Biography

Career

Doug Anderson is a Wildlife Cameramen. Specialising in underwater Film and Video, he has worked worldwide creating sequences for award winning BBC series such as “The Blue Planet”, “Planet Earth” and “Life”. He has spent the last 15 years working as a cameraman for the BBC Natural History Unit in Bristol, England.

Early life

Anderson was born in Glasgow in 1970. His father Stan was a civil engineer and his mother Anne, an artist. He discovered photography and the sea at a young age. During annual trips to the family home in Lamlash, on the Scottish Island of Arran, Anderson quickly became a confident snorkeler and free diver.

At the age of 11 he borrowed a Nikonas Mark 3 camera from his father, a keen scuba diver, and took his first images of a lions main jellyfish just off the “Old Pier” in Lamalsh bay.

Early Life

Doug studied Marine Biology at St Andrews University, Scotland. After graduation he spent five years as a commercial scallop diver on the Scottish west coast.

To pursue a career in wildlife photography, in 1996, Anderson moved to Bristol, home of the BBC Natural History Unit. In 1999, after four years of camera assisting, Anderson shot his first “Blue Chip” Wildlife sequence for a BBC’s The Blue Planet series. The sequence was of an alleged 15 m (49 ft) Sei whale (two later papers identified it as a Bryde’s whale) feeding on a small bait ball of the Pacific side of Mexico.

As of 2010 Anderson has been involved in the principal photography on BBC/Discovery Channel productions The Blue Planet, Planet Earth, Life, and Frozen Planet as well as many other wildlife programmes.

Doug lives in England and is married to Devon wedding photographer Rosie Anderson.

It’s not that O’Three drysuits are good diving drysuits – I can assure you they are. Othree understand fundamentally what mixture of materials and cutting patten when glued and stitched together make a comfortable and very easy to dive drysuit.

It’s not that O’Three drysuits are made of the best materials – which I can also assure you they are. I have an O’Three drysuit that is 16 years old and I estimate (conservatively!) I have spent over 5000 hours in underwater everywhere from the antarctic to the artic and is still in my dive bag on every cold water diving shoot I go on today.

It’s not that O’Three is an actual British company filled with people with real skillsets – when I need something adjusted or a new set of cuffs they do all the work themselves – here in this country!

It’s not that the customer service at O’Three is outstanding – which it is. The owners and team at O’Three have created a company that understands how important make a customer feel valued and supported.

It is this – I dive O’Three suits for the feeling I get when on the first day of a filming job, in some far off land, I open my dive bag and see my O’Three drysuit – in that moment I know that at the heart of what I am about to do is a piece of kit that has my back and I never need to worry about in any way.

Kit List

The cost involved for each second under water is phenomenal. Irrespective of the conditions, I need to deliver. Over the years O’Three has put a system together for me that allows me to think of nothing else but my job.

Doug Anderson, Underwater Cameraman, BBC Frozen Planet

Media Career

Doug’s TV and Film credits include:

BBC The Blue Planet “Open Ocean”
BBC Worldwide “Deep Blue” Theatrical Release
PBS “Silent Roar – Search for the Snow leopard”
BBC Planet Earth “Freshwater”
BBC Planet Earth “Ocean Deep”
BBC Planet Earth “Ice Worlds”
BBC Planet Earth “Shallow Seas”
Disney Nature “Earth” (2007)
BBC Life “Challenges of Life”
BBC Life “Fish”
BBC Life “Creatures of the Deep”
BBC Life “Reptiles”
BBC Earth “One Life” Theatrical Release
BBC “Frozen Planet” “To The Ends Of The Earth”
BBC “Frozen Planet” “Summer”
BBC “Frozen Planet” “Autumn”
BBC “Frozen Planet” “Winter”
BBC “Frozen Planet” “The Last Frontier”
BBC “Africa” “Kalahari”
BBC “Hebrides” “Islands on the Edge”

Doug Anderson has also appeared in several “camera diaries” including:

BBC The Blue Planet “Open Ocean” Making Of: Diver filming Sei Whale on baitball
BBC Planet Earth “Ocean Deep” Making of: Expedition to the Bahamas to film Oceanic White tip sharks
BBC Life “Fish” Making of: Expedition to Tobago to film Flying Fish
BBC “Frozen Planet” “Summer” Making of: Expedition to Antarctic to film Killer Whales hunting Weddell Seals.

Awards:

2010 Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Primetime Emmy Awards. Cinematography for Nonfiction Programming: BBC Life “Challenges of Life”.
2010 Jackson Hole Wildlife Film Festival – Cinematography: BBC ‘Life “Challenges of Life”.
2012 Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Primetime Emmy Awards. Cinematography for Nonfiction Programming: BBC Frozen Planet “To the Ends of the Earth”.
2012 Wildscreen Film Festival Panda Awards. Cinematography: BBC Frozen Planet “Winter”.