photography and stereoscopy | Cyril BARBANÇON |
| Camera operators | John JACKSON |
| Pierre PETIT | |
| Stereography – Shooting – Machinery and equipment | Keir CAMPBELL BYATT |
| Raphaël PALIN SAINTE-AGATHE | |
| Philippe PIRON | |
| Colas BESNARD | |
| Juan SEPULCHRE | |
| Noari DRAGH | |
| Claude TARDY | |
| Gérome IACHKINE | |
| Underwater camera operator | Roberto RINALDI |
| Specials effects | BENUTS |
| Sound | Yves BEMELMANS |
| Fabrice OSINSKI | |
| Film editing | Luc PLANTIER |
| Philippe RAVOET | |
| Sound editing | Frédéric DEMOLDER |
| Yves RENARD | |
| Raphaël ANDRIEU | |
| Emmanuel de BOISSIEU | |
| Sound effects | Olivier THYS |
| Mixer | Emmanuel de BOISSIEU |
| Post-production | Ingrid RUBBENS |
| Olivier REY |
Photo Credits : © John Jackson (picture 2); © Phillipe Piron (picture 3); © Raphael Palin Sainte Agathe (picture 6); © Jean-Yves Asselin (picture 4); ©Yves Bémelmans (pictures 1 et 5).